In the news:

Forget competition! New ally on board!

8 April 2008

It happened at last! Things are official now; AFKARMEDIA is starting join venture projects with JoyBox Co. this new game development company in the market is aiming high, although it started working on mobile phone games and applications couple of years ago, JoyBox is moving on and planning to start developing videogames for PC and other platform in cooperation with AFKARMEDIA.

This alliance is proving the commitment of both sides for strengthening the media business, exchanging experiences and resources and offering more kicking titles for the public, so let's just sit and wait, hope for not too long!

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Exhibition HOMO LUDENS LUDENS

18 April 2008

Fri, April 18 , 2008 - Mon, September 22 , 2008
Locating play in contemporary culture and society
Exhibition: 18 April – 22 September
Conference: 19 – 20 April
Venue: LABoral Centro de Arte y Creación Industrial, Gijón

LABoral Centro de Arte y Creación Industrial presents HOMO LUDENS LUDENS, an international exhibition and conference examining play as a principal element of today’ s world, and highlighting its necessity for our contemporary societies. Following the exhibitions GAMEWORLD and PLAYWARE, that reflected respectively on the different playful and social sides of gaming creativity and interactive art, HOMO LUDENS LUDENS now sets the setting that embraces these data and looks into the notion of play in a wider spectrum, presenting how it has evolved in our digital times.

Projects of a different character and orientation reflect play’s various expressions and roles: Play is being reformed and reversed; it embodies social and political acts and issues; it becomes a tool for activism; it mingles the virtual and the real; it revitalizes other disciplines; play can be misused and exploited; while stereotypes are challenged, questions are raised and different understandings are offered.

Following the same direction, the international conference HOMO LUDENS LUDENS which is co-organized with the Planetary Collegium aims through its two-day programme to situate the frame context of contemporary play, to highlight its interdisciplinary character and to present the multifaceted reality of the playful society we are living in. To achieve this, the Conference forms a special setting for dialogue and experimentation where it brings together international experts from the field of game theory as well as artists and practitioners who embrace elements and signs of play and playfulness in their work and research activities.

So, what is play today and what about the player? The exhibition and conference can be understood as an examination of play as a vital element in our everyday life and as a speculation on the emergence of a Homo Ludens Ludens – the contemporary player of games.

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Exhibition Play Cultures

8 April 2008

Curator: Kristian Lukic
07.03 - 08.04.2008
Salon of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Belgrade

The exhibition “Play Cultures” is an international exhibition that presents contemporary artistic production that uses the language of digital games and shows one possible view of how the genre of digital games can be used in a creative and engaging way. The exhibition consists of standalone games, mods, video works, multiplayer games and interactive storytelling.

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JCI Damascus ends its year with a memorable dinner!

6 Dec 2007

On annual dinner 2007 the board of JCI (Junior Chamber International) decided to give Mr.RADWAN KASMIYA the prize of creative young entrepreneur award (CYEA) for his achievements and visionary projects, well congratulation boss, you deserve it! Can I get my allowance now?

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Quraish® to be shown on 'Dar Al HAYET'

7 October 2007

Quraish® to be shown on the back cover of the most respected and decent newspaper in the Arab world, 'Dar Al HAYET' means a lot for us. (Arabic)

Article link (.mht)
Article link (.htm)

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Quraish® game in Windows Magazine®

October 2007

another new review about Quraish® game in Windows Magazine®. (Arabic)

Article link (.jpg)

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Quraish® Review in LYBIA It magazine

August 2007

Quraish® Review in LYBIA It magazine. (Arabic)

Article link (.pdf)

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At Last, Quraish® is on Sale

22 August 2007

Next Monday 27th of August, will be the day to release Quraish® game "Golden Edition" in UK by our distributors "Books Plus" to all our devoted gamers, here you go guys, to arrive late is better than not showing at all!

P.S: please do not forget to run the update batch (version1.2.0) from here before playing the game.

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Omar Shamshoon Says D’oh

10 July 2007

Armed with pen and notebook, and reading a local English newspaper at the doorsteps of a hidden hostel in old Damascus.
That's how I met Richard; he would be the guy to spent 72 hours with him on a road trip through Syria.
That trip was an excuse for me and a project for rich, but I think that we both enjoyed it.
Richard poplack is trawling through the Muslim world to find how north American pop culture is engaging with our society, a very interesting topic indeed, he is profiling AfkarMedia projects as a quest, weather they are actions, reactions or something else, well, that what we will find upon releasing his book:
Omar Shamshoon Says D’oh!: Trawling the Muslim World for North American Pop-culture from Penguin Canada, good luck rich!


