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John Oremus
Professor Zagal
Ethics In Video Games/Cinema
4/11/13
Super Columbine Massacre RPG! Game Log 2
The second time I played Super Columbine Massacre RPG! was much different. I played through the most famous part of the infamous series of Coloradan events, the actual massacre itself. The way that the game dealt with violence was something I was very curious about when I heard we were to play the game because it, to me, would be the barometer of what the game was trying to say. Instead of a Hotline Miami-esque bloodbath of Eli Rothean proportions there was a strange aspect of violence in the game. The playing of the massacre sequence felt a bit bizarre because of how non-realistic it was. Going with the nature of the gameplay I guess this should not be totally surprised by this, but it was still bizarre. It all felt a bit like a fairytale, the horror did not seem to be there. This is probably due to the viewpoint of the game, so I guess the makers were trying to portray a strange sense of control that the two killers may have felt in real life, though we will never know. It was ethereal in the sense that it did not feel like it was of this world, not in a positive way, more in a science fiction way. The lack of “realism” in the portrayal of the shooting and the game’s design as a whole was more effective than the infamous level in Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 when you shoot civilians in an airport. In that case it felt a bit phony, there was no characterization of the victims. There was no confrontation. It was blind and meaningless. In this game the opposite was true. There was eye contact and alleged justification. I just clicked buttons and the sympathetic people dissolved into the screen. Gone forever. Locking onto the helpless animated students selecting the weapons was painful, there was more at stake here than a game like Hotline Miami. Their disintegration somehow felt more painful than if they lay there in a pool of blood. It seemed somehow more consequential. I can’t describe why because I am not entirely sure why it felt that way. The reactions of “the trench coat mafia succeeds again!” made me cringe. I’ve never felt so disconnected from the characters I controlled in a game. This, coupled with the music and the video game design I so often associate with my youth, put a horrible feeling in my stomach. When the imagery of the aftermath came on the screen with that overtly melodramatic music I stared at the screen blankly. The game tried to make it seem like I did it, even though I obviously did not. In this way I guess it was an effective experience. It seemed a bit manipulative, but if there were ever a case that deserved emotional manipulation it would be this case. Like I said, it was unlike any game I’ve ever played. Being definitively in the seat of the villain was like an outer-body experience and I did not like it at all. This is probably the goal of the game; in that case it did a good job.
The third act of the game, which takes place in hell, will be an interesting conclusion to the game. I’m not sure what the game will try telling me, but I am certainly curious about what lenses the developers were wearing.
Rating (out of 5): |
