Night Trap Week: Controversial Beginnings
In the early 90’s, the advent of CD technology changed the face of console gaming forever. The amount of storage space opened up nearly limitless possibilities to game developers and they took many chances. Some paid off, others, not so much. It was a time of experimentation in the gaming industry akin to the early days of MTV, except for the considerably lower production values and even lower artistic merit. While PC gamers were playing masterpieces like Myst and Bad Day on the Midway, us console gamers were stuck with endless full-motion video games.
One of the most notable CD console releases was Night Trap for the Sega CD. The game was developed by Digital Pictures and sported full-motion video. It was similar in flavor to Dragon’s Lair, considering that you watched video footage and responded with a well-timed press of a button. Each action event would allow the footage to split into two separate tracks. Either you would accomplish your task, and the movie would continue in a positive direction, or you would fail, and the footage would continue along the loser track. Essentially you had to protect a group of girls at a slumber party from intruders with traps laid out around the house. The player had to monitor the surveillance cameras in every room to keep the girls safe. Once an “auger” was spotted, the player would have to wait for the villain to approach a trap. Then footage would delay a second for you to hit a button and trigger the trap.
It was released on October 15th, 1992 to almost instant criticism over the “sexist” and “violent” content included in the game. First the cover art was changed because of criticism from several interest groups. Then the game came up in several 1990s Congressional hearings concerning offensive video game material. Night Trap and Mortal Kombat were commonly cited in the same breath as prime examples of harmful, tasteless violence in gaming, and were primarily responsible for the creation of the ESRB rating system.
The game was pulled from Toys “R” Us and F.A.O. Schwartz on December 16th, 1993 in response to a ruling by the joint Senate Judiciary and Government Affairs Committee hearing on video game violence. Night Trap was put through the wringer and was condemned for the player’s effort to “trap and kill women”. The game was also called “shameful”, “ultra-violent”, “sick”, “disgusting” and “promoting child abuse.”
I hereby dedicate this Night Trap Week, for I will be delving into this notorious title every night from Monday through Friday, including footage, dissection and nostalgia. Did I fail to mention that Different Strokes star Dana Plato is the heroine of the game? Yeah, it's that good. Night Trap made quite an impression on me when I was 14. That year I received a Sega CD with this game and Sewer Shark. I remember reading about controversy surrounding the game, so I held it much closer to my heart after that.
So make the jump for a documentary about the making of the game and the controversy surrounding the title. In the immortal words of the King of Cartoons, “Let the cartoon, begin!”
Toots
Posted to Hot Stuff, Video Games, Videos on 18 June 2007
· Comments (4)
Other stuff like this: dana plato, digital pictures, full-motion video, Night Trap Week, sega cd
Boo on good ole Howie for jumping on the bandwagon. I used to think he was one of the cool guys - a little shy in his suits, but A-OK as a businessman. But chiming in with the video game hate choir is a really bad move. Boo!
Ahh sewer shark "we got a whole mess of bogeys bearing 6 12 niner"that robot voice was so funny i miss my sega cd games still have the system though
never got in to NightTrap, but i loved sewer shark. "pretend it's a gayme..."
I liked Double switch it was fun and had Corey Hiam in it