Many, many video games discover historical past. However when a sport will get into John F. Kennedy’s assassination, you simply comprehend it’s gonna get bizarre.
In case you missed it, President Kennedy was fatally shot in 1963 whereas using in a motorcade in Dallas. The assassination was stunning — it occurred in entrance of big crowds, and pictures of it was extensively disseminated.
The gunman, Lee Harvey Oswald, was arrested. Two days later, he was killed by a neighborhood man named Jack Ruby.
Easy sufficient. However right here’s the factor. Sixty years later, the Kennedy assassination continues to be fodder for heaps of theories that query that easy sequence of occasions. A 2012 Gallup ballot confirmed that eight in 10 People imagine that Kennedy’s loss of life was a part of a conspiracy.
The video video games that have interaction with the assassination are inclined to get goofy with these theories. A Mafia 3 post-credits scene sees a disturbed CIA agent taking dramatic, lethal revenge on the senators he believes colluded within the assassination — in the midst of a televised listening to.
A serious plot level of Name of Responsibility: Black Ops is the did-he/didn’t-he query of whether or not the brainwashed participant character was concerned in Kennedy’s loss of life.
Then there are video games just like the notorious JFK Reloaded, which ostensibly asks gamers to recreate the assassination in actual element — however most frequently leads to goofy ragdoll pratfalls and automobile crashes.
I interviewed Carrie Andersen, Ph.D., who wrote an academic paper on video game representations of Kennedy’s assassination, in regards to the impact of those video games and why the assassination nonetheless captivates folks 60 years later. Try the video, and keep in mind to subscribe to Polygon on YouTube to remain updated on all our newest tales.