Tabletop, DnD, board games, and minecraft. Also Animal Crossing.
Rules
I hope people here aren't such contrarians that they would say that socialist propaganda is a waste of time. I think, especially for the treaterlites of the west, it's very helpful for people to be shown visions of how a better world is possible. You just gotta be really careful about how you portray it to resist it being dragged into liberal narratives.
Since you say this is not about marketing but about showcasing propaganda, could you tell me more about how you portrayed revolution here?
Spoilers incoming about the entire game, but especially the end.
spoiler
Sure, it's inspired by the Russian revolution (particularly Trotsky's account of the February revolution), but with the difference that this city is an industrial, western-style power more like Germany or Britain.
There's a factory worker faction (with internal divisions), a dockworker faction (susceptible to religious reactionary ideas) and a vanguard party faction (who are small but can be grown). Each faction has its own sidequests.
The workers are tired of the war and terrible conditions. Different factions meet and decide it's worth collaborating; these meetings are instigated by Markov, the leader of the vanguard party. This leads to 1) the "People's Assembly" (a city-wide soviet, inspired by accounts I've heard of the plenums in Serbia) and 2) a general strike. When the emperor calls in the troops to restore order, the people appeal to the soldiers, and the rank and file soldiers turn their guns on their officers. (Taken 1 to 1 from the February revolution.) Reactionary troops (inspired by the Black Hundreds and Freikorps) continue to fight for the emperor, but he's pushed back to the palace. Parliament can be stormed at this stage, which triggers large-scale political discussions about the future form of government. If you're able to advocate for worker democracy then parliament is dissolved in favour of a national People's Assembly ("All Power to the Soviet"). And the sequence where you storm the palace is very inspired by the climax of the movie "October: ten days that shook the world", a propagandist account of the storming of the Winter Palace.
If you succeed at advancing worker struggle and consciousness on these fronts, the Soviet takes power (led by a radical member of the factory faction, not by a member of the vanguard party). Parliament and the military can't do anything, because there are no soldiers left who will defend bourgeois democracy or the imperial regime.
The one glaring, irreconcilable issue with the game's political framing is that the fate of the city can be changed by the actions of the player character, who isn't even a political leader at the start of the game. This makes no sense in terms of material dialectics, but it's sort of necessary for the game to work and feel satisfying. I justify it to myself with the explanation that the player represents an expression of the will of the masses as a whole, and reflects more than just the consciousness of one person, but, eh, I can see why someone would disagree.
Yeah, I mean the more plausible thing is usually to put the player in charge of a faction or something rather than an individual if that's what you're going for. It could be interesting for the player to represent the bulk of a vanguard but not the leadership, so you need to evaluate the cases they make when there are disputes.
I agree, that would be an interesting game and a more accurate exploration of historical materialism in action. But I wanted to put you in the shoes of one person, down on their luck, scraping by, hunted by the authorities, as they get swept up in a movement way bigger than they are that lifts the whole city. I wanted to focus on the emotional aspect of those experiences; that's what makes this art rather than a simulation.
Liberal Crime Squad, a game created in 2002 by Tarn and Zach Adams (much more commonly known for Dwarf Fortress) has a sort of hybrid dynamic. You start as a single character attempting to recruit members and start a radical organization. This character's stats and backstory are generated by a series of questions asked to the player in the beginning of the game - a unique process which establishes the setting for the game and does not occur for any other characters. In most play-throughs, the organization disbands and the game ends immediately if this character dies, but if you recruit enough members and have the right stats (I don't remember the exact mechanics), one of the members can take on the leadership position and the game continues.
Not trying to argue that you should hammer this mechanic into your game or anything, but the discussion reminded me of this relevant example of RPG design.
Edit: Cheers on the launch, btw! I've dabbled with game development since I was a second grader and started making custom levels for Doom. I always bite off more than I can chew when it comes to personal projects. It takes a lot of commitment to see it through! I look forward to giving it a spin this weekend.
lmao (I got nightmares)
Success: You climb out of a hot shower with only two thoughts on your mind. Juice. Mallomars.
Was going to say "oh, looks like Citizen Sleeper", then I saw Gareth's review featured on the Steam page. Congrats on getting their mark of approval!
This'll probably be one of the games I pick up during the holidays.
Edit: I lied and impulse bought it after a cup of coffee lmao. Now to find the time to play it.
Haha, yes! I played CS and was immediately hooked by the mechanics-driven narrative system. And he was kind enough to try it out and give me some pointers just before release.
Thank you so much! It takes about 10 hours to finish one playthrough, which is a nice length I think.
put it on my wishlist. Will consider getting it
thank you!
Congrats on launching your game! If I wasnt hopelessly addicted to Factorio I would try this. But it have wishlisted it
haha, I quite understand, there's lots of games and little time. Thank you for wishlisting it!
Any plans to port it to consoles?
I would like to but I've never done that before. If it does okay then I'll hit up some local developers who have experience with that. Step 1 is just getting controller support in, though, which I want to do in the next few months.
Consoles are usually more difficult because they each require contracts, license fees, and non-disclosure agreements in order to use their software development kits. Small studios usually need to outsource this to a porting house which holds the required licenses and does this work under contract (so they either need to make money first, or take out a loan hoping their game will go viral) . Publishers will make this happen somewhat transparently, but they will take an even fatter cut than the ONE THIRD Steam or Apple take, while asserting creative direction in the long run and replacing the original developers if they deem it necessary.
Congrats. Hella cool
thanks comrade!
Sounds dope. Once I get off my Pikmin and Pokémon kick, I'll pick up a copy and give it a whirl.
I'll check it out. Hope it succeeds and inspires others
Very awesome. I'm going to try it on my steam deck