Mark Foley Newsgame?

Submitted by zach on Wed, 10/04/2006 - 15:37

No, there isn't one yet. As far I know, no one has yet made a game about the recent scandal involving Congressman Mark Foley (R-FL) and the innappropriateness of his relationships with Congressional pages. Given the hugeness of the story, however, and the lurid details of the inappropriate behavior, I figure it's just a matter of time before someone uploads a Flash game somewhere.

What I want to know is, what will this game (or games) be like? We've looked at inflammatory games related to political and news topics before, but based on what we've seen in the past, can we predict what someone will make out of this now?

I think a good way to capture the essence of this would be to create a creepy chatbot who, in the guise of "Maf54," makes people uncomfortable by suggesting they perfom sex acts while complaining about an ongoing vote on the House floor (or whatever he did). I don't have time to put something like that together, but I bet somebody will.

What do you think?

It will be a queer one, to say the least.

Submitted by Amanda Phillips on Thu, 10/05/2006 - 00:50.

I don't think people will be able to separate the queer issues from what happened. It's not just that he had sexually-charged conversations with children online, but he had sexually-charged conversations with male children online. Homemade game makers aren't known for being terribly thoughtful about how their games grab onto stereotypes for the sake of a laugh - look at Border Patrol, Quest for Saddam, and So you think you can drive, Mel?, all of which have been featured on this blog.

Anyway, call me a pessimist, but I'll put my chips on a game that exploits (and misconstrues) the complex queer issues at work in the Foley scandal.

Foley Game

Submitted by Matt (not verified) on Thu, 10/05/2006 - 09:39.

That's my thoughts, too, Amanda. My guess would be someone would try to create a mix of Michael Jackson and Mark Foley...

And indeed that association

Submitted by zach on Thu, 10/05/2006 - 10:33.

And indeed that association has begun on late night monologues as well as in the political cartoons:
http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/6686/6billdayae1.jpg

Well I've found one,

Submitted by zach on Thu, 10/05/2006 - 21:43.

Well I've found one, courtesy of the Huffington Post: Help Hastert Hide the Perv. You play as Haster and, with the help of Boehner and Shimkus, try to hide Foley while he apparently seduces pages.

It focuses on Hastert, obviously, and so probably makes a more valuable point than a "let's make fun of Foley" game might. One that compared him to Michael Jackson, for example.

With this game, though, I'm not sure how to play. I mean, I don't know if there are consequences for failing to hide Foley, and the game just seems to keep going with no timer or score. I guess that's kind of where we are with the scandal in real life, though there is of course a countdown to November.

And another:

Submitted by zach on Fri, 10/06/2006 - 09:32.

This one is more like what I predicted:
http://www.addictinggames.com/imfoley.html

Again, this one isn't technically interactive, and I don't think all those pickup lines are genuine, but it gets to the essential, weird idea behind all this. Certainly plays up the queer angle too.