R.Kasmiya

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"BISLAN" our Junior Art Director:

22 May 2007

Emad Mirza, our Art director became a father again, he had clone himself for the second time, congratulation buddy, your older son "ASLAN" has a new brother now, by this rate, the MIRZA's are going to be majority in AfkarMedia soon, "BISLAN" looks smarter than his dad and I think he is aiming higher than him too, I'd better watch my back for he wants my job!


R.Kasmiya

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White Car, White sheep!

5 August 2007

Guys! check out my new car…egggghhh, those were the words of "Mustafa" our colleague before he was sucked out the company buy his pals from the 3D department and forced to give them a ride ( more than 10 persons all together), well the car survived the ride and it was Baptized, but as the custom states in such occasions he had to make a barbeque party for us, mm… Eventually he did it at the point of a gun, and we had a wonderful time consuming all that meat, sorry Mustafa, sorry vegetarians!


R.Kasmiya

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15 Years:

1 year competing in AfkarMedia yet he was promoted.
5 years driving helicopters in rough circumstances yet he was survived.
15 years of marriage yet he is still carrying on happily ever after.

All of AfkarMedia teams are saluting our oldest husband and wife Mr.and Mrs Abu-Zaid in their 15th marriage anniversary, congratulation guys!


R.Kasmiya

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We are celebrities now!

14 August 2007

Aljazeera, Number one news channel in middle-east is showing a good 6 minutes documentary about Us, and another 12 minutes of live debate, Yeahhhh, we are celebrities now, I'd better start negotiating my next raise.

First part
Second part
Third part

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Cool they didn't miss this time!

6 July 2007

Al-Arabiya, another major news channel is putting our game "Quraish" under the spot, cool they didn't miss this time.

Download link

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"UnderSiege" "political or not"

25 June 2007

France24 – the international French satellite channel, are running a reportage about our game, "UnderSiege" "political or not", however, here you go.

Download link

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I Hate JUDO!

8 June 2007

Well, what can I say, I HATE JUDO! and I wish that some body would make a law to forbid all violent sports, but hey… what can I do, I am living in a jungle of machos, the man with blue suit is my Sensei -sorry- Art Director, he didn't mention his obsession in his resume, but months later I started to notice that I was signing too many sick days off, mostly broken bones among our Art team, then it became a general phenomena, and when I tried to do something…###…

Well, the picture was taken by me during my attempt to make them stop, I was hanging upside-down from the ceiling.
The man to his left is my lead programmer, and the last one to the right is my Post Production manager.
P.S we are not responsible of the guy with the broken neck standing between them; in fact he is a prepaid practice bag.

R.Kasmiya

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Congratulation LUAI, you have just lost your freedom!

15 June 2007

AfkarMedia Team wishes all the best to LUAI MSUTI, our freehand designer, he is going to get married, congratulation.
Frankly we have a bad reputation in messing any party we intend to, so LUAI was hiding his engagement from us, actually he succeed to hide it for five months until our intelligence officer noticed the ring during our monthly picnic.

So all the best for him and for his charming Seniorita MSUTI (not showing in the above photo, the hairy guy is a new junior modeler, I can't even remember his name, however we promise you to post some of the wedding photos…well, if he stays focus and do not run in the last minute.

R.Kasmiya

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Invitation to Join the Geeks league :

26 June 2007

The guys at Software Industry Forum are calling us to join their league; at least they are recognizing game development companies as part of their software industry..Ok don’t push so hard, we are coming guys.

R.Kasmiya

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AL ARABIA Coverage, Nothing is perfect!

