The Slaying of Sandy Hook Elementary

[Paddy™]

I think there's something to be said for a game like this. If you listen to the punditry surrounding gun control as it relates to something like Sandy Hook, it's easy to see why a game like this exists and is - dare I say it - necessary. The pundits sicken and anger me more than this game does, and I find them to be more disrespectful of the dead and the grieving in their pursuit of ratings, votes and soapbox-masturbation than the developer of this game could ever be. I feel that they're the target of this game, because this is the video game equivalent of the verbal/political game those people play every day when they pontificate.

People hypothesise about how different kinds of law pertaining to gun control could have prevented or altered the outcome of Sandy Hook (let's not get into that debate here). A game like this takes those ideas and puts them to the test, it makes people have a more visceral "hands on" view of what they propose, offering an insight to their own world view which they'd never otherwise have. Great art holds a mirror up to society, and that's what I think a game like this can do. In its most significant ways it's not even about the atrocity itself.

Don't get me wrong, The Slaying of Sandy Hook Elementary probably isn't a great example of the power a game can have in a debate like this (excepting that it raises the question quite effectively), and it sure as hell ain't "great art", but a game in which you take on the role of a real-world killer and re-enact what he/she did can have value. JFK Reloaded and Super Columbine Massacre RPG! are perhaps better examples.

[Froge]

My main criteria for judging how much I like a game is based around how fun it was for me to play it, which is influenced by factors such as depth of gameplay mechanics, storyline, an engaging message, etc.

I did not find the message engaging or the game fun at all, so it fails for me.

[Alardem]

I'm thinking of the movie Funny Games as a parallel. The director smugly proclaimed it to be a commentary on the torture porn genre, which fails on two levels: the people who the message would be likely to affect will not want to see it, and those who the message would be useless on (guys who enjoy the genre) would decry it as lame and boring.

That being said, I can't be too sympathetic to anyone. The developer is an arrogant spoiled brat who would lack the empathy to see the funny side if a tragedy affected him personally, and the media circus is taking his bait and denouncing him as a horrendous monster for...making an offensive game. He deserves to be mocked, but I feel like all the energy devoted to getting angry over him could be used to tackling the underlying issues that lead to massacres. Let's face it - there will be school shootings in the future, and scapegoating individuals avoids the fact that societal issues like the availability of firearms, the stigma towards the mentally ill and a culture that worships violence all contribute to horrible outbursts like this.