By Jordan Shapiro, Contributor
Get Water is a game with two goals. First, it wants to be an awesome touch-screen game: fun, challenging, engaging. Second, it wants to raise awareness about water scarcity and inspire conversations about human rights and social justice. In my opinion, it succeeds at both goals. I can’t stop playing and I’m having conversations with my children about the fact that there are kids in other parts of the world who don’t have faucets. After enthusiastically swiping my finger across the ipad screen in my doctor’s waiting room for about an hour, I found myself glancing at the humming five gallon chilled spring water dispenser in the corner and thinking about how all of my everyday conversations about water take it for granted–reusable vs. disposable bottles, BPA-free plastic vs. glass, brita vs. spring. I’m realizing how privileged I am to have First-World water problems. Maya, the fictional main character in the game Get Water, has bigger problems. “Maya loves going to school, but she keeps getting pulled out of class to fetch clean water because the water pump is always broken! They never seem to make the boys get water though. What’s up with that?“ And right away, halfway through reading the description on the itunes download page, I realize it is not just a question of thirst and purity, but also an issue of education and gender. These are some big human rights issues that Get Water drags out of the invisible shadows and brings into the light of discussion. I’m now having surprisingly sophisticated conversations with my two sons (five and seven years old) about the privatization and commodification of water rights while we swap devices and controllers on living room sofa…all because of a video game. Hence, Get Water proves not only that games can do more than just entertain, but also that game developers can, and perhaps should, give serious consideration to the potential social and cultural impact that a game’s narrative can have. Get Water is made by Decode Global, a Montreal based startup that aims to “break down barriers” around what games mean. Angelique Mannella, CEO and founder, started the company last June with 25,000 Euro in seed funding from Nokia. She wants to “develop fun and engaging games that not only increase awareness about important social issues, but also drive change in our communities and the world.” Get Water, Decode Global’s first game, is an addictive endless runner/side-scroller that is newly available for free in the itunes app store. The game hopes to earn revenue using freemium model in which consumers have the option of buying in app currency should they wish to fast-track through the game. Players control Maya, a young girl who can’t go to school because she needs to retrieve water for her family. She collects drops of water in the vessel she carries on her head, avoiding dirty water, flinging boomerangs at pesky peacocks, jumping over turtles, and avoiding bouncing footballs. The game’s art and music are first rate …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Forbes Latest
