Darfur is Dying
Encyclopedia
Browser game
A browser game is a computer game that is played over the Internet using a web browser. Browser games can be created and run using standard web technologies or browser plug-ins. Browser games include all video game genres and can be single-player or multiplayer...
about the crisis
Darfur conflict
The Darfur Conflict was a guerrilla conflict or civil war centered on the Darfur region of Sudan. It began in February 2003 when the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army and Justice and Equality Movement groups in Darfur took up arms, accusing the Sudanese government of oppressing non-Arab Sudanese in...
in Darfur
Darfur
Darfur is a region in western Sudan. An independent sultanate for several hundred years, it was incorporated into Sudan by Anglo-Egyptian forces in 1916. The region is divided into three federal states: West Darfur, South Darfur, and North Darfur...
, western Sudan
Sudan
Sudan , officially the Republic of the Sudan , is a country in North Africa, sometimes considered part of the Middle East politically. It is bordered by Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the northeast, Eritrea and Ethiopia to the east, South Sudan to the south, the Central African Republic to the...
. The game won the Darfur Digital Activist Contest sponsored by mtvU
MtvU
mtvU is a division of Viacom's MTV Networks which produces a 24-hour television channel that is available on more than 750 college and university campuses across the United States, as well as several digital cable packages...
. Released in April 2006, more than 800,000 people had played by September. It is classified as a serious game
Serious game
A serious game is a game designed for a primary purpose other than pure entertainment. The "serious" adjective is generally prepended to refer to products used by industries like defense, education, scientific exploration, health care, emergency management, city planning, engineering, religion,...
, specifically a newsgame
Newsgame
Newsgames are a genre of video game defined by their rapid creation in response to current events. They can be thought of as the video game equivalent of political cartoons...
.
Development and release
The game's design was led by Susana Ruiz as a part of TAKE ACTION games. Then a graduate student at the Interactive Media Program at the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern CaliforniaUniversity of Southern California
The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...
, she was inspired to make a game after her nephew told her about a class lesson on the Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
that did not mention any modern genocides. She initially proposed a game about the post-Rwandan Genocide
Rwandan Genocide
The Rwandan Genocide was the 1994 mass murder of an estimated 800,000 people in the small East African nation of Rwanda. Over the course of approximately 100 days through mid-July, over 500,000 people were killed, according to a Human Rights Watch estimate...
gacaca
Gacaca court
The Gacaca court is part of a system of community justice inspired by tradition and established in 2001 in Rwanda, in the wake of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide, when between 800,000 and 1,000,000 Rwandans, mostly Tutsi, were slaughtered...
trials, for which she was criticized by colleagues who felt that a game was an inappropriate form to approach a serious topic. She was attending the Games for Change
Games for Change
Games for Change is a movement and community of practice dedicated to using digital games for social change. An individual game may also be referred to as a "game for change" if it is produced by this community or shares its ideals...
conference in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
in October 2005, at which mtvU
MtvU
mtvU is a division of Viacom's MTV Networks which produces a 24-hour television channel that is available on more than 750 college and university campuses across the United States, as well as several digital cable packages...
announced that they, in partnership with the Reebok
Reebok
Reebok International Limited, a subsidiary of the German sportswear company Adidas since 2005, is a producer of Athletic shoes, apparel, and accessories. The name comes from the Afrikaans spelling of rhebok, a type of African antelope or gazelle...
Human Rights Foundation and the non-profit International Crisis Group
International Crisis Group
The International Crisis Group is an international, non-profit, non-governmental organization whose mission is to prevent and resolve deadly conflicts around the world through field-based analyses and high-level advocacy.-History:...
, were launching the Darfur Digital Activist Contest for a game that would also be an advocacy tool about the situation in the Darfur conflict
War in Darfur
The Darfur Conflict was a guerrilla conflict or civil war centered on the Darfur region of Sudan. It began in February 2003 when the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army and Justice and Equality Movement groups in Darfur took up arms, accusing the Sudanese government of oppressing non-Arab Sudanese in...
. Given that mtvU was offering funding and other resources, Ruiz decided to change her original idea.
