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Columbine RPG Kickout Has Repercussions
As a direct result of the removal of the Columbine RPG from the Slamdance game competition, two games (so far) have pulled out of the judging process. The Forge has extensive commentary on the first pullout (the game Braid), as well as the removal of fl0w from the competition. From the article: "Regardless of the artistic merit, the facts as I understand them are that Slamdance had actively courted the creator of SCM RPG! to enter it into the festival, which then judged it to be a finalist before bending over for the corporations and shredding their credibility by removing it from the competition. Imagine Dominoes Pizza deciding it objected to the theme of Brokeback Mountain and told the Academy Awards to remove it. Imagine them doing it after it was already a finalist."
Good for them. When you give in to pressure from big business to censor you lose all of your credibility.
Haiku for you!
I know most people think that SCMRPG is in horrible taste, I disagre (I view it as documentry/commentary on a horrible event in video game form). Flow standing up against this is good of them in my mind.
I don't think that the SlamDance guys are bad for caving to the preasure (they do need corporate backers), however seeing a company that is gettign LOTS of recognition standing up against something like this still makes me happy.
as a note, if you havn't played around with Cloud (their other game) I deffinatly suggest it.
Do Or Do Not, There Is No Spoon, There Is Only Zuul. Everything in the above post is probably opinion.
When the hell is that game coming out?
The following replies are posted by unwashed nerds.
Of course, any game based on something as horrific as the Columbine shooting is at best bad taste, at worst shameless exploitation of the event to get in the press, and people should rightfully be angry, and the game should be pulled out.
But for some reason I fail to understand, there are dozens of games glorifying WW2 combats, or simulating the Iraq war. Millions have died during WW2, and hundred of thousands died in Iraq and continue to do so. Yet nobody finds reasons to be upset when you incarnate a G.I. killing German soldiers in a game. It's all perfectly normal to them.
My grandfather died in WW2, I never knew him. He was fighting for the "good guys" (the allies), but that didn't prevent my dad from crying often when he thought about him. War simulation games make me just as angry as this stupid Columbine RPG, and people who get their pants in a knot over the Columbine game then go play the virtual soldier ten minutes later make me sick, because they're biased, politically correct idiots with short memories...
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
I mean you would have to be blind not to.
The problem I have with JT... well firstly he can't engage in any kind of discussion or be at all diplomatic... but in a broader sense its the belief that keeping the public in the dark with as many issues people may make judgements on is the "safest" thing to do. Personally I think a lot of things "promoting" badness are just showing it, and letting the user decide whether its sensible, or far fetched, or whatever.
And I think thats totally wrong. Although I view the Colombine killers as assholes, putting them in a game isn't going to swap peoples minds if they know all the facts. If the media didn't preach bullshit maybe people would see reality as it is, and there wouldn't be as many cop killings, like JT says their are.
What would Dominoes Pizza have against Brokeback Mountain? Is this like on the Simpsons? "We don't know if non-standard families eat our pizza, and quite frankly, we don't want to know."
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
That's a poor analogy. It would be like Domino's pizza objecting to a movie that glorified the two kids who went on a rampage at that school. And I would fully expect that such a movie would be pulled from such a competition.
People like to throw around the term censorship, but it's really only censorship if the government is involved. A private entity has every right to screen whatever they want. Why is it improper for them to have decided they don't want that RPG included in their competition. It isn't, just like the creator of Flow had every right to protest by pulling out of the competition.
I tend to be fairly open-minded, but I can't help but get the distinct impression that the creator of that Columbine RPG created that game for the sole purpose of being controversial. He want to get a rise out of people and hopefully get their 15 minutes of fame by being offensive. He seems to try to make the game seem more profound than it actually turns out to be. He could have explored the motivations of those two kids in a more thought provoking manner. He could have been just as shocking but far less offensive. However, people go for shock value because it's easy. I frankly think it's an amateurish way of getting attention.
We don't just get to partake in free speech and that's the end of it. We're supposed to be responsible for what we do. But it seems most people have chosen to forget that part of the equation. Ultimately, at what point do you draw the line? What if I decide to make a game where the player is a rapist? The player earns experience by going around raping women and children. Or worse, how about a game where the player works at a Nazi concentration camp massacring innocents?
