As election fever rises with the approaching six state elections and with the campaigning period underway, the news is inundated with racial and religious politicking, propaganda and more.
As such, the Malaysia Information Literacy Education (MILE), a local group that supports critical thinking and information literacy education in the country, has released a new character and storyline in its ‘Are you Yang Bijak?’ browser game aimed at young voters.
Expanding from the first ‘Are you Yang Bijak? storyline, which allowed players to take on the role of a first-time voter, MILE has released its latest character — a reporter covering their first big election — in time for the coming polls.
“We hope players will understand the challenges and pressures faced by reporters in such situations, on top of what drives various media coverage of election news and its weaknesses,” said MILE co-founder Darshini Kandasamy.
“‘Are you Yang Bijak?’ aims to help voters understand the role the media and bots can play, as well as recognise other forms of personal biases, propaganda and divisive agenda.
“All of these are common features in politics, more so during election season. If left unchecked, these can colour a person’s opinions, even their votes,” she said.
Funded by the Google News Initiative and illustrated by Studio Behind 90, the game ‘Are you Yang Bijak?’ was first released last November ahead of the 15th general election to help Malaysians navigate the spread of misleading and/or deliberately false information and divisive campaigning.
This simple, fun game is an expansion of MILE’s popular 2021 “Choices I Make” game initially created to help Malaysians navigate the Covid-19 infodemic.
Although aimed at young voters, Darshini added that ‘Are you Yang Bijak?’ can benefit everyone of various age groups and voting experiences.
The game is available in English, Malay and Chinese and can be played both on desktop and mobile.
The MILE team is already working on a third character and storyline and hopes to be able to release that soon.
You can play the game here:
EN: http://choicesimake.com/yangbijak/en
BM: http://choicesimake.com/yangbijak/my
CN: http://choicesimake.com/yangbijak/zh
