'#WarGames' Is a Unique, Interactive Revival of the '80s Movie

The FMV videogame emerged in the late 1980s, and then died an ignoble death in the early 1990s. But in the past few years the genre has gotten a small, unlikely revival--one that unlocks its potential in a way the first wave never did. Indeed, what's emerged now is something very different, a format more playful and more thoughtful than anything that surfaced back then. Created by Sam Barlow, an FMV pioneer and the developer behind 2015's mystifying Her Story, the game stars completely unknown talent and is just as odd, and just as promising, as you would expect. In #WarGames, which you can stream online, Kelly's mother is a soldier killed in the line of duty, inspiring Kelly and a fellow group of hackers to engage in a crusade that takes them up against the military industrial complex, ensnaring them in a sprawling conspiracy world that ranges from broadcast news to drone warfare.