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Q&A: Postal designer on Manhunt 2

By Brendan Sinclair, GameSpotPosted Jun 21, 2007 3:23 pm PT

Running With Scissors' Vince Desi has built a franchise on pushing the envelope, so where does he stand on the recent controversy surrounding Rockstar Games' latest?

Earlier this week, Rockstar Games' unreleased action game Manhunt 2 was banned in the UK and Ireland. The controversial PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, and Nintendo Wii title was then issued an AO for Adults Only rating in the US, effectively extending the ban to domestic shores, as neither Sony nor Nintendo allow AO-rated games on their systems.

Running With Scissors CEO Vince Desi is no stranger to controversy, having seen his violent Postal series of games banned in countries like Brazil and New Zealand, as well as blamed for real-life tragedies. Given his familiarity with the subject, GameSpot today posed a handful of questions to Desi in order to get his views on the Manhunt 2 controversy, the effectiveness of the Entertainment Software Rating Board, and whether or not these high-profile incidents help or hurt the bottom line.

GameSpot: What's your general take on the Manhunt 2 situation?

Vince Desi: My main concern is for our industry, the game industry itself. Whether I or any other developer or gamer likes, loves, or hates Manhunt 2 is not the issue. The real issue is we as an industry allow ourselves to be set up. I'm a big fan of the ESRB, I think in general they do a great job. The dilemma is that while we are supposedly a free society (who knows about the UK), the fact is government, hypocritical politicians, and the media dictate directly and indirectly who wins and loses, or who gets to play, so to speak. Does Hillary really have a clue?

GS: Have any Running With Scissors games ever received an initial rating of Adults Only from the ESRB?

VD: No, all of the Postal games have been rated M.

GS: Are you at all jealous that Rockstar managed to land an AO rating with a game before you?

VD: We make games that are humor-driven, not violent-centric. As for being first, Postal 2 received six descriptors; you know we were the first to get an "Intense Violence" descriptor. Seriously, I don't think any developer purposely intends to corner a negative score.

GS: How has controversy over the extreme content in Postal helped or hurt the series' sales?

VD: 2007 is our 10th anniversary, and we are currently developing Postal III for the 360/PC/Mac and we have a major motion picture coming out in September, so looking back we've done great. However, in the beginning it clearly was harmful here in the USA; we were never big enough to buy our way onto the retail shelves.

GS: If Manhunt 2 were a Running With Scissors product, do you think the rating would have been the same?

VD: Who knows? I would like to think that all games are evaluated on their own. At least that's the way it should be.

GS: If Manhunt 2 were a PC-only game, do you think the rating would have been the same?

VD: Again, in a perfect world I would say yes. That said, I'm not sure it would get the same rating if it was submitted at a different time or if a different individual scored it.

GS: Will this rating do anything to keep politicians and parent watchdog groups off the industry's back?

VD: I don't think so. The video game industry is too easy for them to complain about, and with a presidential election next year I can only imagine the pseudo talking points we'll be hearing. It could be the only issue the Democrats and Republicans agree upon.

GS: Will this rating do anything to prevent children from getting their hands on inappropriate or violent games?

VD: How old were you when you lit your first cigarette? Drank your first beer? I think rating systems work in general as they provide consumers with so-called valuable information, [but] they should never be seen as or expected to be a policing policy.

GS: Do you expect Microsoft's prohibition on AO-rated games for its systems will become an issue when Postal 3 is ready for its Xbox 360 release next year?

VD: Not at all. Our design policy is really very simple. When we consider content we first ask ourselves, "Is this fun to play?" And second, "Is it funny?" We never think in terms of violence, it reduces the game to a one-dimensional perspective, aka BORING. We design for laughs. It's so much more entertaining when you can play for fun and at the same time laugh your ass off.

I think it's important for developers to reconsider their motivations; it shouldn't be about money, or the latest trend or tech feature. We're in the game business, games are meant to be played, and playing should be a fun experience. That's it!

