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(Wiki Article #1: Simulating Detroit:A City with Cars and Crime but no Races)
(Wiki Article #1: Simulating Detroit:A City with Cars and Crime but no Races)
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"SimCity (1989 video game)." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 April 2013. Web. 04 June 2013[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SimCity_(1989_video_game)]
 
"SimCity (1989 video game)." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 April 2013. Web. 04 June 2013[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SimCity_(1989_video_game)]
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In molestie sodales magna, ut viverra nisl eleifend eget. Vivamus et elit velit. Aliquam tristique mi eu elit facilisis at semper odio pharetra. Fusce tincidunt urna eget sem semper sit amet tincidunt arcu varius. Maecenas vestibulum suscipit augue ac rutrum. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Donec erat est, porttitor at aliquet vitae, iaculis ac turpis. Duis sit amet velit rutrum purus suscipit posuere. Curabitur cursus arcu in neque accumsan viverra.
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McSpifferton, Spiffy . (2012). ''Pig-Tossing as Ritual in Losakaki''. Journal for Pigology. Denver, CO: Pig Press.

Revision as of 09:45, 27 June 2013

Wiki Article #1: Simulating Detroit:A City with Cars and Crime but no Races

Simulating Detroit:A City with Cars and Crime but no Races

Brief Summary:

SimCity (later named Micropolis) is a city-building simulation video game, first released on October 3, 1989, and designed by the famous game developer Will Wright. SimCity was the first product of the video game company Maxis, which has since been ported into various personal computers and game consoles, and generated several sequels including SimCity 2000 in 1993, SimCity 3000 in 1999, SimCity 4 in 2003, SimCity DS, SimCity Societies in 2007, and SimCity in 2013. Until the release of The Sims in 2000, the SimCity series was the best-selling line of computer games made by Maxis.

On January 10, 2008, after EA owned the rights of Maxis, the SimCity source code was released by EA under the free software GPL 3 license with the original working title – Micropolis (Wright’s original name for his city simulation). The objective of the game is to build and design a city that can maintain a certain scenario set up for that specific city. In this case, of Detroit 1973, the scenario was that crime and depressed industry wrecked the city. The mayor needs to reduce crime and reorganize the city to better develop.


Main Argument:

The author, Mark Sample, started this article by first introducing the reason Detroit was so famous and the real motivation behind SimCity Detroit 1973. He introduced Detroit as the motor capital of the world and argued that its importance lies in the huge automotive industry it has. He then goes and introduces the game itself and how when it was released, in the late 80s, it was the closest (of all the other scenarios) to real life simulation. The author then to introduce his main part of the argument by talking about the 1967 Detroit riot and how that was reflected into the game. The riots were caused mainly by racial problems Detroit was facing in those years; however, back then, nothing was mentioned about the automotive greatness of Detroit and how the city was living by its industry to overcome those problems. On the other hand, SimCity was based entirely on the automotive industry and the theme was that if the industry is not in good condition, crime rises. “Not race problems. Crime.” as described by Sample.

Sample is arguing that SimCity was intentionally avoiding the racial problems Detroit was facing by blaming the problems on just crime. He goes on to explain, “the riots in my 1974 version of [SimCity] Detroit are virtually whitewashed. They are riots in the abstract. There are no people involved. Only algorithmically-determined mobs.” This shows how SimCity was precisely built to avoid certain issues and rather concentrate on the gaming side of SimCity as Will Wright himself explains when asked about this: “I just kind of optimized [the game] for game play.”

Social and Cultural aspects
Sample clearly wants to question why SimCity did not take into perspective the main social issue of the time and why avoiding it was better than discussing it. He takes his argument to an even broader perspective by asking what do contexts of any simulation game really represent.
Political aspect
The author did not really discuss any political aspect of the game even though this topic seems like one that would definitely have a political angle to it. He mentioned how in the 1967 riots the national guard were called and their impact on the situation; however, he did not discuss the impact such political situations had on the game itself.
Comments’ debate
The main theme in the comments, which really ties into my own point of view, is if such topics were indeed explicitly discussed in simulation games more problems would be generated consequently. Computer simulation can never really present the issue with fairness to all sides of the issue. Another aspect of the situation was that throughout that time period the main theme of urban politics all over the US was to in fact turn “race” into “crime” and avoid the problem altogether. As Rob Macdougall explains in a comment: “I continue to suspect such conflations/evasions/oversimplifications are basic, indeed essential to historical simulations – they’re not just flaws of this or that game, they are the whole point of simulation in the first place.”

I believe that given the atmosphere of the time the game was introduced, it was the perfect way to deal with such an issue by preserving the simulation world to be the ‘ideal’ world and not fall into the mistakes caused by such a sensitive issue.


Works Cited:

Sample, Mark. "Simulating Detroit:A City with Cars and Crime but no Races" Play The Past RSS. Play The Past, 14 Feb. 2012. Web. 04 June 2013.[1]

"SimCity (1989 video game)." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 April 2013. Web. 04 June 2013[2]



Wiki Article #2: Lorem Ipsum 2

ABSTRACT2

In molestie sodales magna, ut viverra nisl eleifend eget. Vivamus et elit velit. Aliquam tristique mi eu elit facilisis at semper odio pharetra. Fusce tincidunt urna eget sem semper sit amet tincidunt arcu varius. Maecenas vestibulum suscipit augue ac rutrum. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Donec erat est, porttitor at aliquet vitae, iaculis ac turpis. Duis sit amet velit rutrum purus suscipit posuere. Curabitur cursus arcu in neque accumsan viverra.

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In molestie sodales magna, ut viverra nisl eleifend eget. Vivamus et elit velit. Aliquam tristique mi eu elit facilisis at semper odio pharetra. Fusce tincidunt urna eget sem semper sit amet tincidunt arcu varius. Maecenas vestibulum suscipit augue ac rutrum. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Donec erat est, porttitor at aliquet vitae, iaculis ac turpis. Duis sit amet velit rutrum purus suscipit posuere. Curabitur cursus arcu in neque accumsan viverra.

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Works Cited:

McSpifferton, Spiffy . (2012). Pig-Tossing as Ritual in Losakaki. Journal for Pigology. Denver, CO: Pig Press.