[[MadWorld http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/MadWorld.jpg]]
[[caption-width:325:TruthInTelevision.]]
-->''"Disemboweler IV, the game where [[{{Manhunt}} condemned criminals dig at each other with rusty hooks]]."''
-->--'''Bart Simpson''', ''TheSimpsons''

Fictional video games on TV tend to be disgusting, ultraviolent messes of blood, guts and severed limbs as the hypnotized player kills everything that moves, and more than a few things that don't. [[GodOfWar Many]] [[GrandTheftAuto games]] ''are'' about killing everything, of course, but with some style.

Also, the names for these types of video games on TV tend to be rather unimaginative and generic as if every game was named like MortalKombat, with names such as "[[GoryDeadlyOverkillTitleOfFatalDeath ACTION KILLTACULAR DEATHMOWER 5000]]" or simply "The Decimator", when in Real Life, they're often much more sophisticated and clever, like HalfLife, {{Halo}}, {{Contra}}, TimeCrisis, or TheChroniclesOfRiddick. Granted, ''some'' ultraviolent RealLife games are named like the Trope, but not all.

Often just used for name-dropping as a gag. If such a game is shown, it can be an example of PacManFever (another case of producers not getting it) and/or [[BrandX bear a surprising resemblance]] to a well-known game.

In a CrimeAndPunishment show these can cause innocent victims to act out the events, possibly including AnAesop about why [[NewMediaAreEvil video games are horrible]] and teenagers [[BrokenAesop should be watching responsible adults shoot each other on TV instead.]]

Sometimes the corruption comes not from the violent games, but from the very influence of computers themselves -- from the Internet. This is because [[ExecutiveMeddling Meddling Executives]] worrying about the time you spend away from your TV want to convince you that NewMediaAreEvil.

Though they may sound similar, this usually has nothing to do with SuperPunkOctoPuddingGasMarkSeven nor {{Trope2000}}. Also not to be confused with GoryDeadlyOverkillTitleOfFatalDeath, although the name is an example of it.

See also MurderSimulators.

Constrast with UltraSuperHappyCuteBabyFestFarmer3000, where the game is a really kiddy game.

Not to be confused with GearsOfWar or MadWorld, which this trope is an accurate description of.
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!!Examples:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder: Anime and Manga ]]

*Interestingly, ''SerialExperimentsLain'' did something like that. In one of the early chapters of the series, there are several teenagers stuck in an online shooter called ''Phantoma'' without even being logged on to their computers, and confusing random people with enemy {{NPC}}s as a result. [[spoiler:One of them commits suicide, while the other one murders a little girl.]]
** This was obviously intentional, given how one of the main themes of the series was the ever-growing disconnect with reality that most Wired developed. It's not about the violence, it's more about the reality itself and its perception.
* Subverted in ''ParanoiaAgent''. [[spoiler: The detectives are interviewing the suspect for the Shounen Bat assaults. The boy seems convinced that he is living in the world of an RPG he played, and all the people he assaulted were, to him, the enemies controlled by the BigBad that needed to be cleansed with his magical, holy sword. In the end it turns out that the kid wasn't the real Shounen Bat, he was just an attention seeker.]]
* Mamimi from ''{{FLCL}}'' spends half the second episode playing FireStarter, a handheld video game with the objective of "burn down a demon-infested city while dodging the cops". (She spends another quarter hanging out with Naota, and the last quarter starting fires.) But being Mamimi, she's incredibly whacked ''anyway'',so the game's probably not really to blame.
** In the manga, the point of the game is to simply burn down the city [[WellIntentionedExtremist so it doesn't expand]] [[GreenAesop and devour the Earth]].
* Subverted in ''PureTrance'': some of the games that are mentioned are "Connect the Bowels" (kind of appropriate since most of the characters are nurses), "Throw The Baby Around", and "Real Fight", a fighting game that uses "ordinary things like scissors and razors as weapons (not for children)".

