No Colony for colonisers
You might remember 2021's Umurangi Generation, developed by Māori studio Origame Digital. It placed its focus on its first-person photography system as much as its very direct anti-colonial and anti-neoliberal criticism, stemming partly from the Australian government's mishandling of COVID and the bushfires that spread across the country in 2020. Origame's second game, the newly-released Penguin Colony, is just as direct in its anti-colonial theming, with its target being the ongoing Palestinian genocide by Israel, and the games industry at large for its silence.
Penguin Colony is, to boil it down to its simplest nature, a sort of walking simulator in which your playable penguins take a trip through an Antarctic consumed by Lovecraftian nightmares, in a riff on At the Mountains of Madness. It also reframes the academic explorers of Lovecraft's story as German and British Nazi occultists, while celebrating Māori culture and survival, opening with Aboriginal land acknowledgements and noting that the game itself was made on Wurundjeri Woiwurrung land.
What it closes with, though, is the most overt statement on BDS and the Palestinian genocide by a game developer since...well, last week, when House House explained why they're not selling Big Walk on Xbox. Following Penguin Colony's credits, the following message appears:
'The cowardice of the Games Industry during the ongoing genocide of Palestine by Israel will be recorded by the art it makes.'
Also, the game is not, and will not be for sale in Israel (and presumably on Xbox), a member of publishers Fellow Traveler explaining on Steam being that 'In the absence of more organised sanctions, this act is intended to demonstrate solidarity with Palestine. We fully support their decision.'
The ongoing Palestinian genocide is an atrocity which is gradually being recognised as such by more than just those who've been screaming about it for years. Yet, many in games development and games media are unwilling to comment on its reality or join the BDS boycott of Xbox and Microsoft, which BDS have identified as a priority target due to Microsoft's complicity in its ties to the Israeli military through the technology it provides.
Origame Digital making a statement so clear means something. It meant something when House House did it, it meant something when the Game Awards' Future Class wrote an open letter calling for recognition of the genocide and were ignored (and later abandoned entirely). It means something when you and those around you do not support Microsoft and are loud about the boycott, let alone not supporting the corporation while it destroys Xbox and the livelihoods of thousands through insatiable greed.
As Origame developer Naphtali Faluklner says in this Bluesky post regarding Penguin Colony not being sold in Israel: "Everyone should do this. Ask your favorite devs to do this. See how they respond."