Video Games as a Propaganda Instrument in the Context of Russian-Ukraine Conflict

• Main Author: Світлана Борисівна Фіялка
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute 2017-12-01
• Series: Технологія і техніка друкарства
• Subjects: відеогра; пропаганда; риторика ворожнечі; маніпуляція; демонізація ворога; фальсифікація історії
• Online Access: http://ttdruk.vpi.kpi.ua/article/view/112012

The Russian-Ukrainian military confrontation was not left out by the creators of video games, which became one of the many fighters of the information warfare. Video games provide wide opportunities for influencing the formation of public opinion, society’s assessment of political, economic and military decisions of the authorities. Video games are a source of propaganda, enhance its influence and fit it into public discourse, but at the same time camouflage it. The propaganda motives in video games based on plots of Ukrainian-Russian confrontation were explored. For researching we have selected video games available on Google Play dealing with the events occurred in Ukraine after the Revolution of Dignity someway or other. This is the games both created by patriotically-minded Ukrainian developers and pro-Russian ones promoted the imperial ambitions of theRussian Federation. Video games represent the following methods of propaganda: repetition of a certain idea, the use of emotional statements, demonization of the enemy, falsification of history, exploitation the ideas of patriotism, labeling, cultivating stereotypes. Above that, the same narratives that anti-Ukrainian mass media spread are imposed in the games of such kind as well as the double standards are applied. As a source of video game propaganda based on the Russian-Ukrainian confrontation, three ways of persuasions are used: with words, with images and with operations (gameplay). In order to avoid the destructive propaganda impact of video games on the Ukrainian public, it is necessary to monitor their content: if they distort the geopolitical position ofUkraineor harm the image of our state. At the same time, at the state level, it is necessary to encourage the creation of gaming products based on national values, as well as on historical propaganda. At the same time, opposition to pro-Russian propaganda in any case needs to be true, shifting the emphasis on heroic pages, demonstrating examples and technologies of victory through reason and strategy.