Consider the journalistic and storytelling possibilities inherent in video games. What a fabulously interactive way to better understand a topic, by experiencing it in a game or simulation. And what an interesting environment in which to consider stereotypes, particularly racial stereotypes, as the action unfolds.
Thomas Huang, a Dallas Morning News assistant managing editor on a yearlong ethics and diversity fellowship at Poynter, writes about this topic in a Poynter Online centerpiece, Storytelling and Stereotypes in the World of Video Games.
Here’s an excerpt.
not only reading about it, but playing a political video game. Well,
such a game, “PeaceMaker,” has already been developed at Carnegie Mellon University.
Using video games for journalistic storytelling is not far-fetched. The New York Times last year published a game to help readers understand immigration legislation that was up for debate.
“Serious games”
are already being developed to help players learn about health, social,
political and economic issues. Check out these sites to learn more
about “serious games”:
Grabowicz, a professor at the University of California-Berkeley
Graduate School of Journalism, is working on such a game with his
students, using funding from a Knight News Challenge grant. With their “Remembering 7th Street”
project, Grabowicz and his students hope to create a virtual replica of
an Oakland street known for its jazz and blues club scene in the ’40s
and ’50s.
“A newspaper or other local news organization needs to
be more than just a pipeline for informing people about current news
and events,” Grabowicz wrote in the MediaShift Idea Lab blog.
also should provide context for people to understand their community
and its history. A video game can do that, by letting people re-live
the history of their communities and understand not just what’s
happening today but what came before.”
