In an effort to engage the generation that had not experienced the War of Liberation and imbue them with the spirit of 1971, a group of young software experts from Rajshahi launched on Sunday Bangladesh's first liberation-war based 3-D (dimensional) video game.

Abdullah Abu Sayeed, director of Biswa Sahitya Kendra, unveiled the video game named "Arunodoyer Agnishikha" or "Flame of Sunrise" (FS), in the presence of other liberation war heroes and luminaries of the IT industry at a press conference organised by the producers of the video game, Shom Computers Ltd., at the Jatiya Press Club the same day.

The game works with the unique objective of the gamer as a student, farmer or an adolescent freedom fighter who either has to capture a flag from a Pakistani camp or dominate a Pakistani-occupied area in an environment digitally created in close resemblance with three historically-true battlefield -- Akhaura, Chittagong and Rajshahi.

The first "First person shooting game" made in Bangladesh and one that contains detailed survey of a game in Bangladeshi context, its makers also boast making the first video game in Bangladesh with their own game engine.

"We wanted to make a shooting game in Bangladesh and it required a very concrete historical and informational base for an international standard video game," said Ragib Ahmed, lead character animator of FS and one of the seven members of Trimatrik Interactive (TI), the developer of the game.

TI first started working on the project four years ago in Rajshahi and was set to launch the game on December 16, 2002. However, Shom Computers, a software development firm, marked their initiative at a trade fair and followed to assist Trimatrik financially, technologically, in marketing, and most importantly, in compiling the historical data for the game.

The interactive CD will also feature historical background to the battlefields in 1971, essays, photographs and a chronological account of the War of Liberation.

Abdullah Abu Sayeed delivered the keynote speech while freedom fighter and women's rights activist Naila Khan, freedom fighter KM Jahangir, Kazi Farook Ahmed of Proshika, S M Iqbal, president of Bangladesh Computer Society and Mahbubur Rahman, president of Multimedia Association, spoke on the occasion to an audience comprising civil society leaders and young gaming enthusiasts.