MadWorld: Controversy from the Idiot Convention

Oh what a difficult time it is to be a Wii owner. Remember when you first bought your Wii, how everyone was envious of Wii bowling...how parents and even grandparents were even interested in gaming for the first time…and what fascination the world had with this new and exciting console from a seemingly dying gaming company. Fast forward two years. Has your Wii been reduced to a dust collector? Do you still have the same excitement about your console as you used to? Can you remember what the last Wii title you purchased was? If you are like me, these questions have less-than-positive answers.

Thankfully Sega has just released MadWorld, an over the top beat-em-up that is truly worth bragging about. Although I have yet to complete the title, I can honestly say that MadWorld is a gem. The concept of the game is simple: you are Jack, a former marine with a chainsaw for an arm, and your task is to survive a gladiatorial game show by killing hoards of enemies. Although the concept is rather simplistic, the game itself proves to be anything but ordinary. Without a doubt, MadWorld is one of the most stylistically impressive games that I have had the good fortune to play: a comic-book inspired game rendered entirely in black and white except for the endless red showers of blood. I could go on all day about this game…

…but this article isn’t a review…if you want that I suggest skimming through the endless praises for the game in Metacritic; the sources on Metacritic have finished the game and are more capable of doing it justice. This article is a defense piece. You see, the praises MadWorld should receive are being drowned out by the controversy its content has caused. I for one, do not appreciate that the first must-have Wii title of 2009 is being buried by narrow-mined prudes whose PhD’s have masked their lack of common sense.

I wrote this article out of my frustration with media watchdog groups and their near toddler-like ignorance with the video game industry. Just as I was pissed off when Doom was condemned for the Columbine shootings, I find myself yet again skimming through the internet with complete disbelief…how can people be so stupid? This time, however, the watchdogs have gone too far. Sure, there will always be religious zealots and over protective parents out there condemning video games, I have begrudgingly come to accept this. I concede that parents have a vested in interest in protecting their children from violence and profanity, and praise them for taking an active role in their children’s lives (even though their attempts to regulate their children’s exposure to such vices are both futile and misguided)


Where I draw the line is when these groups fail to do their homework. If your role is to effectively advise parents about the content in various games, at least get the information right. Pixels to Polys is my soapbox, and I feel compelled to call out the National Institute on Media and the Family for their ill thought position which is just as stupid as it is indefensible. This group recently condemned Nintendo for licensing this game on their system. To quote Dr. David Walsh, president of this assembly of idiots,

"In the past, the Wii has successfully sold itself as being the gaming console for the entire family and a way to bring family-game nights back into people's living rooms. Unfortunately, Nintendo opened its doors to the violent videogame genre. The National Institute on Media and the Family hopes that Nintendo does not lose sight of its initial audience and continues to offer quality, family-friendly games."

(…what a pompous, condescending, and presumptuous statement by the criminally uninformed and out of touch.)

Although I find it troubling that video games are still scrutinized by insular family-value groups, what I find most troubling is that the Wii has been branded as a family console…or that Nintendo has ever been an entirely family oriented manufacturer. To argue this is to exist in a state of self imposed amnesia: to believe that there has ever been a family values console is to be so ignorant that it borders on negligence. Make no mistake about it, there has never been, and never will be, a family-console. Each console has, and always will offer a wide variety of titles to suit the various tastes of gamers. NIMF somehow construed Nintendo’s family themed ad campaigns, designed to target non-gamers, as its position as a family console.

Although it is true that Nintendo sought to attract non-gamers with the introduction of family themed games, in no way claimed to be this generation’s “puppies, kitties and rainbows” console. To claim Wii is a family console is to disregard the mature themed games that have always been on the console, as well as disregard the family themes games present on both PS3 and 360. The Wii has been wrongfully singled out from the aforementioned consoles because it actively pursued demographics that weren’t usually targeted by the industry: non-gamer youth males, females, and family-aged adults.


The National Institute on Media and the Family wrongfully misinterpreted Nintendo’s marketing campaign and confused a strategy of alienating gamers with a strategy of including non-gamers. Nintendo never looked to alienate traditional gamers with mature tastes (although arguably its focus on controls rather than graphics did just that). What Wii offered was something for everyone, and therefore NIMF is out of line for condemning both Sega and Nintendo for MadWorld’s place on the Wii. MadWorld is a mature title, that appeals to mature Wii owners, a demographic that has been neglected on Nintendo’s little white box.

While NIMF and other idiot media groups look to disparage the title, I look to praise it. Wii needs more quality titles like this. If you are a Wii owner, give MadWorld a try, and give media watchdog groups the finger. They are irrelevant outlets for misguided information, written by overeducated dimwits, for parents who are too stupid to determine what is right and wrong for the children. If gaming is truly an art form, as I have always believed, these clowns would be the type to rave about color by numbers.

I conclude this unusually tame post with a small list of mature-themed titles on previous Nintendo systems (as proof that Nintendo never was a family oriented console manufacturer), as well as a hearty “fuck-you” to Dr. David Walsh. You sir, are an idiot, and your group is a fucking sham.

Death Race (NES)
Resident Evil 4 (GCN)
Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem (GCN)
Wolfenstein 3D (GBA)
Perfect Dark (N64)
Killer 7 (GCN)
Mortal Kombat (Wii, DS, GBA, GB, SNES)
Conker's Bad Fur Day (N64)
Goldeneye (N64)

...there's a ton more, i just got lazy...