27 June 2007

http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2007/06/26/35907.html

AL – Arabia news channel, one of the major satellite news channel in the region, is running an article about our latest game "Quraish" on its home page 27 June 2007, and wow! It seems to be that page visits are rocketing…

Hmm.. I wouldn't complain much, the piece was very good, but as in many press articles, they have plenty of mistakes, and they are neglecting my feedbacks to fix them, anyway, here is what they are supposed to fix :

  • They forget to mention the developers "AfkarMedia" and the distributors "Dar Al-Fikr", ooooh that hurts.
  • They stated that we have the character of "khawla", which we don't.
  • They mentioned "UnderSiege" and stated that in level one the player have the chance to change the result of Hebron massacre by shooting Goldstein, which is totally nonsense, since all levels run as they were happened, the layer will witness, participate in the moods but certainly not change the fact that non of the prayers at that day was holding a gun, and the crowds have to attack that maniac by fire extinguisher to knock him down.

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In Videogames You Shoot Arabs or Aliens!

Abstract:

The interview with Radwan Kasmiya, an executive manager of the company Afkar Media, a Syrian studio producing political and other videogames. The interview was made in the company office in Damascus in May 2005, just before their release of a new videogame dealing with Palestinian Intifada ‘Tahta al-Hisar’ (Under the Siege). Vit Sisler - Charles University in Prague

Will it be possible for people in Europe to buy your games Tatha al-Hisar (Under the Siege) and Quraish?
Tahta al-Hisar will first be issued in the Near East only. In the Near East we have a network of distributors and we know how to advertise the product and such things, but we will have to conduct research for the market outside of the Near East. We want to get Tahta al-Hisar to Europe, because in European media the Palestinian question is often being presented from one point of view only and the other one is missing. With Quraish, we faced problems with the archaic Arabic, we didn’t have anyone who was able to translate it in a proper way, however, we eventually managed it somehow. But even if the game was in Arabic only, it is a success for us. The Arabs are not used to reading books, in general, less then other nations, they depend mainly on TV, movies, newspapers, magazines… and computer games. That is also one reason why we made a game about the history of Islam, Quraish.

I know that you do not like to talk about Tahta al-Ramad (Under the Ash) a lot, as it was your first game and you consider it dated, but I am interested in what the response of the public to it was?
The players of the game were Arabs only – Under the Ash was never translated. But in general, the players were really keen for the game, they looked at it with pride – do you know the term “Digital Dignity”? They saw that Under the Ash offers a true perspective. The player community is interested in games which offer a different point of view, whereas all the games here, like Delta Force, involve you shooting Arabic-speaking enemies… The Arabic players felt that something was wrong, after completing such a game you feel some bitterness, you feel like… like being guilty a bit, do you understand? That was the reason why Under the Ash was accepted so positively among them. It offers a different point of view and mainly the game is not about reverting to the usual scenario, the game is not about an Arabic-speaking hero shooting different-language-speaking enemies. Under the Ash had a story and it was not a simple action story. The game evokes emotions, I know some players who cried during this game. After completing the game you can’t separate the emotions, you feel something between joy and sadness. This game could ignite fire inside the players.

You have mentioned the Delta Force. Kim Ghattas, a BBC correspondent wrote about Afkar Media and she said that your games are a reaction to Delta Force and similar anti-Arab games. But you deny this…
Everybody understands the message of our games in a way they want to. Kim Ghattas wanted to comprehend this in a simple framework, but she did not realize that we come with brand new thinking. It is not a problem, it is just her view. I am happy that her article was printed, I believe in exchange of information. I have talked about in Delta Force or now in Spring Break Fallujah you are always playing an American soldier and your task is to accomplish a mission. But what is the mission? To “seek and clear” the terrorists, who are often being depicted as Arabs. In general, you shoot Arabs or aliens in recent videogames. In the States, according to the last elections, almost half of the nation do not agree with the politics in Iraq. I think that every society has its right to have its own opinion, but nobody has the right to deny the opinion of the other, but that is exactly what is happening now. The Americans in Iraq closed some channels, e.g. al-Jazeera, they even attacked their building and killed their reporter. There is information they want to publish and information they do not, and it is exactly the same in videogames. In the games from Kuma/War you play as strong and intrepid American soldiers who help the Iraqis to promote democracy. The American game companies reflect the American society as we reflect the Arabic society.