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Film ]]

* In the Spike Lee film ''InsideMan'', the leading bank robber sees one of the hostages, an African-American boy, playing a GTA-like game of plotless violence with racial overtones. He's not happy. It should also be noted that the graphics on the game are pretty good. For a handheld device. [[spoiler:Then again, the robbers weren't meaning to harm anyone. They don't even steal any bank notes but the diamonds collected from the traitor turned Bank manager.]]
*Mike Teevee's updated "sin" in Tim Burton's ''{{Charlie and the Chocolate Factory}}'' is having a passion for violent video games. Oh, and being an InsufferableGenius.
** This made the stage version, this troper watched hilarious, as Teevee is playing his Wii and talking on a cellphone while Charlie is still listening to Little Orphan Annie via an old radio.
* In the RobinWilliams film ''Toys'', the GeneralRipper antagonist sees children playing violent games at an arcade and has the bright idea to use the children to fight wars by remote control, in the style of ''Ender's Game''.
---> General: (very heavily paraphrased) What happens when you hit the UN trucks?\\
Kid: You lose points.\\
General: That's ridiculous. (blows up every vehicle on screen, UN trucks included)
* The Swedish {{So Bad Its Good}} 1997 crime/detective movie ''Beck - Spår I Mörker'', a gang of teenagers who live in the underground tunnels beneath Stockholm run around armed with swords and knives and decapitate random people on subway platforms and trains at night. It's quickly revealed that they do it to get the most frags, and that they are inspired by the game ''Final Doom'' (the script writers probably did not know that a version of ''{{Doom}}'' actually existed by that name), and in the end the gang's underground hideout is raided by the police, and you clearly see the game Marathon on their computer screens.
* The mind control game central to the plot of ''{{Gamer}}'' is called ''Slayers''.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Literature ]]

* In ''HarryPotter'', Dudley Dursley is fond of "blowing up aliens on his computer." He has a Playstation game called ''Mega Mutilation Part Three''. As an odd side note, he destroys his Playstation in ''The Goblet of Fire'', which is set in 1994, before it was even released in Europe. (J.K. Rowling admitted she DidNotDoTheResearch.)
** At the time (Summer 1994) it wasn't yet released even in Japan, and wouldn't be released in Europe until 29 September 1995. Otherwise, given how pampered Dudley is, he might get an imported one.
** Why worry about whether the console was available if the game doesn't even exist?
* ''Dave Barry's Money Secrets'' includes a passing reference to ''Death Killer of Fatal Murdering II: The Slaying''.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Live Action TV ]]

