Serious Games Source checks in with Chris Chambers, Deputy Director of the Army Games Project, who offers his thoughts on the successes of America's Army so far. Some quotes from Chambers:
On America's Army's goals:
The Army started this project as a means of connecting with America, using pop culture as the medium. Originally, the mission focused entirely on the successful development and launch of the PC game product alone. Today, the brand has been extended into a variety of additional products, all of which establish new touchpoints with young people.
Embedded in the original mission was a concept that continues to drive the project still, namely to create an opportunity to provide young adults and their influencers with virtual insights into the range of Soldier experiences. The game uses online technology to place a great deal of information about the Army into a voluntarily consumed popular culture medium and thereby reduces the information search and assimilation costs for information seekers...Since its launch, the game has placed Soldiering front-and-center within popular culture.
On the game's global reach:
Clearly, the internet is a global forum. So, internet based games are also global, causing us to always factor in the potential messaging implications involved with foreign audiences. When foreign gamers play America’s Army, they see that American Soldiers operate within a value-laden organization. This aspect of the Army message is very important for global, as well as national, strategic communications purposes.
In other news:
ABC News (April 2006): Army Guard, Reserve Recruiting Falls Short:"All of the active duty services met their goals last month, including the Army, which is heading into some of the most challenging recruitment months of the year. That is in part because the Army lowered its goals for the first months of this year from levels of a year ago."
ABC News (July 2006): Army on Course to Meet Recruitment Goals: "Pentagon officials attribute the turnaround this year to the presence of more recruiters and more financial incentives. An additional reason for the Army's success so far has been the lowering of monthly goals for most of the recruiting year and the signficant increase in the monthly goals for the summer months, which have historically proven to be the most successful recruiting period."
Christian Science Monitor (July 2006): Army upbeat on recruitment numbers: "Army officials attribute the turnaround to 1,000 additional recruiters on the street and bigger bonuses for new enlistees. But critics contend that the Army has also begun to lower its standards, letting in less-qualified recruits as well as gang members and extremists."
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