Animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) are now protesting the treatment of aliens. Yes, they have decided that they will hand out fliers at the launch event of StarCraft 2: Heart of the Swarm in Irvine, Calif. tonight. The launch event, which will have several members of Blizzard Entertainment on hand at the Irvine GameStop, will be treated to the kind of ridiculous protests that only a group like PETA can put on. So what will they be doing at the Heart of the Swarm event?

In response to a statement from the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) earlier in the week about whaling in Assassin’s Creed.

As it is wont to do sometimes People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) is targeting another video game for its depiction of cruelty towards animals, though this time it was induced to do so by GamesBeat who asked the organization for its comment. While I can assure PETA that no animals were harmed in the making of this video game, the organization sometimes has trouble differentiating between what is real and what is not (video games, for example).

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) have decided to capitalize on the release of Pokémon Black and White 2 (it was released this Sunday) with the release of a game that depicts the abuse Pokémon might go through in their own special web game called Pokémon Black and Blue. Their catchphrase for the game is "gotta free 'em all."

We know that PETA has said that they were just kidding but that hasn't stopped a number web sites and internet video shows from taking a crack at the subject anyway. The Escapist's The Big Picture is one of those web shows offering a rebuttal to PETA's campaign against Mario for his Tanooki-suit wearing ways. We'll let show host MovieBob do all the talking.

Thanks to Andrew Eisen for the link.

Source: The Escapist

Sometimes when someone says something stupid, outlandish or inappropriate the only defense they can use is that it was "just a joke." That's the tune PETA is playing to backpedal away from attacking Mario for wearing a Tanooki-suit with a press release and a web game called Mario Kills Tanooki. Today PETA tells web site Kotaku that the whole campaign was meant to be "tongue-in-cheek." Gamers found it to be more like "foot in mouth" or "head up ass."

Yesterday, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) launched its Mario Kills Tanooki campaign, a stunt meant to draw attention to the plight of the real-life tanooki that is apparently killed for its fur in some parts of the world.

Perhaps not so coincidentally, Super Mario 3D Land released the day before and one of Mario’s power-ups is the Tanooki suit (pictured).  Yeah, I’m sure you can see where this is going.

A new game from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) pokes fun at Super Mario Bros. Trying to draw some attention to its cause, PETA says that its new game, Super Tanooki Skin 2D, will hopefully make Mario think twice about wearing fur in his games. In the game, which is part of its new "Mario Kills Tanooki" campaign, players "direct a bloody, skinned raccoon dog as he chases a tanuki fur–suited Mario through a surreal fur farm where raccoon dogs are routinely skinned alive for their fur."

You might want to sit down for this.

There’s a popular war video game out there that not only allows players to shoot hundreds upon hundreds of human characters but it also features the horrific and brutal snuffing out of a small and innocent life.

Yes, in Electronic Arts’ recently released Battlefield 3, players can kill a virtual rat.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) are apparently cheesed off that Michael Vick has advanced to the "Sweet 16: of fan voting to determine who will grace the cover of Madden 2012. They should be grateful if Vick wins the distinction because Madden NFL cover athletes tend to have very bad luck.

"I can tell you we've already received the letters from our good friends at PETA urging us to take him out of the bracket," EA Sports president Peter Moore said recently at the World Congress of Sports in Miami. "I personally believe, and this is personal commentary right now, that Michael served his time. He's had a tremendous season."

President Barack Obama has signed into law a bill that outlaws the creation and distribution of so-called animal crush videos, a response to an April 20 Supreme Court decision (United States v. Stevens) that struck down an earlier federal law that banned a more broadly defined description of animal cruelty. The court was concerned that the law could be applied to hunting and fishing videos. The new law specifically addresses creating and distributing videos and ties it to obscenity - saying that these kinds of videos - involving burning, crushing and mutilating animals appeal to a particular sexual fetish. Why would the law say that? To tie the act to obscenity and make it an exception to the first amendment.

"This [new] law protects both animals and free speech by focusing specifically on crush videos, which clearly have no place in our society,” said Randall Lockwood of ASPCA.

Team Meat (developers Edmund McMillen and Tommy Refenes) have responded to PETA's Super Meat Boy parody game on their official blog, saying that, while he sympathizes with the organization’s cause, he takes issue with some of what their game, Super Tofu Boy, takes liberties with. Edmund McMillen thanked PETA for giving his little indie game a dramatic push, though he does not appreciate that they do not understand just what Super Meat Boy really is:

"First off I want to thank Peta for helping us turn Super Meat Boy into a house hold name and of course for making themselves look quite foolish in the process... see (as mentioned in countless interviews) Meat Boy isn't made of animal meat, he's simply a boy without skin whose name is Meat Boy.. but sshh don't tell them that."

