Strategy Games Have A Liberal Bias (DMW TOP Salvage)

Once again, it's time to turn our attention to the well known liberal bias of the media. Today we'll be discussing "Strategy Games" or as they should be called, "Liberal Brainwashing Games."

Let's start with a classic example of the Genre. Civilization, which purports to be modeled off the history of civilizations, and reflective of how they rise. Starting right off the bat, there's a problem because the game has the government of your civilization making all of the decisions. As we all know, the true rise of knowledge is due to individuals, not governments.

It gets even worse as you progress!

As the game continues, the government of your civilization actually is forced to engage in public works in order to make the civilization viable. You are not limited to the only true purpose of a government, which is of course protecting its citizens and fighting defensive wars. No, if you actually spend all of your tax revenue (Which you cannot cut to increase your tax revenue in the long term, theoretically of course) on military, your people actually are unhappy! Clearly this is a liberal lie, since the truth is that if you cut social services, people will actually just solve problems by themselves.

After that egregious example, you'd think that would be the end of it. But no, the games get even worse when they branch into Science Fiction. Take the 4X games. These are called this due to the four "X's" which consist of "explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate". That would be fine of course, but you cannot actually engage in free enterprise. As usual, the liberal bias shows through, as you are often forced to engage in diplomacy with others, as opposed to simply dictating terms. You cannot simply allow your companies to go wherever they wish to cut costs, rather you are forced to engage in trade protectionism, and numerous other anti-business activities, which are more reflective of socialist utopias.

So far, I've stuck mostly to Turn Based games, but the final insult comes in the form of Real Time Strategy games. Many of these games are simulations of building a base and then sending soldiers and vehicles to attack the enemy. At first glance this is a legitimate military simulation, but then you realize the horrible Liberal lies present. You don't have to play Star Craft for more then ten minutes, before the whole game devolves into a hate fest against conservative values. In the game's plot, am "Evil" dictator has seized power, and you are actually forced to work with monsters in order to defeat him. Clearly whoever wrote this game has a strong problem with effective leadership, since the values of loyalty and following orders are minimized and the idea of challenging authority paramount. It gets even worse, when you realize that in these games resources are LIMITED! Yes, the games suggest that conserving resources is necessary, when in fact there are always plenty of resources, since God has planned for that.

Clearly this is a case of liberals infecting our culture once again. In fact, the mere act of playing games is anti-conservative. It encourages thought about what could be, and also what could have been. A true conservative knows that all of that time is better spent in contemplation of Jesus or ensuring that your underlings are in fact working and not wasting time on such ridiculous pursuits..

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdykXAT19Go]

(Just a little satirical observation that those who seem to be running things don't really seem to be playing the game I want them to be playing. Years Later, I finally do get the Game that the Politicians are playing. Only the sad thing is it's Junta.)

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Wish I had more time for games.

Although I haven't played it in a while, I used to enjoy several versions of SimCity. Acting as the city government, the player builds infrastructure (highways, airports, seaports etc.) and services (power, water, police and fire stations, schools, etc.) and establishes zoning, taxes etc. Then you see how the city grows or declines as businesses and individual citizens make their own virtual decisions based on your decisions. One of the big factors in SimCity is pollution, which can be minimized by using non-polluting power sources (except that the nuclear reactors tend to blow up after a number of years).

Outpost 2: Divided Destiny is more or less a sci-fi version of SimCity. Where SimCity is completely open-ended, Outpost 2 has a plot that requires the player to complete missions. The goal is to develop resources (mining and manufacturing are a big deal in the game) to build up the colony, eventually creating the capacity to escape the planet ahead of impending disaster. There's a strong environmental message in this game.

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"We've done the impossible, and that makes us mighty."

detroitmechworks's picture

They made it all about how much money you gave the publisher. (The Allegory for what happened to government in general is just to apt to pass up.)

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

I think you're being snarky here, but as far as I can tell, most Civ games are all about domination and control, and yes, extermination. Meanwhile, most euro strategy games are economic, with strong free market capitalistic themes: trading, auctions, investing, stock markets, etc. Wargames are, of course about war, and most often from the American geopolitical perspective, or have western colonialist and/or imperialist themes. Ameritrash (thematic) games are heavily weighted towards violence: fighting and killing hordes of bad guys (zombies, Lovecraftian horrors, etc). Not much peaceful conflict resolution there!

Even the German farming games such as Agricola are really about cut throat competition for scarce resources.

Speaking of socialism, the German strategy historical game Wir sind das Folk is a simulation of the fall of East Germany. The game is designed to prevent the socialists from winning: a capitalist democracy is inevitable.

The thing that gets me is how utterly clueless game designers and gamers are about how deeply western culture and economic and political attitudes are embedded in these games.

There are a few games that are more "socialistic", but they are few and far between. I recently backed a kickstarter campaign for a cooperative game called Spirit Island. In that game, you play island spirits fighting to repel European colonialists who are invading your island, destroying the environment and enslaving the native population. I just love the idea of a game that's all about rejecting the encroachment of Western power and culture.

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Tell the truth and run - Croatian proverb

detroitmechworks's picture

But one of the things I HATE in Civilization is when a War starts. I try to play as an enlightened Civilization that doesn't declare war, and any time it happens, I groan because I know there's a couple hundred turns of national treasure being sucked away into the war machine...

Haven't played any board games that were not "Paint your own army" miniatures games in a while. My old favorite as a younger man was "Time Agent" which was all about trying to stop time travel from happening, but ONLY when your group was on top in the "Present"

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

It's funny, just this morning I asked whether the civ game Through the Ages: A New Story of Civilization could be played peacefully. The response was that yes, at least for that game, you can leave out the military and screwage cards and the game is still playable. So there's that.

