Video Games under Maoist Criticism

Maoist International Movement's critique of video games accomplishes what should have been done much earlier: A leftist critique of video games. A number of very popular games such as Simcity, Command and Conquer: Red Alert, Fallout, Tropico, Hearts of Iron are discussed within -sometimes a very strict- Maoist perspective -but most of the time uttering what we all have been observing as well. You may disagree with their observations, but still it is a great way to remind us of "politicalness of everyday life."



Link - For the website

It is important to note that while there are important statements like "... video games are not politically neutral" the discussion goes fanatically out of context at some instances such as; "Just like there are many roads to socialism, where some are better than others and some are false turns, the player in Fallout will discover ways to do much better or play the game from an entirely different perspective the second, third, and further times through the game."

Anyway, I admired some parodies, especially those about Red Alert:

"But the gameplay in Red Alert has been 'balanced' in such a way as to present caricatures of Soviet and Allied battle tactics. The Allies have standing naval power in the form of cruisers, destroyers, gunboats, and cruisers while the Soviets only have subs to sneak around with. ... The Soviets have attack/patrol dogs while the Allies don't. The Soviets have giant flame turrets and big tesla coils that resemble an agressive bug-zapper whereas the Allies have more conventional machine gun and artillery turrets. ... And so on. Soviets can't even train medics to heal their troops."

Eventually, I guess it is worth a look (and most probably more).

Source: BoingBoing.net