Starvard
Why do we trust each other?
A playable story about why trust grows, and why it breaks.
Nicky Case built a short game that asks a big question: why do people trust each other, and why does that trust sometimes fall apart? You play simple rounds of give and take against characters with different habits, some kind, some sly, some forgiving.
Bit by bit the game shows how trust grows, and what makes it crumble. It takes about half an hour, and it may change how you think about your own neighbourhood.
The game itself, embedded from ncase.me. Released under CC0 by its maker.
Open The Evolution of Trust on its own site
Try this first
Play it in one sitting, about half an hour, and do not skip the sandbox at the end. The characters you meet early come back later with longer memories, and that is where the real lesson hides.
Good to know
Made by Nicky Case and released under CC0, public domain in spirit, so anyone may embed or share it. It runs in any modern browser and asks for nothing but your attention.
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Treasures are wonderful free things made by other people. Starvard gathers them with admiration; the credit is all theirs.