Ruiz formed a design team and spent two months creating a game design document and prototype. The team spent much of the design phase talking to humanitarian aid
Humanitarian aid
Humanitarian aid is material or logistical assistance provided for humanitarian purposes, typically in response to humanitarian crises including natural disaster and man-made disaster. The primary objective of humanitarian aid is to save lives, alleviate suffering, and maintain human dignity...
workers with experience in Darfur
Darfur
Darfur is a region in western Sudan. An independent sultanate for several hundred years, it was incorporated into Sudan by Anglo-Egyptian forces in 1916. The region is divided into three federal states: West Darfur, South Darfur, and North Darfur...
and brainstorming how to make a game that was both interesting to play and was an advocacy tool. Ruiz has stated that the game design was influenced by that of Food Force
Food Force
Food Force is an Educational game published by the United Nations World Food Programme in 2005. Due to its content, it is considered a serious game . Players take on missions to distribute food in a famine-affected country and to help it to recover and become self-sufficient again...
, a 2005 game published by the United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
World Food Programme
World Food Programme
The World Food Programme is the food aid branch of the United Nations, and the world's largest humanitarian organization addressing hunger worldwide. WFP provides food, on average, to 90 million people per year, 58 million of whom are children...
. The Ruiz team's beta version was put up for review by the public, along with the other finalists, and was chosen as the winner. The team then received funding to complete the game. The web and application development firm interFUEL was brought in to complete the game design and programming. The game was officially released at a Save Darfur Coalition
Save Darfur Coalition
The Save Darfur Coalition is an advocacy group calling for international intervention in the Darfur genocide in the Eastern African state of Sudan...
rally on 30 March 2006 and the first official player was American speed skater
Speed skating
Speed skating, or speedskating is a competitive form of ice skating in which the competitors race each other in traveling a certain distance on skates. Types of speed skating are long track speed skating, short track speed skating, and marathon speed skating...
Joey Cheek
Joey Cheek
+William Joseph Cheek is an American speed skater and former inline speed skater...
.
Gameplay
The game begins with the player choosing a member of a Darfuri family that has been displacedForced migration
Forced migration refers to the coerced movement of a person or persons away from their home or home region...
by the conflict. The first of the two modes of the game begins with the player controlling the family member, in follow mode, from the camp to a well
Water well
A water well is an excavation or structure created in the ground by digging, driving, boring or drilling to access groundwater in underground aquifers. The well water is drawn by an electric submersible pump, a trash pump, a vertical turbine pump, a handpump or a mechanical pump...
and back, while dodging patrols of the janjaweed
Janjaweed
The Janjaweed is a blanket term used to describe mostly gunmen in Darfur, western Sudan, and now eastern Chad...
militia. If captured, the player is informed what has happened to their selected character and asked to select another member of the family and try again. If the water is successfully carried back to the camp, the game switches into its second mode - a top down management view of the camp, where the character must use the water for crops and to build huts. When the water runs out the player must return to the water fetching level to progress. The goal is to keep the camp running for seven days.
While most media coverage of the game has concentrated on its advocacy aspect rather than its gameplay, one review has commented that it is initially unclear in the management mode how to go about growing food and other tasks.
Reception
The game has been reported by mainstream media sources such as The Washington PostThe Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
, Time Magazine, BBC News
BBC News
BBC News is the department of the British Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online...
and National Public Radio. In an early September 2006 interview, Ruiz stated that it is difficult to determine success for a game with a social goal, but stated that more than 800,000 people had played 1.7 million times since its release, of which tens of thousands had forwarded on the game to friends or sent a letter to an elected representative. As of April 2007, the game has been played more than 2.4 million times by over 1.2 million people worldwide. Critics have noted that despite the number of players, the actual crisis was unaffected, and the sole outcome of the game was to give publicity to the game's creators.
The game has been the focus of debate on its nature and impact. Academics interviewed by the BBC on the game varied between those stating that anything that may spark debate on Darfur and issues surrounding it is a clear gain for the advocates, to those who thought that the game oversimplified a complex situation and thus failed to address the actual issues of the conflict. The game was also criticized for the sponsorship of mtvU, raising the possibility that the game might seem like a marketing tool for the corporation. The official site does not use the word "game", but refers to Darfur is Dying as a "narrative based simulation."
External links
- Darfur is Dying official site
- Jose Antonio Vargas, "In 'Darfur Is Dying,' The Game That's Anything But", Washington Post, 1 May 2006
- Michele Norris, "Online Game Peers into Life in Darfur Refugee Camp" (contains link to audio), National Public Radio, 5 May 2006
- Speech by Susana Ruiz in Washington DC (streaming video), 3 min streaming video hosted by Google Video, 24 May 2006
- Jack Fairweather, "'Ethical' computer games take on shoot-'em-up classics", The Daily TelegraphThe Daily TelegraphThe Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
, 29 June 2006