Feature: 'Slamdance, Post-Columbine'

For today's in-depth Gamasutra feature, we present exclusive event coverage of the 2007 Slamdance Guerilla Gamemaker Competition, the event that has come under recent fire for its disqualification of competition finalist Super Columbine Massacre RPG!. In this excerpt, correspondent Patrick Dugan covers now perhaps the most important aspect of this year's Slamdance competition, its panel on controversial games, with Slamdance games manager Sam Roberts and president Peter Baxter talking with SCMRPG! creator Danny Ledonne: ”The panel on controversial games, and Super Columbine in particular, was host to much truth and reconciliation. Danny Ledonne noted that he was more surprised at the game being courted than it being pulled, while Peter Baxter noted that despite the press' spin, his organization did not have the resources to fight potential litigation. I asked game competition organizer Sam Roberts if Ian Bogost is more press-savvy than then entire Slamdance organization put together, and he confessed in no uncertain terms. [...] Roberts and the developers in attendance agreed that a great opportunity was missed in the wake of Baxter's pulling of SCMRPG!. If the ESA had been called in the wake of the game's nomination and asked to cover Slamdance Inc. should any legal issues arise, it could have allowed a precedent to be set for games to be recognized as an art form, rather than simply as "free speech" which is a subtly different classification." You can now read the full Gamasutra feature on the subject, with more on coverage of the controversy, as well as presentations on games that remained in this year's Slamdance competition (no registration required, please feel free to link to this feature from external websites).