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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?

34 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... by JFMulder · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Have you ever heard about a game called Eon of Tears? It's not really a sim, but more of an Action-RPG based on the Bible in which you play the role of Jesus, Moses and other biblical characters.

      Here's a quick interview with the co-president of the little start-up.

      I wouldn't know about this company in fact if their office wasn't like 3 streets from my house! :p

    3. Re:Well... by RevAaron · · Score: 2, Informative

      I can't speak of the quality of this game, but it reminds me of some others. It's tough to guess whether or not this EoT game is a super-christian game or if it's just a clever and whacky idea... If I were a super-xian I'd think the idea blasphemous, but so much of what fundamentalists do seems blasphemous to me, so *shrug*.

      Yes, the games. I love wierdo christian games. I remember a game a friend of mine had for his SNES, which sat somewhere between Wolf3d and Doom in its 2.5D quality... You played Noah, and you had to go around shooting your animals and some evil demons who were trying to prevent you from rounding up your animals. Of course, it wasn't real shooting; you were using a slingshot and you shot out pellets of food with a bit of tranq in them. Why the evil demons would eat these without question is beyond me; must've been holy water in them or something. Heh. That friend- his youth group was always letting them know of xian versions of various fun stuff- new, popular music, video games, etc. "Hey guys! This is like Doom, but Christian!" I'll never forget when he came to middle school one day, excited off his little weak feet- "Hey guys! You gotta check out this new band!" We were always very wary of any music he was trying to push, but he put the last nail in his cross when he said: "yeah, this band rocks- they're just like Green Day, but christian!!" heh.

      Then there was an FPS a few years back (5?) that was for christians. You played either an angel or a demon, you picked your path at the beggining of the game, good or evil. You spend the whole game battling the opposite side- I believe it was the battle for the throne, for control over heaven, the revolt of Lucifer. Anyway, the best part is that if you choose the side of evil, you can't win. You can invest a hundred hours in the game to play out its story mode, but at the end- an inch from winning- you loose. Because you're evil, and they're christian. :)

      --

      Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
    4. Re:Well... by NanoGator · · Score: 2, Funny

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

      Oh I dunno. The way people jump my ass here if I don't sing the praises of Mozilla, you'd think it was a religious sim.

      --
      "Derp de derp."
    5. Re:Well... by MalachiConstant · · Score: 2, Informative
      I remember a game a friend of mine had for his SNES, which sat somewhere between Wolf3d and Doom in its 2.5D quality... You played Noah, and you had to go around shooting your animals and some evil demons who were trying to prevent you from rounding up your animals. Of course, it wasn't real shooting; you were using a slingshot and you shot out pellets of food with a bit of tranq in them.

      That would be Super 3D Noah's Ark.

      See also: Forgiveness, Saints of Virtue, and Life's Battle.

    6. Re:Well... by RevAaron · · Score: 2, Funny

      Christ, it's even worse than I thought- "Noah has gotten bored and decided it would be fun to stop feeding the animals. Consequently, the animals have organized a mutiny against him..." If that isn't blasphemous, I don't know what is! :)

      Kind of funny in the review of "Forgiveness," when they ask why no one can make a good game based on mythology of the western world- but they talk about Norse mythology games which are good. Which west is Mr. Awful talking about? Last time I checked, Europe was very much part of the Western world...

      --

      Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
  2. Better question by buffer-overflowed · · Score: 4, Funny

    Why hasn't there been a reality TV show yet, like
    "Who wants to be a Senator?"

    Are you an NBC-Crat or a CBS-ican?

    --
    The key to the enjoyment of pop music is to replace any instance of "love" with "C.H.U.D."
    1. 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.
    2. Re:Better question by anthony_dipierro · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Why hasn't there been a reality TV show yet, like "Who wants to be a Senator?"

      Stupid Campaign Finance laws, probably.

      I thought there was supposed to be one though, but the closest I could find was this: HBO's new series, Candidate 2012, will follow the journey of one curious and compelling young American as he or she travels across the country in an attempt to figure out what it will take to become President of the United States in the year 2012.

      Not sure how they'll get around the soft-money laws, though.

  3. nomination pc game by develop · · Score: 2, Informative

    Back in the days of the original IBM PC was a game called nomination. It was alot of fun and followed the primary elections. You picked your candidate then answer questions and got results on a timely basis. It was a text based game I believe (blue and white).

