As a person who was in High School in CO when it happened and actually I had a roommate who went to Columbine and and was ON THE DEATH LIST! I can wholeheartedly say that to make a game about Columbine is FUCKING FANTASTIC!! I mean video games were blamed for the situation, Marilyn Manson was blamed for the situation....etc etc all this bullshit about blame when it really just came down to the fact that these guys were wack and their parents totally dropped the ball! Video games ABSOLUTELY need to be made about issues like this because through their interactivity we will be enabled to experience and thus understand more facets of our totally fucked up culture that we have going here. Its not like video games are mind control! They make you think! and like so many other mediums video games need to be considered an artform instead of entertainment or a pastime.

At bleep:
Most of your post i can agree with totaly, but if the game went into more of a positive direction, like your in colombine and your trying to get the fuck out of it(solid snake+sam fisher), i would play the game to death. But since its more around shooting inoccent people, and then going to hell in doom-land, its just not my type of game. Dont get me wrong, i love shooting mother fuckers, but when they also have a weapon and are shooting the fuck back.

here is another example:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_of_America_%28film%29
this movie was released not long after Columbine, and its probably at least 5 times more offensive than this game, but I'd bet no one here has ever even heard of it.

@Ruthra - Elephant is a fucking fantastic movie, thanks for bringing it up.

I'm not a fan of the game, but everyone has a right to their opinion and the right to put it into a media form.

Sure, no one has to publish the game or include it in a contest, but if Slam Dance took it in the first place and then backed out afterwards, then I don't agree with that. You allowed them to enter in the first place, so don't let someone else tell you to throw them out.

Anything and everything can affend someone at some point. Some people like SCMRPG, and others hate it. Some people like GTA 3: SA and others hate it. Its all in how you look at it.

Personally games that feature the Olsen Twins affend me and should be burned. BURNED I SAY!

And also, while I certainly enjoy Summa-bashing as much as Summa enjoys Nintendo-bashing...

How in the fuck did this this thread turn into yet another Summa-lynching in the comments?

Thanks Nex. Flying cocks ftl.

@nic_disassembly

Well i did mention what i think the reason was for taking it from the killer's perspective... i think one of the points in making the game was to better understand what the hell those guys were thinking... and really, there was no better way to do that than making the game from the pov of the killers. Afterall, by better understanding the waht twisted them like that, can we do better to prevent other kids from winding up like that. I think there is even one description of the game going around that says that it's a look it to the deranged minds of two killers, or something like that.

Taking the story from the point of view from the victim is a very effective way to express the tragedy of the event, however, this focus mostly on the tradegy and much less on how and why the event happened. By taking it from the killer's point of view we get the exact opposite, the focus is somewhat taken from the tradegy of the event, and placed more on the hows and whys. So one of the goals of making the game was to better express why this event happened in the first place. And as i said, the best way to prevent future incidents, is to have a clear understand of how and why it happened in the first place.

A serious thing that occurs with tradgic events is the poeple can't help but get wrapped up in emotion, and those emotions end up messing with our ability to think with logic and patience... so much so that instead of looking deeply into the issue, we want very fast answers and resolutions, answers that may not be very correct since they don't look deep enough (such as blaming games like DOOM as a leading cause of what happened...)

It was a shitty game. Shitty games shouldn't make the finals of Slamdance just because they're controversial.

Hell, whoever made the Border Patrol game - remember? the one where you shoot pregnant Mexicans crossing the US border? - should've entered the contest. At least that had gameplay.