In the last ten years, gaming has emerged as one of the most efficient youth-appealing alternative propaganda to the canonical Salafi-jihadi audiovisual material, with particular respect to the Islamic State (IS) communicative flow.

Considering the entirety of the Salafi-jihadi ecosystem, gaming does not appear to be a new entry into the communicative sphere of jihadi groups. Conversely, video games – and later gaming platforms – have become a significant tool functional to the dissemination of Salafi-Jihadi propaganda and its consequent narratives and ideology. For instance, in 2006 AQ introduced the first First-Person Shooter (FPS) video game named “Quest for Saddam (2003)” followed by the Global Islamic Media Front (GIMF) production “Quest for Bush.” The latter AQ-related game was later readapted in “Night of Bush Capturing: A Virtual Jihadi (2008)” by the Iraqi American artist Wafaa Bilal, where the player had the role of a suicide bomber with the main objective of killing the US president. Hence, the last AQ-related example of gaming jihad is attributable to Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) during the 2012 Mali War. In this context, AQIM released its 2-D video game Muslim Mali (or, Islamic Mali) where players were allowed “to control jihadi aircraft, viewed from a top-down perspective, shooting down French jets invading Mali.”

Moving to IS, 2014 marked a new chapter in the history and evolution of gaming jihad, written by IS (non-officially affiliated) supporters and sympathisers. At that time, the first material related to gaming released within the IS online ecosystem was a trailer of an adaptation of the famous Grand Theft Auto (GTA) 5, entitled “Salil al-Sawarem” (en, “Clinging of the Swords”). Yet, it was not clear whether the video game was produced or by whom; certainly, it was not by any then-IS institutional media house (Al-Hayat, Al-Furqan, and Al-Ethar), which stood against entertainment activities. There could also be a possibility that “there was no such standalone IS modification” to GTA 5, but a “slightly modified vanilla version was only used by […] IS’s sympathisers to record two ‘game trailers’ […] which promote the jihadi ‘lifestyle.’ Furthermore, the first trailer was followed by another less noticed video with a banner showing one of the GTA 5 characters with a long beard, tawhid gesture, and a background banner containing IS’s Al-Furqan Media logo. Alongside GTA 5 videos, IS supporters also exploited Microsoft-developed RMA III and Call of Duty (CoD) to enable users to experience battlefield combat and promote the IS propaganda message.

Standing out from the aforementioned war-themed video games, the IS institutional media house Maktabat Al-Himma (or Al-Himma Library) released various interactive Arabic applications to teach the Arabic alphabet and preach to children, which represent a peculiar case in gaming jihad. Produced by Maktabat al-Himmah and shared through IS Telegram channels, the first release was Huroof, the only video game ever released by an IS institutional media house, as an Android application. It was designed as an interactive Arabic alphabet teacher for children through words like gun, tank, rocket, and anasheed. Moreover, it was also advertised in the IS institutional Al-Hayat Media Center magazine Rumiyah Issue 2 (English version). Huroof is presented with the following slogans: “Write, Practice, Learn,” “Letters and Numbers,” and “Letters Nashid”, closing with an invitation to “choose your target” among “UK, US, FR, [and] RU”, represented respectively by stylized representations of the Big Ben, the Statue of Liberty, the Eiffel Tower, and Spasskaya Tower  (Figure 1).

