Do you want to hear a joke about communism? Communism.
That out of the way, political satire is not a very common topic in games. In fact, I can't think of that many games that are either overly political or very satirical towards politics in general, as games tend to take a lot of time time to create, so any attempt towards topical politics might get lost in time. Of course, there are jabs towards politics here and there and some games do revolve around some thematic of fantasy politics, but most of the genuine attempts in exploring a game setting from a political perspective are rare. Irony Curtain is a good example of how a political satire can actually work as a game.
Evan Kovalsky is a bright-eyed and ideological journalist, who adores the communistic nation of Matryoshka, lead towards its glorious future by a Stalinistic leader. Despite people of the capitalistic States keep ridiculing Evan, he maintains his views of the communistic utopia, which provides to its people and the world an example worth following.
After attending a public debate about communism, Evan is contacted by Anna, an agent from Matryoshka, who invites him to the land of his dreams. After escaping the central intelligence agents, Evan finally ends in a plane, that takes him to Matryoshka, where his final real contact with the country is a tremendous amount of pointless, ineffective bureaucracy for the sake of bureaucracy that happens before he can even get his hotel room.
When Evan finally manages to level the hotel, he witnesses how the planned economics has failed the people of the country. Everywhere he looks, he sees lines of people waiting to get their daily rations and how the stores yaw empty. From behind the palace walls, a continuous volley of shots echoes as the sign of the state machine removing the voices of dissidents.
Nothing about Matryoshka is like the overflowing propaganda has described it. The oppressed people try to go through their existence without rocking the boat too much, as that would take them to either prison or get them executed. The glorious architecture is mostly smoke and mirrors meant to portray greatness that doesn't exist to the people or at all, really.
Meeting with a great leader isn't much better. Instead of a loving and loved man, Evan meets a ruthless dictator, who sits on his throne behind the fortressed walls, effortlessly ordering executions of anyone who might pose a threat to his power.
Artifex Mundi is better known for its hidden object games, so I was genuinely surprised to see a genuine point-and-click adventure from them. While their hidden object games do have adventure elements in them, the main focus of the genre is solving puzzles that have nothing to do with the story itself, as the puzzles are what the games are all about. With Irony Curtain they do prove, that a more traditional point-and-click game, well made at that, isn't out of the reach for them either.
Irony Curtain has all the trappings you'd expect a point-and-click adventure to have: dialogue puzzles, inventory puzzles, a solid story, puzzle design driven by the narrative, nice looking art, and well-done animation, soundtrack, and voice acting.
I must admit, I wasn't expecting much, but the aesthetically a bit Deponia-looking Irony Curtain was a very pleasant surprise. It's a well-made game with a subject matter that is rarely explored in games. I'd happily recommend it to any fan of the genre, even if you aren't necessarily that interested in portrayals of politics in games.
Hardened, soulless capitalists can get Irony Curtain from GOG and Steam. It's also available for consoles and communists will be happy to learn it runs on Linux as well. I just don't know if it's included in the upcoming Five Year Plan.
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