Strategy games keep giving players the most depressing insights into real-world politics and economics

gamesradar.com:

As much handwringing as has been done over the idea of 'politics in video games' over the years, one thing's for sure: strategy games have never shied away from the topic. Politics - that is, the activities of state - are integral to any game about running a government, and everywhere from Victoria 3 to Dwarf Fortress, players keep finding themselves learning accidental, often depressing lessons about the political and economic systems that govern the real world.

A quick glance at any discussion forum for a government-focused strategy game will show you a bunch of thread titles that would be just as appropriate as headers in an anti-capitalist pamphlet. For example, from the Victoria 3 subreddit (opens in new tab): "If your economy is laissez faire, continually staying in small wars really helps out."

In Victoria 3, you choose one of over 100 countries from the 19th and early 20th century and guide its government over the course of that historical time period. Naturally, that means choosing the direction of foreign and domestic policy. With all the other nations getting simulated, it's likely that a major war will break out at some point, and that means you're going to need a well-equipped military. But your nation can't just keep local military suppliers afloat while waiting for Franz Ferdinand to get assassinated. What's a nation's leader to do?

Well, as it turns out, forever wars are an extremely convenient way to support the kind of bloated military-industrial complex you need to be prepared to participate in a global armed conflict. You just need to "join small wars against impoverished nations overseas that present no threat," as the post linked above notes. "As long as your infamy level stays low enough you don't