Gaming in Arabia

No tents, no camels

Here's an interesting article (by Mary Beard's son, as it happens) regarding the sort of computer games that are being made by Arabs for Arabs.   Some of them sound rather depressing:

 For his first Afkar game, Kasmiya did not shy away from controversy. Under Ash (2001) tells the story of the first Palestinian intifada. It is considered the first distinctively Arab computer game. Others quickly followed—Hezbollah even tried its hand at creating an anti-Israeli videogame called Special Force in 2003. Kasmiya followed Under Ash with Under Siege (2005), which is based on events of the Second intifada. Players must sometimes attempt to get out of protests alive or, in other levels, fight Israeli soldiers—but never civilians, Kasmiya stresses.

“Some people call them propaganda games, some call them docu-games, depending on their perspective,” says Kasmiya. It is clear which camp he falls into: he tells me the series was based on UN records of events and so reflects reality. Victory is impossible—whichever male or female character you choose, you always die in the end. “You may not get the glory but you do get the knowledge,” he concludes. “I hope my games will make people think rather than just press the action key on the computer.”