I've gotten heavily into boardgames in the last year or two. I'd be happy to give you some suggestions for less conflicty strategy games.

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Tell the truth and run - Croatian proverb

Yeah, i've toyed with designing some games to force other viewpoints. I have a few good ideas on hand but we'll see if the time ever comes about.

I have not backed Spirit Island but now I must go and consider propelling my kickstarter game backing addiction...

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There's a game called Machi Koro. It's a light weight game about buying real estate to generate income. It has a little bit of strategy but is mostly luck based, and has a big runaway leader problem: once a player rolls the right dice values and get a lot of profit, they can buy more buildings than other players, and then generate even more profit and jump ahead to win. It occurred to me that this game is a perfect analogy for an unregulated free market capitalist economy. So I've been working out ways to "fix" the game's economy to make it more socialistic. The first improvement is a progress tax system: at the end of every player's turn, he must pay a tax based on his income. That really helps suppress the "oligarchy effect". My other "expansions" involve investing in public projects and other ways to win, for example by gaining prestige rather than profit, etc.

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Tell the truth and run - Croatian proverb

That's a good mechanic idea. I recently got a game called Lost Woods which had a mechanism where gnomes pop up and steal gold. And they always steal from the wealthiest player and give to the poorest. It really helps with the potential runaway leader issue. But it also tempers the need to be in front which has an interesting effect.

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Lost Woods looks interesting - I'll check it out!

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Tell the truth and run - Croatian proverb

Is that DodoSpeak?
::ducks and runs for her knitting::

It's not that I'm old. I got tired of either fighting over land to grow food and the cost of food or fighting over who has the best financial exchange.

So I took up knitting and REALLY went nuts.

Just ask my cats. They steal the crochet hooks I use to rectify mistakes as I find them, rather than unravelling the entire thing and starting over.

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Muerte al fascismo. Muerte a la tiranía. colapso total de los que promueven tampoco. A la pared con el unico porciento%

underwriter505's picture

casual "HOPA" games have a pretty liberal bias - I mean the ones that are downloaded to be played by a single player (at a time). You usually don't have an antagonist who owns everything, but you often have one who is working on it and you are trying to prevent it. (One is The Secret Order: New Horizon. Yes, it involves time travel. But the world you are trying to go back in time to prevent is eerily like the very worst of the modern United States.)

Some of course are in fairy tale/fantasy settings, other worlds, and other unrealities but it's amazing how the protagonist wins through progressive values over an antagonist with right wing values. Pretty universal. And sometimes there are coincidental giggles. Such as, in "Vampire Legends: the True Story of Kisilova" you discover there was a real-life vampire in the early 17th century in Serbia named Blagojevich. Not supernatural, but absolutely true - you can google it. One wonders how common the name was and whether Rod is a descendant.

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has been relegated to the computer for the last several years, with the notable exception of Settlers of Cataan, which the entire family enjoys. I recently bought Betrayal at the House on the Hill because of the great reviews and the fact that it's cooperative (you win or lose as a group, with one exception); played it twice and it sucked both times. And we have a copy of Pandemic (another cooperative) we'll likely try out for the first time this weekend.

On the computer, I'm a big fan of the first 3 iterations of Civ, but find it impossible to make much headway on anything other than a total conquest tear. That's the only complaint I have.

I recently downloaded Stronghold, an old medieval warfare/city-building game. Very good game, but the political bias of the developers is obvious. Any treasury dollars that are invested in the people are simply "bribes."

But hey, it's very cool to see these gaming threads here!

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"The real power is in the hands of small groups of people and I don't think they have titles. -- Bob Dylan"

I like Settlers but most of my friends find it dry and I can't argue. It is a bit dry, but good. I really like Pandemic. It's fairly politically benign. I mean, it is basically, stop the damn pandemic and save the world!

ETA: Looks like that kickstarter finished. I'll have to keep an eye out for pre-orders or something.

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Don't care for the trading and "take that" mechanism of the robber.

We're big eurogame fans, and are getting more and more into the heavier weight strategy games, particularly "engine builders" - games where you build something (a farm, buildings, a machine, etc) that generates victory points. Our current favorite is one called Fields of Arle, about building a farm in East Fresia, Germany. Tonight we played a game called Viticulture, where you build a vinyard and winery and sell wine for VPs. Both are very relaxing puzzly games.

Betrayal at House on the Hill seems to be a love it or hate it thing. I haven't played either but I've read that Eldritch Horror is the best coop game in the horror genre.

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Tell the truth and run - Croatian proverb

E. L, Kazer game I think. I have neighbors who think it's too difficult to play, though there's a first grader I gave a copy of it to (at 20 bucks that was a huge prezzie for him, but it worked on the notepad his father bought him when he was 4); he's been solving the high degree of difficulty puzzles in under 2 minutes for a year now.

If that doesn't make me sleepy at bed time and the melatonin won't kick in, I play Super Candy Cruncher until I nod off in my chair and the game declares it wins.

It's just better for me to knit or read a good book until I nod off. Kindle goes to sleep and doesn't break if I roll over on it.

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******************************

Muerte al fascismo. Muerte a la tiranía. colapso total de los que promueven tampoco. A la pared con el unico porciento%

One of the best mystery/deduction games ever published (in 1981!). Here's a good video review.

One of the reasons I like boardgames so much is that they get me away from my e-device and create opportunities for actual face to face interactions. There's also something more satisfying about moving physical bits around compared with virtual ones.

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Tell the truth and run - Croatian proverb