Videogame Bully may be running afoul of Florida judge

Lawyer asks for injunction to prevent sale of the game

13 October 2006 12:09 GMT / By Amber Maitland

Rockstar Games’ title “Bully” is making headlines again in the US, just 5 days before its release.

In Florida, a judge has mandated that the makers of the game give him a copy of the videogame so that he can test the game himself to see if the claims of a local lawyer should be heard.

Anti-videogame lawyer Jack Thompson has filed a motion for the court “to grant some relief to stop the witless, crass release of this game in five days”. He wants the judge to stop the game from being sold in Wal-Mart and Gamestop, as well as other retailers.

However, the furor is over the fact that the judge may place an injunction on the game before its published, which goes against a Supreme Court decision in 1931 that said that this sort of action is against freedom of speech.

Thompson, the solicitor, has asked the court to declare the game a “public nuisance”, which is a term usually restricted to describing environmental pollution.

And all of this is being caused by a man who has yet to play the videogame, which early reviews have shown to be considerably less violent than many other games out there. Indeed, it tells a story from the point of view of a child who’s being bullied, and who decides to defend himself.

In the UK, the game has been renamed Canis Canem Edit, or Dog Eat Dog in Latin, and is due for release for PS2 on 27 October. An Xbox version of the game has been cancelled.

Full tags

Gaming, PS2, RTS, Rockstar