* ''{{CSI}}: Miami'' went to town with the trope. A not-GTA-honest game was essentially a nonstop synaesthetic rollercoaster of violence, robbery, murder and rape (though only on bonus rounds), causing easily influenced youngsters to mimic these acts point-by-point while shouting "[[PacManFever 9000 points]], bitch!" The protagonists got lines like [[GrissomOneLiner "It'll all be very real soon"]] and [[GrissomOneLiner "So he played to death."]] Also notable for gamers giving their nicks as their names in interrogations, total ignorance of sites like {{GameFAQs}}... you get the picture.
** ''Computer game'' CSI: 3 Dimensions of Murder had an "episode" where fictional game "Gut Wrench 3" was central to the plot. And yes, fictional game was a FPS, was that bloody, and yes, murder imitated game's poster. Although in subversion [[spoiler:the murder had nothing to do with the nature of the game, real motive was boss cheating one of his employees out of their promised bonus. Resemblance to poster was there to throw suspiction at somebody else.]]
*** ''3 Dimensions of Murder'' itself fits this trope. In name, at least.
*''TheDistrict'', episode "Something Borrowed, Something Bruised." Complete with flashes to and from reality and screams of "It was only a game!" The goal of the game is to beat an unarmed bystander to death.
* ''KillerInstinct'', episode "Game Over." Constantly used the phrase "murder simulator" and went downhill from there.
** Which is sad, seeing how a NINTENDO fighting game shares the same name. Although it IS violent...
*** For the record, ''Killer Instinct'' was the name of the show. The game in question was a ''GrandTheftAuto'' {{Expy}} called, as I recall, ''Murder One''.
* ''LawAndOrderSpecialVictimsUnit'' featured a subversion in one episode. A boy obsessed with a console RPG was suspected of killing another child. After playing through the entire game, the detectives realized that he had tried to save the girl by imitating the game's "rescue the princess" storyline.
** There was a later episode with a GTA clone, but "the game made them do it" was the defense, which the prosecution quickly set to tearing apart.
** Another episode revolved around a clone ''Second Life'', where the rapist used the game to track down his victim. However, the detectives turn the tables and use the game itself to find the necessary evidence to convict the felon. The tacky clothing on the game model was actually purchased in a tacky in-game store.
*** This one could be easily TruthInTelevision; though this troper hasn't any reports of rape victims stalked through SecondLife specifically, after it has happened in other social networking and forum sites, Linden Labs tries to head it off in SL. Linden Labs also takes every reasonable effort to keep minors away from the main Grid and adults away from the Teen Grid. Other than that, SecondLife is absolutely no different from the web with regards to the content and individuals to be found there, so if it's been done on the web, it's conceivable in SecondLife.
*** This Second Life Troper concedes the point that the above writer is probably right, but such cases are given undue weight in the media. Everything else about that ''SVU'' episode was brimming with DidNotDoTheResearch and SpecialEffectsFailure. Now, CSINewYork, they actualy went into and filmed in Second Life, and did a promo game of the show in world, and their innacuracies were closer to AcceptableBreaksFromReality except a few, and managed to make SL look cooler than it actualy is.
* And while still on the social [=MMO=] topic, {{Numb3rs}} actualy avoided this trope when they did an AlternateRealityGame with a video game component that stuck to fairly standard fantasy violence. And they ran the game in the show as an actual AlternateRealityGame. And the show ''wasn't'' an AuthorTract about videogame violence. And on the whole was pretty cool.
* ''TheXFiles'' did this one too, with its usual flair. A virtual reality game is [[YourMindMakesItReal killing its players]], so our heroes get called in. Scully got to act as the voice of disapproval, while Mulder and the Lone Gunmen were "reduced... back to moony adolescence." Interestingly, this episode was cowritten by William Gibson, one of the people with a claim to inventing CyberPunk.
** Though that did give us [[CrowningMomentOfAwesome Scully getting armed to the teeth and having a shootout with the program]], so it was worth it.
* Averted in ''{{NCIS}}'', where at least two of the protagonists are gamers themselves. One case is solved because one of these has played ''GTA 3'', thus knowing which real-life car a teenager referred to when he named the ingame equivalent. This editor considers such storytelling and knowledge from TV writers to be positively saintly, when concerning this topic.
** Given that the ''writers'' aren't gamers themselves, the show still suffers from a bit of PacManFever now and then.
*** This troper recalls an episode where two navy crewmen who played an MMORPG 'Immortals', a fairly transparent World of Warcraft parody, ended up dueling with swords, and then killing themselves, all because of the game. Of course, the whole series seems to have a Nerd Culture Is Evil Vibe going. Makes you wonder why they bother doing all this investigative stuff when they could just walk in and arrest the guy with the biggest knowledge of sci-fi/comic books.
**** WRONG. They had a few sword fights, then one of the players got disillusioned with the game (With the other player even saying he was taking it too far) and in order to prove he was immortal strapped weights to himself and tried to walk to shore underwater while in full cerimonial uniform.
*** True, but that was before [=McGee=] joined the team full time. after that it seemed seriously more balanced. Heck, he nearly nailed a Redskins cheerleader that he met in an Armani store because she played on the same server. This troper thinks it's funny that they use so many real video games but they never actually state what MMO [=McGee=] plays.
*** That episode also featured Abby kicking butt and taking names as she played through the game. And Abby, for all that she's [[PerkyGoth always wearing black]], is basically the personification of sweetness and light.
*Avoided in ''TheOffice'' (American), season 2, when the members of Jim's new office play ''CallOfDuty'' as an office team activity.
** And again, where Jim finds Dwight's character on SecondLife. Dwight's Second Life has his own Second Life. He also flies, a feature Dwight finds very liberating.
* In ''KamenRiderRyuki'', Shibaura Jun (Kamen Rider Gai) creates a fighting game that gradually makes the players so obsessed with the game that they start re-enacting it in live-action, to the death.
* ''StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' had an episode featuring a 24th Century version of such a game used as part of an attempt to take over the minds of the crew and thus the Enterprise as a whole. Data and [[TheWesley You Know Who]] successfully resisted the "lure" of the game, the latter resorting to what can only be described as video-game inspired tricks to lead the [[MindControl mind-controlled]] members of the crew on a merry chase through the rest of the ship [[spoiler: while Data worked on an antidote for the addictive qualities of the game]]. And then he got to kiss Ashley Judd. Lucky bastard.
** Arguably Mr Crusher's one and only CrowningMomentOfAwesome, where he wasn't just an anti-FanService ButtMonkey. As well as one of the better episodes of the show itself.
** This is a bit of a subversion as the game itself was entirely non-violent, and consisted of herding red discs into funnels. Indeed, the game is described as "practically playing itself"; if you try to [i]not[/i] win, it makes you win anyway. I'm pretty sure it doesn't qualify as a game at that point.
** The episode suggests that the game's rewards are ''literally'' orgasmic.
*** '''''[[{{Understatement}} Suggests?!]]'''''
* An episode of ''{{Tekwar}}: The Series'' featured a Tek video game where the point is to kill cops. The game was designed to convince the players that they were still in the game even after they stopped playing, causing them to kill cops in real life.
** Then a Tekwar videogame was made, but the objective is apparently to convince people that they should go out and [[SoBadItsHorrible kill the developers]].
*** Despite the quality it's notable for being one of the first (or perhaps ''the'' first) game to feature a [[TheHub Hub World]] (a subway station).
* In an episode of the CBBC series ''{{Stupid}}!'' one character is playing a game called ''Killing People 3''.
* ''Gutwrencher 1'', a classic arcade game on the show ''TheMiddleman'', is so violent, it's banned in 17 countries and is the only arcade game ever to have been condemned by both Tipper Gore and the Dalai Lama. ''And'' it's the game that leads to [[GeekyTurnOn Wendy and Tyler's first hookup]].
* Trying very hard to forget the episode of {{Touched By An Angel}} entitled "Virtual Reality", where a good student immediately turns bad after his cousin introduces him to "''Car Jack 2000: Millennium Mayhem''". Rife with [[PacManFever PacMan Fever]] when the game shouts out "2000 points" every time someone is run over, as well as have having an evil CG monk lead the characters in a ''prayer to the video game''.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: New Media ]]

