Let’s play some games!

Game 1: Spent

This is Spent. You are placed in the position of living a human being’s life who is faced with critical dilemmas for one month that lay the foundations of how his life is going to unfold later on. You are given responsibilities like children and pets to take care of, which made me personally feel incredibly pressured to survive and make it through the month alive. As you go through the game and play it more than once, you begin to adjust and better assign the importance of certain decisions with respect to the money you have. Suggestion: Give the game more choices, as the people playing may have different preferred ways of diverting a problem and finding a solution.

Game 2: BBC Syrian Refugees

In this game, you are a Syrian refugee who chooses to escape and is presented with the choice of either going to Egypt or Turkey. You are confronted with only two options, in contrast to the game Spent, which already had a problem with the number of options, in my opinion. Treachery is felt after choosing particular paths, as you may find yourself stranded with a low-battery cellphone, having had one call to make, and your only hope is promising to help, yet they never show up. The game made me increasingly self-aware and conscious, as well as losing trust in certain people I got to know in the story as I went through.

Game 3:  Responsible Partying

Going to a party with the sole purpose of enjoying my time and having fun Rejecting all the drinks given to me, I put myself in the place of the person and imagined myself actually being there. I rejected any offers for alcohol, whether they were by seniors or hosts, and even though it was said that this party was monitored, it felt not to be. Non-consensual events had almost taken place, if not for me stopping one of them. Women offered hookups, but I rejected their offers, as I was just there to have fun with my friends and had no time for these games. I suggest the game be the same, as I even enjoyed the static picture shown. In comparison to the games before it this was a bit different in the sense that it was a first-world problem, not a critical situation that is very important.

Game 4: September 7th, 2020

A black, trans, and chronically ill biology student at a good university in North America who traverses in a wheel chair due to his condition Their family is worried about them, but they persevere. Going through his thoughts, I kept having the feeling of claustrophobia, as the number of assessments in their heads was way too much for a human, let alone a chronically ill one, to go through. Suggestions: Increase the number of pressurizing situations, as I assume it is worse for similar people in these situations in real life. Compared to the ones before, this had a few choices, yet there were dilemmas that only made sense to be answered with the choices given. The situation is important as it got me thinking of how easy COVID passed for me when compared to others.

Game 5: Among Us for Teaching English (Student Game)

This game took a completely different direction in comparison with all the others. The game implements the aim of the game among us through tasks that aim instead to teach English instead of arcade-like ones, and at the same time, it stimulates your brain to focus on underlined letters in order to know and be able to vote the imposter out. A very interesting game, however, if made longer, would more likely show that it is actually helpful and interactive, in addition to being more useful for kids than the regular game.

Game 6: Peer Destruction (Student Game)

I went through the game and got the gist of what they were trying to say. However, the game mixed my initial choices in some runs; where I had chosen the undersized girl, I had instead gotten quotes for the oversized girl, so I would recommend that they fix that. Nonetheless, this reminded me of the COVID game, where constant stimuli from all directions constantly made the situation worse and worse. The girl, already in a low position in life mentally and physically, kept getting hurled at with demotivating and demeaning words of unkindness that the person in front of them may not have had in the moment they realized they were doing.

Mini-Reflection

Spent and BBC Syrian Refugees described critical and extreme situations of life, where the person who’s shoes you are placed within is truly going through the rough and where each decision you make will likely seal your fate if not be weary (usually third world problems). Whereas, games September 7th, 2020 and Peer Destruction showed more first world problems and may have affected players more as they would most likely be able to relate to such a “mundane” thing (as it may be seen) that would occur around them or even to them, their friends or family. Finally, Responsible Partying and Among Us for Teaching English are in their own category each (even though they are both essentially teaching games), where the first puts you in a situation that makes you aware of your modern day rights and that makes you feel that it is okay to keep away from peer pressure and fall victim to it or prone to it; the second game uses the famous Among Us game to attract children and trick them into learning english in a fun way as they might see it.