Many people believe the Republican Party has a fairly good shot of taking back the US Senate this November. But to help advance that cause, the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) — or one of its interns, probably — just launched a new game called Mission Majority. You play as Giopi (get it?), a pixelated elephant who looks like he belongs in the good 'ole 16-bit era, but is instead doing his best to persevere in a modern world.
Giopi says he's a hopeful GOP volunteer just trying to cut through the "red tape and regulations" standing between Republicans and a Senate majority that would help the right push its legislative agenda. Throughout the run-and-jump platformer, you'll have to overcome "job-destroying taxers" and other foes who represent President Obama, Senate majority leader Harry Reid, and basically everything Democrats stand for.
Sadly we couldn't try the game firsthand. We gave it a valiant effort, but Giopi's adventure is totally broken. Once you sign in with Facebook, Google+, or your email account (prepare for endless GOP email blasts leading to the midterms this fall), Mission Majority just kind of stalls and sits there like this:
Whoops. Software engineer / artist Cole Ott has one theory on what's so wrong with the GOP's web browser game.
…is, it seems, that they're ignoring problems caused by [I kid you not] Race Conditions
— Cole Ott (@coleott) August 27, 2014
(for real. if you have a null pointer on page-load, there's a good chance it's a problem with race conditions. I died when I saw that)
— Cole Ott (@coleott) August 27, 2014
So it would seem the Republican Party isn't very good at making video games. Advertising in popular games young people actually play might be a better idea. Then again, the White House has come up short on much more important web-related projects, so maybe everybody loses. It doesn't matter anyway, since Mission Majority is little more than a cute attempt to round up email addresses so the NRSC can fill up your inbox with its talking points. Good luck with that, Giopi.