Harpooned is an arcade "game" made by Conor O'Kane. It was developed using the Torque Game Builder system. The purpose of this game is not to entertain, but to "inform" or, in other words, just to be an activist tool. The game is labeled as a Japanese Cetacean Research Simulator. You take the role of a Japanese whaler ship in the Antarctica, with the objective to hunt whales for research purposes. Each whale has a specific amount of health. Once you have shot it enough, it will disintegrate into pieces of meat you can pick up. These pieces are later unloaded into a research trip and you get the results of the research in terms of hamburgers, research papers and other sarcastic objects. The obstacles you have are icebergs and protesters getting in your way. It is obvious that the game is used as an activist tool to bring awareness about the whaling activities in Japan. As Japanese said, their whaling activities are for research purposes, but activists say they are to keep the whaling industry alive. As with many activist's protests, the game lacks real content. As a game, it is too easy to play and it is even entertaining, which is not the purpose of the game. As an activist tool, it lacks the main thing - information. There is no factual information on Japan's whaling activities, whaling in general or even why would someone protest against whaling. As such, this is a misinformatiing tool rather than informative one. As a game, its a good arcade game with the objective of killing whales. For whaling information, you better get some serious research, because you won't find anything but sarcasm here.
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