Creating a Racist Computer Game - A Relatively Simple Task
Making Ethnic Cleansing was fairly simple. Its designers were able to use a powerful, freely available open-source game program or engine that "drives" the program by providing the basic operating instructions to the computer. The designers then simply plug in their message of hate.
Open-source software is a common phenomenon in the computer world. Programmers often give permission for people to use or modify their work, usually in exchange for an acknowledgement.
The designers of Ethnic Cleansing then created a "mod" (modification) without changing the existing game programming code. The engine gave them the ability to change the characters, backgrounds and sounds of the game thereby creating new "worlds" and targets in which players can interact.
By plugging in a small set of images and sounds created in readily available graphic and sound editing programs, the mod producers at the National Alliance created an immersive environment filled with Nazi propaganda in which users could indulge their violent, racist and anti-Semitic fantasies
The game engine used by Resistance Records is the open-source, freely distributed Genesis 3D engine. They also used the Reality Factory Games Developer Kit from the same company. Neither of these programs has racist content.
February 19, 2002
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