NYT article GarageGames mention
by Tom Spilman · in General Discussion · 01/29/2007 (12:54 pm) · 11 replies
The NYT article on the Guerrilla Gamemaking Competition and Super Columbine Massacre game has a mention of GG...
Quote:To many of today's independent game designers, the commercial video-game industry has become stagnant and intolerably risk-averse as game budgets reach tens of millions of dollars and design teams swell into the hundreds. But the advent of digital distribution and affordable game-building tools from companies like GarageGames has allowed them to create a broad spectrum of unconventional games.Video Game Tests the Limits. The Limits Win.
About the author
Tom is a programmer and co-owner of Sickhead Games, LLC.
#5
01/29/2007 (1:41 pm)
Pat wins! 
#7
I tried it, and thought it was a big heaping pile of attention-grabbing crap.
Still, I think it should have been able to enter the festival no matter how poor or offensive a game it is.
02/09/2007 (11:33 am)
Has anyone else tried Super Columbine Massacre? I'm curious to hear opinions.I tried it, and thought it was a big heaping pile of attention-grabbing crap.
Still, I think it should have been able to enter the festival no matter how poor or offensive a game it is.
#8
What kind of message does this send? If you're a no-talent game designer with no discipline, make a game that shocks people by trivializing tragic events to get people's attention.
I can't wait for Abu Ghraib Extreme Pinball.
02/09/2007 (12:22 pm)
Dang, and NOW there's a TWO PAGE spread on this game in the latest GameInformer magazine issue. Unbelievable.What kind of message does this send? If you're a no-talent game designer with no discipline, make a game that shocks people by trivializing tragic events to get people's attention.
I can't wait for Abu Ghraib Extreme Pinball.
#10
We have many war games based on many time periods such as Vietnam, WW2 and others. We play "the enemy" killing our own BOYS (many, if not most of our military on the ground were younger than 24), yet no one blinks an eye. If I lost my father in that war, should I be offended?
Movies are the same way. We watch movies where very bad things happen based either completely on truth or surrounding what actually happens with a different story. Is this not the same thing? Should Texas Chainsaw Massacre be more or less offensive if it's based on a true story?
How many of you who are offended by the Columbine game are also people who fight for the fact that video games don't cause violence? Isn't that a little hypocritical? This game isn't going to cause someone to go shoot up a school.
Let's look at what's offensive in this game. Is it the fact that you are killing high school kids? Do they even LOOK like high school kids or would they pass as characters in Grand Theft Auto? Is it the fact that it's based in a school where some psycho actually killed high school kids?
If a movie came out about Columbine, would you watch it? It's just a story, like every other movie/game out there; a story being told about things that happen in this world, good or bad. Isn't that what the point of what we're doing is? When I play counter-strike and play a terrorist, am I not gunning down, exploding and blinding people who spend every day protecting me?
I'm more pissed at the people making a big deal about the game because from what screens I've seen, it doesn't look impressive at all. This reminds me of when Marilyn Manson first came on the scene and everyone was protesting and claiming their suicidal kid's deaths were his fault and so on. As soon as people stopped making such a big damn deal, he left the lime light and toned it down.
*puts on flame retardant blanket*
02/09/2007 (12:49 pm)
I haven't played the game. I get in quite a few arguments that turn heated because of my viewpoint on what's "appropriate" and what's not. Death is a part of life. It's tragic when something like this happens and I sympathize with the parents of the kids who were killed, but we need to take a reality check when we start calling things offensive and why we are calling them that.We have many war games based on many time periods such as Vietnam, WW2 and others. We play "the enemy" killing our own BOYS (many, if not most of our military on the ground were younger than 24), yet no one blinks an eye. If I lost my father in that war, should I be offended?
Movies are the same way. We watch movies where very bad things happen based either completely on truth or surrounding what actually happens with a different story. Is this not the same thing? Should Texas Chainsaw Massacre be more or less offensive if it's based on a true story?
How many of you who are offended by the Columbine game are also people who fight for the fact that video games don't cause violence? Isn't that a little hypocritical? This game isn't going to cause someone to go shoot up a school.
Let's look at what's offensive in this game. Is it the fact that you are killing high school kids? Do they even LOOK like high school kids or would they pass as characters in Grand Theft Auto? Is it the fact that it's based in a school where some psycho actually killed high school kids?
If a movie came out about Columbine, would you watch it? It's just a story, like every other movie/game out there; a story being told about things that happen in this world, good or bad. Isn't that what the point of what we're doing is? When I play counter-strike and play a terrorist, am I not gunning down, exploding and blinding people who spend every day protecting me?
I'm more pissed at the people making a big deal about the game because from what screens I've seen, it doesn't look impressive at all. This reminds me of when Marilyn Manson first came on the scene and everyone was protesting and claiming their suicidal kid's deaths were his fault and so on. As soon as people stopped making such a big damn deal, he left the lime light and toned it down.
*puts on flame retardant blanket*
#11
Whether that game is good or bad in terms of quality as a game I have no idea, haven't played it, but i'm not offended by it's existance as from what I have seen and read it isn't trying to glamorize the actions or put any sort of positive spin on them in any way.
train of though moves onto something else...
...I had a whole lot of thoughts back in high school of doing all kinds of bad things to the people I went to school with, including shooting the place up. I never did any of them of course, but it seems like the whole world gets outraged that anyone could even *think* of doing stuff like that. Those kind of thoughts are commonplace for a lot of people in a situation like high school that is completely unnatural and brutal to people who dont fit in. I think people should look harder at our schools.
Not sure where all that came from, but anyways thats my .02 cents on that. :)
02/15/2007 (5:15 pm)
I personally would be more offended by the folks who made whatever that 911 movie with Nicolas Cage in it was, expressley for the purpose of making tons of money off a nations tragedy, than some folks who put together a free game based on Columbine...but then again, I don't get offended very easily. Whether that game is good or bad in terms of quality as a game I have no idea, haven't played it, but i'm not offended by it's existance as from what I have seen and read it isn't trying to glamorize the actions or put any sort of positive spin on them in any way.
train of though moves onto something else...
...I had a whole lot of thoughts back in high school of doing all kinds of bad things to the people I went to school with, including shooting the place up. I never did any of them of course, but it seems like the whole world gets outraged that anyone could even *think* of doing stuff like that. Those kind of thoughts are commonplace for a lot of people in a situation like high school that is completely unnatural and brutal to people who dont fit in. I think people should look harder at our schools.
Not sure where all that came from, but anyways thats my .02 cents on that. :)
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