The Notoriety of Death Race
This week's post isn't really about the game Death Race, but more about how notorious it was.
Basic Game History
Death race was released on April 1, 1976. It was developed by Exody. There was a B-movie released the year before by the same name, but the game has nothing to do with the movie. The game was released because the year before, Exody had made a game called destruction derby and sold it to Chicago Coin. Unfortunately, the game tanked, and eventually Chicago Coin went under. But, Exidy had sold all the rights to Chicago Coin, so Exody couldn't profit off the game. They had a newly employed engineer named Howell Ivy to modify the game into what is now known as Death Race.
Gameplay
The game was set in a graveyard, and you controlled a car. The car was controlled by a steering wheel mounted on the cabinet, and a lever to control speed. From either side of the play-field your car will get surrounded by gremlins. The goal is to run over each gremlin before the screen gets to dense with gremlins.
The Press
Multiple press sources claimed Death Race, was "bloody" and "gory". Both blood and gore were not featured in the game. When you hit a gremlin, they were replaced with grave markers. Even if there was blood, you wouldn't be able to tell. The game was in black and white. The main thing reporters and concerned parents focused on was the noise the gremlins made when they were run over. Reporters claimed it sounded like a baby being run over. But... How do they know what a run over baby sound like? The main thing was, they thought it was too violent.
The Affect
The negativity from the press seriously backfired. Any people who played the game knew the press was wrong, and people who didn't play the game were basically MORE interested in playing the game. SO the end result was that Exidy Sold THOUSANDS more cabinets to arcades. The negative press was really just free publication.
The Justification
I can understand why people were afraid of Death Race. Video Games were very new, and so it was scary without the fake "violence". But this new violent thing, society was SUPER scared. All this new stuff in the american life shook the country up, and when this new stuff was violent, it was just too much.
Well researched and structured. 3 thumbs up.
ReplyDeleteI learned a lot of history from this post. But I also learned a lot about other things. You made the point that it was called gory for a SOUND. That's crazy. But it also shows how impressionable people are. You also made the point that all the negative press caused the game to become MORE popular. You closed with the point that the game was new and that which is new is scary. That's a big important point. This was a good blog post. Thanks for it.
ReplyDelete"Hey, you know what that sounds like? That sounds like that baby you ran over.!"
ReplyDeleteRight? Like, "Ok mr. Run over baby expert."
DeleteVery interesting. The press used description that could be proven wrong. And how do you know what a baby getting ran over sounds like. Were they just like it sounds like a baby ran over, as they proceeded to run over a baby?
ReplyDeleteMy guess is they ran over a large test group of babies and averaged out the noise and said: "hey, have you heard that Death Race game noise? it sounds like the average run over baby noise!"
Delete