Super Debate 20XX

The web is full of year-end retrospectives. Gameological has the only one that you can play. We invited four indie development teams to make a browser game inspired by a major news story from 2012, with two weeks to bring their game from concept to reality. And now you get to experience the results. Don’t just remember the year. Play The Year.

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Modern presidential debates have been reduced to a verbal sparring match. The candidates prepare “zingers” and defuse controversy with a familiar, limited set of “safe” talking points. At the end of each 90-minute session, anchors and pundits consult their scorecard and tell America which Oval Office hopeful earned the most debatin’ points. It’s like a playground game for the highest office in the land.

Super Debate 20XX lets you play that game of presidential roshambo. In order to become leader of the free world, all you need to do is construct the perfect argument. If he argues rock, you argue paper. If he says that only a strong scissor initiative will get this country’s economy back on track, you counter that our founding fathers believed in the lasting power of rock. Make your point effectively, and electoral success will be yours—because who is going to vote for that scissor-using buffoon?

How to play: Press 1, 2, or 3 to throw rock, paper, or scissors, respectively. Your opponent will argue first. Counter his argument—ties go to your opponent, because nobody likes a copycat—and then offer up your own. If the other guy can’t answer back, you win the point. (More detailed instructions are available in-game.)

About the developers: Super Debate 20XX was created by Peter Malamud Smith and John Lynch.

Smith is editor of Nerve and singer/guitarist for The Aye-Ayes. With Charlie Hoey, he co-created The Great Gatsby For NES.

Lynch is a teacher in Chicago who began making video games in 2009, having decided that if he was never going to outgrow them, he could at least learn something in the process.

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Dunwatt

As a mixed-race person with no musical talent, you’re damned right I’m winning over mixed-race bassists.*/**

*Sorry, dead John Entwistle.

**Not sorry, guy from Fallout Boy.
caspiancomic

As far as I’m concerned this is a terrifyingly accurate representation of the process. Except in real life, both candidates are that kid who used to shoot “lava”, that beat everything and can’t be beat by anything else.
- http://www.avclub.com/users/merve,96925/ Merve
  
  At my elementary school, we didn’t use Lava as the trump. We used Big Bird, Black Hole, or Dynamite. Eventually, we just started playing the trumps against each other, at which point we realized that Big Bird, Black Hole, Dynamite was isomorphic to Rock, Paper, Scissors. We went back to regular Rock, Paper, Scissors after that. (Then we discovered Rock, Paper, Scissors, JINX!, and we realized that robbing each other of the right to speak was far more fun than actually playing Rock, Paper, Scissors.)
HobbesMkii

If Romney throws paper, he always throws scissors subsequently. What a moron.
- Captain Internet
  
  America needs a President who sticks to his principles. Under President Obama, we have no idea if it’s going to be paper, scissors or stone, and that uncertainty is harming America.
  
  That uncertainty leaves middle class families worrying about their future. That uncertainty makes the markets edgy, and keeps investors from taking risks. That uncertainty leads small businesses to hold off on hiring new staff.
  
  And that uncertainty etc etc etc
- http://www.gildedgreen.com/ Girard
  
  More importantly, this is not an accurate simulation of his mercenary flip-floppiness. His choice of hand shape should be dictated by what the polls show the electorate wants. “The electorate says we should maintain a military presence in I-rock.” “The electorate supports marriage for people who scissor as a primary means of sexual congress.” “The electorate feels that proportional income calculations aren’t the only factor that should determine how much in taxes each citizen should pay per year.”
- http://twitter.com/Evad_Dalrymp Unexpected Dave
  
  That’s also why Ron Paul will never be president. He knows that paper is statistically the best, so he just keeps throwing it, refusing to compromise on his position that paper is the best.
IntotheNightSky

Bar-Rock Obama wins again. Is it just luck that Romney threw scissors every time?
- Doomla
  
  He did that for me too. Maybe a bug?
  - mittensbrother
    
    Hey folks – John Lynch here.
    
    I checked this out, but couldn’t reproduce a scissors-only Mitt Romney. Maybe he just had a first-debate-Obama moment and fell asleep on the S key?
    
    Thanks for playing!
http://www.facebook.com/mhsewell Mark Sewell

LOVE the title screen.
Aaron Riccio

I know this is more of a joke (and an effective one) than a game, but it’s surprisingly tense, what with the speeding up of the MIDI and the moderator getting faster with his questions.

On the comic side, every zinger was hitting home, from the bad dialogue of the newscasters (“A winner is anyone’s guess tonight”) to the Rube-O-Meter on the screen, and the “finishing” moves — my favorite was the “Math Attack,” though I’m wondering (since I played as Obama) if Romney has some different moves.

And on the sad-but-true front, yeah. Debates and government don’t seem to be on a level much higher than this one, and they’re about as meaningful as the RPS tournament. (To be fair, some people take those gambits very seriously.) If nothing else, the repetition and run-around speaks volumes.

And yeah. For those who might disagree with me? I throw lava. Tough shit.
nitaipanle

http://ur1.ca/c4ee0

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SUPER DEBATE 20XX

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