A video game made by an independent Taiwanese studio has grabbed the attention of Taiwanese and foreign players alike. It is a reminder that storytelling techniques and aesthetics can be influential in terms of a nation’s soft power, and that Taiwan can speak freely about its political terror history, an experience shared by people in many other nations — now or in the past — allowing it leeway to navigate a diplomatically unfriendly global environment.
Set against the backdrop of Taiwan in the 1960s under martial law, Detention (返校) has been a surprise hit with gamers with or without knowledge of Taiwan’s history.
The horror game was released on the Steam online distribution platform on Thursday last week and surged to the top seven in the global game charts. Many are asking why.
The game’s creator, Yao Shun-ting (姚舜庭), said: “Taiwan might not prevail in the market by making games with European-American or Japanese elements, but Taiwan is a sure winner in making games with Taiwanese elements.”
The game incorporates religious and folk practices and symbols, and the background music includes traditional instruments such as suona (嗩吶) horns.
However, the essence of its unique plotline lies in the fear evoked by political terror, embodied by calls to “rat out commies,” the presence of military officials in schools — the game is set in a junior-high school — for surveillance and the disappearances of classmates and teachers.
Although the game takes place during martial law rule, the place and the time are not specified, which Yao said was to emphasize the universality of political suppression.
A Chinese gamer posted a video talking about Detention and complaining that he could not speak freely in the video because of Internet censorship, adding: “Aren’t people supposed to be born free?”
The gamer later posted on a Chinese microblogging site that a Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) report about his video might get him in trouble, before noting — tongue in cheek — that Taiwan is an inseparable part of China.
The game might not only strike a chord with those who are facing similar horrors; it is possible that players who know nothing about Taiwanese history could develop an interest in the nation.
As 1979 Revolution: Black Friday — a video game set in the middle of the Iranian revolution — has shown, dark political history can sell and be educational.
International experts have been invited to Taiwan this week to review the nation’s second implementation report of two international covenants adopted by the UN in 1966 and ratified by the Legislative Yuan and signed into law in 2009. The review highlights an embarrassing truth: Even though Taiwan is no longer a member of the UN, it has tried to follow international precedents, and inviting a review of its implementation of covenants is the nation’s way of cooperating with the international community.
Like Detention and its background, which presupposes a democratized environment, Taiwan’s human rights record is also a positive experience that it can share with the world.
Taiwan’s transitional justice could likewise help link the nation with other democracies and aspiring democracies, but it requires government action.
Critics saying Detention airs the nation’s dirty laundry or the storyline is based on exaggerations have prompted several people to defend the game, citing their own family stories of disappearances and executions during the White Terror era.
Such online exchanges can be educational, but the continued denial of Taiwan’s past by some people shows the nation still has a long way to go to achieve true transitional justice.
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