Shadow President is the greatest exponent of the sandbox management game.There is really no objective, despite the scenarios the game poses, from “Super Iraq” to Economic Crisis scenarios. Declare a trade embargo on Sweden? Can.Īnd why should he stop reducing the world to a heap of smoking ashes? Because he can. Launch nuclear warheads over Portugal? Can. And all from your computer, through the so-called Shadow Network, which provides absolute control over all US resources.
![joel shadow president joel shadow president](https://www.matookerepublic.com/wp-content/uploads/Joel-Ssenyonyi-1.jpg)
In Shadow President the player takes on the role of the president of the United States in a world in which, in 1990, the Cold War has not ended: the enemy is there, on the other side of the sea.īut, contrary to reality, he is not bound by a Senate or a Congress, and here he has the power to do absolutely what he pleases. One of the strangest and most original is the one that concerns us. That is Shadow President.Īt the beginning of the 90s, all kinds of management games proliferated: from controlling a city (SimCity), to a theme park (Theme Park), through television networks (Mad TV) or ant hills (Sim Ant). No elaborate decision trees or complex mechanics. Power to, at the push of a button, decide between world peace or nuclear devastation. Now imagine giving a player absolute power.
![joel shadow president joel shadow president](https://foreignpolicy.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/libyathinni15.jpg)
But let’s be serious: these decisions, except for very specific cases like Mass Effect, have an absolutely limited impact on the game and are reduced to having an ending as good or an ending as evil. Much has been said lately about moral decisions in games, despite not being a new concept at all there is the Ultima saga, for example.īe that as it may, the attempt to emotionally connect the player with the world in which he plays through decisions that affect it is curious.