This is a review of Kevin McCullough’s article “The Sex-Box Race for President” My words are bolded where Mr. McCullough’s words are unchanged and italicized. This entire review has not been spell-checked so that any obvious errors will still be present in the reposting. I must stress to all of you who read this article that you have been completely lied to and seriously misled and uninformed. My whole goal in this revision is to correct the lies and provide truths.
This has been emailed directly to Mr. McCullough.

“I know that they all probably assume they have better, much more important, urgent, timely, things to campaign on, but I sure would like to get their individual takes on the new video game that one company is marketing to fifteen year old boys.”

No, they are not marketing this game towards 15 year old boys you moron. Mass Effect clearly has an ESRB rating of “M” which is specifically designed towards a mature (17 and older), thus the “M” rating, adult audience.

“It's called "Mass Effect" and it allows its players - universally male no doubt –“

Again I have to stop you already; its players can be both male and female. Wow, in less than 15 seconds of reading you have established yourself as horribly uninformed about your own topic. Lets continue to see how much more you can an achieve in the name of uninformed opinionated ignorance.

“to engage in the most realistic sex acts ever conceived.”

Amazing! Again already, in next line even! Somebody start tallying this. Sorry to say no, it does not let you engage in “the most realistic sex acts ever conceived”. I will be honest does the game have a sex scene? More like a love scene, but still, yes. Is it graphic? No. Is it pornographic as you lead others to believe? Not even close.  We can even go so far as to quote the OFFICAL rating the ESRB gives this game, “Blood, Language, Partial Nudity, Sexual Themes, and Violence.” All of these elements are commonly found in “R” rated movies which ALSO are tailored for a 17 and older audience. I personally don’t see any 15 year old boys by themselves in an “R” rated movie. Why don’t I see them? Oh yeah, because they can’t buy tickets. That’s very much like why any under 17 children can’t purchase an “M” rated video game.

“One can custom design the shape, form, bodies, race, hair style, breast size of the images they wish to "engage" and then watch in crystal clear, LCD, 54 inch screen, HD clarity as the video game "persons" hump in every form, format, multiple, gender-oriented possibility they can think of.”

Did you even do any research on this game at all before you championed yourself to bash this game? I’m thinking you didn’t. But now to prove you wrong again. I’m starting to get tired of correcting your every thought and point. I almost pity you, Okay, so on to what you said above. You are partially correct, but only slightly partially correct so you don’t get any points and you are still far in the hole.
However, I digress. That digression is due to me having to the truth to the good people you have horribly misled here. Yes you can modify all kinds of physical attributes to the main character in Mass Effect, whether they are male or female. You can do this because mass effect is a role playing game. By being able to heavily customize and modify the hero, not XBOX porn star as you suggest, it allows the player to become immersed much more on the deep plot line and very elaborate story this game has to tell. It also makes players identify with the hero they created and ultimately care what decisions that hero makes in the game as they play it. This is a very basic concept. They call these heroes “protagonists” and “Main characters” in books and movies as well.

“The objections to such filth should be simple to understand.”

The objections to you ever writing another article should also be equally understood. Seriously though, you call it filth? Have you even seen this game? Are you sure you didn’t see a couple a screenshots for some Japanese rape simulator and the two words “Mass Effect” just happened to be near them? This is becoming a chore. Let’s move on.

"Starting with the disgusting idea that one can "create" their own versions of what people look like, removing warts, moles, and bald spots while enhancing - shall we say - the extended features of the game's characters tends to objectify women, sex, and human relationships. Right? We can all agree on this?"

