EA to install SimCity on every OLPC computer
OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) is a non-profit initiative which aims to give every child in the world access to modern education. The humanitarian organisation has already created the $100 laptop, or XO-1, to distribute to third world countries, and now each one of those laptops will come with a pre-installed copy of the original SimCity.
Electronic Arts has decided to donate the original SimCity game to the organisation, and hope that the educational and creative aspects of the game will work well to compliment the aims of the initiative.
Steve Seabolt, vice president of global brand development for The Sims Label explained:
“SimCity is entertainment that’s unintentionally educational. Players learn to use limited resources to build and customize their cities. There are choices and consequences, but in the end, it’s a creativity tool that’s only limited by the player’s imagination.”
“The game should prove to be an incredibly effective way of making the laptop relevant, engaging, and fun, particularly for first time players. We are thrilled to be making this contribution to OLPC to help meet their goal of educating the children of the world.”
The XO-1 laptops will now be distributed to schools in countries such as Uruguay, Peru, Mexico, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Haiti, Cambodia and India. As well as SimCity, they will come with wi-fi functionality and open-source office applications to give the recipients a basic working computer.
I think this a great idea, and a nice gesture from EA, which may encourage other big companies to donate money or resources to the OLPC initiative.
If I was to choose a game to be included on the machine, this would probably be it. It’s educational, open ended, entertaining, and helps kids learn about a wide number of important topics, without blocking creativity.
My only doubt would be letting too many of these games get a place on the system, as that would just lead to the laptops being pre-installed with so much bloatware, there wouldn’t be any room left for the kids to express themselves. EA might have started a trend but I think OLPC need to be careful how far they let the trend develop.
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