Controversial Games

[The Blackangel]

What’s the most controversial game you play and truly enjoy? Personally I love playing Hatred. For those who don’t know, it’s an EXTREMELY violent and graphic game. In a nutshell, you’re a pissed off character that kills literally everything that moves. Several groups have lobbied to get the game completely banned. I downloaded it from Steam. I haven’t checked lately, but I think that Steam has removed it from their catalog.

[killamch89]

Hatred definitely pushes the envelope when it comes to violence in video games. I can see why it's controversial, but I think there's a place for games like it in the industry, as long as it's clear what the game is about. It’s just not for everyone, and that’s okay. As for controversial games I love to play, Manhunt is the one I love to play using an emulator. I'm still confused why they banned this game when there were even more violent games out at the time that haven't been touched at all.

[The Blackangel]

I never got what the problem was with Manhunt either. I think it was actually Manhunt 2 that was the big problem. I could see differences between it and the first Manhunt but nothing that would be the downfall of society, as they tried to make it seem.

[Shagger]

I'm posting under the assumption that controversies related to the business practices surrunding a game or the companies behind the game are not relevant here. Such complaints are understandable, but not actually related to the game itself.  This is about games that are controversial because of thier content.

 

Weirdly, I actually miss the days of people complaining about violence in games and that being considered controversial.  I don't think it's been brought up since Hatred (or possibly GTA 5), and even that wasn't a huge deal.  Sex and sexualisation of characters has come up sometimes, but not to the point whare it's been exatly mainstream news.  These days most "controversial" games get to be "controversial" for, quite frankly, ridiculous reasons.  It's usually a load of buthurt man-babies upset that a game has gay or black people in it.  Or because a game has a woman in that actually looks like a woman and not some teenager's wet dream.  Embarasment is a more familiar feeling than anger for me these days.

 

I hate censorship as much as the next guy, there is just no need for it when we have the ratings system for games.  So long parents respect both the ratings system video games themselves for what they are, an entertainment medium and not toys, children are pretty safe form content that is innapriate. Having said that, there has to be a line drawn somewhere.  And let's be honest, there are good reasons why it's not gamers and the game developers that cater to them that decide whare that line should be.