* {{The Onion}}: [[http://www.theonion.com/content/video/hot_new_video_game_consists?utm_source=a-section ''Hot New Videogame Consists Solely of Shooting People Point-Blank in the Face'']]
*** [[http://www.closerangegame.com/close_range.html And they actually made the game.]]

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Newspaper Comics ]]

*The comic strip ''FoxTrot'' likes this one, with "Doomathon 2000" being my personal favorite. Hmmm, what could that possibly be in reference to?
** The strip sometimes uses the names of real games. When they referred to ''{{Carmageddon}}'' this troper initially thought it was another joke name (and quite a clever one at that) and was startled to discover it was an actual game.
** Not to mention "World of Warquest," and Jason's rather extreme addiction thereof. However, all of this could be an AffectionateParody as Bill Amend, the creator, is quite the avid WorldofWarcraft player as well.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Video Games ]]

* The Wii game ''{{MadWorld}}'' does its best to [[{{Gorn}} live]] [[BloodyHilarious up]] [[BeyondTheImpossible to]] [[HeroicSociopath this]] [[CrossesTheLineTwice trope]], being a pretty obvious commentary on games such as ''{{Manhunt}}'' and the western media's reaction to them.
* The third incarnation of the ''{{Doom}}'' franchise, itself a common target of this trope, contained a very silly playable MiniGame in an arcade machine called “Super Turbo Turkey Puncher 3.”
* One news report in ''VampireTheMasqueradeBloodlines'' involves a "Senator Limperman" railing against violent video games such as ''Rape and Pillage'' and ''Abe Lincoln Teaches Killing''. (He's also upset about a crude TakeThat directed at him in another unnamed game).
** The TakeThat mentioned is an example of TruthInTelevision - a thinly veiled allusion to {{Postal}} 2, the final mission of which takes place in a Waco-like compound plastered with posters saying "[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Lieberman Lieberman]] Sucks".
* In real life, the game ''{{Killzone}}'' fits this trope nicely.
* Postal and its sequel manage to live up to this, as well...of course, it doesn't help that when you go to do something as innocent as picking up your paycheck that you run into trigger happy MediaWatchdogs who want your head on a pike.
* ''{{Manhunt}}'' and especially its more violent but inferior sequel, also.
* ''Super Viking Shark Panch Corpse Ride 9000'' lampshades this trope by name, despite being of the rhythm genre. It involves punching sharks in the mouth while riding a corpse to the beat of music.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Webcomics ]]

