Salta!

Jump with the left mouse button. Collect all the information. Avoid the soldiers. Be a good spy. Or die...

Credits

Cecilia Verino - Game designer, narrative designer and historian

Comrade Internet - Art

Kate Tavasoli - Music: https://www.katetavasoli.com/

Magnus Lindh - Code

Vibhav Bobade - Sfx

Thanks to

Jsfxr for some of the sound effects: https://sfxr.me/

Emanuele Feronato for some of the code: https://www.emanueleferonato.com/2020/02/20/html5-platformer-prototype-inspired-...

Historical background

María Loreto Sánchez Peón (1777- 1870) was a high society lady in Salta, current argentinian province. In that period, Argentina as a country still did not exist, there were instead a bunch of territories called “Las Provincias Unidas del Río de la Plata” (La Plata River United Provinces). Salta was the territory where patriots such as Martín Miguel de Güemes and her sister Macacha struggled with spanish invasions from the North (current territory of Bolivia) in a attempt of recover the Provincias Unidas of Río de la Plata terrotories. 

After winning Vilcapugio and Ayohuma battles (hard defeats for Provincias Unidas del Río de la Plata army, AKA Ejército del Norte or Northen Army), the spanish general Joaquín de la Pezuela occupied the city of Salta. So, Juana Moro and María Loreto Sánchez Peón constituted an effective espionage network to which women from all social ranks contributed.

Pezuela himself would inform the viceroy of Peru in a communication intercepted by the patriots that "The gauchos wage a slow but tiring and damaging war on us almost with impunity. To all this we add another no less harmful one, which is being warned for hours about our movements and projects through the inhabitants of these rooms and mainly the women, each of them is a vigilant and punctual spy to transmit the occurrences. smallest of this Army."

Aided by their young children and their servants, they spied on the royalist enemy and informed the patriots, taking advantage of their sociability and love of parties. She used to dress up in disguise to sell bread and cakes to the royalist army and at roll call time he would sit in a corner silently taking note of the number of enemy forces with the help of two bags of corn, one for those present and the other for those absent.

For her communications with the patriotic colonel Luis Burela, she used a hole made in a tree on the banks of the Arias River, where her maids who went to the river with the excuse of washing clothes or to carry water for domestic service, deposited the messages. and they withdrew instructions.

In 1817, General José de la Serna (another spanish general whose misión was recover Salta and the other territories of the current argentinian North such as Jujuy, Catamarca, Salta, etc) had planned an entry into the Calchaquí Valley and to distract the Salteños from leaving, he organized a dance, which María Loreto attended. Upon hearing from an officer of the expedition, she left the room and, still at night, mounted a horse and set out to notify to the Ejército del Norte who were thus able to organize the defense.

Current map of Argentina.

Provincias Unidas del Río de la Plata territory in when Maria lived