Difference between revisions of "Columbine High School massacre"

Revision as of 16:38, 16 May 2007

The Columbine High School Massacre occurred on April 20, 1999 at Columbine High School in Jefferson County near Littleton, Colorado, United States. Two teenage students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, executed a planned shooting rampage killing 12 other students and a teacher before committing suicide. It is considered to be the second worst school shooting in U.S. history, the worst being the Virginia Tech massacre.

Part of a rash of similar shootings, the events triggered a wide-ranging debate about the effect of violent entertainment, particularly the video games Doom and Quake.

Doomworld posted an editorial defending Doom and the staffers of the time participated in a variety of press interviews. Andrew "Linguica" Stine and Matthew "Mattrim" Dixon were interviewed by SFGate.com. Javier "Dukrous" Heredia defended Doom as part of an interview by CNN.

Doom connection and the Harris levels

Eric Harris was an enthusiast of the Doom series, owning some of the Doom novels and having designed Doom levels under the nickname "RebDoomer". In a videotape recorded before the shooting, Harris expressed enthusiasm for the planned shooting, saying it would be "like fucking Doom." He also pointed out that the shotgun was "Straight out of Doom".

An urban legend spread that the Harris levels were designed to look like the halls of the high school, populated with representations of Harris's classmates and teachers, and that Harris "practised" for the Columbine shootings by playing these levels over and over. However, though Harris did release several WADs, none are known to be recreations of Columbine High School. After the shootings, many websites refused to provide downloads to the levels, seeing the shootings as something the community should dissociate itself from. Although this position has largely dissipated, Ty Halderman still regularly rejects the maps from inclusion in the idgames archive.

Harris's UAC Labs WAD contains comments which appear somewhat disturbing in retrospect. For example, the description ends, "Good luck marine, and dont forget, KILL 'EM AAAAALLLL!!!!!", while the copyright section threatens, "You may NOT change a damn thing with this WAD, if you do, i will blow you up".

Copies of the following files are known to exist:

UAC Labs (uaclabs.wad) 

A two level single player WAD. The most well-known of the Harris levels, it has an E1-style techbase theme. The WAD includes extra graphics that increase the gore in the monster death animations. In the second level, the player is confronted with an enormous arena filled with Demons.

Deathmatching in bricks! (bricks.wad) 

A deathmatch level, the name refers to the abundant use of brick textures. The level mainly consists of a number of high rise walkways which players must walk along. Dylan Klebold is credited for playtesting this level.

Mortal Kombat Doom (fightme.wad) 

Deathmatch level consisting of an arena containing four pillars on which the players start. Each player is given a berserk pack, the intention being that the players should fight each other using fists.

Hockey.wad (hockey.wad) 

Deathmatch level consisting of an ice hockey rink and surrounding stadium.

KILLER (killer.wad) 

Deathmatch level consisting of a large open grass arena containing several buildings with weapons.

Station (station.wad) 

Techbase-themed deathmatch level consisting of several rooms connected by a single corridor.

The ENDOOM screen for uaclabs.wad also mentions the following, although no known copies of them are publicly available:

• techout
• outdoors
• assault
• thrasher
• realdoom (which is consistently mentioned in the text files for all of the Harris levels; Harris encourages the reader to email him to ask about it)

External links

• Wikipedia article about the Columbine High School Massacre
• "No easy explanation for Columbine killings" – CNN article referencing Doomworld (April 28, 1999)
• "Doom fans say blame for school killings is unjustified" - sfgate.com article interviewing Andrew Stine (April 22, 1999)
• "The Harris Levels" - Urban legends page dismissing the claims that the Harris levels resembled his school.
• Doomworld - The Top 10 Infamous WADs - "UAC Labs" can be downloaded here