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JHerna50's Super Columbine Massacre RPG (PC)
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| [August 16, 2009 11:19:27 PM]
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For my final session I tried to figure out the reality of the game. I saw that many people commented on the fact that it was a horrible game and that it was difficult to play because they didn’t like the fact that you would kill innocent people. I still think that this movie was meant to be looked at in a documentary sort of perspective, which is how I looked at it. It captured the atmosphere of the feelings that people during that time could not understand and will continue to not understand as the game pretty much concludes. When you are asked if you want to continue killing or to end it all most people would decide to end it all as in response to their negative feelings towards killing innocent people. The game does not offer you awards after the game ends if you choose to continue so it doesn’t really fantasize the idea of murdering innocent people in anyway. The game merely walks you through the scenarios which played out during the day and in days leading up to the day in which the actual massacre occurred. I honestly don’t think it is even trying to show the bad effects of bullying, if I did believe it was this I would consider it to be used as a teaching mechanism in school but I don’t. A documentary in true form is supposed to be a recording of an event as if it were true life, a documentary is supposed to capture the emotions of the time, the issue which arose, and the events leading up to the documented, not to promote anything but information.
If you are going to create a game based on columbine massacre without trying to make fun of or criticize school security or physicians who give prescriptions for antidepressants than I think SCMRPG did a great job of documenting the massacre and creating a game type environment. I don’t get sick by playing the game at all, which kind of makes me afraid to say after reading everyone’s comments. I really am not affected in that way. I kind of used it as a learning experience for myself; the game was a lens into what might have been going through their heads. I found it frustrating to have to walk through the halls a billion times trying to get past girls and hall monitors who seem to dart for me. Yet I was only frustrated because I wanted to learn more about what happened on that day.
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| [August 16, 2009 03:06:08 PM]
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In my second session of the game since I pretty much already realized the mission of the game in terms of how to get from one stage to the next I looked at it in the perspective of documentary. I kind of feel that because the graphics are so simple the fact that it was a bloody and violent massacre was not to centralized idea that the developers tried to send out. I think developers wanted to show the massacre and the issues which became public after the massacre happened.
After planting the bombs in the cafeteria I am lead back to the parking lot where I must grab my guns. The mayhem of the game started soon after. I was able to pick up items that would be necessary to restore my health such as food, and a medicine kit and even antidepressants. I was also able to pick up such things clips for extra ammo. Also what was interesting during the game is that there were flashbacks. I got see when the kids were bullied and how the bullying was interpreted by the two kids. At several times in the game I was confronted by I guess I can call it an opponent in where I had no choice but to kill them. I would end up dead when I didn’t kill them.
Developers of the game really tried to make this not about really the violence although it was part of your mission in the game but it was more about documenting what exactly people believed to be the cause of the massacre. Despite its negative criticisms I think it was a great culmination of issues surrounding what happened that day and the days leading up to it.
I looked at this game solely as a documentary because as far as it being a game with necessary hand eye coordination it is not. You enter combat with someone, you choose a weapon, and you kill. The dialogue and the items in the game are what really evoke a sort of documentary feel. The game fails to actually make you feel like a killer because although it gives you actual dialogue from transcripts that the two had written the graphics are way to retro to even give you a virtual realness.
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| [August 16, 2009 11:13:04 AM]
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The atmosphere at the time of when the actual Columbine shootings occurred, in 1999, was of shock and horror. People quickly questioned and debated issues of gun control laws, guns and our children, school security, cliques, the gothic culture, depression, all the way down to why exactly these kids did what they did.
I believe columbine RPG really tries to recreate a scenario in such a way where you can try to comprehend (although only minimally because you can never really understand what goes on in this type of situation unless you actually are the shooter) what may have been going through the heads of the kids who participated in the massacre. Everyone’s question after the shooting happened was- why? This game was made in reaction to this question.
The game starts out with a quote by Andre Breton, one of the most popular surrealist artist in the beginning to mid 1900s at the time of World War I and II and the in between years. He was known to be an anarchistic artist as much surrealist artists were. What I know about Breton was that he wanted his art to shoot down the ideas which he believed to have fueled war and what went on in the psyche of man. His work was highly involved with the studies of psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. By starting out with this quote, it sort of sets up this game as being a sort of psychoanalysis of the boys who did the shootings.
When I woke up in the game I knew from the overview of the game that I was the shooter so as the game instructs you quite well I call my buddy and we quickly get ready with bombs and firearms for the “big day”. Then the game tells me more about how the boys felt before going into the shootings. The boys talked of revenge, recognition, and urgency to complete what they believed had to be done. Because this game makes you travel in a world that is obviously not real I feel the focus is on the dialogue and the goal of your mission. As I pack the bombs and find my way into the school I find myself continuously getting caught before even realizing where security cameras are and finally get into the cafeteria where I once again get caught. Finally after recognizing janitors and such plant the bombs and save the game. I guess in this session what I learned of the massacre was that it was about revenge and that these boys were on a definite mission and getting caught was an issue. This game makes it seems like it was extremely hard to have this sort of shooter situation to happen. I wonder if it really was like that.
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