<sarcasm>I know, I know, it’s shocking to discover that a wargaming company produces games that “simulate violent combat“. You’d think they’d realize that nobody is actually interested in violence or combat, and especially not “violent combat”, as this game is alleged to glorify:</sarcasm>
One player racks up points by defeating Native American tribal leaders, the other by snuffing out settlements of English colonists. Capture Boston or Plymouth Colony? Victory is yours.
That’s the gist of “King Philip’s War,” a board game based on a bloody and violent clash of the same name between colonists and Indian tribes in 17th-century New England, and developed by a company partly owned by former major league pitcher Curt Schilling.
The game’s designer says he hopes to educate children and others about a war that cost thousands of lives but receives scant attention in history books. But some Native Americans want the game blocked from release, saying it trivializes the conflict and insensitively perpetuates a stereotype of Indian tribes as bellicose savages.
The people getting all hot and bothered by this are clearly people who’ve never even seen a board wargame.
Given that the game wasn’t going to see publication until MMP got enough orders to justify printing and distributing it, I suspect this will end up being another Streisand Effect in operation.