Regardless of whatever profound statement claim I'm trying to make should should that sort of crap be permissible? At what point do we decide a line has been crossed or do we just say that anything is fair game?
Like I said before, I'm fairly open-minded. I think the reaction to that hot-coffee mod was absolutely ridiculous, for example. And these political campaigns to stop offensive games are absurd. There's no substitute for proper parenting, although that's something sorely lacking in this day and age. Nevertheless, I do think there's a limit; there's a point when someone has really gone too far.
How the matter is addressed at that point quickly becomes a tough question for many people. But one thing that I don't think should even be an issue is Slamdance's right to ban any game they find offensive. Whether they came to the decision themselves or advertisers requested this of them is irrelevant. You have the right to control what is watched in your own home, why shouldn't these companies have the right to do the same?
Give it 20 more years and the general public will feel just a bit more detached to accept this game, or something to its liking, anyway.
Five finalists have pulled out in protest.
First off, I'm not angry or upset about Columbine Massacre. If I find something to be tasteless / offensive / not my cup of "Hot Coffee" <grin>, then I just don't buy it. Seems simple enough to me, so I'm not interested in "how can you judge it without playing it" arguments.
However, I see the organizers of Slamdance as trying to have their cake and eat it, too. They courted the makers of the Columbine RPG primarily for shock value... and the publicity. Then they found out that some of their sponsors objected, and planned to do their objecting with their sponsorship of Slamdance, and decided to remove the game from the competition, meanwhile loudly blaming "outside pressures" for "muzzling" games.
And that is what bugs me about Slamdance. If they were willing to seem edgy with their inclusion of Columbine Massacre, then they could have accepted the consequences of their sponsorships getting yanked. But they didn't, so they shouldn't.
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
Everyday Shooter, Toblo and Once Upon a Time have also pulled out.
This leaves the number of finalists at 8. leaving only ~60% of the original...
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violence depictions based on real-world events need a certain buffer to be forgiven. war/battle sims, movies and lots of other artistic content constantly invade/avoid such a buffer. 9/11 was "off-limits" until the softest, most congratulatory touches began - or hack comments about ethnicities, etc.
The buffer is time, or social distance, or satire versus sympathy (Borat movie comes to mind), etc.
These days, you can re-enact or view depictions the scenes from some major historical moments - many quite violent and offensive if there hadn't been that buffer.
Slamdance originally announced 14 finalists. They are currently down to 8 participating finalists.
Super Columbine was ejected.
Braid has pulled out.
Flow has pulled out.
Toblo has pulled out.
Once Upon A Time has pulled out.
Everyday Shooter has pulled out.
With nearly half of the finalists already gone, just a few more pullouts could cause a complete collapse of Slamdance this year.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
STill waiting for the 9/11 RPG.
The maker of Cultivation has this tagline on the of bottom of his page, but has yet to pull out of the competition:
For those who do not fear sacrifice:
your souls will burn bright trails in the night sky.
I can totally tell that none of you have played this game and you're totally bashing on it. You're doing exactly what the media does with games like Grand Theft Auto, etc. This game glorifies nothing about Columbine, but gives insight into what happened that day. Also, the game costs nothing, you can go ahead an download it for free. http://www.columbinegame.com/download.htm Just my 2 cents, stop hating without being educated about what you're criticizing.
Good karma sticks to me like velcro on a piece of plexiglass.
Move along, citizen.
That leaves 11 finalists.
How many would need to leave before the event was no longer viable?
If you're not going to read the article, at least read The F'ing Summary:
It's not as if Slamdance was "stuck" with something they found distasteful, they initially chose this game to be a finalist, before caving to pressure from sponsors to kick it. Obviously the Slamdance organizers did like the game to begin with, or at least thought it had artistic merit, or they wouldn't have nominated it as a finalist in the first place. For them to do a complete about-face and remove the game afterward, based solely on the pressure of corporate sponsors, completely destroys any appearance of integrity they may have had, and reduces this once "independent" games festival to nothing more than a corporate marketing platform.
And while I'm on a rant, it needs to be pointed out to many people that, while you may find something distasteful and even patently offensive -- which in itself is certainly your right to choose what you like or dislike -- that does not give you or I or anyone else the right to silence those offensive statements or works of art. The whole point of the First Amendment is not to protect speech that you like, but to protect speech that you don't like, whether it's a social viewpoint or political commentary or an artistic endeavor, or, as is most common today, artistic endeavors that provide an avenue for controversial statements. Just remember: If someone's voice can be silenced because you don't like what they say, then yours can be silenced because someone else doesn't like what you have to say.
