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Thursday, March 28, 2024

A refugee develops a video game with a message

Duration: 02:03s 0 shares 5 views

A refugee develops a video game with a message
A refugee develops a video game with a message

The goal of Lual Mayen's video game is to survive the horrific ordeal of a refugee, an experience that his family knows well.

Freddie Joyner has more.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) LUAL MAYEN, CEO OF JUNUB GAMES, SAYING: "Video games are the tool we can use to change the world.

There's no question on that.” Lual Mayen is not your typical game developer.

The South Soudanese refugee was born 25 years ago as his family traveled 250 miles to escape the country’s second civil war.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) LUAL MAYEN, CEO OF JUNUB GAMES, SAYING: "It was a hard journey.

It's not a journey that - where you wake up in the morning and say I'm living what I love.

No.

It was a journey of life and death." Growing up in a refugee camp, Mayen never even saw a computer, until one day, at age 12, he reported to the camp's registration center.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) LUAL MAYEN, CEO OF JUNUB GAMES, SAYING: “...they were registering refugees, and they brought, like, people from developed countries to come and, like, enter your data on the computers.

It was a moment that actually helped me to understand, wow, I want to use this one day.

I don't know what it's going to take me, but I want to use something like that." For the next three years, his mother worked tirelessly to stash away $300 to buy him a laptop, which he now keeps in a glass display case in his apartment.

Eventually he developed a mobile game titled “Salaam” - an Arabic greeting meaning peace - that would put players in the shoes of a refugee, giving players a better understanding of what it means to be homeless, hungry and on the run.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) LUAL MAYEN, CEO OF JUNUB GAMES, SAYING: “...I was like, how about I create game for peace and conflict resolution?

How about I create game that can help people understand empathy or resolve conflict, like peace-building and education?

Like - that's the moment I had the inspiration to start making video game." His game went viral after he uploaded it to Facebook and caught the attention of the gaming industry.

In 2018, he was named a Global Gaming Citizen at the Game Awards in Los Angeles.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) LUAL MAYEN, CEO OF JUNUB GAMES, SAYING: "To see something I started in a refugee camp - ending up as an African independent game designer - to be able to, like, represent the continent and represent the game for social impact, it gives me so much hope.

And it gives me - it gives more refugees hope."

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