14 DAY TRIAL // It seems that the Russian Parliament has had enough of the stereotypical way in which citizens of the great nation are portrayed in videogames and plans to deal with the issues by creating no less than six patriotic videogames. The Ministry of Communication has actually requested about 500 million rubles, which is more than 10 million dollars, in order to fund these projects.
Pavel Zyryanov, who is a member of the Russian Parliament and sits on the committee that deals with youth-oriented policy, stated, “What we need is more programmers who have a patriotic education, who are on the right ideological level. Computer games today are part of a vital ideological platform that affects the consciousness of our young people. They learn history, they adopt values, and it's important that this process is given a pro-Russian background.”
It seems the biggest issues the members of the Russian Parliament have are related to the way their country is portrayed in relation to its participation in World War II. They might also take issues with their villainous image promoted in recent shooters like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Battlefield: Bad Company 2.
It's not exactly clear what genres the six patriotic videogames will tackle or when they are scheduled to come out. It's also not clear how the Russian administration is planning to get them to gamers. If the funding is approved and some competent developers are recruited, it might be nice to see them launched free to play, allowing any willing gamer to take a look at them and decide whether they make the case for Russia as a benevolent force in the world.
One model that could prove interesting for the Russians is that of America's Army, the shooter developed by the United States armed forces and used in its recruiting drive, especially among the young.