Ethnic Cleansing (video game)

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Ethnic Cleansing is a video game developed by Resistance Records, an underground record label specializing in neo-Nazi and white supremacist "music", which is owned by the white supremacist organisation National Alliance. Based on that information and the game's title, one could probably make a guess as to the game's content and not be far off.[1]

Contents

[edit] Gameplay

Yes, it's true. The game is a first person shooter of which the extremely, extremely threadbare plot appears to concern a takeover of the United States of America by Jews. The player takes the role of either a skinhead or a klansman, who, operating out of a crack house, runs through a ghetto killing blacks and Mexicans before descending into a subway to kill Jews. They eventually reach the "Jewish Control Center", where they must kill Ariel Sharon, former Prime Minister of Israel, in order to win the game. Blacks in the game are portrayed as gangbangers who make ape noises when killed (the game claims these noises were "recorded using real life negroes."), Mexicans are portrayed as banditos who say "I'm gonna take a siesta now" when killed, and Jews are portrayed as Haredim who say "Oy vey!" when killed.

By default, the game plays a cover version of the racist band Skrewdriver's song "When the Boat Comes". Sample lyrics from said song: "Take no shit from anyone cause the white race rules! We'll fight the communists, 'cause communists are fools! Try to take our nations, and give em to the blacks! Won't take it anymore, we're gonna take our nations back! So we say: nigger, nigger, get on the boat!"[2]

[edit] Quality

Ghastly sentiments aside, the game is also pretty dismal from a technical perspective. Developed using the Genesis3D engine, the graphics are hideous, the collision detection is terrible, the draw distance is about 5 feet (thus making it impossible to spot enemies before they shoot you), there are only two levels, and it crashes regularly.[3] Oh, and there's only one weapon: a machine gun. Also, for some inexplicable reason, instead of using the W, A, S and D keyboard configuration for movement that every other computer game ever made uses, by default, Ethnic Cleansing uses S, Z, X and C. We think the quality of this game accurately reflects how intelligent the white supremacist crowd is.[4]

[edit] Controversy

The Anti-Defamation League publicized the existence of the game[5] and (being apparently somewhat unfamiliar with the ideas behind open source software) unsuccessfully lobbied the developers of Genesis3D to change their licensing conditions to prohibit the use of the engine to develop racist games. They have also lobbied the Interactive Digital Software Association to encourage their members to adopt such policies.

Stuff Magazine named Ethnic Cleansing the 40th most controversial video game of all time in January 2003. In 2010, UGO ranked it as the #1 most racist video game in history.

The game was featured in an episode of the History Channel documentary series Gangland that focused on skinhead gangs.

[edit] Getting the game

As you can probably guess, this isn't a game you can just pick up at your corner video game store. It can only be ordered directly from Resistance Records.[6] These days, of course, you might also be dumb, bored or curious enough to download it illegally for free.[7]

[edit] Sequels

The game has spawned two even more spectacularly unsuccessful sequels, White Law, and ZOG's Nightmare. Resistance Records wanted to create an entire series of games based on The Turner Diaries, but this seems to have fallen through.

[edit] Footnotes

  1. But just in case, here's the Wired article on the game.
  2. A YouTube walkthrough of the game, WARNING: As you can guess, the game seen in the video itself is highly offensive. As is the soundtrack.
  3. A review of the gameplay itself
  4. heather riot. "Ethnic Cleansing Video Game Review. Lovely." RIOTgamer. 2009 February 2.
  5. ADL Report: Growing Proliferation of Racist Video Games Target Youth on The Internet
  6. RationalWiki will not link you to a place where you can purchase it. You'll thank us later.
  7. Though you'd still likely be overpaying for it.
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