LogFAQs > #958934369

Found this "game" that puts people in charge of the response (from an NZ point of view, and starting about a week back from today).

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/453357/game-puts-players-in-charge-of-covid-19-response

I'm going to write this post as I play. Note that my comments on what I'd do IRL (rather than while restrained by the options the game offers) are from a point of view of seeing each week independently, ie: not taking into account what the difference would be between my in-game action and would-be IRL actions for previous weeks.

Week 1 - 29 new on the day / 250 total active cases. No data on where in the country they are, but from real-world and in-game alert level context I am guessing all in Auckland. I'm basically given the option of following what the government actually did recently, putting the entire country back to Level 4, open everything up, or do nothing (ie: keep restrictions as they already are). I expected it wouldn't be complex enough to eg. fine tune individual requirements like mask orders and that, but this outright seems shoehorned into "provide the government's actual option, a do nothing option, and a couple of really bad ones". I pick leaving things as they are. (My real life choice were I in that situation would have been to put Auckland to Level 4, but not all of NZ - or even better, some kind of "Level 3.5".)

Week 2 - 97 new cases on the day / 718 total cases. Still no data on where in the country. This time I'm given no options relating to alert levels or similar restrictions whatsoever, instead I'm given options on how to approach vaccine passports. My options are to implement a government-run vaccine passport scheme to be required at large gatherings, to endorse privately-run such schemes, to ignore the issue altogether, or to explicitly ban them. It's a no-brainer to go with the strictest option here, of course. (Real life: I'd go even further and require them for leaving the house or having guests, other than during an emergency or for contactless delivery at all.) Businesses seem happy, small number of people want to protest, apparently people overseas are callign me a "nazi" and a "Democrat loser".

Week 3 - 261 new cases / 1910 active cases. There's still nothing about where the cases are, so I'm presuming all in Auckland still despite the high numbers and that it'd be almost inevitable in reality that it'd slip out by this point. I notice at this point that the game is operating on the scale of week-to-week, not day-to-day, so I first go back and edit my previous points to refer to "Week 1" and "Week 2" rather than "Day 1" and "Day 8, which it skipped to for some reason". Today's question is about schools, I still have no options around alert levels / restrictions. My strictest option on schools is limiting groups to 10 students + mandatory masks for everyone + mandatory vaccinations for staff. The next option down drops the 10 student groups and reduces the mask requirement to those who are 12+; the next down from that is mask requirement for 12+ (and no other restrictions). And of course, the last option is reopen them pre-covid style. I go with the strictest option here. (IRL: I wouldn't go for the groups of 10, but would have the vaccine mandate for teachers and eligible students as well as the mandatory masking at all ages.) The public / education system reaction is negative, but mostly due to the groups of 10 part, which as noted would not have been a factor in how I'd actually respond.

Week 4 - 645 new cases / 5059 active cases. Of interest is that it puts the % of population fully vaccinated on this date (which it sets as 25th October) at 48%. Needless to say, four weeks into me running the show there would be far, FAR stronger vaccine mandates than anything this game has given me the option of, so it's worth noting it's wildly inaccurate at this point to how I'd actually run things. The options I'm given are, finally, about alert levels / restrictions again. The game is getting a bit ridiculous at this point - the options I'm offered other than "just stay as-is" are the two extremes of going back to Level 1 or going to "Level 5" (with no detail on what that might actually entail, nor whether I am doing this for all of NZ or just Auckland - which I still don't know where exactly the cases are, though logically I would assume at this size it would have to have jumped the Auckland border by now), or to just be spiteful and... ban picnics nationwide?

Yeah, at this point, it's very clear this is more focused on "pick exactly what the government actually does, or else we'll just get silly; we're making sure all other options are unrealistic or bad package-deals", and I'm going to stop playing here. (EDIT: I did actually try to pick a few options, now without really putting much thought into them, and it seems to just get more and more ridiculous. One of my options at one point was "bribe people with Lorde's new album". >_>)

I like the concept, but it's clear that this particular implementation is half propaganda half comedy rather than serious, despite initially presenting itself as neither.

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