{"id":548871,"date":"2006-05-22T07:14:42","date_gmt":"2006-05-22T07:14:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/wordpress\/technology\/548871-outrage-over-massacre-game.html"},"modified":"2006-05-22T07:14:42","modified_gmt":"2006-05-22T07:14:42","slug":"outrage-over-massacre-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/technology\/548871-outrage-over-massacre-game.html","title":{"rendered":"Outrage over massacre game"},"content":{"rendered":"

"I want people to walk away feeling disturbed or at least introspective," said the game’s creator, who has chosen to remain anonymous and goes by the screen name "Columbine." <\/font><\/p>\n

"I think the ultimate purpose of the game is to promote real dialogue on the subjects of school shootings, violence, retribution, media coverage, and many others," he said in an interview with the Rocky Mountain News in Denver. <\/font><\/p>\n

His comments defending the "Super Columbine Massacre" role-playing game have appalled those who lived through the tragedy on April 20, 1999, when two students shot dead 12 of their classmates and a teacher and wounding 24 others in a Denver suburb. <\/font><\/p>\n

"I want people to see what happened" at Columbine, says Joe Kechter, whose son Matt was killed in the deadliest school shooting in US history, "but not acting it out in a video game." <\/font><\/p>\n

The games’ creator said he spent so much time researching the shootings, he imagined the teen killers, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, were beside him designing "Super Columbine Massacre." <\/font><\/p>\n

The game was released online free of charge last year, on the six-year anniversary of the shootings. Columbine’s May 16 interview in the Rocky Mountain News has provoked widespread debate and attracted more users to the game’s website. <\/font><\/p>\n

The game, characterised by basic graphics, features actual quotes from the killers and photos of them, including after they shot themselves dead. <\/font><\/p>\n

Players start as shooter Eric Harris in his house, but Columbine noted that "Later in the game, players can control Dylan, as well." <\/font><\/p>\n

The player ends up at Columbine deploying bullets and bombs, and later in hell battling demons. When someone is killed, a screen pops up that says, "Another victory for the Trench Coat Mafia." <\/font><\/p>\n

The "Mafia" was an actual clique at the school, and there is some debate over whether Harris and Klebold were associated with it. <\/font><\/p>\n

Columbine acknowledges the victory box may glorify the killings, but he also said by e-mail: "In fact, it’s parodying the widespread violence that’s expected of any player in any video game…" <\/font><\/p>\n

Claiming he was at a Colorado high school at the time of the lethal shootings, Columbine says the game is educational as it examines the issues behind school shootings. <\/font><\/p>\n

He told the News he was "a bullied kid," and when the shootings occurred, "it was empowering to see two oppressed, marginalised kids rise up." <\/font><\/p>\n

Former Columbine student Richard Castaldo, who is in a wheelchair because of injuries he suffered in the shootings, wants to work in the gaming industry and has played "Super Columbine Massacre." <\/font><\/p>\n

The 24-year-old said he was "shocked" the game existed, and felt eerie at times while playing it. But he said: "It seemed like parts of it were trying to make sense of what happened." <\/font><\/p>\n

"I think there’s probably a way to do a game like this – and this probably isn’t the best example – that tries to make you think and realise things you haven’t realised before," Castaldo said. <\/font><\/p>\n

Brian Rohrbough, whose son Dan was killed at Columbine, said he had not played the game and did not intend to because he believes "Super Columbine Massacre" diminishes "the value of the innocent people and it glorifies the murderers and the crime." <\/font><\/p>\n

Rohrbough called the game’s creator a "coward" for hiding behind the cloak of anonymity. <\/font><\/p>\n

Inet-Bridge<\/font><\/i><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The creator of a video game that simulates the notorious shooting spree at Columbine high school has provoked outrage among victims’ families by describing his invention as an educational tool.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-548871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548871"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=548871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/548871\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=548871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=548871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=548871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}