*''GunnerkriggCourt'' plays this one for laughs [[http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=201 on this page]], where we see Antimony's first (and presumably last) exposure to video games. To most of you, Antimony's voice will probably sound like the Englishwoman that Peter Griffin put into a coma with a dirty joke.
** [[http://danbooru.donmai.us/data/251ff8d5506d566e82fc56b933986297.jpg She does a little better with a different kind of violent game, however.]]
* In the ''{{Jack}}'' arc "Two for You", the character Evan mentions a game entitled "Killing Killers and the Killers Who Kill Them."

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Western Animation ]]

* ''TheSimpsons'' has mentioned such games repeatedly and featured them at least twice in the early seasons, once with ''Super Slugfest'', which might have been played straight, once with the hottest new beat-em-up ''Bonestorm'', which really wasn't. Recent addition: ''Death Kill City 3: Death Kill Stories''. 3 guesses what it's based on.
** However, they ''do'' accidentally mention [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BloodStorm a real game...]]
** TheMovie gives us ''Grand Theft Walrus.'' And hives. [[DidNotDoTheResearch In an]] [[RuleOfFunny arcade cabinet]].
*** That actually might not be a bad idea for an arcade game. Insert another coin to come back after you die...
* In ''{{Daria}}'' (particularly the ''{{fanfic}}''s), the title heroine and her best friend love playing the video game 'Cannibal Fragfest'.
*Ben Tennyson, the titular hero of ''{{Ben 10}}'' is so enamored of the video game "Sumo Slammers" that he has abused the Omnitrix to get at it and even in it.
* This trope wouldn't be complete without a mention of the "Vampire Piggy Hunter" series in ''InvaderZim''.
* This troper is a little fuzzy on the details because I only saw the episode once, but I remembers an particularly {{Anvilicious}} episode of ''PepperAnn'' that was about this. Pepper Ann's aunt was asked by someone to do a study on the dangers of video games, so she borrows Pepper Ann's system and plays it continuously for "research". As she plays the game more and more (which looks like a simulation of the Vietnam War), she starts to think she is actually in the game, which looks like Vietnam veteran flashbacks. In the end she declares that videogames are dangerous because they blur the line between reality and fiction.
* An episode of ''KingOfTheHill'' features Hank playing a GTA-esque game (probably a GameMod of San Andreas) known as "Pro-Pain". (Where's the button to turn yourself in?)
** Sort of subverted in the Hank ends up enjoying (and even getting addicted to) the game when he finds out the benefit of WideOpenSandbox is that you don't ''have'' to kill anyone to win. But he does anyway.
* Spoofed on ''RobotChicken'' with ''Codename: The Abortionator''. Highlights include: "Shoot your parents! Urinate on the homeless! [[KickTheDog Kick a puppy!]] Make sweet, sweet love to your hot cousin! Or your hot cousin's mentally disabled friend! Take out your aggression the old-fashioned way: with a motor vehicle! Extra points for family members!"

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Web Animation ]]

*One [[HomestarRunner Strong Bad email]] throws a few gag titles up: ''Blood Bleeder'', ''Head Chopper II'', ''Scab Wars'' and ''Blistergeist''. There is the strong suggestion that these games would be really fun to play. It also pokes fun at the MoralGuardians' alternative, because Homestar can only play ''Clapping Party'': no, it's not like [[{{DanceDanceRevolution}} DDR]], it's [[http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php/Clapping_Party just clapping]]... This is, of course, a one shot joke, and most of the games that Strong Bad plays and enjoys aren't evil whatsoever, varying between ''Sundae Drivin''' and ''Thy Dungeonman'', which is also a real game playable on the site.
** In another email, he mentions a preference for R-rated movies, apparently independent of factors such as "quality" and "not a waste of moneyosity". So it may not be a statement of the entertainment value of the games (except insofar as even ET would be an improvement over what Homestar's allowed to play) so much as another one of those factors that blurs exactly how old these characters are (when's the last time you automatically equated violence with quality? Probably when you were eight).

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Machinima ]]

*[[GearsOfWar Gears of]] {{Halo}} [[GrandTheftAuto Theft Auto]] 5!
**http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAB2iEvaMwE

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