The Educational Value of Role Playing Games
http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3662
by Michael Bell
In today’s world, cell phones, pagers, iPods, computers, video games, and the like are as common a part of life as food and sleep. For the most part, these things are a distraction, and in case of video games, an outright form of escapism comparable to drug addiction.
Today’s youth are especially preoccupied with video games, spending countless hours working with other gamers worldwide on quests to destroy goblins and liberate office buildings from zombie infestations; this time could be better used for homework, personal study, exercise, or productive hobbies.
Video games have become such an integral part of young people’s lives that they have even led to fatalities among dedicated gamers. One woman essentially drowned herself in a contest to win a Nintendo Wii for her children by drinking gallons of water and holding in her urine (whoever held it the longest would win).
In another legendary incident, a man killed himself because his character in a particular game was accidentally deleted. (For those of you who are unfamiliar with the dynamics of video games, players are able to save their progress onto a “memory card” at a given time during the main quest and return to it later.)
But what if there were a video game that had an educational significance, and a racial one at that? What if there were a video game that subliminally opened the player up to issues of race, politics, and culture? I believe I have found just such a game, as I myself have enjoyed it for many hours at a time over the last few years (I’m in my early twenties, so give me a break) and have had a chance to dissect its contents. It is not a single game exactly, but rather a series: The Elder Scrolls (TES).The setting, or “universe” of the TES series is the fictional world of Nirn. Nirn is like Earth, having numerous continents and oceans; every game in the series takes place on the continent known as Tamriel, which is populated by a multitude of sentient humanoid races that hail from their own respective countries and kingdoms (e.g. the Nords of Skyrim and the Argonians of Black Marsh).
Tamriel is currently ruled over by the great Cyrodiilic Empire which resembles Ancient Rome in its people, language, material culture, religion, and cosmopolitan social structure, among other things. Though it boasts the most powerful military force, the Imperial Legion, Cyrodiil is a waning power, beset by continual internal threats that demand the intervention of the game’s players for resolution.
Subliminal Racialism
Racial themes permeate every aspect of TES games. At the very beginning of the game the player must construct a basic identity for his character: a name, class (knight, mage, assassin, etc.), gender, and race, among other things, comprise this identity. There are nine playable races, and interestingly enough, each one bears notable similarities to actual races in our world. Not all races in the game are human, however.
The peoples of Tamriel are divided into Man, Mer (Elves), and different bestial races. The subspecies of Man include the Nords, a tall, robust, fair-skinned people who physically and culturally resemble Nordic Vikings; the Imperials, or Cyrodiilic peoples who bear Greco-Roman sounding names and resemble White Mediterraneans; the Redguards, an African-looking people who even have African-American sounding names (e.g. Trevond); and the Bretons, a very short and pale-skinned mix of Man and Elf with French-sounding names.
http://www.toqonline.com/2009/06/digitally-dueling-with-chaos/