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By: Brian Crecente
Slamdance finalist Super Columbine Massacre RPG has been officially kicked from the festival due to mounting pressure from protesters and the loss of sponsorship, the game's creator told Kotaku Thursday night.
This is the first time in the Slamdance Festival's 13-year history that a game or film has been removed from the festival due to criticism or outside pressure.
In a last minute phone call Thursday evening, Slamdance president and co-founder Peter Baxter, told game developer Danny Ledonne that he regards his decision to remove the game from the festival as "deeply flawed," but necessary to the festival's survival. He went on to say, according to Ledonne, that the festival's initial decision to select the game was "consistent with Slamdance's philosophy but somewhat naive," and apologized profusely for pulling the entry.
Ledonne said that he bears no ill will toward the festival, but that the decision to pull the game does raise concerns about freedom of speech and video game development.
"I don't want to paint them as the villain in this," he said. "I don't think the real issue is a couple of guys at Slamdance who decided to reject my game, it's the larger pressures placed on them."
Ironically, Super Columbine Massacre RPG was courted by the festival coordinators. Ledonne initially wasn't behind the idea of entering the game. In late November, the festival announced that Ledonne's game was one of 14 titles selected as a finalist.
In the press release naming Columbine Super Massacre RPG a finalist, Sam Roberts, Slamdance's games competition manager said that the year's entrants "push the edges of what games can be and can try to be, experimenting in art style, gameplay, metaphor, story, concept and time. They provide challenges and inspiration for game designers working the traditional space, and game designers who will work in the future. While each of these games forces you to examine something you thought you already knew, or experiment in life and evolution, they also all entertain - they strive to be fun, and to be true play experiences."
Baxter added that video games are "as important and influential as movies have ever been."
Neither Baxter nor Roberts were responded to calls or emails seeking comment when the story broke late Thursday night and the website still lists the Columbine game as one of the finalists.
Ledonne said Thursday evening that he was contacted by Roberts earlier that day and told that some financial backers for the show had pulled their support because of the game's selection as a finalist. He was then told that his game was being removed from the competition.
Ledonne said he's not sure now what he should do.
"There are people in the gaming community who think I should protest," he said. "But I haven't decided what to do yet.
"I don't feel like (Baxter and Roberts) ought to be vilified in this, I think they had the best of intentions to showcase this game."
Ian Bogost, an agenda game designer, academic game researcher at Georgia Tech, and educational publisher on the topic, said the decision to pull the game from the festival could have greater implications for the indie scene, though he thinks it could be more serious for flim makers.
"As I understand it, Slamdance has never before pulled a film or a game they've accepted. So I'd imagine this will have some impact on the indie film scene — maybe it will even have an impact there first," he said in an interview with Kotaku last night. "Unfortunately, the indie game festival scene is not as experimental and daring as the indie film scene, and there probably was never a lot of empathy for SCMRPG... I hope I'm wrong though. I hope there is a strong response among indie game developers. We could use the solidarity."
Bogost, whose Persuasive Games studio had finalists in the past two Slamdance festivals, says he's not sure what to think about the decision as a developer.
"We make games about political and social issues, and also games about corporate critique," he said. "If we made a game with a political opinion one of the Slamdance sponsors didn't like — heck, if we made a game about one of the sponsors — would we have a place there? It's a concern."
Ledonne is set to speak in Vancouver later this month at the 69th Annual Canadian University Press National Conference about video games as an alternative form of journalism. Next month, he will be speaking at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles about the first amendment and video games.
Update: I've since had a chance to the Slamdance organizer and others. Slamdance: Columbine Pulled on Moral Grounds.
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