"Oiligarchy"

The game "Oiligarchy" was an interesting way to add real life complex issues into the perspective of a gaming platform. The entire purpose of "Oiligarchy" is to show in a game environment the complex issues involved between the oil industry and the world as a whole. After reading the "Postmortem" I was able to understand the purpose behind the game, the projected issues that the player could/would encounter, and the possible endings. There were so many complex issues that never would have occurred to me without the experience of the game play, such as the level of oil dependency or "oil addiction" that the world currently has and that this is a relatively new problem as it arose after World War II. Another key point that I got out of reading and playing was that I am a facilitator of this "oil addiction" problem as I am completely dependent on oil and all that it allows me to do. The game also brings in the aspect of off-shore drilling, the effect on the natives of this drilling, the tension it causes not only oversees but here at home especially among environmentalist and government. Another interesting aspect of the game was the ability to not only make money (the goal of the game) but to make it money and help move the world away from it's "oil addiction" to a more "green" way of living, mimicking the state of the world currently.

As for game play, it was easy to figure out but was complex in it's motives behind the choices made. With the knowledge I gleaned from reading "Postmortem" I started the game with the distinct purpose of trying to get a good ending. This proved to be an exercise of keeping a oil baron's mindset  of money, money, money but also keeping an open mind to the fact that I can still make tons of money without destroying the environment, creating global warming, being guided by foreign, governmental, or special interest group's influence. With the knowledge I gleaned from reading "Postmortem" I started the game with the distinct purpose of trying to get a good ending and luckily I was able to get an ending that didn't have catastrophic event - I was allowed to retire. I then played with the sole purpose of getting the money no matter the means - this was a bit easier of game play but it also was not without it's own issues, such as uprising against moving production overseas, the issues of holding on to oil interest overseas, and the moral issues of displacing indigenous people and harming the world in an almost irreversible way.

Next I played "The McDonald's Game" and noticed that they were very similar in regards to the fact that the games intent is to show the affects of solely keeping a capitalist mindset. Again, there are many ways to play the game that ranges from solely making money without a care for anyone else to playing with too much concern for the world which then leads to fiscal failure. I attempted to play the game as I did with "Oiligarchy" but after five playthroughs of the game the only outcome I received was firing. What both games showed me was that society may see these industries as evil and ruining the world but what isn't realized is all the components that go into running a company within a society that values capitalism above all else. The games also spotlight issues that arise out of businesses like this such as "oil addiction" and obesity. Summarily, the purpose of these games is to provide a snapshot of real life issues that society is dealing with on a daily basis. What the games actually do is provide the player with tangible experience of how complex these issues are and that there is not one simple answer to solving the problems being faced in today's world.