October 8, 2009
Not Playing Train
At Indiecade this past weekend I asked friends if there was anything I should definitely check out - the universal answer was Train. I arrived where it was set up not knowing anything about it. As soon as I saw boxcars and broken glass, I knew two things: I knew where the story was going, and I knew that I would not be able to play the game.
I read the rules - with trepidation at first, and then with increasing admiration. I stepped back and contemplated the quiet scene.
Ever since some time in elementary school, the Holocaust has been embedded in my consciousness. I know facts and names, I recognize symbols and analogies. I have read books, visited museums, and talked with survivors. This isn't because I deliberately seek to immerse myself in the events of the Shoah - this is just part of what being Jewish has entailed for me.
Because the facts of the Holocaust are overwhelmingly horrific, I have found that the most meaningful and thought-provoking experiences with it are simple ones that don't demand a specific emotional reaction. One of the best memorials I've been to is the Children's Memorial at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem - it is a dark room filled with mirrors that reflect candles so that you feel like you're floating in a sea of flickering stars. An audio track quietly reads the names of children who died in the Holocaust. You are given the space to feel however you want - sad, peaceful, resolute, defiant, or anything else.
I don't know what it's like to play Train as someone who was unfamiliar with the imagery and history, and so wouldn't immediately see where the game was going. But after thinking about it for a long time, I like to believe that you wouldn't end up flipping over your Terminus cards to see the names of concentration camps - you would realize the bigger picture some time before. Ultimately I think that Train is a game about walking away - after all, Brenda Brathwaite's instructions conclude with the sentence "Train is over when it ends."
If the goal of the game is indeed realization rather than a surprise reveal, I think that Train succeeds in providing the player with emotional space rather than demanding a feeling of guilt. In asking the player "What are you really doing?" rather than saying "Look what you've done!", the game gives you a productive outlet. You don't play this game as a Nazi mastermind - they knew exactly what they were doing and where they were sending their victims - instead you play as a lesser actor, someone involved in a system but unaware of its larger consequences. That is a state that we all live in today - our jobs, our consumer choices, our political system, and our investments all involve us in actions of which we're only vaguely aware. Train lead me to ask myself what systems I might be a part of that enable actions I disapprove of or even vehemently oppose.
I stopped for a moment outside the gallery to say kaddish, and to resolve to become a more informed member of the systems I participate in - or chose to walk away from.
Posted by rosenblj at October 8, 2009 3:53 PM
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