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Monday 17 May, 2010
In my third session with the game, as I made my way through the school, I realized I might as well enter into more combat situations to further the game. At one point, a flashback unexpectedly came up in the game, which showed my character sitting in the cafeteria alone at lunchtime. All of the other long tables are filled with other students, while I sat alone in the corner. Some of the narrative shows that my character wanted someone to sit with him, but no one did. I figured this was a move to have players sympathize with the character and consequently with the actual gunman, but I did not feel this empathy. I could not relate to the game’s presentation or depiction of the event that day, thus I felt this was an obstacle that I wanted to finish.
After this flashback, the game moves to show the two characters in a fantasy land where they wish they could live without any other people bothering them. The narrative explains that this probably could never happen, though, thus the player is transported back to the present day. The two characters realize that they no longer wish to live, thus both kill themselves. What comes next was incredibly disturbing. A number of actual photos from the Columbine shootings are flashed across the screen in a montage, which made me feel somewhat sick to my stomach. The photos were very graphic, which I found disturbing. When these were thankfully done, the player then basically enters into Hell, where I was tasked to attempt to kill Demon Soldiers, but was finally taken down. I found this game to be a distasteful exploitation of the true event of the Columbine shootings, and thankfully its crude representation of the massacre (aside from the photos) lessened the disturbing nature of the game. I certainly would not recommend this game to anyone.
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