Super Columbine Massacre RPG! review.

The Core Video Games Forum
1

Oh, here we go.

I don’t normally review indie RPGs unless they cause a lot of commotion. That would make this only the second one I’ve ever done. That being said, if the subject matter is too touchy, don’t read it - I mulled over reviewing this game for a while but I think it ought to have a chance to be looked at critically. If it makes anyone feel better though, my review was mostly negative.

Also, plus: Probably the shortest review I’ve ever written :open_mouth:

This…This might be the most difficult game I’ve ever reviewed for two reasons:

For one, just mentioning this game, let alone the historical event, sparks a lot of controversy and strong emotions. I’m not so worried about this part; after all, Super Columbine Massacre RPG! was created to stir emotions on the subject and present a different perspective on WHY it happened, rather than the usual scapegoating of Industrial Rock bands and violent video games.

The fact is, I love this aspect about it. This game dares to tell people straight to their face that they have no fucking clue as to why it really happened BECAUSE they’re too busy blaming all their various hobbies instead of the personal events that occurred in both of the shooters’ adolescent lives. And to this end, the game is executed almost flawlessly by allowing you to ‘experience’ the day from their perspective, from the moment they woke up to the moment they committed suicide - most of it based on events that really transpired that day. There’s also a ton of flashback events based on things that really happened in their lives. When playing through the game, it feels like the true answer to the question of ‘why’ is so obvious despite its complexity, that it starts to feel annoying when contrasted by the scenes in the end that demonstrate that no one really gets it. And that, to me, is brilliance.

The second reason that this game is difficult to review, however, is the one that troubles me more: In a game like Super Columbine Massacre RPG!, where the entire point of the game is meant to be an ‘experience’ more than an actual game, am I missing the point if I try to criticize it in the way that a normal game would be criticized? After all, it’s easy to say that someone who criticizes the various other facets of the game is missing the point entirely.

To this I say, “Bullshit.” I agree that, to some extent, this may be true. It’s ridiculous to critisize certain aesthetic qualities like the generic 2D graphics that comprise a lot of the game, or the really awful MIDIs of popular music that are ubiquitous throughout the game. However, there are so many aspects to the game that really trivialize the experience.

Is it really necessary to make it so that the bombs you set under the cafeteria tables have to be set in a VERY SPECIFIC corner, making it incredibly hard to figure out?

Is it really necessary to make it so that almost every ‘enemy’ can survive a gunshot attack when most of them don’t fight back in the first place? The whole idea, I thought, was to be a way of demonstrating the horror and panic of the situation, coupled with the frailty of human life; but, it feels silly when some characters can survive like two or three shots.

Is it really necessary to make it so that you have to kill EVERY person in a room to see a particular cutscene, especially when you wind up shooting way more than thirty-five people (the number of people shot - not necesarily killed - in the Columbine School Shooting)? The very fact that you can miss these very important scenes feels so ridiculous, especially coupled with the fact that there are several rooms in the game where you don’t get a cutscene for killing everyone. Why should I have to tediously mow down all ten million guys to see if MAYBE I’ll get an important cutscene if I do? And wouldn’t it have been better to just substitute those with a few more scripted events of things that really happened?

Is it really necessary to have ‘enemies’ that do things like cry and pray to get health back? That might be funny in a different setting, but it just makes the experience feel like a joke in this case. The same is true for the various dialogue in certain places, particularly the banal bit of dialogue about menstruation. What the fuck?

Is it really necessary to make an entire second half of the game with a ‘real’ ending that you can MISS if you don’t find a certain item? I imagine that this game was made so that people would SEE these events unfold. In that respect, it’s really dumb that you can miss the most important scene in the game. And for that matter, why is the second half of the game so dumb and pointless? After you die, you walk around in hell fighting enemies from doom, and you can find a room with random video game characters in it. All the dialogue is really fucking stupid, and feels like really awkward, out-of-place comic relief until you finish it and see the ‘real’ ending.

It might be missing the point to criticize the game in a the usual way game journalists review games, but then again, I think that the standard method of reviewing games misses the point even in commercial games most of the time. I feel that all of the points I brought up add a lot of tedium, and even tastelessness, to the experience that make it a whole hell of a lot harder to enjoy. It almost felt like the game didn’t WANT me to see the most important things it had to offer intellectually.

Danny Ledonne, the creator of this game, should be applauded in the sense that he braved the waters of a subject that no one dares to talk about, got in your face with it, and forced you to really think about it. In a different sense, I think he should feel ashamed for making so many gameplay, dialogue, and direction decisions that almost completely undermine the entire thing. Since then, Ledonne has made a documentary about the game called “Playing Columbine”, which I can only hope won’t be bogged down by so much dreck that it blurs the line between serious tragedy and goofy parody.

