I'm all for videogames tackling serious issues. Especially political issues. If movies, television, and songs can do it, why not videogames?

The problem is doing it well. One game that seems well on its way to not doing it well is Rendition: Guantanamo, in development at a Scottish studio called T-Enterprise. Their take on the prison at Guantanamo Bay is that it's a place for mad scientists to do experiments on human subjects. And since the developers are worried about an action game in which US soldiers are the enemies the player has to kill, the game will take place after the current day Guantanamo has been somehow turned over to indeterminate mercenaries. It all sounds rather goofy and about as politically relevant as Resident Evil.

So it's a bit surprising that former detainee Moazzam Begg is lending the project his name. Mr. Begg was a British national living in Afghanistan with his family during the 9/11 attacks. When US forces moved into Afghanistan, he fled to Pakistan where he was seized by the CIA. A year later, he was transferred to Guantanamo, where he remained for three years. In 2005, he was returned to England and released without charges. He has since been an outspoken critic of US and British policy towards detainees. And now he's essentially shilling a videogame about mad scientists. He's also lending the game his likeness, some voicework, and even a little level design. T-Enterprise director Zarrar Chishti told the blog Deadline Scotland:

We approached Moazzam because it's very hard for us to know how to design the layout of the prison and he helped.

Begg himself told Deadline Scotland the game "will not demean the reality of Guantanamo but it could bring those issues to people who would not usually think about it". But given that it's set in some fictional Guantanamo run by mercenaries on behalf of mad scientists, I'm not convinced it'll make anyone think anything about Guantanamo that's even the least bit relevant to the actual political issues.

In other words, move over Blacksite: Area 51 and Six Days in Fallujah. You're about to get some company.

(Thanks Game Politics.)