Indie Game To Get Blamed For Shooting Spree
Well, it hasn't yet, but I expect it will. (Update: Yes, it did. See below.) The video game connection to another school killing spree is already getting highlighted in the press: Click for the CNN report.

Kimveer Gill, age 25, decided to do a shooting spree at a Montreal college, leaving one woman dead, six people in critical condition, and twelve others wounded. He was killed by police gunfire, apparently the way he claimed he wanted to go out of the world on a website, in a hail of bullets. And it also sounded like he had a fascination with the Columbine killings of seven years ago.

He posted on a forum that one of his favorte games was "Super Columbine Massacre," (I expect the website to dissapear within HOURS, but as of right now it's up). Super Columbine Massacre is a free indie game, an "RPG" based around the infamous 1999 event. Now, first off, I've never played it. I've read the review by Amber Night, who I must give kudos to for braving the game. She's apparently a bigger man than me.

The game was created with RPG Maker, the same engine that was used to build the wonderful, kid-friendly indie game, "Aveyond."

I expect to hear Jack Thompson say something within hours. I expect that some of the sympathy for poor struggling indies against this tide of anti-videogame legislation is going to evaporate. Or, it could be that because this was a game created for free by hobbyists and NOT some great big corporation with lots of lawsuit potential, it could simply dissapear. Only time will tell. I would love to believe that the media and politicians will simply understand that Gill's fascination with the game was a symptom of his mental illness, and not the cause. But I won't hold my breath.

In the "Artist's Statement," the developer of Super Columbine Massacre explains his purpose for creating the game :

"The question at the center of the storm was an elusive one: `why did they do it?'...

"The lingering question—that grand burning query so many have tried to answer—is one I believe this game allows us to at least access in a more honest way. Beyond the simple platitudes and panaceas of gun control, media ratings/censorship, bully prevention programs, and parental supervision remains a glaring possibility: that the society we have created is deeply moribund. This game asks more of its audience than rudimentary button-pushing and map navigation; it implores introspection. This is why the game’s forum is equally important to the SCMRPG project. Through it, people from six continents and all walks of life are discussing the game itself and the incident it is based on. Some of them confess childhood pain or share personal feelings on the shooting. Some of them sustain vulgar diatribes or accuse the creator of wrongdoing. Some of them discuss the game’s social implications in a broader context. At the end of the day, the understanding of the Columbine school shooting is deepened and redefined. That is the real object of the game."

As to the depiction of the events, the author claims:

"I knew I had to be true to the events of the Columbine school shooting—as true as I could be while maintaining respect for the tragically deceased; it was a more delicate balance of personal morality than many of my detractors imagine I took. Since 1999 so many mistruths have been spoken and political postures have been struck in the wake of the shooting that I didn’t want to fall into the speculative pitfalls of much of the media’s coverage. The game had to be told from the perspective of the shooting’s greatest enigmas of all: Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. They left behind many of their thoughts—some frightening, some deplorable, some comical, and some deeply enraged."

Amber Night's review indicates that in her opinion, the artist failed in his mission, but that the game poses some interesting questions of its own:

"And yet, while I believe the execution to have failed miserably, I cannot help but wonder if the attempt was at some level worthy... So I pose the Super Columbine Massacre RPG Paradox: Could it be that Super Columbine Massacre RPG had to be made, in order for us to understand that Super Columbine Massacre RPG shouldn’t have been made? A couple of weeks ago I thought I knew the answer. But as distasteful and poorly executed as I find the game, I just don’t know."

Me? I was in the videogame industry when Columbine happened. We'd done some games with some somewhat cartoony violence about cars with guns in a car-combat tournament - the Twisted Metal series. And of course, the media locked into the fact that one of the kids was a big fan of DOOM (shoot, what kid with a computer in the mid-90's WASN'T a fan of Doom?). Because so much about the kids, neighborhood, and the school seemed, on the surface, like the stereotypically perfect Cleaver kids that white middle-class America imagines as its ideal, the hunt for some reason behind the murder spree went turned into a frenzy. The videogame connection was the one "abnormality" (at least to press and politicians), and it included guns and violence.