2

I think you’re giving the creator of this game far more credit than he deserves. In my opinion, the game is just a half-assed attention grab, and doesn’t really warrant an in-depth analysis. If you look past the “shocking” subject matter, you will find that it actually has nothing to say about the massacre. It doesn’t really tell you anything (nor does it attempt to infer anything) about the shooters’ adolescent lives that you can’t get from reading a superficial newspaper article. The game maker just copied a bunch of surface details from such articles, put in some caricatured crying and pleading from the victims, and then added an incredibly tasteless endgame. The damn thing doesn’t <i>have</i> a “perspective.” There is nothing “brave” about it.

The reason for the crappy execution (the MIDI soundtrack and so on) is because it was made in RPG Maker 2000, and doesn’t push the limits of the software. Unlike Barkley: Shut Up And Jam! Gaiden, which built on the RM2K capabilities and created a unique battle system (not to mention the humour value of the story), the Columbine game just uses the default RM2K battle system and gameplay. The “game” part of the game was ineptly slapped together with little regard for quality, which also makes me think that there isn’t anything to it other than a lame attempt to be controversial. If it wasn’t for the subject matter, it would be just another shitty RM2K game – in fact, I’m sure there are many RM2K games that are much better.

Basically, I think the game maker is a fraud. He used the shock value of his topic to cover the extreme banality and idiocy of his thoughts about it. Then, having gotten some attention, he is trying to milk it as much as possible by self-importantly praising himself and the alleged cultural significance of what, in the end, is just a really shitty game.

3

You might be right. I don’t think that it doesn’t infer ANYTHING…I think it’s thought-provoking the way the game basically says “No one really gave a shit about these guys, and no one really gave a shit after they died.” Sure, a lot of the content of the cutscenes is readily available material that you can read on wikipedia, but it was put together in a way that I think is a bit more intelligent than the countless newscasts that proclaim that they “trained for the shooting by playing Doom,” what a load of crap.

On the other hand, and I agree with this wholeheartedly as you know, there’s too many factors about the game that make me think “…Seriously?” Like shit and period joke, the necessity of having to kill almost EVERY person you come across. the very random implied homosexuality at one point, the absurd amount of cussing (I was willing to overlook it just a little bit, because I remember thinking I was cool for cussing up a storm when I was 16-17, but it’s admittedly very excessive), or even just the NAME of the game. When I first heard about it, I thought the game was a joke, and to be honest, it feels awfully like a joke in too many places. Perhaps I’m just too optimistic about peoples’ intentions.

The reason for the crappy execution (the MIDI soundtrack and so on) is because it was made in RPG Maker 2000, and doesn’t push the limits of the software. Unlike Barkley: Shut Up And Jam! Gaiden, which built on the RM2K capabilities and created a unique battle system (not to mention the humour value of the story), the Columbine game just uses the default RM2K battle system and gameplay. The “game” part of the game was ineptly slapped together with little regard for quality, which also makes me think that there isn’t anything to it other than a lame attempt to be controversial. If it wasn’t for the subject matter, it would be just another shitty RM2K game – in fact, I’m sure there are many RM2K games that are much better.

Yeah, I’m aware of the reason for the bad execution, but it was like…it almost felt like “how do you criticize this game on its own merits in a way that proves that it’s detrimental to the message?” …Well, assuming that you think there is one :stuck_out_tongue:

I also think that using the defaults of RM2K wasn’t necessarily a bad idea. It’s some of the other stuff they did with it that makes me feel like it’s inappropriate, like allowing people to survive gunshot attacks. If you think about it, the turn-based system would be really appropriate for what likely happened; people got shot at and made no attempt to fight back. However, it wasn’t really done that way in the game, which is kind of disturbing.

Basically, I think the game maker is a fraud. He used the shock value of his topic to cover the extreme banality and idiocy of his thoughts about it. Then, having gotten some attention, he is trying to milk it as much as possible by self-importantly praising himself and the alleged cultural significance of what, in the end, is just a really shitty game.

Maybe you should write a review for it! I admit, the main reason I wrote one is because I wanted to question whether or not the game is really as ‘good’ as it’s heralded to be. I feel like the people who herald it as some sort of brilliant work of art are just as stupid as the people who shun the game simply because it’s a game about the Columbine School Shooting.

But on the other hand, I don’t think that the game was completely meant to be a tasteless romp through the events of the shooting, because there wouldn’t be any point to adding the flashback scenes of the game if that were the case. It’s just hard to make the argument that it’s such a good piece of art when, like you say, there are so many tasteless aspects of the game. These could be removed entirely and the game would instantly be better for it.