183 Comments

  • chilipepperman

    Posted Aug 24, 2008 4:17 pm PT

    this guy seems pretty chill and postal III is looking pretty funny!

  • YoJim8obaJoe

    Posted Aug 2, 2008 3:13 am PT

    if games make people violent then prey we never discover time travel and get hold of Ivan the terribles console to manufactor on a mass scale,and on a serious note.If games make people violent murderers how come I never heard of a games developer going insane and going on a killing spree.Surely theyd be most likely to go insane considering they spend most of there time with games

  • lillitu

    Posted Dec 16, 2007 7:48 pm PT

    I personally liked both games manhunt and postal, they were differently styled so comparing them just with the violence aspect is a bit stupid. As for these companies (rockstar / running with scissors) It is good to see they have the balls to push were others rather not go. Most gamers are not kids anymore so new content including adult content is welcome and should be acceptable. we can go rent a movie which is far more graphic than any game but are so restricted in this area. We all know that the blame game is bull***t people who do sh*t then blame media such as games have something askew in their head to start with. We will only have the chance of this if companies as such keep up the work.

  • sancezz

    Posted Oct 28, 2007 2:12 pm PT

    Actually There has been research carreid out which correlates raised aggression levels in people who have recently played a violent game. not much or a rise, but it is there. I say it's probably adrenaline; you'd find the same rise after rollercoasters or other incident. But it's twisted and...well...statistics always are.

  • LinkinPark_X

    Posted Aug 31, 2007 9:27 pm PT

    Both games r fine-- But postal... it realy made me Pee on ma Self !!! LOL! its soo damn entertaining

  • Myriam_D

    Posted Aug 25, 2007 2:01 pm PT

    I forget-did we manage to get MH2 in Canada?

    EDIT: Also-who the heck marked down the guy that said research proved that there is absolutely no link between video games and violence? It IS TRUE! There has been no rise in deaths, all people who both played games and murdered were twisted and either insane or simply made a conscious decision they already would've. Any KID who does this had no real influence from the media-their parents ignoring them shows them acquiring these games a a symptom, not a cause! There IS NO EXCUSE-make them care!

  • LfunkeyA

    Posted Aug 3, 2007 2:55 pm PT

    postal 2 AWP goes beyond manhunt. postal III may not beat manhunt 2 violence-wise, but at least the violence will be more controlled (in manhunt it's just cutscenes for every execution).

  • curlyq101

    Posted Jul 29, 2007 7:41 pm PT

    i agree with negativenetwork i do like the postal games though

  • negativenetwork

    Posted Jul 3, 2007 6:51 pm PT

    postal 2 is lame compared to manhunt though. postal 2 has you urinating in the air to put yourself out if you're on fire and manhunt has you stabbing glass shards into people's eyes. blergh... the sooner the world accepts the fact video games aren't only for kids the better. not everyone wants to play sonic the hedgehog.

  • zamardii12

    Posted Jun 29, 2007 3:37 pm PT

    Daelock, you don't get the point. The point is, Manhunt was 100% focused on killing. You kill the person, and the gate opens to the next area where you repeat repeat, and then repeat again. Postal had you do hilarious things, but gave you the OPTION of doing them. When the controversy of Postal 2 came about, and I played it I was like wtf? This game was not made to be about violence, it was about being humorous. Like, they would show a screenshot of a room with blood, and heads, and bodies all over the place, and then it would say as a caption, "Do you want your kids playing this?" Then, after playing Postal 2, I was like, those actions are totally voluntary. If I don't want to wait in line for milk, and I feel like killing the people in front of me, lighting their bodies on fire, and putting the flames out with my piss, then I can do that, or just wait in line like a good samaritan. Bottom line is, Manhunt 2 was boring, because it did not emphasize anything but repetitiveness, and if you don't agree then you pretty much have no idea what you're talking about. I'm not discrediting the people who liked it, I'm simply saying is that the repetitiveness is what sold the game, and the wonder of how you can kill your next victim. Next...

