This week, we were tasked with speaking about the politics that are sometimes involved in games. These politics can be viewed pretty broadly. Looking at Belman and Flanagan’s ideas about value-based design, we see that these values can come be “motivated by their designers’ interest in or commitment to particular values” and “that their design would require a significant departure from the standard (and sometimes clichéd) devices of mainstream games.”(Belman, 2010). For me, when someone mentions a political game, the first thing that comes to mind is the Bioshock series. Each one of the games have some kind of political theme behind them and for this journal, I’ll be focusing on Bioshock 2.
In Bioshock 2, there is a level named Pauper’s Drop, this is obviously where the lower, working class, resides. This is huge because when you think about the idea of the city of Rapture, it was supposed to be a utopia; a place for the worlds best creative minds to congregate with no constraint. However, even in this “utopia” there was a clear difference in power and social standing. In order to create such a grand feat that is Rapture, someone needs to build it and maintain it. This is where the citizens of Pauper’s Drop come in. The workers, builders, and just unfortunate were stuck there in an area that was described as a place that wasn’t supposed to be lived in for long term. I think in terms of politics in games, this is a good example of differences in social standing, status, and money.
Belman, J., & Flanagan, M. (n.d.). Exploring the creative potential of values conscious game design: Students’ experiences with the vap curriculum. Retrieved March 03, 2021, from https://www.eludamos.org/index.php/eludamos/article/view/vol4no1-5/156