12:40 PM on 02.16.2011 |
|
|
Iranian-born Navid Khonsari -- voice actor, co-director and writer for PS2-era GTAs -- is working on a new game centered around the 1979 Iranian Revolution. Specifically, the happenings surrounding the U.S. embassy hostage crisis.
In an interview with a Russia Today lady whose hairdresser lives in the 90s, Khonsari doesn't go into much detail about the gameplay, but instead focuses on how there are not really good or bad guys in a conflict situation like this. He sees it as something that depends on the perspective of the people involved, the context surrounding it, and the way a situation can cause people to become swept up in it. "Nobody is to say that this person is right and this person is wrong. It is just a matter of what the situation is dictating and the legions of people that are making decisions, that has kinda caused this conflict. But the people involved in them might not be the true aggressor. There is a number of different facets to it. And I’m not pointing to say that Americans are bad or Iranians are bad. I’m saying the situation is bad."
While I'm not sure how exactly he's going to make this work in a game, it certainly sounds intriguing. The last time a game openly and bluntly gave us any political commentary, we got it via Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood's Shaun Hastings with his snarky notes on the U.S. healthcare system, and the Subject 16 puzzles which paint the U.S. as a Templar/Abstergo-controlled corporate state.
Khonsari's concept sounds like a game approach to humanizing the 1979 Iranian Revolution period in a way Persepolis has done before through animation, with maybe a touch of GTA's trademark social and political commentary. Perhaps he's right, and hopefully he will succeed in generating a form of awareness, understanding and dialogue through the medium of videogames that hasn't been achieved before.
No matter how it ends up, I'll gladly take his attempt over "Big Strong Western Man Shooting Brown People For Points Game #69" anytime.
Hi, I'm Chris Carter. I play a lot of videogames. I mean, seriously, a lot. Specifically, this year I've played about 100 new games in 2013 (and by "new," I mean released after January 1st, 2013). Over the past few years, I'v... It's been a while since we shared a piece from our artsy pal Zac Gorman, but his latest deserves your attention. Based on the famous opening scene from The Legend of Zelda, this comic turns what we thought we knew completely ... The latest update on Valve's interest in bringing Left 4 Dead 2 and Steam over to Ubuntu was a spot of bright news for Linux users, and there's more where that came from. Croteam and Devolver Digital have announced that Serio...
I spend a lot of time sitting down, as typing would probably be a bit uncomfortable if I was standing up. Sometimes, just to mix things up, I cross my legs. I'm a maverick. I never once thought that I was putting my big ol' ... It's a good thing the government shut down Megaupload. With those crooks out of business, content creators can finally earn money for their hard work. People should be paying for their digital goods on a site like Legalsounds... If you visit The Escapist (which you should be doing anyway to check out Jimquisition!), you might have heard of Bob Chipman and his series Escape to the Movies and The Big Picture. Both are really good shows, but I much pref... Microsoft says that recent thefts targeting Xbox Live users are isolated incidents, and often tries to portrays the problems as phishing scams -- effectively blaming the consumer. However, an eyebrow-raising amount of comment... Destructoid officially stood against the Stop Online Piracy Bill last week, to a round of applause from its readers. The message seems to be that you care about stomping on this horrible little bill as much as we do. With tha...
Although rage against SOPA has been bubbling for a long time, things didn't truly get real until recently. While GoDaddy has suffered for its long-running SOPA support, other companies are yet to face retribution, including ... Destructoid has posted editorial that criticizes SOPA -- the Stop Online Piracy Act -- but until now, it has not offered an official company stance on the matter. Today, it is my honor and distinct pleasure to relay the offic...
|
|