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SimCandidate - Why Aren't There More Political Sims?

Posted by simoniker on from the president-pikachu dept.

Thanks to Slate for their piece discussing why there aren't more videogames simulating current-day politics. The article posits: "The U.S. presidential campaign may be the first true election of the digital age, but it's still missing one key ingredient. Where is the video-game version of Campaign 2004?" It goes on to suggest that "presidential politics lends itself naturally to the idiom and audience of today's games. Political campaigns are already structured like games, with an escalating series of discrete competitions that determine the eventual winner. In addition, there's an existing body of readily available data, going back many decades, that could be harnessed to craft the simulation" Would you play a modern-day political sim videogame?

7 of 112 comments (clear)

  1. Well... by Captain+Beefheart · · Score: 2, Insightful

    For the same reason there aren't any religious sims, either.

    1. Re:Well... by Carnildo · · Score: 3, Insightful

      For the same reason there aren't any religious sims, either.

      You missed seeing Black & White?

      --
      "They redundantly repeated themselves over and over again incessantly without end ad infinitum" -- ibid.
  2. Re:Well... B&W, Populous by Zeio · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Before Black and White there was Populous, rather a fun game that came out for Genesis, PC and SNES, probably others.

    Also, SNES has ActRaiser where you play God and ward of evil though acts of God and an Avatar in a side scroller.

    None really get into the complexities of religion, but they are certainly themed in that way - leveraging mass devotion to an unseen entity that is quantified as mana by which the entity can act on the natural world.

    --
    Legalize the constitution. Think for yourself question authority.
  3. Seems to me... by Otter · · Score: 4, Insightful
    • People who aren't interested in politics wouldn't be interested in the game.
    • People who are interested in politics tend to have strong views, and wouldn't be interested in modulating them to score points.
    • The people who are interested in changing their opinions to win approval are already running for office in reality.
    --
    What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
    1. Re:Seems to me... by RevAaron · · Score: 3, Insightful

      People who aren't interested in politics wouldn't be interested in the game.

      A game about politics wouldn't be for the kind of folks who are really interested in the world's real politics. There are tons of folks who would like games full of political intrigue and all the other not-boring political stuff. Think of political novels, not the real world.

      People who are interested in politics tend to have strong views, and wouldn't be interested in modulating them to score points.

      Again, this is a game, not the real world. A game would allow those with errant political views to acually succeed, unlike the real world where they fail. I repeat: we're talking about a game. There's no reason where someone could make modern republicanism work- at least in the altered rules of a video game.

      The people who are interested in changing their opinions to win approval are already running for office in reality.

      *sigh*
      Do you play games? Did Risk fail because anyone who would like such a game would just go play real wargames in the military? Did Quake and other FPS fail because everyone became a murderer or soldier? Did SimCity fail because everyone just got their own town and became mayor? No, no, and no.

      One of the reasons people love games like this is because it gives them an alternate universe where they can do what they can't in the real world. Sure, I could put a lot of time, money and energy into running for City Council in my town- but I'd probably loose, at least the first time. At this stage in my life, I don't have the desire to run or the desire to pump in all of my time, money and energy into running for some public office. A game like this would afford some of the "fun" of politics with a tiny fraction of the time, money, and energy.

      --

      Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
  4. Re:Better question by Sylver+Dragon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And this would be worse than our current crop of congresscritters, how?
    At least they might be open about the fact that they are clueless idiots.

    --
    Necessity is the mother of invention.
    Laziness is the father.
  5. "The Sims" started it... by gamgee5273 · · Score: 2, Insightful
    Remember? There is a political track your sim can follow in the game. But, in all, that's a pretty lightweight idea of political simulation.

    Speaking as someone who has run (winning) real-life political campaigns: no one who plays in the political arena would want to play a game predicated on getting a candidate elected. None of us would really want to design such a beast, either. Politics is a game already, and it isn't always the idea of "he with the most toys, wins," but it comes close. The tactics and the strategy it takes to run and win a campaign is not something I consider "leisure," and I doubt many people would disagree.