Taking Bully Seriously? 69
simoniker writes "There's been plenty of controversy about Rockstar's PS2 title Bully, but does it actually have anything to teach players? Ian Bogost looks into whether the game actually has a social message, explaining: 'Taking Bully seriously means acknowledging that the game has something to say about the world, not just that the world has something to say about it. It means assessing how effectively the game tackles the topic of bullying and how meaningful its claims about it are.' His conclusion? 'Sweeping away all the dust that Bully left in the wake of its release, it's hard to defend the game, not because it might be a pubic nuisance or a danger to kids, but because it could have been so much more of a scathing critique of high school social politics than it turned out to be.'"
Scathing Critique? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:La! Release it upon the PC. (Score:3, Insightful)
It's getting old for me too. I mean, how many times can you WOW, TURNIP PRICE IS LIKE 478 BELLS! WOOT! BIGGER HOUSE HERE I COME!...
Erm, as I was saying... how many times can you go digging for HOLY CRAP COOL I'VE FINISHED MY STEGOSAURUS!
No, sorry, what was it... Ah yes. I'm sick to death of that evil bloody kitsune Crazy Redd and his forged artwork. Surely there should be another way of obtaining material for the museum's gallery. That's why I'm cross at Animal Crossing. Yep.
Oh, and I got called a redneck by the fashion zombie giraffe thing last week. That didn't please me.
And Firefox's inbuilt spellchecker doesn't know 'kitsune'. Silly thing.
Re:Scathing Critique? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's called "KZ Manager" (Score:1, Insightful)
It's called "KZ Manager" [wikipedia.org]. "The goal of the game is to keep the camp functioning by keeping the "public opinion" or other important resources and gauges over or under a certain threshold. In one version, public opinion rises when the "manager" executes a number of prisoners with Zyklon B. However, ordering said gas costs money, which can be gathered by forcing the prisoners to work. Spending too much time without a "sufficient" number of executions makes "public satisfaction" drop, and having too few working prisoners will soon drive to a resource shortage, and closing of the camp, thus losing the game."
Re:Scathing Critique? (Score:3, Insightful)
Meanwhile, back in the real world, we have games being attacked by idiot lawyers, and some people trying to defend the games on the basis of freedom of speech. I'd rather take the social criticism angle than the "But you honor, beating up kids in school entertains and engages me! Whatever happened to fun for fun's sake?!?" defense. And further, girl, this article is probably not about your entertainment, but rather about in what way this particular game is meaningful activity. Yes, consider that: It's not about you and your entertainment.
Kids today...
What's the big deal? (Score:3, Insightful)
Has this one just become a big deal because the Spectrum couldn't handle full motion 3D graphics? Bully seems to be just a logical evolution of Skool Daze, a game that's over 20 years old now but was great in its time (and I played it recently on a Spectrum emulator and enjoyed the hell out of it, still!). Hell, it even had the "homosexual content" thing down where you could kiss guys, so even that's nothing new.
Having said that, I'm actually looking forward to picking this one up and playing it. I have always enjoyed Rockstar's games and I see no reason I won't enjoy this, too. I doubt it's going to turn me into a bully because (a) I'm not at school; I'm in my 30's and (b) Grand Theft Auto didn't turn me into a carjacking gun-toting villain except maybe for a few hours every few days when I got time to play it! If you seriously can't separate fact from fiction enough to play a game like Bully, then you probably shouldn't go to the movies, or watch TV... or hell read a book!