Video Games as Participatory Playgrounds for Civic Imaginations on War: The Case of Laika: Aged Through Blood

This paper examines how video games can function as participatory spaces for processing and reimagining war, using the indie action game Laika: Aged Through Blood (Brainwash Gang, 2023) as its central case study. Its central argument is that Laika's whimsical fictional and visual design, which features anthropomorphized animals, a fictional settlement, and a vaguely post-apocalyptic setting, allows it to engage seriously with the trauma of armed conflict while avoiding the exploitative spectacle common in mainstream war games. The authors draw on close readings of the game and its surrounding texts, situating it within the history of war representation in games and within research on colonial violence and everyday life under conflict.

The analysis highlights how Laika's narrative opens with the brutal killing of a child, shifting the tone from play to trauma, and follows a protagonist pursuing vengeance against an imperial force building war machines. The authors argue that the game balances this darkness with depictions of everyday persistence, including family bonds, community culture, and peaceful life that endures despite occupation. Positioned on the periphery of the commercial market, Laika contrasts with mainstream titles that tend to reproduce World War II scenarios or Western-versus-"barbaric" framings, and with photorealistic or referential depictions of ongoing conflicts. The paper contends that its focus on small communities rather than top-down strategy invites players to connect the game with real-world wars, including those in Ukraine and Palestine during late 2023 and early 2024.

The study is a qualitative, interpretive case study rather than a quantitative survey, and it draws on textual analysis of the game, its official description, and a substantial body of scholarship on war games, activism, and civic imagination. Its scope is conceptual and theoretical, with no player sample or empirical data on audience reception. The authors position Laika as an example of how games can support anti-war critical thinking, activism, and shared political language, while acknowledging that the game's timeliness may be partly coincidental to its development.