C-Shock: Game designed for Indians traveling abroad

C-Shock: Game designed for Indians traveling abroad

Nipan Maniar has created a mobile phone game named C-Shock. The game is targeted at students traveling from traditional societies to UK where it is hard for them to adjust with the entirely different culture.

Maniar himself came from landed in Britain from India. He says that the game could as an “e-mother” for new arrivals.

Maniar further said: “I came here as a student back in 2000. It was my first trip out of my country, the first time I had left my family. There was no-one I knew, I was in an alien world where people react differently and the whole culture is different. One of the first things I saw was a couple kissing in public — I had never seen anything like this live before. The whole thing was a complete shock. It would have made my life so much easier if I had been introduced to these things in India through some kind of game.”

The game itself follows a student who has just landed in Britain for the first time. The aim for the gamer is to reduce the character’s “culture shock” rating from a default of 100 to zero. He can do so by performing a series of tasks involving culture shock-inducing incidents and images.

Maniar added: “The whole culture of students here is to enjoy life. The three main characteristics as far as I can see are drink, roaming around the world, and sex. But for me as an Indian those are the last things I would think of. For me the focus is education, degree, job…”