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What games are genuinely 'not political'

sn00zer

sn00zer

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Feb 28, 2018
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More of a thought exercise if anything, but I could really only think of a very small handful of game I would consider not having politics. Even Tetris has a pretty heavy Moscow aesthetic with a rocket taking off at the end.

Any game that has a bad guy inherently has some sort of characteristics of a 'bad guy' in society. And a ton of videogame bad guys are typically centered around corporate greed.

This was the list of the apolitical games I could think of:
Frogger
Defender
Doom 1
Some Tycoon games
Flight Simulators
Pacman
Racing games without stories

Games I thought might be apolitical but aren't
Spyro: has a large number of enemies in military garb, and some pretty odd Arabic enemy design choices
Duke Nukem: Cops are literally pigs
DOOM games past 1: Makes it pretty clear the unchecked science and greed were the downfall of Earth
 
lowhighkang_LHK

lowhighkang_LHK

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Oct 25, 2017
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Well, I mean - even something like Devil May Cry. It glorifies weapons and guns (even if they are used to kill demons).

Politics are almost everywhere. Same thing with Doom 1. A solider who defies orders by his commanding officer gets sent to Mars on a Science Experiment gone wrong.

EDIT: Even racing games. People question the safety and environmental aspects of the sport. But, sometimes - yeah, it does feel like a stretch. But political connections can be still be made.
 
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JohnMichonski

JohnMichonski

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The reason the Doom marine is sent to Mars in the first place is because he refused an order to fire on civilians and beat up the commanding officer that told him to.
 
PlanetSmasher

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Tycoon games are pretty damn political, since the whole point of them is "capitalism is good". You can't win at a Tycoon game if your park runs out of money.
 
Biske

Biske

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Nov 11, 2017
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"Political" is just a buzzword for shit you don't like. Anything and everything is political when someone doesn't like it and wants to go online and fucking whine about it.
 
jph139

jph139

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Frogger is about a frog trying to get home, and it starts off with him trying to dodge cars on a freeway. I don't know if that's intended as an environmentalist critique, but it can certainly be read as one.
 
steviestar3

steviestar3

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Anything even remotely related to human society is political. So the only real answers would be games that are completely abstract like most puzzle games.
 
CypherSignal

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Don't forget, aspects of "politics in art" can also include how they are representative of the culture they arose from. Would Doom exist exactly as it does in a world where guns (or the culture around it, e.g. action movies) were universally abhorred or non-existant?
 
AdmiralSnackbar

AdmiralSnackbar

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Oct 27, 2017
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Political just means it reflects some aspect of life that makes you uncomfortable. Anything with basic human elements like a some kind of struggle against adversity is going to get interpreted as political if there's some ulterior motive yo criticize it.

You have to go to something totally abstract and detached from reality like Tetris or something.

...And even then someone will still probably find a way to get upset.
 
Soundscream

Soundscream

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Nov 2, 2017
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So wrong OP
Frogger- man's continued expansion into native species habitats
Defender- aggression towards alien species
Doom 1- anti church of Satan propaganda
Some Tycoon games- corporate greed
Flight Simulators- bucking federal requirements for pilots license
Pacman- disrespect for the dead
Racing games without stories-
 
NoName999

NoName999

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saci said:
Tetris
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You mean the game marketed by the Soviets?

e30c1bc637d4d90e57abb31c1a22245a.jpg
 
Ploid 6.0

Ploid 6.0

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Oct 25, 2017
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Games without stories that involve characters? Alien character, animal talking characters, maybe even nature stuff.
 
The Cameo

The Cameo

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Apr 26, 2018
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steviestar3 said:
Anything even remotely related to human society is political. So the only real answers would be games that are completely abstract like most puzzle games.
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It's this (mostly). Anything created is a reflection of its creator and the world and times that creator exists in, which includes the politics of said creator and said world they exist in.

This includes puzzle games.

And the thing is that, really, everything is political, as ideology is just ideas and ideals which inform choices as small as what peanut butter you prefer to who you want to fuck to what job you want to how and who you vote for. There is nothing on this planet that politics does not touch, because interaction in and of itself is political.
 

Deleted member 8861

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Everything, everything is political on some level.

Anything with a character in it, at least, supports political readings.

UraMallas said:
Honestly, strictly puzzle games.
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If you really stretch it, you could claim that puzzle games with any progression system (or any deliberate/pronounced lack thereof) is making a statement about how art (or entertainment) should be presented. For example, if you have a hard puzzle you can't access without accessing old puzzles, does that mean you're gating off some of your audience as more worthy of seeing all of the game? Or if you do otherwise (e.g. Crosscells), is it an advocacy for egalitarian access to all parts of an art work?

(Clearly this isn't exactly some sort of political manifesto people would actually argue very much over, but my point is that politicality is ill-defined, nebulous even.)
 
UraMallas

UraMallas

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Nov 1, 2017
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Funyarinpa said:
If you really stretch it, you could claim that puzzle games with any progression system (or any deliberate/pronounced lack thereof) is making a statement about how art (or entertainment) should be presented. For example, if you have a hard puzzle you can't access without accessing old puzzles, does that mean you're gating off some of your audience as more worthy of seeing all of the game? Or if you do otherwise (e.g. Crosscells), is it an advocacy for egalitarian access to all parts of an art work?

(Clearly this isn't exactly some sort of political manifesto people would actually argue very much over, but my point is that politicality is ill-defined, nebulous even.)
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You make a good case, honestly.

Lant_War said:
Angry Birds? (Pre-narrative ones at least)
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Cartoon violence hurting the youth.
 
balgajo

balgajo

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In general games that doesn't have story. Things like, for example, Piano Tiles.
 
Chirotera

Chirotera

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Oct 27, 2017
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Frogger is about the rapid urbanization of man forcing native species out of their desire habitat into increasingly dangerous situations. Not political? Pfft.
 
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