The Weekly Gamage: The March Of Controversy

With a frightening frequency nowadays, developers are throwing caution to the winds and coming out with games with any number of politician-baiting activities including, but not limited to:

• Cop Killing
• Drug Use
• Spousal Abuse
• Rape
• Degrading Women
• Nudity (jubblies and the like)
• Sexual Content/Innuendo
• Prostitution
• Extreme Violence
• Devil Worship
• Potty Mouth
• Being Too Urban
• Presidential Assassination (Vice Presidential ok)
• Keanu Reeves

I liken each controversy to a swing at one of those strength test machines at the carnival. Weak swings are games so crappy that to make a fuss is not even worth it. A bigger swing is a bigger controversy and each one moves up in levels with a bigger reaction at each level. Luckily no controversy has hit the “prize” since the cold war and only one game controversy has even come close, you’ll see what I mean.

Level 1. Parental Warning-Example: 25 to Life
This is the basic level that is basically attained by any game that gets an M rating. If anything that only gets this far either you’re not killing anything anyone cares about (zombies or terrorists for instance) or the game is too horrendously bad to warrant any further attention, as is the case with 25 To Life.

Level 2. Blurb From Conservative News Source- Example: Blitz The League
It’s a simple fact that uptight conservatives will pick up on anything offensive in the youth culture much faster than anything else. This is a key point in any controversy’s life, because as soon as the right starts making a stink, the left needs a response. It takes a good game with a very minor controversy to stall at this point.

Level 3. Blurb Everywhere Else- Example: Any GTA Rip-off
It’s time to hit the mainstream, but whether it hits like a kick in the grapes or just a love tap will depend on content. As history has taught us, sex-based controversy always goes farther than violence. Originality also counts, that’s why most GTA rip-offs stall here.

Level 4. Involvement Of Loudmouth- Example: Bully
This is really where a controversy can take off, where a simple issue of morals becomes an inescapable national debate. The only reasons anything stalls at this point are A. the game isn’t out yet and details have become scarce or B. the loudmouth is losing his/her touch.

Level 5. Editorials Galore- Example: Manhunt
Things are starting to heat up and it’s time for the uninformed and over-opinionated to weigh in before they seem out of touch. A combination of mixed reviews and decent sales will land something like Manhunt here.

Level 6. News Updates/Request For Censorship- Example: Gun
If any sort of censorship is even mentioned, the controversy has made it, and in turn can provide regular news updates as different people of dubious importance sound off. Things like Gun can skip straight here because they offend a specific group.

Level 7. Irresponsible Lawsuit(s)- Example: Any GTA
At a certain point in a controversy can spark the greed inside people, and that means it’s time for some frivolous lawsuits. Mourning families, illiterate consumers, groups desperate for publicity, all are possible lawsuits waiting to happen. Any GTA is guaranteed to make it this far.

Level 8. Misguided Political Action- Example: Mortal Kombat
Once those lawsuits start coming in, politicians can smell blood in the water and just might need that little extra issue for re-election. It was something like this that created the ESRB and we never thought another game controversy would make it this far until…

Level 9. Debates Everywhere- Example: Hot Coffee
Last summer, the shit hit the fan like we gamers had never seen before. We had been chucking ultra violence at the mainstream for years but it took some poorly rendered sex to really set things off. At this point things are just time capsule and I love the something’s fodder but the next step brings a controversy to coveted historical footnote status.

Level 10. Street Fightin’- Example: Rodney King
Luckily, no game has ever pissed everyone off enough to start a riot, but stuff like this has happened before. A game probably will never get this far but if one does, it’ll probably involve either minority hunting or serial man-rape I’ll leave it to Rockstar to start those projects at their leisure.

Before we get to news it’s time for the random story of the week. I’m was in a contest for the most invited members at 1up and one of the guys in the top three stated that he invited a bunch of his friends from Beast Forum to help him in the contest. So I checked on what Beast Forum is and it turns out it’s a forum for bestiality lovers. It’s a bunch of guys who send in pictures and videos of them screwing their dogs. Just thought you’d like to know

In new releases, Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter will become the latest Tom Clancy game we hope won’t give any world leaders any ideas.

We also will be seeing new Onimusha, which joins the prestigious wait-I-thought-it-was-a-trilogy club. Proving once again, how much easier to continue an old idea than come up with a new one.

Also, Midnight Club 3 DUB Edition Remix follows the Virtua Fighter 4 model and shows me, again, how the franchises I love, love me back.

In news this week. While the standard response to being lampooned by the jokesters at Penny Arcade is usually to threaten legal action, Sony Online Entertainment decided to take a more… unexpected course of action. Apparently, after their paczki-inspired (look it up) Wednesday comic comparing the Jim Lee-SOE partnership to pastries filled with crap, the less-than-admired developer decided to send 1200 donuts over to the PA. offices for whatever reason. In the end some donuts went to children’s hospital workers, some went to overworked PA staff members, and a good laugh was had by all. All I have to say is kiss half the promised upgrades for the next EQ expansion pack goodbye.

Also, the return of ilovebees.com, seemingly for Elder Scrolls IV finally proves my theory that game developers would rather confuse us than inform us.

Finally Rockstar chose to hop on the confuse everyone bandwagon and reveal that their much-anticipated 360 title wasn’t GTA, or even anything remotely controversial, it’s ping pong. I really hope that Rockstar is choosing to revive the oldest genre in gaming for some reason other than a need to distract people from whatever else they’re doing.

That’s the Weekly Gamage, come back next week when I grab the gaming news, wrestle it to the ground and make it my bitch.

By Zack Rovinsky