More Video Games About Buildings and Food

Last year I came across a Japanese diet-based video game which taught kids that their relationships with food and exercise could be dysfunctional and fun, too. Apparently it's back on the front burner, as more than one person has emailed me regarding Fatworld.

While the developer creates games "powered by sarcasm and social commentary", it's tough to see any sarcasm in this one. The developer's page on the game goes into more a little more than the Wired article.

As a Fatworld inhabitant, you can choose starting weights and health conditions, including predispositions towards ailments like diabetes, heart disease, or food allergies. You can design your daily meal plan, choosing from hundreds of ingredients and recipes that ship with the game, or you can build your own from scratch and share them with friends online. Then you can exercise by walking around or playing a variety of exercise minigames. Or you can influence public policy by visiting the Govern-O-Mat, or try to get a glimpse into your own character's health -- if you can afford it -- at the Health-O-Mat.

Also of note: the game was commissioned in part by your pals at iTVS, PBS and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. (Their page says it all: get fat, stay healthy, or die.)

Now, I'm not opposed to investigating the admittedly complex relationships between society, poverty, access to food, packaged food, whole foods, and all that. Not at all in fact, and we need to discuss it more. But it's clear to me here that fat is the metaphor for unhealthy - it's not called Unhealthyworld after all. Fatworld can exist in a vacuum. It doesn't have to kowtow to genetics, the media, eating disorders, psychological disorders, choice, or anything else. It has decided that food makes you fat.

I expect this game to get promoted nicely by PBS as well; it could dovetail nicely into a special on The Fat sponsored by a drug maker. Moneygrab, anyone?