Will trying to recreate the magic bullet give you all the bang for your buck?
It's Dealey Plaza in downtown Dallas, Texas on Friday, November 22, 1963 at roughly twelve thirty. You're the lone gunman, Lee Harvey Oswald, sitting in the sixth floor window of the Texas School Book Depository looking down at the parade route which will take President Kennedy's motorcade down Elm Street under the triple underpass onto Stemmons freeway to a luncheon that will never happen.
We won't pretend the subject matter isn't dark. As morbid as it may seem, it is arguably the most controversial defining moment of American history. And before we go further we should probably point to hundreds of game titles inspired by the mass slaughter of soldiers from the pelopponesian war to desert storm II.
The premise of the game here is academic, could a lone gunman from Oswald's location have assassinated the president?
It's a decent simulation, it isn't much of a game. It only lasts as long as it takes for the president to pass by. As a game it isn't exactly fun, unless you get your kicks taking a shot at Jackie O.
As a simulation, it's alright. There are some inconsistencies, but you're going to have to expect that. The sight on Oswald's Mannlicher-Carcano was reportedly off, in the simulation it's fine. The seating in the motorcade was a bit more staggered with the president sitting higher than Governor Connally. It's not going to be 100% accurate.
We played it for a while. The game has a checklist afterwards to see how the shot you made compares to the shot from the single bullet theory. It's a tricky shot. Three shots were fired, first one missed, second one gets Kennedy in the throat, third is the headshot.
Can it be done? Sure. The thing is the way the shot ended up was pretty wild and hard to duplicate, but you're bound to play the game a dozen times through and realize getting Kennedy isn't a problem. Trying to duplicate any shot the exact same way twice with all the movement factors in play would be a tough task.
Would have liked to have seen a more free ranging simulation that compares the mythic grassy knoll vantage point. Was impressed with the Zapruder film angle already preprogramed in the review mode.
The game seemed interesting to us. We think we took something educational away from it and it inspired us to learn more about a tragic day in our nation's history. Who said video games have to leave you feeling happy, right?