BRISTOL, UK DECEMBER 18th, 2012: GameTheNews.net, the team turning news into games have released their latest offerings; ' My Cotton Picking Life' a game about the cruelty of child labor in Uzbekistan. The game puts the player in the role of a cotton-picker in the former Soviet state of Uzbekistan, where vast amounts of men, women and children are forced into picking cotton for the enrichment of the regime and to supply cheap material that ends up on the shelves of western stores. The game's designer, Tomas Rawlings remarked, “The game replicates the monotony of the work these children have to do – we challenge the player to see how long they can last as a cotton picker and point out that while they can quit at any time, those forced into doing this sort of work don't have that luxury.”

The game is free and available now on the  Google Playstor e and on their website at  http://bit.ly/mycottonpickinglife

The game took only a day to create and continues the developers direction of making games that target difficult issues, their previous game being an exploration of the Syrian conflict titled, ' Endgame Syria'. Both projects were created using  GameMaker Studio development technology. Game the News is supported by the  University of Abertay Dundee's Prototype Fund with additional help from the  Pervasive Media Studio in Bristol.

About:

GameTheNews is a project by digital development and consultancy studio Auroch Digital, based in Bristol, UK. The project is exploring how games can be developed from news stories. They have produced a number of games before this one on a variety of topics such as the US elections and solar power. The existing GameTheNews games can be found on Wired and the Huffington Post –  see here for more information.