'Bully' lies in wait

Protests revive as release of controversial school-themed game looms

Brian D. Crecente, Rocky Mountain News

Thursday, August 10, 2006

NEW YORK - The creators of Bully, a controversial video game about school life and bullying, announced Wednesday that the game will reach stores in October.

The announcement by Rockstar Games, makers of Grand Theft Auto, comes a year and a half after the developer unveiled the title to international outrage and calls for the game to be banned or boycotted.

While the game doesn't include the virtual blood, injuries or death that protesters suggested it would, the news that Bully is coming sparked renewed reaction from critics.

Ronald Moten, co-founder of Washington, D.C.-based Peaceoholics, who has not seen Bully, likens it to alcohol or tobacco. He says his non-profit group, formed to help reduce juvenile crime through intervention and community outreach, plans to hold protests in hopes of keeping the game out of stores.

"We don't want the game to come out at all, we don't think there is a purpose for this type of game," said Moten, whose group protested in front of Rockstar Games' New York offices last year after the initial announcement. "I think we can stop it from coming out. If it does come out, we can get the stores that sell to stop selling it."

Rockstar Games already was in political hot water last year over the hidden sex scandal surrounding Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas when the company announced Bully in May 2005. The one-sentence description of the game sparked protests in the U.S., Australia and Britain.

The Miami-Dade School District passed a resolution earlier this year calling for Rockstar to not release the game and asking local stores not to sell Bully if it is released. The game was also added to the school district's list of prohibited software. CNN's Lou Dobbs called it "another disturbing example of our culture in decline." In Britain last December, the House of Commons condemned the game and some members called for it to be banned.

Amidst the controversy, Rockstar went underground with the title, continuing to develop it but refusing to speak publicly about it until recently.

"I think if the entertainment industry had always chosen the path of least resistance, I think we would have missed out on some incredible films, a load of life-altering records and a host of books that changed literature forever," said Terry Donovan, who helped found Rockstar Games in 1998.

"I think (video games) exist at the critical intersection of art, technology and fiction - and as the medium matures, the controversy will dissipate into nostalgia as the demographic that enjoys them today become the establishment of tomorrow."

Recently Rockstar invited the Rocky Mountain News to their New York offices for a sneak peek at the nearly completed game. Sitting on leather couches in a back room of the Rockstar offices, which take up an entire floor of a nondescript office building near Broadway and Houston Street, members of the development team showed some video for Bully and played through large chunks of the first chapter of the seven-chapter game.

The concept, they said, was to create a game that captured the feeling of those terrorizing first days of school and to extend it to a year in the life of a troubled teen on a private campus.

Bully takes place in a sort of generic here-and-now on the campus of Bullworth Academy, a nonexistent private school located in the northeast town of Bullworth.

The mood-setting animation that leads into the first playable moments of the game depict a troubled teen anti-hero from a fractured family, an uncaring establishment and a large private school campus. Fifteen-year-old Jimmy Hopkins is not a bad kid, just a troubled one.

While the game has an overarching story line broken down into seven chapters, Bully's biggest appeal will likely be the ability to roam the school and nearby town, making up your own story.

While there is an illusion of complete autonomy in Bully, the game builds boundaries by punishing and rewarding behavior such as skipping class or attacking a teacher.

Another key component to Bully, its developers say, is its complex social network built around the game's five cliques. The way you interact with a particular member of a group affects the way they treat you during the game.

While Rockstar says the game is about the experience of school, its critics, who have yet to see the game, see it as being all about the bullying. But the National Parents and Teachers Association says it has chosen not to address Bully specifically, instead relying on the video game rating system to do its job.

"We don't have any position on any specific games right now," said national PTA spokesman James Martinez. "But we do (have a position) on the fact that parents should make informed decisions using the ESRB's ratings and that those ratings should be enforced by retail stores."

Bully for you

The video game Bully does limit what players can do and involves consequences. For example:

• While you can use objects such as a slingshot, stink bombs or baseball bat, there are no guns or knives.

• The game features fights, but no animated bruising, bloodshed or death.

• During a fight, you can choose to humiliate opponents with things like Indian burns and charley horses, or stop the fight by apologizing.

• Attacking a teacher or female student, skipping classes or staying up too late leads to swift punishment that can stall out the fun.

• While Bully includes fighting, the heart of the game is an exploration of the complex social interactions at most high schools.

More online

• Speak up: Should game developers be allowed to create and sell a game like Bully? Go online and vote.

• Talk back: Join a chat with video game writer Brian D. Crecente at 11 a.m. Friday to talk about Bully and other controversial video games at:

www.RockyMountainNews.com

crecenteb@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2811