4

But you can just as easily get that insight from one of the more moderate newspaper articles that tried to give a more thorough portrait of the gunmen. In the Columbine story, the key detail is the hypertrophied, unhealthy jock culture at the school, and the way the teachers actively promoted that culture. But the game doesn’t try to develop anyone or anything aside from the gunmen, and it mostly develops the gunmen by showing their own macho pronouncements prior to the shooting, which are really not all that interesting, if you think about it. The game has so little to say about the real-life setting that it relies on an idiotic endgame fantasy to pad out its running time.

But what if the real point was to get as many people as possible to believe that the game was a work of art – without having anything worthwhile to say, and without caring about the quality or content of the game? If that was one’s intention, one would probably do something very similar to the Columbine game. First, pick a controversial topic with the potential to offend people. Columbine is a good choice because people had initially blamed video games for the shootings – so here you are, making a video game <i>about</i> the shootings, so it’s even more controversial than, say, making a movie about them. Then do an extremely shitty job on the game itself, pad it with tasteless jokes, but put in a few flashbacks and a few cheap ploys to make the gunmen look more sympathetic. That kind of lazy moral reversal would give your game a veneer of substance, enabling you to spin off a long bullshit discourse about how it’s actually a subtle parody, or a psychological study, or whatever – and then spend more time talking about your feelings while making the game than you ever spent making the actual game.

5

Touche. I suppose it’s different for me, because way back then, I certainly wasn’t watching the news. All I knew was that there were shootings, and people blamed the video-game playing, ‘gotchic’ sort of lifestyle for it. Maybe it’s easier for me to be tricked because I never studied it that thoroughly.

But what if the real point was to get as many people as possible to believe that the game was a work of art – without having anything worthwhile to say, and without caring about the quality or content of the game? If that was one’s intention, one would probably do something very similar to the Columbine game. First, pick a controversial topic with the potential to offend people. Columbine is a good choice because people had initially blamed video games for the shootings – so here you are, making a video game <i>about</i> the shootings, so it’s even more controversial than, say, making a movie about them. Then do an extremely shitty job on the game itself, pad it with tasteless jokes, but put in a few flashbacks and a few cheap ploys to make the gunmen look more sympathetic. That kind of lazy moral reversal would give your game a veneer of substance, enabling you to spin off a long bullshit discourse about how it’s actually a subtle parody, or a psychological study, or whatever – and then spend more time talking about your feelings while making the game than you ever spent making the actual game.

Yeah, but who the fuck would DO that? I admit, there’s a heap of evidence within the game that lends credence to the idea…but honestly, the thought of someone doing something like that seems as awfully contrived as some of the shitty plots from some of the shitty RPGs we review. Why then, should we accept that such an absurd scheme is more feasible in the realm of reality when we find the thought of such absurdities so hilariously stupid in the realm of fantasy?

6

Well, who the fuck would make a game about Columbine where you fought Doom enemies and talked to a cartoon Satan, and then try to pass it off as some kind of serious analysis? I mean, we’re talking about pretty fucked-up shit to begin with, it’s not unreasonable that it might have fucked-up motivation.

I guess I don’t find the idea as far-fetched as you do. For example, some people may start doing webcomics or animations as a hobby, but then, the second that they get a small audience, they immediately try to milk their creation by printing T-shirts and getting donations, and start talking about the “artistic” aspects of their goofy jokes and half-assed ideas. Suddenly, just having a fun hobby isn’t enough, it has to be “art,” and if nobody pays enough attention to it to start discussing its “artistic” aspects and influences, then the author will push his own “behind the scenes” speeches and make documentaries about his thoughts while making the “art” – completely crowding out the fact that the art itself is pretty crappy. That kind of desire for fifteen minutes of fame is not unimaginable, and there’s always bound to be someone who wants to get that fame by cynically manipulating the audience.

7

Touche. I guess I was assuming that the entire plan was contrived to begin with, but when you put it that way - that the ‘plan’ was made after the fact - it certainly sounds more feasible.

I still don’t think I will change my opinion entirely - I want to believe that, like the creator said, he made the game because of his own experiences with bullying and being ostracized by his peers. Still, I can’t deny that there’s a ton of evidence to support your claim. In any case, I added a bit more to my review after this discussion…I’ll send you an e-mail, heh :smiley: I think I’m also going to put this review up on the Columbine RPG website. The creator still looks at the forums, so I’d like to see what people in that environment - or, even better, the creator himself - has to say about it.