RELEASED TODAY:
Tempest in Crescent City
Okay, what does that look like to you? A predictably ironic postmodern painting? A wacky dream inspired by a late-night meal at Deanie’s? A panel from Mary Worth? Alas, it’s none of those things. (Though I wouldn’t blame you for guessing Mary Worth.) It is, in fact, a screenshot from a video game–a videogame about Hurricane Katrina.
Called Tempest in Crescent City, it was developed by Global Kids, a nonprofit with a mission of “educating and inspiring urban youth to become successful students as well as global and community leaders.” This marks its second videogame–the first being Ayiti, in which you help a family in Haiti make their way from poverty to prosperity. (I know, right?)
Anyway, in Tempest in Crescent City, you play a teenager trying to find and save your mother before, during, and after the storm. You interact with neighbors, pick up supplies, spread them around, and save people from attics. On its website, Global Kids says it had three goals in developing the game:
- “Teach players about how everyday residents of New Orleans acted heroically to help each other….”
- “Emphasize what are perhaps the two most important priorities in any disaster: communication and use of local resources, needs, and knowledge….”
- “Draw attention to the continuing struggle in New Orleans as residents fight for housing in 2008….”
All of which sounds laudable (maybe), but something still gives me a case of the icks. Being the objective kind of guy I am, though, I tried to put that aside for a second and play the damn thing. Here’s how I graded it, based on four different criteria:
TECHNICAL: A
The game didn’t didn’t make me install any crazy extensions, didn’t resize my browser, and downloaded in about 10 seconds. In that respect, it’s exactly what a Flash game should be.
CONTROLS: A-
Apart from the directional buttons and the space bar, you don’t use much in this game, and it’s all very intuitive. It felt like there ought to be a few “special” options available, but maybe that’s just me and my six-button, two-bumper, two-trigger, 360-loving ways.
GAMEPLAY: B
It’s a side-scroller, so if you’ve ever played Pitfall, you know what you’re getting into. It’s not especially challenging, but it is timed, and there’s some richness in your character’s interaction with the environment that make this game different from others. However, there are definitely some glitches in the game (e.g. I had trouble finding the right spot to jump onto roofs) that make it frustrating at times.
SCENARIO: ?
I have no idea where I stand on this point. On the one hand, I hate parochialism and essentialism; I know we do things a little differently here, but I don’t want to be labeled one of those GET OFFA MY PROPITTY! kind of people who take pride in thinking that “outsiders” can’t possibly understand New Orleans. People move here all the time, same as any other city; some of ’em get it and stick around, others don’t and move on. BFD. So although I believe that New Orleans is far too rich and diverse to be explained in a simple videogame, I don’t have a problem with anyone trying to do that. Hell, they do it to New York all the time.
On the other hand, creating a videogame involving life-and-death consequences–a videogame based on recent, widely known, real-life, tragically life-and-death events–well, that seems a little dodgy. Would Global Kids have created a game based on the September 11 hijackings? Or the Indonesian tsunami of 2004? It all seems a little gray to me. Yes, it raises some valid questions, gets people thinking, but I’m pretty sure that all that talk about videogames being educational is 95% crapola.
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UPDATE: Global Kids’ Barry Joseph contacted me yesterday to thank me for writing about Tempest in Crescent City, but also pointed me to this Pew study (PDF), which seems to indicate that in certain circumstances, videogames can, in fact, educate–insofar as they positively influence civic impulses in players. I think that’s pretty cool, although I’m not sure all of those circumstances apply here.
The topic Mr. Joseph didn’t address was his team’s sensitivity to recent, fatal events. That, I think, is what icks me out the most–especially given the game’s earnest tone. Strangely, I might be able to stomach Tempest in Crescent City if it were intentionally crass and rude–you know, Cartman-style. Seeing it done without a trace of irony…well, it’d be laughable, if it weren’t so weird.
Nor did he address another important issue: was anyone in New Orleans consulted about all this? And if so, whom?
I doubt much of this matters to his target demo (i.e. probably kids under 14), but it may, in fact, matter to those kids’ older sibs and parents. I posted a link to the game on my Facebook page yesterday, and the comments were 100% negative. So, you know, take that for what it’s worth.
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