You have said that your games are not a reaction to Delta Force etc., but what is the main difference? In Tahta al-Hisar you are also playing a Palestinian killing Israeli soldiers…
You know, if you compare a Hollywood movie with a European one, the Hollywood one will be splendid and gorgeous, with exploding cars, helicopters and so on, but European movies are deeper. There is a similar distinction between our games and, say, Delta Force, I think. It was our aim to show what happens in Palestine behind politics, to show people stories and problems. The civilian, who takes a gun at the beginning of the game is killed by soldiers in the end, but he took the gun only for defense. I think that the main message, which we try to spread throughout the game, is that what happens in Palestine is a result of some problem, and we also offer an opinion on what the cause of that problem is by showing it. Before you can solve a problem you have to describe it and be aware of it, and we wrote a book about this problem with our game. We do not try to give an answer, we just present the topic, we can not change someone’s opinion by a videogame, but we can move the player to go and search for the answers on his own.

You raised an interesting point in that all the “heroes” who take a gun are killed sooner or later in the game…
In Tahta al-Hisar there are five main characters who represent archetypes of the Palestinian society. There is a lad who believes that he can change a world with a gun, there is another one who discover after some time that this is not possible and he starts to collaborate with the Israelis, he hopes that this will lead to a solution. There is Abu Himayn who observes everything from far, an old man who remembers how things used to be before and how they are now. And finally Ma’an, a schoolboy who sees his school always closed and the houses being demolished. With a group of his friends he used to throw stones at Israeli tanks until he is finally killed. I am afraid that exactly the thing which happens now – killing the youngest generation of the conflict – is killing the future of Palestine.

You have told to Kim Ghattas that you can not see a solution for Palestine, do you still think the same?
No society wants to live in a war, I believe in peace in Palestine, but I also believe in justice. If it should be strong and stable peace, it has to be just.

Tahta al-Hisar is based on reality, for example, a majority of the missions have real backgrounds, and that because of this reality the game is objective. However, the Israeli point of view seems to be completely missing. Moreover, all Israelis who you meet in the game are soldiers, you can see them only through the sniperscope or when you are hiding in front of them. Surely these elements of the game lead to a partiality? In reality not all the Israelis you can meet in Palestine are soldiers, what about the peace activist or just normal people… there is no evidence of them in the game.
I understand, you say that the game is biased… In such a topic objectivity is a slippery thing. I do not think a game or movie exists at all which could provide both points of view in a non-biased way. Even in books where the authors generally try more to achieve this state, objectivity is not fully possible. For me objectivity means that there is no lie in the game. To present both points of view is not possible even because of gameplay. Of course we know that Israeli society is not homogenous and their opinions vary. Israel is a democratic state with lots of trends and tendencies, many people do not agree with the official politics against Palestinians and many others think their politics should be even tougher. There are activists and fundamentalists, like elsewhere. For me, as an author of the story, the balance means absence of lies. In the name of balance I would not add a mission to the game in which you would as an Israeli soldier shoot Palestinians…

Of course not, but I am speaking about something different. In Tahta al-Hisar it is not possible for interaction with the Israelis. They are presented only as armed enemies, that creates a message which has nothing to do with gameplay.
First off, there are not only soldiers, you will meet even Israeli civilians there, they freely wander around in some missions. Not like main characters, but you can not open fire on them, that is quite a clear message, isn’t it? If you are in a cross-fire with soldiers and you harm a civilian you lose the game. So, this message is included in Tahta al-Hisar, although not in a direct way. [1] And there is a second thing, in the reality there is a green line between the citizens which Palestinians can not cross and even the Israelis do not cross it. There is in fact racial segregation. If Palestinians and Israelis demonstrate alongside the line there are soldiers between them and each group demonstrates with a different aim, against Israeli politics. People in Gaza demonstrate because they want to live, Israeli activists demonstrate because they do not agree with the government politics. I can not add something to the game what does not exist in reality. Beside that, we tell a story, we do not search a justification for one or other side of the conflict.

The opening mission of the game involves Baruch Goldstein - aren’t you afraid using such a topic in a computer game? What about the feelings of those whose relatives died there? Aren’t you afraid of their reactions? In European context such utilization would be considered as non-ethical…
The Arab society is different in this point. The concept of personal freedom and personal rights varies in the Middle East from Europe or America. In Europe it could be seen that the utilization of victims in game is non-ethical. People would consider it as making money from sacrifice and blood of their relatives. By the way, we will not profit from Tahta al-Hisar, we will just pay back the development – you know, what are Arab software markets are like. People often regard us as someone who helps in making sure that their relatives would not be forgotten. Once a woman called me, she cried and told me that what we depicted in our game had happened in reality to their relatives, their kids. She wanted to thank me that they will not be forgotten.

