Feature By

Dale Weir

Securing its own area inside the 2001 Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3 2001) last year, Rockstar Games made clear to the gaming world its intent to corner the market on adult-oriented gaming that gamers were clamoring for. Depending on which video screen you looked at, you could see games that encouraged immortality, unethical behavior and lawlessness in some way. Grand Theft Auto III was a "crime simulator," Smuggler's Run 2: Hostile Territory covered contraband smuggling and Max Payne cast players in the role of a vigilante cop.

It should come as no surprise that Rockstar Games walked away with as much positive buzz, if not more, as the big-named console manufacturers and developers at the show. One of its games that earned quite a bit of coverage seemed to appear from nowhere to shock everyone in attendance. The game in question encourages players to beat and maim whomever is in your way and destroy as much property as possible. You are essentially supposed to take part in a full-blown riot that is aptly called State Of Emergency.

Speaking of which, it should be made clear that State Of Emergency is far from a high-minded loot at the rioting or political revolution. It is an arcade game along the lines of a Final Fight, River City Ransom or The Bouncer that gives it subject matter as much weight as Crazy Taxi or Ready 2 Rumble Boxing gave cabdriving or boxing respectively. This is in keeping with Rockstar Games' modus operandi of producing controversial subject matter, but with a less than serious approach. Gamers get the looting, fighting, blood and gore, but without the political motivations and ethical ramifications one might associate with such activities.

State Of Emergency is set in the near future where a tyrannical organization known as the Corporation had declared a State Of Emergency. In an attempt to quell any civil disobedience and unrest, state authorities have begun clamping down on organized resistance and restricted the movements of its citizenry. Many citizens have banded together to form the Resistance, an organized movement whose sole mission is the destabilization of the Corporation. It is their hope that through violence, death and destruction, you and other "Freedom Agents" will do just that. The idea is to create one of the longest and most destructive riots ever seen since the Los Angeles Riots of 1992.

More details about the game and its gameplay will be presented with screenshots and accompanying captions in the following pages.