By: Brian Crecente

Richard Castaldo, who was last paralyzed from the chest down after being shot in the arm, chest, back and abdomen by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold during their attack on Columbine High School, emailed me recently about our post on the Super Columbine Massacre RPG.

Castaldo, who hopes to one day work in the gaming industry as a sound designer, is a regular reader of Kotaku and wanted to let me know that he had downloaded the game and played it.

He was kind enough to agree to a short Q&A about his thoughts on the game.

What made you decide to download and play the game?
I saw it through Kotaku actually, and at first it just surprised me that someone would make a game like that. And I know most peoples knee-jerk reactions would probably be that it is horrible and disgusting and stuff like that. But, I just thought I should play it to see what it actually was. I didn't think it was necessarily bad, if i was done the right way, which at least part of it seemed to be.

What did you think of it?
It probably sounds a bit odd for someone like me to say, but I appreciate the fact at least to some degree that something like this was made. I think that at least it gets people talikng about Columbine in a unique perspective, which is probably a good thing. But that being said there are a lot of things that are har to play or watch. And it seems to partially glamorize what happened. It shows a stark-contrast between fantasy and real life in an interesting way.

I like the part in the game where if you go up to the water fountain theres a thing that comes up that explains that the water in denver is a little bit hard because it contains calcium and magnesium but is harmless. Answering the hypothetical question of "Was there something in the water, that caused this?" Clearly not, and the causes for this are not easily apparent.

Did the idea that you were playing as Klebold and Harris upset you?

It's all third person, so your kind of looking down on this thing as all of this horrible stuff is going on. It reminded me of the movie 'Elephant", because it showed a lot of stuff in cutscenes that they were doing that led up to that fateful day. It showed them doing a lot of stuff that supposedly influenced thei actions. TherLike it showed them being bullied, and how much they hated it. But, then the people they actually killed had nothing to do with that.

Do you think it glamorizes what happened at Columbine?

There is a part where after the character's representing the killers in the game die, and then the game shows an extenended real-life montage of what happened that day. And it shows their blood-soaked corpses, and isn't pretty. Which to me deglamorizes what they did. I've heard of some stories where some students try to make folk heroes out of these killers, which is very disgusting to me. I think people who have that mindset and then play this game and see that part it would make it real for them. As opposed to having this sort-of romanticized version that some people have.

But, at the same time there are some dialogue in the game that comes up after you kill the students that refers to you as being "brave boys", which i would hope was supposed to be ironic, because clearly what they did was not brave or heroic in anyway, it was quite the opposite. It has you killing students with absolutley no protection whatsoever. Which is what actually happened. So if the killers (or anyone else for that matter) thought that what they were doing was heroic in any way they were deeply fooling themselves. People ask me all the time, "Did you know them?" And my answer is of course no, i didn't. And, I didn't do a damn thing to either one of them. So, I think the game kinda highlights that. That there was no real rhyme or reason why specific people got killed.

Do you think the fact that it's a game trivializes the attack on the school?
I think that ultimatley a videogame is just another medium for artistic expression. But, you do end up killing literally hundres of representations of high- schoolers. But 'm not sure the ulitimate intention was to trivialize it. It seemed like the purpose was to expose people to what happened in a unique perspective. There are probably a lot of people that would find it and play it out of curiosity. And find out more about Columbine than they usually would have were it not in game form. And in this process learn that what they did was not glamorous in any way. There is a weird part after the school where you die, and then go to hell, which I suppose is appropriate. And it looks like that part kind of does make heroes out of them to some degree, because you're killing demons and such. Which is kind of an odd digreesion. I think its supposed to resemble the fact that they played violent games and such. Which is the primary audience of this game, people that like violent games. Which is why I like this game in a weird way, because if you are going to play games why not learn something important in the process? And in that process I think it might become apparent that what they did was not heroic in any way and shouln't be glamorized. But it is a mixed- message at best.

Does the game's use of low-res, 16-bit-era graphics make it easier to deal with?
That's the weirdest thing about it, that the graphics are so primitive by today's standards, but the subject matter is very serious. You play as these cartoonish little characters doing horrible things but the impact gets sort of lost afterawhile. Untill of course, you actually see what really happened, and it becomes real. Which I suppose was the point in making the game, to make people remember and also that if you were to glamorize this, you don't really understand what happened. I would be so bold as to say that the effect is very post-modern.

I understand you want to get into the video game business, what are you hoping to do?

Well, I know a quite a bit about sound and music. I have recorded and produced some bands, as well as my own stuff at my place And obviously I'm very interested in video games. So. I Have been trying to get an internship within the industry. I have a resume, and experience and all of that. I really enjoy the sound effects in games. And have made my own sound effects and incorporate them into some of my own music. When my old band was recording a demo here, I tweaked one of the guitar effects, and the guitarist said that it, "sounded like a videogame" so I guess that statement turned out to be prophetic.

How can people looking to talk to you about a job reach you?

I have a resume posted online at the blogger.com site.
I believe I could be a good addition to a team, and I'd be willing to start at the bottom.