The first release of Huroof was followed by a video presenting another “New Interactive App for Cubs,” which was entitled Dua al-yawm wa-l-layla (The supplications of the day and the night) and produced by Maktabat Al-Himma. The latter opens with a bus driving through an imaginary city, which shows billboards with words like “Islamic court”, “Accountability”, and a military-like “Cub camp”. As shown in the video, Dua al-yawm wa-l-layla contains “over 40 supplications”, which can be read and listened to. An example of one of the forty supplications is presented in the video and titled “Supplication when settling in a place”, against the backdrop of which is a depiction of an IS military camp with a tent, the IS flag, military equipment, and assault rifles, all accompanied by a nasheed. Later, the video presents “The supplication for when meeting the enemy and the rulers”, showing an IS ‘outpost’, which mimics an attack on a military camp belonging to IS enemies (for example, we see a tank with an American flag and the camp with dozens of flags from countries around the world, primarily Israel, the United Kingdom, and Russia). The video also shows how, by pressing on a surface-to-surface rocket launcher, the user can launch rockets at IS enemies. The last video shared by Maktabat Al-Himma presents another interactive app for “interactive learning,” which is entitled al-hijāʾi (en, “spelling”). With a nasheed playing in the background, the video shows kids playing with this app, which includes “seven spelling lessons” with “multiple examples and exercises.” The app also allows users to “learn the Holy Quran” with “over 25 Surah.”

In recent years, the production and dissemination of pro-IS gaming propaganda has assumed new forms and features. This is the direct consequence of the active implication of young individuals in the production-sharing process within several spaces, from gaming platforms and/or videogames to social networks. In this respect, gaming platforms and/or videogames represent the ‘creative’ hub where the gaming-jihad propaganda is produced, while social networks act as the ‘digital marketplace’ functional to the massive fruition of that kind of material. Specifically, the gaming propaganda content is disseminated particularly on TikTok, since it is characterised by a young-based audience. In fact, by means of analysing a portion of the pro-IS online ecosystem on TikTok, it was possible to observe the presence of gaming-jihad propaganda produced exploiting diversified gaming tools, such as Roblox and Minecraft sandboxes and videogames like GTA 5 and Far Cry V.

By means of observing Gaming-Jihad users’ activities on TikTok, it can be affirmed that most of the Gaming propaganda produced and disseminated using sandbox games like Roblox and Minecraft. The latter gaming spaces give individuals the possibility to fully customise their gaming experience exploiting Roblox and Minecraft features. Consequently, this led some users to take advantage of such gaming environment in order to recreate pro-IS gaming-like propaganda. Mainly, users’ have been observed to be focused on the reproduction of proper IS propaganda, such as Amaq News Agency bulletin and/or frames of audiovisual material originally created by IS’s media outlets, and/or in the creation of audiovisual gaming content related to Prisoners’ executions, IS’s mujahidin and/or IS-like military scenarios (Figure 2).

However, Roblox and Minecraft cannot be considered as the only contemporary platforms exploited to produce gaming-jihad audiovisual material related to IS. In fact, it was possible to notice the use of video games to reproduce pro-IS gaming-jihad content, such as GTA 5 ad Far Cry V. The latter videogames have been seen to be used to recreate IS-related scenarios using the features provided by the video games themselves (Figure 3).

On one hand, using these video games implies greater graphic levels, giving users a realistic audiovisual product and a much more immersive gaming experience related to IS scenarios. However, on the other hand, users do not have the same freedom of action as in the case of Roblox and Minecraft production process. Within the latter platform, the ‘sandbox’ component gives an efficient and effective manner for users to totally manage their gaming world, making them able to create and reproduce (as for IS propaganda) everything they want, without limits imposed by videogames aesthetic.

Notwithstanding the fact that Gaming-Jihad propaganda material is considered to cross the ‘halal-haram line’ assuming a negative pattern within the pro-IS online ecosystem, this type of content represents a crucial element in catching the attention of young people active throughout social network platforms and/or gaming platforms. Therefore, it can be said that Gaming-Jihad propaganda represents a catalyst element in radicalisation and recruitment processes of new supporters within the vast pro-IS online ecosystem. By means of being constantly exposed to gaming-jihad content, young individuals are progressively getting more and more familiar with the fruition of such content. The normalisation and in some way ‘banalisation’ of pro-IS propaganda content turned into gaming audiovisual material poses the youngest ‘just few clicks away’ from the actual and growing threat of online radicalisation processes within the broad pro-IS online ecosystem.