Download it here!

What better way to celebrate April Fools' Day 2021 than by releasing a long-canned project about the 2016 U.S. presidential election? Ya know, the one with Donald J. Trump and Hillary Rodham Clinton (and Gary Johnson and Jill Stein and Evan McMullin and Bernie Sanders and Faith Spotted Eagle!).

Way back in 2016, Pokemon Go was all the rage - and so was the election! I toyed with the idea of making another political game for 2016, but I was starting my first semester of grad school, and I just didn't have the time or willpower to code the project I designed.

Fast forward four and a half years... Lots of "interesting" political things happened! Not to mention a global pandemic that gave me more time to catch up on weird incomplete things. So I decided to open up the .GMK I started in 2016 and finish it! This game pretty much matches the vision I originally had for the game - it's a parody of Pokemon Go, except there are Politicalmon instead of Pokemon! It wouldn't be hard to make a 2020 version of the game (just replace HRC with Biden, and add a few new Politicalmon), but I doubt anyone is begging for that any more than they're begging for a game about an election that happened over four years ago!

Everything you do in this game involves clicking or dragging things with your mouse, or else using Enter, Spacebar, or the arrow keys. The game ends once you get 270 or more electoral votes.

Note that Maine and Nebraska are treated as "winner take all" states - in contrast to real life. There are also no "faithless electors" in this game, so you won't be competing against folks like Colin Powell and Faith Spotted Eagle.

Obviously, this game contains plenty of things that some people might find offensive! Steer well clear of this if you don't like politics - or a heaping cup of political satire.

[7/3 Edit: Made the link work better.]

Oh hey, I remember talking to you about this.

There's the makings of something fairly funny here. Shame you didn't get around to finishing it, but I'm glad we could see it in some fashion.

Yeah, I had some fun finishing this!

This is very close to my original vision for the project, although I ended up simplifying a couple of mechanics. For example, I contemplated having certain Politicalmon being stronger in certain states or when battling certain opponents. I also thought about having a couple of "evil" Politicalmon - if you made the mistake of catching them, they'd make some of your other Politicalmon disappear from your party! I simplified both ideas, and now different Politicalmon are consistently stronger than others in all situations.