  4. There once were... by Kobal · · Score: 2, Interesting

    But look at the development costs for a game today. Given that a political game will mainly, if not only, sell in the country which politics it's based upon and that games are a worldwide market (except the very peculiar and specific japanese market), do you think it's a risk worth taking for any large game publishing house? Maybe it could work as shareware or open source. But except a handful of gems, most shareware sims in the past have been quite poor, either in ui and polish (from bothersome to downright horrible) or in simulation depth (which is much more annoying.)

  5. 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.
  6. Realistic! by Alphanos · · Score: 3, Funny

    For added realism, players could have cheat codes which allow them to edit the voting machine results:).

    --
    Alphanos
  7. This game Pays! by BrookHarty · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Where is the video-game version of Campaign 2004?

    Lol, so, you start out running for mayor, promising the smaller companies (construction) projects if they support you, and donate towards your campaign. After elected, you help nominate judges to ease laws towards construction, which leads into more money for your election for the Governor. Easing tax burdens to keep large companies in your state, and try to make honey deals, you spend money on pork projects for all your supporters.
    Deny the local transportation requirements that might have to cross the richer areas of town. As the money rolls in, you run for Senate. Promise to ease tax laws, or support some religious view to gain support. Slander everyone, showing how righteous you are, never broke any laws (or just got caught), and you are the perfect person for the job.

    Now as Senator, you get to join some nice Committees. Maybe join Energy and Natural Resource, so you allow a nice company from your home state to "Ahem, Bid" on natural gas mining in federal land.

    After some time, you get bored with milking federal and state money and decided to run for President. All you need is a platform. If you're the Republican you have the religious backing, but you have to ban personal freedoms, unless its gun control and force religion on some states. If you're Democrat you have try to pass gun control and help further rights, (gay, women, etc) and spend lots of money public programs that don't work.

    So after you choose your poison, Democrat or Republican, (Not Liberal, as it doesn't support big government) and you get start going to the national caucuses. Oh the fun of promising even bigger pork projects, kick backs and under handed political back stabbing. Debate over issues and sound the same every year.

    Then after elected, you appoint Judges that agree with your "wink" personal views. Make powerful political and business contacts that help family and friends make billions. Purchase some banks maybe. After your term, you quit, and collect a check yearly for the rest of your life. Of course, you have to build a library, and do lots of 1000 dollar a plate dinners. Everyone wants to throw money at you.

    My god this game sounds fun, and it pays well too!

    1. Re:This game Pays! by Goldsmith · · Score: 2, Interesting

      You forgot some key things:

      You get to work ALL the time!
      No family for you, in fact, people will be trying to turn your family against you with allegations of everything from infidelity to drug use. If you're not a problem to society, your son/wife/cousin will be soon.

      Take out loans!
      That's right, it costs money to run, and sometimes, you just don't have the pork to back it up, so sell your house, take out huge loans and tell your kids they can't go to college.

      Forget your ideals!
      Forget whatever you may believe, it's time to tow the party line. You don't want to be on the wrong side of the issue. If you're playing a Republican, you'd better not reach out to minorities, the Democrats will call it fake anyway. If you're playing a Democrat, you'd better not try and act responsable, the Republicans will just make something up if you don't give them something to work with.

      By the way, my dad was a politician, and above are the reasons he got out. It's not all fun and games, there's a lot of reality they could expose with a game like this.

  8. Who needs to play? by smallfries · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It makes we wonder why we don't use leadship simulators. I'm thinking of something like SimCity meets CivIII. Lots of variables to tweak that can have various effects on the nation and its economy. Then we could have cool elections based on the candidates playing the games to see who can score highest.

    Of course, we'd never agree on how to score the results or which models to base the simulation on. After all, depending on how you slant the models you could have the ultimate propaganda tool...

    --
    Slashdot: where don knuth is an idiot because he cant grasp the awesome power of php
  9. 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
  10. URL here: by Tumbleweed · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Here ya go, from an interview with special effects designer Richard Taylor:

    http://www.canada.com/montreal/montrealgazette/sto ry.asp?id=7530006A-C103-4E13-9A55-F6EFCC111ACC

  11. Not political but geopolitical... by gklinger · · Score: 3, Interesting
    There was a great game called Balance of Power (followed up by Balance of Power: The 1990 Edition) which was a simulation of geopolitics and was interesting in that the goal was power and prestige while avoiding a world war. It's quite unique and well worth checking out. You can read a fascinating article about designing Balance of Power written by Chris Crawford, the author of the game.

