The State of Violent Gaming

Ownt.com writes "Today we talk with Running With Scissors' Vince Desi of the controversial, recently released gore fest, Postal 2. We talk with Vince about The State of Video Game Violence and his thoughts on the violent gaming, where it's been, where it's going and many other aspects surrounding whether or not games actually 'teach' the players to go... postal."

Comments

Artical Text

[Sir Haxalot]

We talk with Running With Scissors' Vince Desi about his thoughts on the state of violent gaming in today's computer and video game market. Be forewarned Vince speaks his mind and we didn't dare censor him. How did the idea first come for the Postal series? We were bored making kids games for companies like Sesame Street and Disney. Most everybody in the office was playing Doom stuff, and we had a Robotron arcade machine. You make kids games for 10 years and then lets see what you think of. For us it was always about the fun, the comedy, I mean POSTAL is really about adult humor, that was out goal. Was the "Postal" series created to be controversial from the beginning? Was being controversial your main goal? Our main goal was to make people die laughing, we never took it serious. Not at all, we just wanted to do something different. People ask about our industry not being creative or original that's because every other game that comes out is the same as the other, except with new tech features. I had no idea that setting a marching band on fire was gonna be considered politically incorrect, and the suicide move in the first POSTAL, we all thought it was great, but a lot of asshole politicians just seen it as an opportunity to be hypocritical about. When "Running With Scissors" was first developing "Postal 1", what types of ideas went through the team's heads about how controversial the title was going to be? Back then did you think much about the fact that games could somehow "inspire" the player to commit acts that were portrayed in your game, or any game for that matter? First let me say that if I thought we could make a game that would honestly motivate people to do things in real life, then I would make a game about fucking, cause this world needs more sex than killing that's for shit sure. The creative process here is actually pretty open, everyone just says whats on their minds and it all gets considered, of course it the end technical reality takes over. For the most part the games include it all, we don't approach game design by what can or cant we put it, we just ask one thing, is it funny. Of course we have a different sense of humor but hey that's what makes the world interesting. As for the controversy I've said it before we never planned for it nor did we anticipate, I mean shit in this fucked up place called earth who the hell could have imagined that a video game could get so much attention when the real world is filled with real crazy people, but that's the news today. What has influenced "Running With Scissors" development of such controversial titles? OK, to really get a clearer picture let me run off a few personality characteristics of the key folks in design: catholic school upbringing, some of us grew up in the 60's, 70's and 80's, metal, comics, race, horny male syndrome, drugs, guns, animals...are you getting the picture yet? Sure I could go on and tell you things like Southpark, Spy vs Spy, Robotron, Atari, Clinton, and of course 9/11. Thinking about it I'd say we're a pretty normal group, that decided to go for it, and actually do and say what we feel, I really do think we're very lucky. If there were no rating system on games and nothing holding back any type of gore or adult content, what type of things do you imagine we might see in today's video games or at least "Running With Scissors" titles? I think a rating system is a good thing, the problem is that retailers are scared to carry controversial titles unless they get big ad guarantees, so the corruption and hypocrisy are not limited to the politicians, lets not forget the major publishers that are nothing more than pimps for sorry ass broke ugly developers. True creativity is a rare animal, so I'm not sure the rating system means that much for real and truly creative folks. I'm very proud of POSTAL not because its shock value but because it succeeds in what we set out to do MAKE PEOPLE HAVE FUN. As for RWS all I can say is if you play or watch POSTAL and don't laugh in the 1st 60 seconds then I blew it, and from all the fan mail