This is actually pretty cool. There’s this program called S.E.N.S.E. (Strategic Economic Needs and Security Exercise) from Poland that lets government officials try out various scenarios that might that a good ol’ fashioned market economy might run across, in the hopes that officials might know what to expect when they face it in real life. Soon, officials from the newly-liberated Egypt, Tunisia and Libya will be taking a crack at it.
SENSE models developments in an imaginary country called Akrona and can involve between 40 and 66 participants at one time, with each ‘player’ taking on the role of a different official, state actor or business.
An exercise generally consists of two days of conflict management and negotiation training, followed by three days of computer-based simulation and instruction.
Seeing as the game accommodates 40 to 66 players at once, it’s probably a safe bet to say that S.E.N.S.E. won’t be seeing a commercial release any time soon, but it’s good to know that even world governments see the same potential in games that we see over here at Kill Screen.
-Drew Millard