PAID PATRIOTISM
INVESTIGATION
PAID PATRIOTISM
INVESTIGATION
PITCH is a free downloadable board game which invites you to experience buyable and sellable national identity within sports games
Buying for your nation
Winning for your city
PITCH is a free download board game which invites people to experience “buying and selling national identity” within an economy-simulated system. Through the design research, national identity has been grounded in the performance of singing the national anthem at the Super Bowl. However, as the symbolization of national identity at sports events, national symbols are appropriated by official communities to fabricate national identity and patriotism in economic activities. The current economic situation in the US is to invest public money in the sports events, for example, the Department of Defense (DoD) had secretly spent $6.8m of taxpayers money to fund the performance of singing the national anthem by soldiers and the army at the Super Bowl. This paid patriotism causes national identity to become a buyable and saleable product, and also citizens are being manipulated by this secret tactic.
PITCH turns the tactics that are used by official communities into a competitive game, players would be in charge of public money by themselves and then represent American cities to compete against others to win the game. additionally, this game is to give audiences opportunities to think about the current fabricated national identity and then reframe the national identity.
The board game is an ideal device to introduce paid patriotism within sports games and to open discussions national identity within sports games in a convivial and instructive way.
How the game was born?
The concept of the game was influenced by a news in American about “Paid Patriotism”. It raises a question about the transparency on the expression of national identity so that the intention of the game is to demonstrate the strategy and let citizens being aware of the money-led manipulation. After deciding the design intention, through the analysis of online reports that talk about paid patriotism, the game rule was born.
This prototype game was played a few times, resulting in a notable improvement in its rules. The first time this game was played at London College of Communication with Game design students.
How to play
There is an ongoing competition. American city players compete against each other to finally get the chance to hold the Super Bowl at their cities.
The game combines some elements from role-playing games and some from traditional board-games. As in the role-play games someone needs to be in charge of the facilitation that is NFL player in this game, but the NFL also play the evil role: The judger. The rest of the players must randomly pick from the 4 characters you will find in your PITCH box.
All characters: The NFL, The US government, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Miami, Atlanta, Arizona, New Orleans
Move around the board to buy as many properties as you can. The first player who gets 8 properties that include 2 red, 2 yellow, 2 blue and 2 green properties would be the winner.
City players can purchase properties to win the game, the player who firstly occupies eight properties is the winner.
However, The National Football League (NFL) is a judger. As long as the NFL catch up players and players land on the pitch, the NFL has the right to decide the destiny of the players. While city players land on an owned property, they should move to the pitch then compete against the owner to fight for the ownership of the property, the player who represents the National Football League (NFL) will judge it.
Main Goal
Roles
How to win
Download it and print it!
The open source philosophy of the project is to also provide the possibility to print it at home for free. You can download all the printable files from here. If you are interested in the editable files, please write me on designhaozhang@gmail.com