KY™ (Kanwar Yatra™), let the gaming begin

Gaming has come a long way since we called it ‘playing video games’. But the distance that has been cut down to zero is the one between the various points along the Ganga and Shiv temples in towns and villages in states that have banned the kanwar yatra this year because of fears of spreading Covid- 19. One standard complaint one hears about India, the great IT giant, is that it’s all head and no heart — maximum coding and geekwork, minimum original content and imagination, as so many desi names on the credits-roll at the end of big-ticket foreign animation films attest. So, how about this? Create a game, KY™ — Kanwar Yatra™ — that has gamers go on an arduous trek, while overcoming challenges and obstacles? A new lot of kanwarias, not to mention quite a few disappointed by this year’s cancellation, can find The Way.

Games like Gris, Halo and Sky: Children of the Light are classic adventure-journey classics. As is the kanwar yatra. True, some woke folks won’t like religion mixed with VR/AR. But let’s just say the market of ardent Shiv bhakts who are smartphone users, and of smartphone bhakts who like making the annual trek as a kind of alternate biker-hiker adventure journey, is ready. Points for social distancing, gathering clean gangajal, etc, can be incorporated. All we now need are imaginative game creators to bring us KY™. Bam Bholè!