The first time I visited the Kickstarter page for That Dragon, Cancer, I was a mess. Ever try not crying in front of four coworkers aged 23 to 31? If you could hold back then you would do better than I did. As a father of two beautiful boys (which have had their share of hospital visits), I connected at a parental level with That Dragon, Cancer before ever even playing it.
It was the polygonal images of a small child hooked up to wires.
The harsh green tubes feeding into him as he lay on his dad's chest and shoulder.
The soundtrack that gives me goosebumps as I look at these images.
And also the hopeful gifs of a toddler going down a slide, or the joy he gets from even feeding a duck.
And knowing that this is an interpretation of actual events, the story of a small child's four-year struggle with a very aggressive brain cancer and the experiences that came with it, is all that more heartbreaking.
The child, Joel, is no longer with us, and this game is how his parents, Ryan and Amy Green, have chosen to honor him and his memory.
With That Dragon, Cancer garnering such a strong emotional response out of me, I wanted to show my wife the Kickstarter video. She doesn't play video games, but cries and gets worked up easier than I do — especially when it involves children. As I thought, she cried. And she said it looks incredibly sad. And that she wouldn't be able to play it or watch it.
But she also said to me "I don't understand how this is a game."
Fair point. There's no high scores. No bad guys to defeat. You won't be saving the princess or collecting gold rings or getting to the finish line before the time runs out. Instead, I told her to look at it as more of an experience. By definition, it is a video game. Oxford Dictionaries define video game as "a game played by electronically manipulating images produced by a computer program on a television screen or other display screen." That Dragon, Cancer meets the criteria, albeit unconventionally.
But this is more about experiencing a story with interaction — putting you in the driver's seat of this family's drama as they are helpless while doing everything they can to save their son. They describe it best on their website:
That Dragon, Cancer is an adventure game that acts as a living painting; a poem; an interactive retelling of Ryan and Amy Green’s experience raising their son Joel, a 4-year-old currently fighting his third year of terminal cancer. Players relive memories, share heartache, and discover the overwhelming hope that can be found in the face of death.
The Kickstarter states, "The objective of the player is not to solve problems, but simply to be present in each moment."
I've never written about something I've backed on Kickstarter. I'm torn on what to do now. I want to support this game, mainly because I want to play it. I don't want to review it for work, and I don't believe it should it be a video game that you assign a score to. Who am I to score what a family went through? I want to play it to show support to other parents that went through the most difficult thing parents can go through — the loss of a child. While the $30 I pledge would be another $30 toward their $85,000 goal, it would be more helpful if I help share their game so readers can learn about it, and make their own decision on whether to pledge money to it or not.
That Dragon, Cancer is roughly $29,000 away from its goal with 23 days left. If anything, visit the page and/or watch the Kickstarter video above to learn about this game and its story.
That Dragon, Cancer Kickstarter