    I know this isn't 100% on topic but I couldn't resist. I think a lot of people find this game stimulating if they only knew about it.

  12. Most people... by stoolpigeon · · Score: 3, Interesting

    are not interested enough in real politics - that impact their real lives - to go out and do something as simple as voting.

    I have a feeling that the pool of people that would be interested is very small and of those, many would be too busy doing real political things.

    I guess if it was simple enough and you could become ruler of the world or something people might dig it. I remember when I first played SimFarm. I lost interest because I kept going bankrupt. It modeled reality too closely. I finally found one scenario where it was pretty easy to get rich, eventually buy the crop duster, and I had fun flying around the map.

    --
    It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
  13. Republic: The Revolution by orthancstone · · Score: 2, Informative

    Surprised no one has mentioned this. While it isn't really a campaign simulation by the strict idea of what campaigning is, it does simulate a particular method of gaining power. Perhaps it isn't totally to the point that this news story is looking for but it is an option in my opinion.

  14. Some old, some new by ManDude · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Check out politika, if you can find it.
    Look here
    And something more recent: Republic

    A place to start. If people find others, please post.

  15. President Elect by orthogonal · · Score: 5, Interesting

    President Elect was an excellent game, with (for a game) a realistic grasp of electoral politics based on a database of actual state-by-state results from 1964 to 1988.

    One could run as various historical candidates, or make one's own candidate by selecting the candidate's position on various issues.

    It's mostly a resource management game: you spent money and time on different states or regions to sway the voters in those places. The trick was knowing which states were swing states, and spending your time and money there.

    The game ended on election night, with each state reporting in and showing percentages and the color of the candidate who won it. The states reported in on a staggered schedule based on local poll-closing time, and once or twice I even saw one candidate declared the winner, only to see it change when all votes in swing states had reported in.

    If I were not watching the webcast of Don Knuth's 10th Annual Christmas Tree lecture at 4:15 pm PST,
    at http://scpd.stanford.edu/knuth/, I'd tip my hat to Strom Thurmond's illegitimate mixed-race daughter by playing Strom against Goldwater in 1964 tonight.
    If they made a copy updated with electoral data and demographics through 2004, I'd buy it in a minute.

    --
    Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
  16. Re:President Elect by Alkaiser · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Well...there was also this. As far as I know it's the only one that actually involved real candidates.

    --
    Netjak.com independent reviews of domestic & import video ga
  17. Why would I want to play it? by gothrus · · Score: 4, Funny

    Who wants to play a game in which the only way to win is to cheat.

    1. Re:Why would I want to play it? by EvilSporkMan · · Score: 4, Funny

      Counter Strike players...

      --
      -insert a witty something-
  18. SimCampaign already exists - from 1984 no less by stu72 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I thought part of the /. membership initiation was to type in at least 10 pages of Compute!'s Gazette ML code?

    http://www.atarimagazines.com/compute/gazette/19 84 08-campaign.html

    Evidently not...

  19. One way to do it by Optical+Voodoo+Man · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I've thought that the whole political arena would be a fun game idea. I wouldn't limit it to 2004, but I'd let it be a little more universal. Politics has been around a long time. In order to stay in power (the goal of the game), you would need to balance:

    1) The probability that your constituents liked what you were doing
    2) The amount of political power you have
    3) The size of you election fund

    You can increase you funds by pandering to PACs and special interests, but if the voters find out you're dumping toxic waste in the playgrounds, you're out. The worse the transgression, the larger the monetary gain but the bigger the backlash if your caught.

    Then you have a random generator of temptations and opponents. Your term consists of a series of votes, for which you can vote for the PACs, you heart, or the people. Say the heart and people match 90% of the time. You get to keep what you don't spend beating the other contenders. The more you spend, the better your chances for re-election. Might I recommend the trophy wife.

  20. Hmmm by Anonvmous+Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Sierra should ressurect the Leisure Suit Larry engine for a Bill Clinton game.

  21. Stardock (Galciv) has an awesome one by gtshafted · · Score: 2, Interesting
    "There's all sorts of cool stuff in the lab. We have two new games in development right now. One is called The Political Machine, a strategy game where you run for President as well as a future sequel for Galactic Civilizations which won't be out any time soon."

    http://www.stardock.com/products/polmachine/

  22. Interesting... by Hard_Code · · Score: 2, Funny

    So...what would this game be like...you sit back and refrain from voting, and it just picks a candidate for you? EA Voter Apathy 2004!

    --

    It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
  23. "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.