Bully
What Jack Thompson really did for Bully was make sure that everyone talked about it for months before its release. Sure, brand-new IP from Rockstar is always going to be a big story, but Thompson and the rest of the talking heads who tried to make a name for themselves by calling the game a "Columbine Simulator" and saying it advocated bullying and various other nefarious activities only gave the game more buzz.
If someone is trying this hard to keep something from me, I feel like it's almost a moral obligation to try to track down whatever it is and find out what's so terrible that I can't be trusted with it. Bully even scored a Teen rating, which means anyone can go into any retail establishment and buy it. That's why I enjoyed this review so much.
While I had a good time with the game at Rockstar's New York offices, being able to strip away the hype surrounding the game and spend hours on hours playing it in my own home has been a joy. It's doesn't hurt that the game is really, really good. That's right: I'm not holding back on my judgment for the end of the review. This is a great game and you're wondering if you should buy it, the answer is yes. It's only $40, it has many hours of game play and much to see and do. This is one of those games that make game design look easy, and makes me wonder why everyone can't make games of this quality.
This isn't a game set in space, the future, or in the criminal underworld. You're just a kid going to school, and that may be one of the scariest premises and recent history. Jimmy Hopkins isn't a very good-looking boy. He looks like the kid who always has scabs on his knuckles and is usually up to no good. The truth is that he just wants to be left alone; he's not looking to control anything. Of course, he's also the type of guy who doesn't have a lot of patience for other people's nastiness.
His mother has dropped him off at Bullworth Academy for the year, and it's up to him to either sink or swim. Bullworth's motto is Canis Canem Edit, which is Latin for dog eat dog. You get the picture. You have the greasers, the jocks, the rich kids, the nerds, and a lot of students just trying to get by and stay out of the way of everyone else. Where does Jimmy fit in? Nowhere, and he seems to know it. So does everyone else.
This isn't going to be a very pleasant school year. Rockstar wanted to talk about going to school in the same way movies like School Ties or Heathers treat the subject. When you're 15, school is a huge, scary, violent, hilarious, and surreal place. Bullworth Academy is all these things—and a little more. If you don't think kids go through this kind of madness at that age, you don't remember what it was like.
Bullworth feels like every school, or maybe none of them. It's all the things that are broken about putting a lot of kids together and trying to teach them something. Violence is described by Bullworth's principal as "spirit," and the people tasked with keeping the peace don't seem very interested in actually doing that. This is your playground, this is your hell.
Ben Kuchera
arstechnica.com
While I had a good time with the game at Rockstar's New York offices, being able to strip away the hype surrounding the game and spend hours on hours playing it in my own home has been a joy. It's doesn't hurt that the game is really, really good. That's right: I'm not holding back on my judgment for the end of the review. This is a great game and you're wondering if you should buy it, the answer is yes. It's only $40, it has many hours of game play and much to see and do. This is one of those games that make game design look easy, and makes me wonder why everyone can't make games of this quality.
This isn't a game set in space, the future, or in the criminal underworld. You're just a kid going to school, and that may be one of the scariest premises and recent history. Jimmy Hopkins isn't a very good-looking boy. He looks like the kid who always has scabs on his knuckles and is usually up to no good. The truth is that he just wants to be left alone; he's not looking to control anything. Of course, he's also the type of guy who doesn't have a lot of patience for other people's nastiness.
His mother has dropped him off at Bullworth Academy for the year, and it's up to him to either sink or swim. Bullworth's motto is Canis Canem Edit, which is Latin for dog eat dog. You get the picture. You have the greasers, the jocks, the rich kids, the nerds, and a lot of students just trying to get by and stay out of the way of everyone else. Where does Jimmy fit in? Nowhere, and he seems to know it. So does everyone else.
This isn't going to be a very pleasant school year. Rockstar wanted to talk about going to school in the same way movies like School Ties or Heathers treat the subject. When you're 15, school is a huge, scary, violent, hilarious, and surreal place. Bullworth Academy is all these things—and a little more. If you don't think kids go through this kind of madness at that age, you don't remember what it was like.
Bullworth feels like every school, or maybe none of them. It's all the things that are broken about putting a lot of kids together and trying to teach them something. Violence is described by Bullworth's principal as "spirit," and the people tasked with keeping the peace don't seem very interested in actually doing that. This is your playground, this is your hell.
Ben Kuchera
arstechnica.com
Labels: PS2 Games
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