Right? No Kevin, you are not right at all. Can we all agree on this? No we can’t. Nobody should agree with any of the word vomit that covers this article. I can’t say that I’m positively excited about agreeing on anything with you. From your first sentence I’ve no choice to assume that you believe all forms of self improvement are disgusting. So therefore things like deodorant, hair care products, wart removers, they are all disgusting things according to you Mr. McCullough. They must be disgusting because they help us “create” a better looking person. I guess self esteem is disgusting too. What you fail leave out is that you can also ugly up the character’s looks to no limit. Try having a seven inch long vertical scar on your character’s face. That’s always been pretty to me. Continuing on you say the game objectifies women, sex, and human relationships. Well that’s news to me since the main character can be a heroine, not to mention that some of the supporting classes happen to be very strong female roles, also not to mention one the game’s biggest relationships is with an ALIEN…I rest my case with that point. What’s next?
"Then there's the dishonesty behind the game' title. "Mass Effect" sounds like a war game with a deadly virus that is spreading unless the GI-Joes are able to defeat the evil and deadly substance and it's covert war plan. By it's design, kids could ask for it, or for their parents' Best Buy Card to go purchase it with nary a raised eye-brow. Generic, non-descriptive, and relatively harmless."
 
I REALLY grow tired of having to contradict and correct every uninformed syllable that comes from you. Kevin, there is no dishonesty here. The only dishonest thing we are dealing with is this article you wrote. Mass Effect is a war game of sorts. Well actually it is a space exploration/save the galaxy game. You speak of its design like you have knowledge of this game, which I have already clearly established you have not. As for kids asking for this game, I think not. As I have stated before this game carries an “M” rating by ESRB and little kiddies can’t use mommy and daddy’s Best Buy card to go buy it. Furthermore, if their parents did buy this game for them without researching the game and its rating then they are bad parents and have made poor decisions on what influences their children. “Generic, non-descriptive, and relatively harmless”? I really wish I could describe your senseless article that way. Oh a side note for you. “Its” is possessive, “it’s” is a contraction of “it is”.

"But it IS marketed for the X-Box 360, perhaps the most visually stimulating gaming system ever made. The software for such allows the blending of DVD video, component graphics, and the manipulation of actual pictures so that an alternate reality engulfs the fifteen year old boy playing it without much objection."

Not much to say here. This is perhaps the most well put together statement you’ve made thus far. Well then we must take into consideration that you’re still assuming a 15 year old boy is actually able to go buy and play this game without an ID check at purchase or without adult consent.

"Now if I have trouble with my son taking his James Bond 007 games a little too emotionally, imagine the powerful effect that hormones add to the mix when the player's own character is copulating like jack rabbits with super-models, actresses, and anyone else they can spend the patience to create, name, and "put into play.""

As I feel that you have already embarrassed yourself enough I suggest you not drag your family into it. I hope neither of them has read this. Seriously though, copulating like jack rabbits? There is ONLY ONE LOVE SCENE IN THE WHOLE GAME. There are no super models in this game and the only actresses are voice actresses.

"I hear the libertarian Ron Paul's answer already, "Government has no business censoring freedom of expression." Figures, he's a libertarian."

This article has absolutely no fact in it at all. Figures, you’re a moron. Also I will point out you shifted topics with no warning and are now completely making no sense at all.

"In the race for President there has been a lot of discussion about faith and it's impact on the lives of the individual candidate. Some pretty inane ones like Carl Cameron's less lucid moment this past week when he posed the inquiry about marital submission to Governor Mike Huckabee.
Yet here's a question that deserves to be asked, and in all likelihood will not be: "How much moral judgement should the President push into legislative issues that are likely to severely damage our children's innocence, function, and capability?"

What? Now you go into politics? What does this have to with Mass Effect? Another question that deserves to be asked is who allowed this diatribe to be web published?

I hear the nay-sayers claiming I'm being the wild and crazed Bible thumper I've always been - but its a worthwhile question isn't it?"

I hear readers of this article slamming their heads against hard surfaces hoping desperately that this mindless babble will leave their memory.  This question would work well in a political article featuring morality beliefs of politicians in our country today, not in an uninformed bash on a video game you know nothing about.

"If a pre-teen, teen, young adult, or adult male plays such a game in which the women DO submit without choice, are made to appear as Barbie streetwalkers, and perform whatever act can be imagined, what's to stop that same male from assuming that the women in his "other world" shouldn't be forced to do the same."

