Video games have always had some semblance of violence to them, even way back in the Nintendo Entertainment System era. Mario, while not extremely violent, did smoosh things by jumping on them repeatedly, even killing turtles with THEIR OWN SHELLS! As each generation passed, games grew more and more violent. Soon we were thrust into World War II, traveling to Silent Hill and Raccoon City and even learning the ways of the Bushido. There are countless violent games out there. These are five of the most violent ones that I have played.
5. Madworld
Platinum Games has pumped out some of the most amazing, violent and groundbreaking games since their debut title– Madworld. Their first game is one of their most gruesome and visually interesting. It is only in black and white with a little red depending on how well you do on “Deathwatch.” You control a protagonist with a chainsaw as a hand and must kill everyone on the television show to continue surviving. This storyline paired with the game’s black and white rendering only helps to show the brutality of this game show with blood splashing all over its colorless backdrop.
One other item that makes it a tad more violent than other games I was debating is the fact that it used Wii Motion Controls.This means the player generally had to ACTUALLY act out the murderous move. Looks like Nintendo and Sega wanted to make a bunch of young murders with this title.
4. Dead Island
There are three games in this series by Techland in my opinion: Dead Island, Dead Island: Riptide and Dying Light. All three of them are extremely violent, but I’m giving the nod to the first one. Before Dead Island, the only first-person zombie game I had played was Left 4 Dead, but Left 4 Dead focused more on guns than melee combat and that’s why Dead Island is on this list. I’ll never forget the first time I had to bash a zombie’s head in with a wooden plank while running to a safe-house.
As you progressed, your melee weapons became more and more powerful and brutal. Dead Island made finding blueprints fun, but using the new weapons on zombies was even more fun. You’ll slowly cave in their rotting skulls. There was nothing more satisfying than hearing that squish! I sit here patiently waiting for Dead Island 2 to get a release date, but until then, I’ll just be parkouring with zombies in Dying Light.
3. Mortal Kombat
I believe that I was thirteen when Mortal Kombat came to home consoles. Oddly enough, Mortal Kombat for the SNES was a Christmas gift that year, one of two games on this list that was a Christmas gift. News stations and do-gooders ran rampant hearing about its home release and how it would damage the impressionable youth of our nation.
Yet, I played it at thirteen. I still play it and I’m yet to shoot up a school or movie theater, but my parents did raise me right and taught me right from wrong as well as what is real and what isn’t. What got these do-gooders’ knickers in a bunch were the fatalities, which I could never pull off as a 14 year old. Hell, I can’t get them to work as a 39 year old.
For everyone who has been living in a cave, the fatalities were the ends of matches where the victor would unleash an insanely violent special move. Ripping skulls from heads, lighting people on fire and the like were the awesome scenes we could see if we mastered it. This, along with the gratuitous blood and over the top martial arts action, put Mortal Kombat in the history books. They only got more violent with each new entry.
2. Grand Theft Auto (series)
I remember my first time playing Grand Theft Auto III and realizing that Rockstar Games really did make us the bad guy. Buying a hooker, nailing her in the car, then killing her to get your money back blew my mind back in the early 2000’s. No other game had that kind of realism or utter disdain for human life. I never actually beat GTA III, but my buddies and I spent countless hours entering the cheat codes, causing havoc with full armor and tanks.
Flash forward over a decade and I get my noticeably older hands on Grand Theft Auto‘s latest installment. I said to myself I will beat this game. I still haven’t, but I did get very far. The torture scene was one of the most surprising missions to me. I knew something horrific was coming, but I had no idea I would be pulling teeth out and electrocuting a man for a mission. This shocked the heck out of me; even more so than Modern Warfare 2‘s “terrorist” mission.
1. Manhunt
The second game on my list that was a Christmas present has to be the most violent game I’ve played in my humble opinion. The premise of this title goes back to the days of snuff films. If you’ve seen the movie 8MM, you may know what I’m talking about. If not, a snuff film is a short pornographic movie of someone being killed. Thankfully there is no porno in Manhunt, but there are a lot of people being killed. You play as recently “executed” convict James Earl Cash, who was to die by lethal injection, but was instead saved to be filmed on CCTV cameras dispatching gang members in an abandoned section of the city.
You do this for twenty levels and are graded on stealth, killings and executions. Executions are a huge part of the game. You stand behind the victim and the longer you stand unnoticed, the more gruesome the execution will be. I don’t really know if anyone who would actually watch this show should it come to television, but it would have to be better than The Bachelor!
Are there any games that I may have missed or you felt were more violent than these five? Please let me know in the comments or on my Twitter @Superjerry13.