Thanks, /v/. You're my only friend sometimes.

"RICK SANCHEZ HATES RAPELAY, WHY DON'T YOU?" was how a /v/, 4chan's Video Game board, started early evening tonight.

Thinking I was well past reporting based on "what was hot on /v/" with my old blog, it doesn't help when the rage-hordes happen to resonate with a note I just happened to have reported on. Well, I mean, when a group of screaming anonymous internet people happen to say what would be considered reasonable counter-arguments to the overwhelming hate this game is getting in press lately.

An early post in the thread (I'd link to it, but in any likelihood it'll be gone before you read this):

"I hate the public outrage over this game. It fucking comes out years in the past and nobody cares. Amazon carries it briefly and suddenly a wave of butthurt feminists catches on, causing other people to catch on. Murder is commonplace but rape causes a stir? I can cut off people's limbs while they cry until they bleed out. I put my dick in a woman who doesn't want it and suddenly there's a news story. The jackass has no experience in video games, so he still thinks that games are all for children. WHAT DO YOU MEAN THERE'S MATURE THEMES IN VIDEO GAMES? Not to mention this game is impossible to buy without importing it from Japan, which a parent would need to be involved in.

What's next, a call to ban Custer's Revenge? That's a game about rape. Hell, it's even racist on top of that."

It's true. Video games have evolved well past being merely childrens' toys. This is as true now as it was when Mortal Kombat stopped being a news item and it took violent snuff fantasies being sold at stores like GameStop for people to even get more than half a rise out of extremity in video games. The medium has different demographics now, just as any film or brand of literature (or website, for that matter).

It doesn't help those outraged that the game is rated Adults Only and can only be made available through import.

I really hope Rick Sanchez is an epic troll of some form, because half of the content of the blog entry is not only filled with double standards for other graphic and adult themes in video games, but doesn't take the time to identify what "folger" content is. Maybe a hot-coffee mod for the game already laiden with sex?

edit: Hopefully my comment makes it to prime time on his blog-
This entry ignores several important things that need to be accounted for in video games:
1. The medium has moved past being for "children only." This isn't even just for extreme cases like "Manhunt" or "RapeLay," I mean both in content AND thematic nature. Games like Metal Gear Solid, Gears of War, or even these extreme cases are rated for Adults to play and for good reason.

2. The game is available only through import. You cannot find it sitting in the back of a GameStop or Best Buy. It is not going to magically jump into childrens' hands, nor is it even readily available without considerable searching on the part of the intended buyer (especially after its Amazon.com recall).

3. The game is fantasy. Games, by nature, are fantasy. Fantasy. Not real. As awesome as shooting people in the head with a sniper rifle is in any number of console and computer shooter titles, no reasonable person uses this as an excuse to buy a gun and go for an Ultra-Kill high score. The same is true of this game. While I'm sure some people have sexual "rape-fetishes" (you can google it. I will guarantee hits for it), no reasonable person acts out the fantasy in a fantasy setting and then says, "Wow, that was great. You know what would be better? If I went out on the street right now and raped the first girl I saw."

4. Placing any kind of ban or legislation against a GAME NOT EVEN READILY AVAILABLE ON US SOIL BECAUSE IT IS NOT MADE OR SOLD IN THE US is a tremendous double standard when the video games industry is already ripe with other "socially unacceptable" content that is not or is no longer questioned with more than passing concern.

Is showing a graphic depiction of some guy's head getting blown off repeatedly better than poorly rendered digital non-consensual sex? Probably not, when we take two seconds to consider neither is a desirable thing to do publicly but really no one else's business when acted out in a fantasy setting in the privacy of our homes.