There are many reasons why I have decided to go for the second game which is about a struggling family living in the outskirts of Egypt. But I believe the most important reason of them all is that I got to hear about these struggles from people who actually experience those situations and are the ones who make these decisions day in day out but people might not be aware of or know the depth of these issues these individuals face or know what it is like to be in their shoes and make these life defining choices that does not only impact them from a very young age but also plays an extremely vital role in defining who they are in the future. I have tweaked the scenarios throughout the game and included facts and statistics regarding poverty, education and family dilemmas in Egypt. Throughout this game the player will be stepping into the shoes of a teenage boy living in one of Egypt’s rural areas where he/she will have to make life defining choices regarding choosing between his education, family and striving to overcome poverty.
In addition, these scenarios were developed based on two very important pillars. First, as previously mentioned were from real life experiences that I got to learn about from my house help which enabled me to have an insight about what it is really like to have extremely difficult conditions that not only do they have to deal with but they could be torn between two choices and there is a possibility that neither of these life defining choices will be the right thing to do but will have no other choice but to choose one. The second aspect was secondary research where I learned about and included several findings from research papers and statistics about various aspects and struggles related to the lives of people living in rural areas and the conditions that affect their lives and upbringing. By combining these two elements I believe I was able to add depth to my game that will hopefully shed a light on the devastating truth regarding a large percentage of our Egyptian population.
Personally, after researching this topic and finding out more about these issues, I can honestly say that even though each one of us determines how he/she wants their lives to be yet I strongly believe that a huge part of it does not lie in our hands and in the case of people living in the outskirts of Egypt things are even much harder for them especially that the living conditions are not in their favor and could easily break a person or prevent him/her from reaching their full potential and that how their lives end up to be is mostly based on a flawed system, fewer opportunities and poor living conditions which is really unfair and devastating.
Here are the sources that I used to develop my digital game and don’t forget to play my game by clicking HERE
https://www.demographic-research.org/volumes/vol37/32/37-32.pdf
https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/egypt/publication/economic-outlook-april-2018
https://tradingeconomics.com/egypt/rural-population-percent-of-total-population-wb-data.html
https://ww.egyptindependent.com/278-percent-egyptian-population-lives-below-poverty-line-capmas/
http://dar.aucegypt.edu/bitstream/handle/10526/3587/Margos_research.May%2030.pdf?sequence=3
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/economists-predict-52-percent-growth-egypt-poverty-deepens
https://www.unicef.org/egypt/sites/unicef.org.egypt/files/2018-05/eg_Children_In_Egypt_2016_en%283%29.pdf
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/economists-predict-52-percent-growth-egypt-poverty-deepens
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