Quote from the article: In some of the blog posts responding to this action, reference is made to requests or pressure from "backers" to remove Super Columbine Massacre RPG from the festival. We wish to clearly state that, as sponsors, we neither made any such request, nor were we consulted about this action prior to it being taken. On the contrary, our requests to re-instate the game were denied and our discussions with Peter Baxter over the reasons for the removal of the game leave us unconvinced that it was either a necessary action or one that is in line with the vision of the festival as a place to celebrate independent game making.
You don't have to CAVE to sponsors. I understand completely that without money you don't exist. That is NOT the same thing.
While I would have zero disrespect for someone who said "we're going to have the wholesome game awards" to get more sponosors - even if he and all the judges thought games with mature themes were better - you have to do that BEFORE the competition. And you have to be honest with your sponsors and yourselves. And if you WERE honest with them and they get cold feet in violation of your agreement, you have to have balls.
You're missing the other side of the puzzle. At the risk of sounding like the bubble, if your awards are worthless you have no marketshare, and if you have no marketshare you ALSO have no sponsors. (Unless you're one of those "competitions" that have a big entry fee and give an honorable mention to everything that enters, to pad the things they can put on the box.) If you have a big marketshare and publicity, sponsors - SOME sponsors - will beat a path to your door.
In this case I think they've traded for short-term sponsorship and publicity by giving the long-term popularity of their awards.
If you decide to make "The Wholesome Game Awards" because you'll get more sponsors, more power to you. If you move way out to the edge for the "ultraviolent game awards" then you won't get traditional mainstream sponsors. Maybe you'll get a sponsorship from the Ultimate Fighting Championships or something. Porn game awards would only get porn sponsors. Etc.
Choosing to be mainstream enough to have sponsors is VERY different than what this competition did - caving to sponsors after the game was a finalist. Unless the sponsor has a contractually set veto over the judging process, the right answer is to offer to a) add disclaimers about the sponsor not sponsoring the individual games, etc. and other such concessions if the sponsor will go for them or b) telling the sponsor they can pull out of future sponsorships if they want, but you're keeping the money they already promised for THIS competition, thank you very much.
And if they STILL behave badly - like they withhold money they promised you for this competition or they threaten to sue you for going through with it - then you publicize the heck out of the situation. Include publicizing how this game was in the list of entrants, so the sponsor was ALREADY sponsoring it. You'll get some combination of a) them backing off to stop the continuing press coverage about it and b) a ton of press and name recognition, netting you the ability to get other sponsorships. Get that fact into as much of the press as possible.
Btw, I've never seen the game in question, and the little I've read doesn't make me think highly of it. But the fact that it was a finalist means it was very much exactly what this competition was looking for, whatever that is.
Looking for freelance Actionscript (Flash/Flex) or ColdFusion work and/or freelance developers. Email me, put Slashdot
For a festival that's supposed to be "on the edge" this is turning into one enormous embarassment.
First off, its censorship, plain and simple.
Secondly, banning a game for being too violent removes all possibility that video games
have the potential to make an artistic statement. Afterall, when Cronenberg makes a violent film
the critical response always runs along the lines of: Yes, its violent, but its art.
If videogames are not afforded the same latitude by the festival, then the festival is by nature
denying their potential to be art. Needless to say -- this is a bizarre platform for a
festival promoting the genre.
Thirdly, Slamdance is supposed to be "on the edge". Its supposed to be the festival that
is what Sundance 'once was' -- before the big studios, corporate overlords and big brand
sponsors stepped in. Banning a game whose subject matter runs contrary to family values
is hardly
What will be left in the wreckage of this festival (after all those with any artistic
credibility leave) is a group of game-makers who:
a) Have no artistic credibility
b) Are selfish
c) Are morally high-handed sorts like the Christian Right and the Family Values crowd.
End Result?
All I can say is "nice festival guys". You could have become something important in the gaming world.
Anyone who stays in the festival should be profoundly embarrassed.
I sure wouldn't want to win this year.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )