Not For Broadcast review: a slapstick TV management simulator

Dunno if you’ve noticed, but there’s been a whole lot of news lately. Too much news in fact. Growing up, we barely had any news. There was just one bit of news that we’d all have to share. A man would drive around our village with the news in the back of his van, and we’d all come out of our houses to watch as he slid open the doors and pointed at it, saying “well, here is the news”. And it was the same news, every day. The news about the hole in the ozone layer. And it was all the news we needed.

Not For Broadcast puts you in charge of all of the news. Set in an alternate timeline 1980s Britain in which an authoritarian far-left party has swept to power on a wave of populist policies, it casts the player as the lens through which the nation will view its new government. Seated in front of a bank of glowing screens, sliders and controls, you have the enviable power to switch between four live camera feeds, bleep out naughty words (and later subversive opinion), choose which ads to run during the break, and select which images are highlighted on screen during each news story.

Read more