Games for Learning Reviews
Ayiti: The Cost of Life
URL: http://ayiti.newzcrew.org/ayitiunicef/
Cost: Free
Estimated Age Range: 10+
Reviewer: Ben Wang
Ayiti: The Cost of Life is a role-playing game sponsored by UNICEF and created by Playing 4 Keeps, a youth game development project. The premise of the game is simple: you take control of a family of five living in Haiti and must help them survive in the third world living conditions of Haiti.
The game begins by asking the player to choose one of four game-playing strategies for the family to focus on: health, happiness, education or money. You start as a family of five living in a simple home with a farm for income. The two parents have little education and the kids also begin with no education. Your community has a couple of NGO or non-government organizations that might help you along the way to success; however they are also understaffed and financed.
The game initially seemed very simple because of the easy-to-use interface and clean graphics, however the mechanics of the game is actually very complex and have many variables and paths that affect the final outcome. The game plays very similar to Civilization in that you have to choose the actions of each of your family members before you decide to start each season. Each family member has three statistics: wellness, happiness, and education. These statistics change depending on what you tell the characters to do each round during the game. Finally you have a money meter which measures the amount of money spent progressively each round.
During the beginning of each round, you must choose the actions of each of the family. You have the option of working, staying at home, working at the family farm, or getting an education. Each of these choices has risks and rewards that must be balanced in order for you to successfully survive in the game. For example, you can tell the father to work in a Rum Distiller to make a decent amount of money; however this is very difficult work and will lower your health meter during the round.
The objective of the game is to help your family live a good life at the end of four years. This is extremely difficult and took me many attempts to even keep all of my family members alive for two years. The complex resource management of the game takes a little bit of exploring to fully understand but it is realistic. I was surprised at how many options and paths for the family were possible in the game and the different game playing strategies that you had to use to help the family survive.
Overall I would highly recommend this game. It is more suited for high school to college students although the graphics and overall theme of the game seems to be designed towards a younger audience. The game itself is well-designed and teaches the player about what methods work in helping families in developing counties. Most importantly, the game is extremely fun and rewarding to play.
