Nintendo Holocaust-Era Game Draws Criticism
Putting players in first-person situations is one of the most popular narrative devices in video games, and a French video game developer, working for a British distributor, has done just that with his latest digital adventure. Typically, this would not draw much fanfare but his game topic is startling to some: a first-person experience of a first-person experience of a young child in France during the Holocaust. The game, 'Imagination Is the Only Escape, 'puts players in the role of a young boy in Nazi-occupied France during the war, and follows his attempts to escape the horror of the times by pursuing a fantasy world of his own devising.
Unlike most games developed for the Nintendo DS, which typically caters to kids titles, this game portrays often brutal scenes, with startling imagery and events.
Early outcry on online message boards indicates that the game distributor, Alten8, may not export the game to stores in the United States (although that's not a certainty) but it will be available in Europe.
The 21-year-old game developer says he does not consider the topic of war to be a game, and doesn't intend to demean the concept. Another game he's developed, also distributed by Alten8, puts players into a fantasy realm where the world has been destroyed by global warming.
Tackling serious issues head on, and with a first-person experience, seems to be catching on as a popular device in France. French president Nicholas Sarkozy recently introduced a new education initiative that "pairs" all his country's fifth-graders with the story of one of the 11,000 French children who were killed by the Nazis during World War II.
Sarkozy has come under significant fire since announcing the education plan, with critics saying the learning experience will be traumatizing to the students.
The video game will not depict violence, according to the developer, and is intended to be educational, and not exploitative of the events.
From The New York Times.
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