U.N. Game Wins Hearts and Minds

Feb, 15, 2006 - wired news

The roar of the chopper blasts through my headphones. Frantically clicking the mouse, I adjust my aim for the wind speed and fire my payload: a pallet stacked high with bags of rice.

What -- you were expecting a cruise missile?

With no guns to fire and no cars to steal, you would think that Food Force wouldn't be a very popular video game in today's market. But after it launched on Yahoo Games last spring, it quickly became the most popular free game on the site, racking up 1 million downloads over the first two months.

Created by the United Nations World Food Programme, Food Force is made up of six stages, each one built around a certain aspect of the emergency food program's operations. The entire game takes about 30 minutes to play.

Justin Roche, the game's project manager, said Food Force has had continued success since its launch, with more than 3 million downloads through December 2005.

The United Nations created the game after witnessing the success of the U.S. Army's recruitment game, America's Army. "We became more interested in a downloadable after we saw how prepared kids were to download the large America's Army file at over 200 MB," said Roche. "We come in at 230 MB, which is slightly smaller than the first America's Army."

"Video games is a language that kids speak universally, so I never hesitated to try it," said Julie Shannon, a teacher at Patria Mirabal School, a New York City middle school. "I know that technology is an important tool in the learning process, and also felt that the world hunger crisis needs attention. Our students are mainly Latin American and Dominican, and many are here because of the very issues that Food Force highlights," she said.
Shannon built an entire lesson plan around the game. In science lessons, her students studied nutrition, weather and agriculture. During math, they figured out how to feed many people with few resources.

"The familiar technology, the action and music, and the interactive elements are all very important pieces of the kids' interest," said Shannon. "But I also think that the subject matter grabs them -- they are at an age where they are looking at and judging everything around them. Somehow tragedy and disaster spark their interest -- it's human interest, I suppose."

Food Force's appeal to kids might even turn out to be an excellent recruiting tool, Roche points out. "We have many e-mails from children, saying that they would like to come and work for us when they are older. It's wonderful to think that our little game is having this kind of impact."