The Trolley Problem Problem by Damon L. Wakes profile 2023

About the Story

Created for Single Choice Jam.

I actually had the idea for The Trolley Problem Problem several years ago - apparently in 2019 - and even got as far as writing the first two passages (though not a single word of those appears in this jam game). The trolley problem - and especially the variants that get into "What if you could push someone else in front of the tram to stop it?"- has always struck me as kind of a weird question to put to people because in practice you would never be able to think through that kind of choice under those circumstances. I mean, even if I were 100% okay with throwing one person under a tram to save five others in principle, I'd never actually do it because I couldn't possibly know with any degree of certainty that it would work in the first place. You just don't know what will happen.

So there you have it. That's pretty much the idea behind this single-choice game!

Game Details