Tropico 5 Game Hits A Little Too Close To Home For Newly-Minted Thai Military Junta

from the their-version-of-the-sims? dept

As you may or may not be aware, Thailand changes governments like we change the oil in our cars: every couple of months or three to five thousand miles, whichever comes first. As we previously covered, the latest in Thai military juntas are (surprise!) huge fans of censoring the internet while claiming they don't and taking down social media sites while claiming that they don't. The picture being drawn for the rest of the world is one of an unsteady military government whose primary unifying factor is that it really likes censoring stuff.

But I didn't realize just how insecure these folks also are. That insecurity appears to be on display as the Thai dictatorial government has banned a video game about running a dictatorial government.

Thailand, which has been ruled by a military dictatorship for the past few months, has banned the video game Tropico 5 from appearing in stores, saying "some contents of the game are not appropriate for the current situation," according to publisher Kalypso Media. Tropico 5, of course, is a video game in which you can play as a military dictator, building and running your very own country in as sadistic a fashion as you'd like.

And, as we all know, subjugating millions of citizens as you laugh maniacally is for real life, not video games. The game, it would appear, hits a little too close to home for the Thai junta. After all, if citizens are allowed to play out what is essentially their government's own role, they may come to see how horrifically they're being treated and rebel. You don't want to remind those under your rule that they're under your rule, I guess.

The irony is not lost on Kalypso, the company that makes the Tropico series.

And here's Kalypso's Stefan Marcinek, also via press release: "Our distributor has been working hard to gain approval for the release, but it seems that the Board of Film and Video Censors deem some of the content too controversial for their consumers. This does sound like it could have come from one of El Presidente's own edicts from the game."

You have to think that a game mechanic was just born for Tropico 6, in which your dictatorial rule is furthered by banning video games.

Filed Under: dictatorship, games, thailand, video games