Kill John F. Kennedy for fun, a study in stupid game ideas

Stupid Idea, but in the end at 10$ bucks a pop, people will buy it to see what the hype is all about and in the end... look at all the free publicity. Every news site I've visited so far today have this.

Great marketing scheme... they'll make alot of money for a stupid idea.

I ough make the game to kill other greater leaders behind US.

While I agree that the mention of Rock Star is a bit of a cheap shot, I think this is an interesting scenario. Many games include killing generic baddies (I know, I know, action movies do this too), but once it's a specific person in an assassination, then it's in bad taste.

What got me thinking about this, in part, was the GoldenEye review over at IGN.

"From the get-go EA has told us that Rogue Agent is all about being bad, being evil. Using a Halo weapon set-up (two weapons and a grenade), players find themselves rewarded with points for being evil, over-the-top, and roguish. Unfortunately, being bad here is like being rewarded for simply playing any FPS. You're rewarded for headshots, using human shields, grenade use, using the golden eye technology, etc., but not one of these things is particularly evil or bad -- as videogame go."

There's no real attempt to maybe get at a morality here, which is what might be good about the mainstream media's take. They're a view from outside the industry, and can make people take a step back and reexamine things.

Also, how does this tie in to the Kuma games? Can we say that Kennedy: Reloaded falls under the news style coverage they're striving for? While Kuma hasn't really taken off, it hasn't been met with the same harsh criticisms that the Kennedy game has. Again, though, is this because in the Kuma games you're killing faceless Iraqis and Vietnamese, and not former presidents?

I love games, and am not trying to call for an end to violence, but I do get frustrated at times on the industry's heavy focus on it, and I think it's stunting the medium to a certain extent. A little perspective here might not be the worst thing.

Check out the movie Yi Yi for more insight into this topic.

Woo, that's a lot for a comment.