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Privates (video game)
Privates is a freeware twin-stick shooter video game developed and published by Size Five Games (formerly Zombie Cow Studios) and commissioned by Channel 4 as a sex education tool. It was published on 6 August 2010 for Windows.[1] Privates was positively received by critics and won a BAFTA Award.[2] GameplayThe player plays as a squad of miniature Marines wearing condom hats who are sent into various people's vaginas and rectums, as well as other parts of the body, in order to kill real-life sexually transmitted infections (STI), which are depicted as monsters.[3] The right weapons must be used to destroy them, which include anti-bacterial and anti-viral guns.[3] The player can order their squad, which consists of up to three additional Marines besides the player, to attack certain enemy types while they cover the others.[3] PlotThe main character is Jack, who commands Foxtrot Squad. The squad, whose members have been deemed too useless by the "top brass", is forced to embark on a dangerous mission with a combat veteran in the hopes that they will either "shape up" or die.[3] DevelopmentThe game was funded by Channel 4, in order to promote safe sex for teenage boys.[4][5] Developer Dan Marshall compared the game to Gunstar Heroes in its design.[3] He called his Google Search history when making the game "eclectic, horrific and embarrassing", saying that "if my ISP are snooping on me, they're presumably pretty concerned about my well-being", and saying that the game's artist was "constantly getting sent stuff he desperately didn't want to look at".[3] He also said that his eyes were "opened" about sexual health, and realised how easy STIs were to transmit.[3] The game was rejected from release on the Xbox 360 by Microsoft after being advised that it would fail peer review due to its overly sexual content.[4] This decision was derided by critics, with Destructoid saying "I think it's very disturbing that we have a culture where deplorable violence is considered normal, but sex [...] is treated like something freakish and wrong".[4] ReceptionEurogamer said that it was "genuinely refreshing to experience something that gets straight to the point" about sexual health, pointing to "frightening" statistics amongst teenagers.[6] Rock, Paper, Shotgun praised the game's writing and music, despite remarking on some audio issues.[1] The game was criticised by a feminist blog, Hoyden About Town, for being "misogynist".[7] In a counter-argument by Lewis Denby of Gamasutra, he said that the game does not try to send the message that women's genitals are "filthy and disease-ridden", but rather was a "great idea" due to its focus on sexual education, calling the article "tremendously bad reporting", but ultimately admitting that "the author has a point" and that humorous games about "serious issues" will always be open to criticism.[7] References
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