Playing Through Pandemics
Playing Through Pandemics
Playing Through Pandemics
By Matt Hongoltz-Hetling
October 13, 2020
Summary
A wide range of games including the capitalistic Monopoly, war games like Stratego and Risk, and the slightly geekier colonial-themed Settlers of Catan and Age of Empires can all be described as colonial games.
"The player is not the controlling subject of the game. Rather, the game plays the player," the Norwegian researchers wrote, noting that in the popular board game Struggle of Empires Africans appear only as slaves, while the main purpose of the indigenous people in the game Archipelago is to be tamed by the Catholic Church.
In a board game, every exploited resource and fierce battle is erased from memory at the game's conclusion, meaning that players who sit down for the next gaming session will find an unspoiled world waiting for them in the box.
Board games present the world as an infinitely renewable resource, which Flanagan calls a "Colonial fantasy." Even in Hazagora and other games with natural disasters as a theme, players can avoid the consequences of their actions by simply resetting the game to get back to a state of pristine perfection.
Leacock didn't invent cooperative gaming - the concept has a long history, and is a common staple of indigenous games around the world - but Pandemic, distributed by the independent company Z-man Games, proved to be a significant hit, carrying cooperative gaming into mainstream American gaming culture for the first time.
Board Game Geek, which is to board games what Michelin is to restaurants, awarded Pandemic: Legacy its highest honor, Game of the Year.
Such games show that beneath the surface, the board game industry is finally showcasing commercially successful, socially aware games that have a positive impact on the real world.
Reference
Hongoltz-Hetling, M. (2020, October 13). Playing Through Pandemics - Stories by weather.com: The Weather Channel. Retrieved November 16, 2020, from https://features.weather.com/playing-through-pandemics/