• OW Investigative Series: Violence in Video Games

  

  Written by Zeromage 8 Comments
  Last Updated:: August 11, 2008

  Part 1: Donkey Kong

  This week begins OW’s most ground breaking work since our SegaGate report. Being the lovers of all video games (except Sega games which we only like a little) we decided to launch a multiple part, in depth, and often controversial investigative report on violence in video games. Personally we here at OW feel that the idea of video games influencing the acts of others to such a profound degree is utterly preposterous. For the sake of our journalistic credit, however, we will put aside these feelings and focus on only the facts as history presented them.
  

  The year was 1981; the space shuttle Columbia launched into space, Antigua and Barbuda gained independence from Great Britain, the boys from Metallica first pick up their axes, Sandra Day O’ Connor becomes the first women to hold a seat in the Supreme Court, and a small Japanese company named Nintendo attempts to break the American market with a little game called Donkey Kong.

  

  The plot of the game was rather simple; Jumpman, who later became known as Mario, was a plumber with a pet gorilla. At the time this was common, most plumbers in the late seventies and early eighties had pet gorillas, as it was the fashion at the time. Also the gorillas were strong and good at bending pipes and unscrewing stuck joints. In the game Donkey Kong kidnaps Mario’s girlfriend at the time Pauline, as most of OW fans know this relationship does not work out anyway (since Princess Toadstool steals young Mario’s heart soon after). Mario then has to avoid DK’s onslaught of barrels in order to rescue her. Little did Nintendo know this would begin a massive trend of gorilla on plumber and plumber on gorilla violence that would shake the very foundation of American life.

  The first such event happened early in 1982 almost exactly as described in the video game. Then plumber Mike Balintino was doing some work on a new bathroom at a local winery with his gorilla Bing Bong when Mike’s girlfriend Stacey stopped by and an argument ensued. To describe what happened first at this point would only be speculation, but we do know that somehow Bing Bong got loose and grabbed Stacey, climbed to the top of a series of ladders, and began to hurl full barrels of wine at Mike when he attempted to get the situation under control. This incident sparked a long series of violence between plumbers and gorillas that lasted well into the 90s. Strangely enough Mike went on to marry a princess of a small nation in eastern Europe.

  So did the plumber/gorilla violence of the 1980s start because of Nintendo’s first American game? Well its difficult to say. The facts tell us that before 1981 there was never a reported case of gorillas attacking plumbers or vice versa. After the release of DK plumber/gorilla violence jumped over 400%. Currently tensions between plumbers and gorillas are high and a tenuous peace is still in effect. Though recent incidents, such as the kidnapping of a plumber’s baby at a zoo and recent hostilities toward a group of plumbers installing running water in third world countries may lead to a return of all out war. In this case the evidence speaks for itself, there was an increase in violence after the release of Nintendo’s break out classic Donkey Kong. However this violence may have occured anyway, there was plenty of talk among gorilla communities about their treatment as pets. Could it be that DK was the straw that broke the camel’s back? Possibly, but the facts speak for themselves and facts are all there are in these types of cases.
  

8 Comments

1. #1 Pingfa says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 7:49 pm

   See, I knew it. You can all blame Nintendo for the war that ensued between gorilla and plumber. Those darn gorillas idolize Donkey Kong…

   Then there’s Sonic, who is a great role model to hedgehogs all over the world.
2. #2 TheMountain says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 4:15 pm

   ha. Funny article
3. #3 Morg says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 9:47 pm

   This actually made me laugh.
4. #4 mandrill says:
   November 20th, 2009 at 2:29 pm

   Nicely done. As a way of setting out your opinion of violence being linked to video games its a great peice of satire. I’m very interested in where your investigation leads you.