"What? That'll never work."
— The description of the Rational Debate ability, Clout
Clout is a text-based Political Strategy Game developed solely by a game developer known in the Clout community as "Q". In it, players take on the role of a congressman in a darkly satirical version of the United States Congress. The gameplay of Clout focuses on the players introducing and passing bills in congress to change the United States in various ways, with the overreaching goal of improving the country, based on their political party's view of "improvement".
The player has the choice of committing various dubious actions to help their party and themselves succeed, from taking drugs to improve their energy and reduce their stress, to hiring assassins to eliminate opposing politicians, with the possibility of being displaced from office at the end of the (Real Life) month should their known involvement in these scandals reach too high of a level.
You can find the official website here: http://cloutiverse.net/
Clout contains examples of:
- All Issues Are Political Issues: Not very surprising, seeing how this is a political simulator. Not a good thing when you have an addiction to Diacetylmorphine and political opponents just itching to have that become public knowledge.
- Anarchy Is Chaos: Implied. The win bill of the Libertarians is to abolish all laws.
- Animal Testing: There is a binary bill in which the Greens can outlaw animal research testing while the Libertarians can legalize it.
- Animal Wrongs Group: The Green Party. Among the bills they are affiliated with are Relax Assisted Suicide Restrictions, Fund Soylent Green Research, and their "Win Bill" Legalize Homicide.
- Appeal to Popularity: Essentially what anyone hopes to do by using a conference ability on a bill.
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: This can happen when public knowledge of your scandals starts to pile up. You might be losing support for having affairs with interns, snorting cocaine, and smoking a cigar.
- Color-Coded for Your Convenience: The liberals are blue, the socialists are red, the libertarians are gold, the conservatives are purple, and the greens are...guess.
- Corrupt Politician: The Accuse Opponents of Corruption ability.They're clearly in bed with Big Business.
- Crazy Cat Lady: The flavor text generated by the Filibuster ability often includes long discussions about your cats. Same for when you apply a "Poison Pill" to a bill that happens to include a clause about your pets.
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Creator Breakdown: Delos Ford, the creator the game became increasingly belligerent on Kongregate, and got the game banned from there. He has also ceased all development on any other platforms. His behavior seems to indicate paranoid schizophrenia. You can see it here: https://www.kongregate.com/accounts/delosford / https://www.facebook.com/delos.ford - Dirty Communists: The Socialist party. You can also play the ability Refer to Opposition as "Socialist". Quite humorous when you opposition happens to actually be part of the Socialist party.
- Drugs Are Good: ...to a certain degree. They can be used to increase your energy and decrease your stress, but you can overdose, become addicted, or be found out and scandalized.
- Eagle Land: Everything in Clout takes place in the Not-So United States of America, presumably D.C. and the surrounding drug dens. Also, a play you can make by appealing to nationalism.
- Erotic Asphyxiation: If you have the Good Ol' Boy trait, you can do autoerotic asphyxiation. It can cause a scandal though.
- External Combustion: A way to get assassinated is by having your vehicle detonated.
- False Dichotomy: The Spew False Dichotomies ability, which gets stronger the closer the bill is to passing/failing.
- Godwin's Law: Another ability allows you to Compare Opponents to Hitler/Nazis, where the ability description is simply this trope.
- Going Cold Turkey: If you get addicted to a certain drug and not take it for some time, you will suffer from withdrawals, in which your stats will temporarily decrease until it is over.
- Hegemonic Empire: Players can pass bills declaring war against another country.
- Hookers and Blow: It wouldn't be politics without it. You have the option to pay for an "escort", or sleep with an intern if you have the attractive trait.
- Kill All Humans: The Greens' win bill is to legalize homicide.
- Media Watchdog: The Conservatives can pass a bill to expand FCC's censorship powers.
- Money, Dear Boy: No matter what party players belong to, they can potentially be bought off with a "Campaign Contribution" in return for introducing and passing bills. Also a feature lobbyists can use in the tie-in game "The Lobby" to influence the world of Clout.
- Nuke 'em: The win bill of the Conservatives is to declare nuclear war against Russia.
- Obstructive Bureaucrat: Forming a Budget Accounting Committee will delay the bill's effects from 24-120 hours.
- Oppressive States of America: Declare Martial Law binary bill.
- Poison Is Evil: Another method of assassination is placing poison into the liquor of the target.
- Red Scare: Part of the flavor text for the Refer to Opposition as "Socialist" ability. Generally useful against socialist aligned bills.
- Sinister Surveillance: Establish the Patriot Act binary bill.
- Sunk Cost Fallacy: Part of the flavor text for the Rhetoric ability.
- Think of the Children!: Another ability you can use to further bills. Especially effective for funding education spending.
- Vehicular Sabotage: An assassination can turn out this way.