  • BDL91

    Posted Jun 28, 2007 6:29 am PT

    i was reading an article about bringing an R rating for games to Australia on afterdawn hopefully they will do it

  • Alucard7321

    Posted Jun 28, 2007 4:07 am PT

    Well i've been in contact with Mike J from Running with Scissors for some time now. To be honest, like i said to Mike J, its just become waaay too corporate in the sense that you have Micro$oft herding in developers, slapping the "Games Made For Windows" and funnily enough the blame for policing of what goes and what doens't falls on the lap of ESRB, this isn't fair:

    You have guys like Jeremy Soule, Inon Zur, who when criticized want to file law suits against you in a Jack Thompson-esque style. Its become a society of people who are over-sensitive and the concept of censorship of even your opinion has slowly ate away freedom of speech in the process.

    The latter point in the context of Micro$soft herding developers was that the games market has solely become about just making money. They buy out old franchises like Fallout and believe if they made it like their last game which made "zillions!" it will be popular again. The knock on effect from that is that you can't criticize what they do, you can't say you want that or you dont want it because they have deep pockets...you'll be aptly sued. That, is unfortunatly the bigger picture, its not censorship of violence, its just a slow process of killing your freedom of speech in the long run.

    Postal i wouldn't consider maliciously violent. You can go through the whole game without killing a single person. However i could argue Manhunt is a game series were it focusses on killing, so understandably i can see the controversy but its NOTHING NEW since we've been doing this sort of thing since we blew up invading pixelated aliens in Space Raiders.

    Its like movies. If you dont like it, dont watch it.

  • Alucard7321

    Posted Jun 28, 2007 4:04 am PT

    Well i've been in contact with Mike J from Running with Scissors for some time now. To be honest, like i said to Mike J, its just become waaay too corporate in the sense that you have Micro$oft herding in developers, slapping the "Games Made For Windows" and funnily enough the blame for policing of what goes and what doens't falls on the lap of ESRB, this isn't fair:

    You have guys like Jeremy Soule, Inon Zur, who when criticized want to file law suits against you in a Jack Thompson-esque style. Its become a society of people who are over-sensitive and the concept of censorship of even your opinion has slowly ate away freedom of speech in the process.

    The latter point in the context of Micro$soft herding developers was that the games market has solely become about just making money. They buy out old franchises like Fallout and believe if they made it like their last game which made "zillions!" it will be popular again. The knock on effect from that is that you can't criticize what they do, you can't say you want that or you dont want it because they have deep pockets...you'll be aptly sued. That, is unfortunatly the bigger picture, its not censorship of violence, its just a slow process of killing your freedom of speech in the long run.

    Postal i wouldn't consider maliciously violent. You can go through the whole game without killing a single person. However i could argue Manhunt is a game series were it focusses on killing, so understandably i can see the controversy but its NOTHING NEW since we've been doing this sort of thing since we blew up invading pixelated aliens in Space Raiders.

    Its like movies. If you dont like it, dont watch it.

  • Maxer9

    Posted Jun 26, 2007 11:54 pm PT

    I'm getting the feeling that some gamers are developing the idea that the more shocking a game is the better it is simply due to the large amount of controversy surrounding these games lately. Some companies, such as Running With Scissors; they only have to gain from it.

  • Factor-Zer0

    Posted Jun 26, 2007 9:38 pm PT

    I love both Postal and Manhunt, I will be getting both MH2 and Postal 3 (both on pc most likely.

  • Casper3141

    Posted Jun 26, 2007 9:58 am PT

    The whole "their not going to sell it is bad for business" is **** I doubt Hilary Clintion, Jack Thompson and the rest of their insane mother army buy Video games anyways wow big loss they still wont! The Hitman games were quite graphic and diabolic

  • Daelock

    Posted Jun 26, 2007 9:24 am PT

    Why did they interview this guy instead of someone who was actually on MH2's development? I mean I get that they're in the same business, even down to making ultra-violent games, but quite frankly he comes off a little smug and seems to imply that Manhunt is all about the violence and less about the content. I personally found Manhunt 1 much more enjoyable to play than Postal 2.

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