While we are talking about the reactions of the game’s players, I have seen in the strategy game you are working on, the Quarish, that there is one mission, the Besiege of Medina, where the player represents a chieftain of a Bedouin tribe. He has got an option to accept Islam and take the side of the Prophet or not, and attack Medina. But, if he won, he would in fact endanger the spreading of Islam. Aren’t you afraid of the reaction of orthodox believers?
Of course, not all people would agree with this game, but I think there will be few. Our task is to persuade them. I don’t want to encourage any fanaticism, but I understand my society and I know the way in which people think. It is true, that if you present what have you told me in the very same way to them, you would see very strong and exaggerated reactions. But we deal with them in a different way, if they play our game they will understand what it is about and what is behind it. The game maps real history of Islam, if someone could not accept this history it is just their problem. Through Quarish we want to present the real history of Islam without sensations and myths. In this point we challenge two different things, the negative stereotypes of the West and our own superstitions.

The web page of Afkar Media declares that your aim is to “address Muslims and Arabs in a way respecting their cultural heritage to help them to feel equal to other nations so that they can develop into a civilization which will enrich the surrounding world and not only take from it.” [2] Isn’t that too much of an overestimated aim for a videogame company?
There is one English proverb: “If you aim, aim high.” You have to have something like that in Czech also. It is not our aim to sell one or ten thousands or million copies of our game… Really not. Our aim is to contribute to the balance of cultures. We respect other cultures and civilizations, but in society, in which we live, there exists certain ignorance. I know that my society doesn’t understand the West correctly and I also know that the West doesn’t understand us correctly. We are trying to build a bridge, advantageous for both sides. We are trying to break the stereotype models of thinking on both sides, when the West is for Muslims being presented by Britney Spears and our culture is for the West is being presented by Osama Bin Laden. This aim is broad and long-term, it is more about approach and certain philosophy…

In the world there is now a movement in general towards the production of persuasive videogames with political aims. In Russia or China the governments spend a lot of money to strengthen the national identity in youth population, even through videogames. What do you think about it?
Beware, this certainly is not our aim, to strengthen national identity among Arabs or religious identity among Muslims and to determine ourselves in this way against the others. To strengthen identity in such way leads only to increasing tensions among people. The same thing is to describe current conflicts as the war of religions or cultures. Regrettably, that is exactly what the American media is doing. The whole thing started in America in the Cold War, the bad guys in movies were Russians or spoke Russian. Now the Americans are even increasing the doses on these stereotypes.

You have played al-Quwwa al-Khasa, [3] what do you think about this game?
Of course everyone has the right to produce a game according to his own beliefs, but for me it is an error to make a game literal with a clear political message, but we have an open market and we have to share it. We always try to coin the idea of equality. I am well aware of racism and over-exaggerated national self-identification. What I want to add is that in every place there are people who seek understanding, dialogue. That is what we are seeking, but the conditions in which we work are really hard. We try to be sincere in our work, we do not work for money, not at all. We are not financed by anyone and we do not want to be, we want to keep our independence. I believe that in every society there are people like us, who try to act in positive way.

Published as: Sisler, Vit. In Videogames You Shoot Arabs or Aliens – Interview with Radwan Kasmiya. Umelec/ International, 2006, vol. 10, No. 1, p. 77-81. ISSN 1212-9550. (The interview was published together with a critical examination of recent videogames made by Afkar Media: Sisler, Vit. Digital Intifada. Umelec/ International, 2006, vol. 10, No. 1, p. 77-81. ISSN 1212-9550.)

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Our Rally Sub-Marshall

Along with his JUDO features, our Post Production Manager Mr. Muhannad ASADI is a rally sniffer! yes you read it right, although he claims that he works as rally sub-marshal in every goddamn rally in this country, rumors said that he is addicted to burning Octane, otherwise why he would spend fourteen hours (non paid) in the desert waiting for racing cars to sign there check points?
In fact we couldn't find anything else to rationalize his hobby, until we receive this picture….Yes guys, it is for the chicks.

R.Kasmiya

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