Like everyone else in America, I was astonished and horrified. The anti-videogame sentiment hit a high swing, and we were hit like a ton of bricks. Our publisher for a current game in mid-development quickly came in with a demand that we completely revise the game, re-creating its design from scratch. On top of that, if I mentioned my profession to people at the time, I was frequently met with stares as they tried to fathom whether or not I was deliberately turning their children into psychopathic monsters. It was a hard time to be in the games industry.

At work, we quietly asked the question of each other (again, with no answers), "What if Twisted Metal had been those kids' favorite game?"

So now it's seven years later, and it's an indie game. An indie game very specifically depicting the violence of that day in 1999 - a game that puts you in the shoes of Harris and Klebold, inviting you to see the world from their perspective. A game that not only tells the story of the murder of innocent people, but invites you to participate in the telling.

Sorry, I can't take it. It's too much for me. The scars are still too fresh. That's a little bit to close to home. I can't bring myself to watch the new movie about the World Trade Center for the same reason.

But here's where I'm gonna go out on a limb and I'm going to probably get flamed for it. But I'm going to say it anyway. I have zero interest in playing Super Columbine Massacre. I had zero two months ago, and I still have zero today. But I personally cannot pass judgement on the game, having not played it. Maybe the artist's statement is genuine, and maybe it was just a smokescreen. Maybe it was in poor taste to release it, regardless of intent. I don't know.

Either way, I am vehement in my position that WE MUST LIVE IN A SOCIETY WHERE WE ARE FREE TO MAKE GAMES LIKE THIS.

We must live in a society where people can use the powerful medium of interactive simulation and storytelling to provide serious messages. Like this newly announced indie game about drunk driving. Or maybe the messages may be simple, kid-friendly themes like the value of friendship, and being brave in the face of adversity. Or it could question the nation's methods of fighting the war on terror (as did one web-game I played about a year or so ago). Or maybe they are religious messages inviting the player to discover Jesus or Allah or Buddah or The Great Green Arkleseizure.

Or maybe it simply invites the player to take a walk on the dark side and play a car-stealing hoodlum. Or whatever other purile garbage you can come up with. People can call painted toilet seats art, too.

You may not agree with the message. You may not think of it as art or worthwhile communication. You may certainly believe (and I *DO*!!!) that many of these games are not appropriate for children, for whatever reason. That's fine. You SHOULD take a stand and form an opinion, and pass judgement for your own sake (and feel free to communicate that judgement to others). I certainly disagree with a lot of the messages found in books in the library or movies in available at the DVD store, too. I dislike the easy availability of pornography and the trend towards gratuitous violence across the whole spectrum of media in this country.

But I believe strongly that people should be free to communicate these messages - even if they do it poorly and clumsily. And I believe that video games are a powerful medium for doing just that (Especially the poor and clumsy part). It's got at least as much potential for good as for evil.

And the indies, who have more artistic control over their products with their tiny (often one-man) teams, are perhaps better positioned to take advantage of this medium and use it to explore more difficult (and grown-up) topics.

Kimveer was obviously a man who was deeply disturbed. I am horrified by his actions, and my heart goes out to the victims and their families. I wish there was some simple answer that we could uncover that would help us understand not only how something like this could happen, but also to prevent it from ever happening again. I have to trust the scary world and my children as I send my two daughters off to school every morning. Events like this scare the crud out of me. It boggles my imagination, and I don't even want to think about it, retreating instead to a false belief that, "Oh, it could never happen to me or my family."

It does scare me. But I also know that there are no easy answers. There hasn't been for all of human existence on this planet.

Scapegoats are not solutions. Just this once, can we avoid hunting for one?

UPDATE: Ah, well, can't say I'm surprised...

Labels: Politics, Roleplaying Games

- posted by The Rampant Coyote @ 8:19 AM (Permalink)