What’s to stop him? Well I should hope to God it’s some common sense and a decent upbringing. I’m an adult male and at no point in time while playing any video game had any kind of delusions that women should be forced to become my deviant sexual playthings. Also no women in Mass Effect are made to submit to anything, nor are there “Barbie streetwalkers” present. I heard that might have been a playable class in early beta testing, but it just didn’t mesh with the whole “Space Odyssey” theme.
 
"We now know because of the lengthy track record of serial killer after another that addictive use of pornography was prevalent in case after case - long before the switch got flipped and what their masturbatory imaginations have given into became what they were forcing real live human beings to do."

This is so terribly written.

"And because of the digital chip age in which we live - "Mass Effect" can be customized to sodomize whatever, whoever, however, the game player wishes."

NO. NO. NO. First of all, the “digital chip age” we live in or don’t live in has NOTHING and I repeat NOTHING, to do with the storyline of Mass Effect. Also it should be dully noted that there is no anal sex in Mass Effect at all. Nor can you “sodomize” any type of noun in any fashion.

"With it's "over the net" capabilities virtual orgasmic rape is just the push of a button away."

To continue in my correcting of your empty rhetoric, I will have to say no, Mass Effect is not an “Easy Button” of sorts for virtual orgasmic rape.
 
"Yes there will be many snickers that I decided to bring this issue up in the Presidential cycle of 2008 but how refreshing would it be for a President to prove to the nation that his own manhood was not in question and put his pen and signature to a bill that dealt with such simulated sex excess in a way that was punitive to its creators to such a degree that they would never recover from it?
As technology continues to push the limits of imagination and interaction more and more the brain, the emotions, the feelings will integrate with physical responses in reality. And while the makers of such trash seem to be pushing our next generation of young men through the gates of hell as fast as is humanly possible, it needn't be that way.
Here's hoping that as the next President will be forced to deal with this continual emerging reality - and enemy that has set its site to our destruction from within - that we will have elected a man of such character that he will have precision in the clarity of his response."
 
As for the rest of this, you do make some points which are coherent. Of course with the exception of the part in which young men are being pushed through Hell’s Gates by video game developers. I say in the future when the shame of this article is gone from you and you feel you can write again, I suggest in the future you actually do your homework on the topic for which you base your entire article on. Also pick your topic wisely and write accurate statements that back and support your topic. Until you can do the above mentioned, do not spam the masses with garbage like this ever again. Chances are somebody like me might not be around to correct you and give them accurate information.

"How would that be for a bold and uncompromising "Mass Effect?""

You think you are clever don’t you. You aren’t. Actually Kevin McCullough, you are a complete idiot and a professional liar. I seriously hope you didn’t get paid for this. Also i noticed you used YOU TUBE for refrence videos. Again you're an idiot. Anything that is posted on YouTube can be edited. Until you see with your own eyes licensed footage strait from the game you have no way to justify your self righteous lies.

Now I leave a few words to you, the other readers. I am a champion of video game rights. Tim Buckley was right in his idea that games do not equal violence. And while I honestly agree with Jerry Holkins in what fate should await Mr. McCullough, I wanted to make sure I beat Kevin at his own game. You will not find one piece of foul language in my review of his article. Parents, find out what games your kids are playing and research them. The time for everybody blaming video games and game developers is done. The ratings are on the boxes for a reason. I know kids can buy R rated tickets and M rated video games sometimes, because we rely on retailers to make sure they don’t. Just like we rely on retailers to not sell minors Alcohol and tobacco, but that still happens. Despite the fact that kids might be able to illegally buy these tickets and games, it’s really up to the parents to know what the hell their children are doing, watching, and playing. So now you are informed about the truths of this article. Make your own decisions about the game. For starters I’d read a review of Mass Effect, you can find one here:

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/833/833640p1.html

For more information on the ESRB click here:

http://www.esrb.org/index-js.jsp

Lastly, shame. Shame on you Townhall.com for allowing Mr. McCullough’s mindless garbage to be posted.

Sincerely,
Elrich Böst
Norman, OK
mrbost@gmail.com
I’m not afraid of your spam, viruses, or hate mail, I have filters. If you choose to email me and your email is well written and devoid of idiotic rambling I will write back if you express a desire for me to.