Primal Rage II - Controversy

Controversy

As with other bloody U.S. based fighting titles of the time (most notably Mortal Kombat), Primal Rage sparked considerable controversy due to its violence level, depicting gory fatalities and the live devouring of humans. Though it was a bloody game, Primal Rage was rated "T" for Teen, yet that did not stop its critics from lumping it together with the Mature rated Mortal Kombat. To appease the critics, the game was withdrawn, re-programmed and re-released several times. Later arcade incarnations of "Primal Rage" included a "Gore/No Gore" toggle switch which, when flipped to the "No Gore" setting, disabled the use of Fatalities, the eating of humans, and all of the game's blood. Home console ports of "Primal Rage" retained all of the game's original content however, which was more than enough to continue the controversy surrounding the game. According to Victar's Primal Rage FAQ (section 7.4) the June 1996 issue of GamePro confirms that Ellie Rovella of Gilbert, Arizona became enraged when her 11-year-old son bought and played Genesis' Primal Rage, using GamePro's strategy guide to execute Chaos' golden shower/urination fatality. Rovella was so outraged, she not only returned the game, but also launched a grass-roots campaign. Ironically the Super Nintendo version, in which the particular fatality was removed entirely, displaying a "No Cheeze!" symbol (a sign that was generally used to notify the player that he or she had performed an illegal combo) at the top of the screen if it was attempted, was also pulled from the shelves.