Video Games As Agents Of Change

Mom always said playing video games was good for nothing. Participants in the invitation-only "Serious Issues, Serious Games" conference would beg to differ.

Interactive games are "not simply the media equivalent of the hula hoop," declared Carl Goodman, curator of digital media and director of New Media Projects at the American Museum of the Moving Image. Held Tuesday at Manhattan's New York Academy of Sciences, the event comes on the heels of the first-ever Serious Games Summit, which took place in March during the annual Game Developers Conference.

These days, advertisers brand interactive games to promote their wares, the U.S. Army uses them for recruitment, and police departments employ them to run virtual drills. Now, some groups are educating with Web games to promote social and policy issues. Serious Games themes range from HIV/AIDS and poverty to public policy and New York City's budget.

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