Kettling, the game

Manage protestors by detaining them en-masse in this puzzle game! If you mess everything up, bring in your horses (i.e. reset the level) with the space bar. Game page [Increpare via Indie Games]

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molleindustria

@Wally Ballou
“When there were real protests in America 40-50 years ago, I doubt that any of those protestors played board games in which they took the part of Chicago police or Selma sheriffs.”

You’re just plain wrong:

Chicago, chicago
http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/11502/chicago-chicago

Up Against the Wall, Motherfucker!
http://playthisthing.com/against-wall-motherfucker-0

Corteo
http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/9504/corteo
Rob Beschizza

Is it slightly odd that someone would say that a game where you “take the role of Obama and see how quickly they can bring the economy to a standstill” doesn’t exist, only for that to be totally RIGHT THERE on the internet? That’s some quality viral marketing.
Emo Pinata

They have a very good level design in this game. It’s truly one of the few games that managed to keep the “game” part in “game that makes a statement”.
bascule

So I guess someone should write the game that teaches the little protesters how to avoid being kettled.

Rob, If I write the game will you link to it?
Anonymous

I have always found the term “Kettling” and “Kettle” as extremely ominous when used by police since it derives from the preferred operational manoeuvre used by the Wermacht during their eastern front offensive to encircle and destroy Russian formations the Kesselschlacht.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salients,_re-entrants_and_pockets#Kessel

The fact that the police are going full on Wermacht on protesters just brings shudders to my spine…
Rob Beschizza

As long as it isn’t poo.
Church

Is there a “hipsters” corollary to Godwin’s Law? There should be.
- Anonymous
  
  Churches Corollary. So let it be written, So let it be done.
Anonymous

So you want to protest, try it in a square outhouse.
Wally Ballou

This is an example of why the left is losing and the right is winning. It’s the Colbert/Stewart mentality running full bore.

Within days of kettling on the streets, there is kettling the game, by which means leftist hipsters demonstrate that no matter the adversity, their unflappable ironic detachment remains intact.

When there were real protests in America 40-50 years ago, I doubt that any of those protestors played board games in which they took the part of Chicago police or Selma sheriffs.

Nor, I think, do you find any tea partiers today playing games in which they take the role of Obama and see how quickly they can bring the economy to a standstill.

It’s all a question of seriousness.
- Anonymous
  
  I would like to point out that increpare is one guy, he makes experimental games constantly (Kristallnacht is a particularly hard-hitting one), and he is not American. Your comment assumes this is both a new phenomenon (it is not) and that the person in question is involved in American politics (he is not).
- Angstrom
  
  Card-game of “Suffragette” in a box. – card game
  Description: ‘The Game of Suffragette’ was invented by the Kensington branch of the Women’s Social and Political Union. This card game, with questions and answers arguing the case for Women’s suffrage, was intended to raise funds for the union and was also used to promote the suffrage cause within the home.
  Production Date: 1907
  
  link to game
  - Anonymous
    
    The distinction here, based on the original claim, is that this card game doesn’t provide agency to the player as the oppressing/opposing party.
    
    ‘Suffragette’ the card game apparently teaches about suffrage and evangelizes it. The difference, in Wally’s arguing, is that it is not ironically having you take the role of The Patriarchy to prevent women from voting.
    
    That said, Wally is wrongheaded, and also probably crazy.
- Bennett
  
  Hah, way to fact-check your claims. 20 minutes after your post, you’ve already been proved wrong on both counts. I guess your comment had ‘truthiness’, though.
- S2
  
  Well, I was on the streets 40 years ago. In A^2 it was mainly something to do: meet people, look at girls, be “involved,” etc. In Chicago & Philly things were more serious, but the ER was easily forgotten by firing up some Hendrix and firing up…. It was more than a lark, but barely an avocation. No, we didn’t play board games, but I recall that collecting “pig gear” was a fun side pursuit (but it’s hard to recall all that much since we were pretty well baked full time ;-)
  
  We were kids; most seemed happy just to provoke a reaction or provide some street theatre. In my experience, the real value came from the photos — pictures of bloodied kids and raised batons were far more “effective” than meat-world confrontations with screaming smelly longhairs…shock troops. More recently, went to a few Bush-war protests; the kids didn’t seem any different than the ’60s-’70s crowd, just better dressed. (I, on the other hand, felt much more in touch with the situation’s gravity, which immediately twigged the Old Fart Detector circuits in the youth still inside me ;-)
bascule

I’ve just been watching the London News and I think the students and organisers have possibly figured out some good strategies without a game to train them up. :-)

Apparently a good strategy is to fragment and run away from a possible kettle.
Rob Beschizza

Actually, activists have always done this sort of thing. The difference is that my dad’s 1970s ‘student’ board games rot in the attic and were only every played by a handful of people.

It’s not too hard to find similar stuff from a conservative perspective. But you might say they’re a little behind the times on gaming technology.

It’s a question of SRSNS.