Colleges band to make anti-bullying game [update 1]
by Ross Miller 
{ Sep 7th 2006 at 3:15PM }
The program is being headed up by Heriot-Watt computer science professor Ruth Aylett and features universities from UK, Portugal, Italy, and Germany. According to Gamasutra, the first tests of the software are being planned for early 2007 for UK and German children aged 10 to 12.
Using video games to educate is a great idea, but we wonder if the planned project has anything to do with next month's release of Rockstar's controversial, though reportedly tame, title Bully (now Canis Canem Edit in Europe). We've sent off a few questions to Dr. Aylett,
[Update: Here is our interview with Dr. Aylett.]
See Also:
Slate author: Madden taught me football
[Via Gamasutra; thanks, cringer8]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Paul P. @ Sep 7th 2006 3:27PM
When it comes to bullying, kids need to either use violence to solve their problems or just bend over and take it like a man.
Trying to reason with a bully or going to an authority figure should only result in more severe beatings. Also any kid smug enough to say that a bully acts like that because they are jealous, they really deserve a pounding.
Finally, I hate that bitch always pulling the ball away from Charlie Brown. What a bitch.
SickNic @ Sep 7th 2006 3:35PM
Ban this game right now. This game is nothing more than a similator that will teach kids how to stick up for themselves and not be bullied. What is my bully of a son going to do when all the kids he terrorizes all of a sudden grow some balls and stand up to him? He will be devistated. I am going to start The POBAAG or the Parents Of Bullies Against Anti-bullying Games.
POBAAG, for a better future for our bullying kids.
jc @ Sep 7th 2006 3:38PM
Paul, I sure hope you are not planning to be a child psychologist in the future...
However, I do agree with you about the Charlie Brown / Lucy comment.
Lucca @ Sep 7th 2006 4:00PM
Oh lookie, it`s Charlie Brown! ^^
TehDestroyer @ Sep 7th 2006 4:03PM
Honestly the only times I've had problems with bullies is when I attempted to stick up for myself. I hade the oppurtunity to walk away but I decided to try and reason with them. As for this in relation to Canis Canem Edit, the game is actually about being the outcast in school. You have to gain rep and such with every faction (including the nerds) except the bullies. In alot of cases you end up protecting people from the bullies. For more info I suggest you pick up the latest issue of Game Informer.
matt P @ Sep 7th 2006 4:10PM
Paul your right, well sort of. You cant reason with bullies, and the more you try to the more of a beating the bully will deal. Its all a problem at home. They act like their parents. I agree either take it like a man or beat the crap out of the bully. Thats what i do anyway...
Paul P. @ Sep 7th 2006 4:33PM
I have a lot of bully experience.
Everytime some school counselor would lecture a class about how bullie just have low self esteem, I would inevitably see someone the next day saying "You just pick on me because you have low self esteem" or something like that, and things would only get worse for them. The truth is, bullies have great self esteem, that's why they see nothing negative in any of their actions, they're totally confident.
I avoided the bullies the easy way, by being friends with bigger bullies. Just find someone higher up on the food chain who isn't currently bullying me and buddy up with them.
reppy @ Sep 7th 2006 4:36PM
It's unfortunate too.. because the only reason we're seeing all this anti-videogame backlash is because of bullies. Yes, that's right.. bullies! Do Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold go on that huge rampage if they weren't bullied their entire high school life? I doubt it.
You can only endure being called a "long-haired faggot" and shoved into a locker so many times before you snap and do something you're going to regret.
Buckshot @ Sep 7th 2006 4:59PM
Stop Snitchin'
bazald @ Sep 7th 2006 5:01PM
Why develop such a game a mere month before the release of Bully, which aims to do essentially the same thing?
Zsavior @ Sep 7th 2006 7:00PM
The problem with bullies is, it shouldn't be up to the children to handle bullies, just like normal everyday people don't try and stop crimnals why are we trying to send kids to deal with young punks.
You see bullies arise in schools where the teacher has no real power, probably because their parents can pamper them or the system didn't give a damn. You people are wrong though anybody and everybody can be reasoned with, it just matters what you are prepared to do. I went to a NYC high school named Truman, by far no where near any of the worst schools in the city when I was attending. I can tell you right now there was no bullies what so ever in that school. You want to know why? You take small kid (A) and place him next to said bully, bully goes to harm small kid succeeds. After school bully is beat with in an inch of his life because the clique this kid runs with is murderous. END OF STORY, no crying, not media coverage, nobody giving a damn.
You want to stop a bully, you want to really stop a bully, take them out of their cushy surroundings, drop them in the nearest most horrible inner-city school, make them take mass transit, back and forth and watch them sing a new song. In my school you stayed out of trouble, you didn't get into trouble, if you wanted to be tough you better make sure you were affilated with 50 or so tough people with you, and trust me TRUMAN was a nice school. Bullies are prodcuts of surroundings remove them from those surroundings, and they are nothing more than victims, and this is something my school believed in vigorously.
I remember way over one hundred kids being transfered to different schools split up from any friends, or acquaintances they had, just so there was no back up for them to fight. You know what, it worked like gangbusters, because the rest on the trouble makers stopped. Why did they cut out there actions, when they heard from those kids again that were transfered, they were informed the schools they were sent to were hell. Place there were more like prisons then they were educational institutions. So like I said, want to stop a bully, take them out of their surroundings and put them some place horrible. You will see the rebirth of a new kid right before your eyes, guarantee it.
GTgamer @ Sep 7th 2006 11:45PM
There's already an anti-bullying simulator on the market and it's been available for quite some time. It was called "Track and Field" for the original NES.
Run boy, run!!!