News games, also called news games, are quite simply a genre of computer games which attempt to apply strict journalistic standards to their production. As you might guess, this raises a number of ethical issues, some of which are touched upon below. All these games can fall under several classifications, including simulation, documentary, investigative, and even puzzle and trivia games. So what exactly is behind the scenes in all these games?
News games all have a standard format for play. At the start of the game, you will see a pre-recorded news report with text explaining the situation(s) at hand, the current condition, and any special notices being issued. In many cases, you will also see a photo of that event/situation, although this may vary from game to game. The template message is then shown, which is typically pre-written code which tells you what you need to do in each scenario. For example, if there was a bus accident on a highway, the template message would read, “There have been fatalities. The road is now closed due to the traffic accident.”
In many news games that you play in online games you are required to write a narrative about what is going on, what has happened, who is involved, etc. This is quite an important aspect of the game’s story telling, since it is the only way a player can learn about the dynamics of an event without actually being there. In some cases, this may be just as important as actual journalism in determining how events unfold in real life. For example, if there was a major terrorist attack in London, one could find out by reading about the aftermath, visiting the scene of the disaster, watching live reports on television, and so on.
Some of the better news games in Spanish also allow you to read other people’s tweets about the games themselves, so you can read what people are saying about the games while playing them. You can then read their reactions to certain aspects of the game, which may give you an idea of how they will react when particular aspects of the storyline are presented. You can even get the tweets from real people who are followers of the original Twitter account. They will usually tweet about the games, or post links to the sites where they have played the games. This allows you to get a first hand look at how they react to a particular game, or how the game is progressing in the main storyline.
Other news games in Spanish feature a very similar model of journalism in them. Instead of the journalists being your peers in real life, they are virtual models, who express themselves through tweets, which are then picked up and read by the player. For instance, one news game based on the Oklahoma City tornado, named No Bull, features tweets from real estate brokers, weather people, business professionals, and the local news anchors that were tweeting about the tornado while it was going on. Players can then follow these real people’s tweets, and get a picture of the destruction and aftermath of the tornado, as well as see all of the Tweets about real-time journalism while it was going on.
In another example of a fake news game, named Faithless, the player actually has the option to choose between several different types of statements, such as “I am a Christian” and “I am not a Christian.” If you press the space bar, you will be given a quotation that is being said by a fictional character. The quotation that will come up is in quote form. Another game called Bull Market, takes a more serious tone. It tells the story of how a bull market, or stock market crash, actually happens in the news, with the help of quotes from people who are prominent in that market.