PETA is at it again, with another game making fun of something having to do with MEAT. PETA despises meat almost as much as I enjoy a juicy Porterhouse (medium rare), with a side of delicious mushrooms, mashed potatoes, and delicious ponds of gravy..

The latest target is the wonderful indie game Super Meat Boy. PETA has made a Flash game called Super Tofu Boy, which jabs fun at Super Meat Boy's gameplay, storyline and characters. The game offers ten levels featuring the soy-based life-form as he platforms much like our meaty friend, complete with pro-vegetarian messages here and there to drive home the point that meat is bad and vegetables are wonderful. For the record, I love vegetables too.

You can play Super Tofu Boy at the PETA web site.

Source: Kotaku by way of Rodrigo Ybáñez García.

Responding to PETA’s disdain over the use of Pit Bulls as a “fully fledged combat item class” in its Mafia Wars social game, developer Zynga has responded and removed the dog as a fighting tool.

PETA noted that “Countless social gamers stopped plowing their FarmVille fields long enough to voice their objections to Zynga about the game's negative depiction of this most used-and-abused breed, and the company quickly responded in just the right way.”

"Mafia Wars is obviously only a game, but the suffering endured by thousands of pit bulls who are treated as if they were nothing more than burglar alarms or fighting machines is very real," stated PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. "By removing Mafia Wars' virtual pit bull, Zynga is no longer perpetuating the mindset that it's acceptable to chain, neglect, and abuse real dogs."

On behalf of Adult Swim Games, developer This Is Pop has created a “green” hunting game that substitutes a tasteless food made from coagulated soy milk as a target instead of typical living wildlife.

Tofu Hunter lets users blast away at such non-indigenous species such as Tofu Dogs, Tofu Bucks and Trophy Tofu (complete with sear marks). Players must avoid Tofu Does and are awarded bonus time for shooting Soy Milk containers.

Even with a lack of real animals the game manages to impart a realistic feel, so much so, in fact, that a few commenters on a PETA blog post about the game indicated that it made them uncomfortable to play.  “… honestly it is so close to animal hunting in every way that I found myself sick to my stomach. I didn't find it different than the deer hunting games at all, except that the target was white and square,” wrote a user named Barb.

I think most would agree that clubbing a seal to death for its pelt is a pretty abhorrent, violent act. But is a comedic iPhone app that lets you commit that act equally untoward? Opinions will differ on that topic, for sure, but Apple's official position on the subject seems to be that is very naughty indeed. According to iPhone app developer Matt Smyth, his iPhone iSealClub app has been rejected by Apple because it contains "objectionable content." Smyth was informed of the decision on Tuesday in an email from Apple (check out this YouTube video to get a glimpse of the game in action).

Matt Smyth can't understand why Apple rejected iSealClub:

G4's Olivia Munn is bearing all for PETA in a billboard ad in the Los Angeles area. The Attack of the Show co-star took off all her clothes to protest the treatment of elephants in the circus, according to this G4 story.

Olivia joins such celebrities as Pamela Anderson and Eva Mendes who have shown it all in support of the organization and to protest the treatment of animals. Here's what PETA has to say about Olivia's bold naked protest:

Olivia...has a soft spot for animals and was shocked to learn that elephants used in circuses are torn from their mothers at birth and bound and electro-shocked as babies in order to break their spirits. They spend the rest of their lives performing silly, meaningless tricks out of constant fear of physical punishment, including beatings with bullhooks—sharp, metal-tipped implements that resemble fireplace pokers.

PETA has a little problem with Mafia Wars, and it’s not about the social game clogging up its Facebook stream.

Zynga plans to debut animals as a “fully-fledged combat item class” and is offering two limited edition versions—an African Lion and a Pit Bull.

PETA takes issue with the use of the latter, writing on its blog that:

… perpetuating the image of pit bulls as fighting machines is reckless and wrong. Pit bulls already face a public relations battle and are the most abused breed of dog. PETA's fieldworkers see pit bulls in horrific conditions every day. They are frequently kept chained or penned, they are taunted and trained to be aggressive, and they are beaten and starved—sometimes to death.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has launched a browser-based Flash game to call attention to what the group calls “outdated killing methods” utilized by the McDonald’s fast-food chain.

Super Chick Sisters is a Super Mario-like five level game that has players attempting to rescue Princess Pam (Pamela Anderson) who has been kidnapped by the Evil Ronald McDonald. Information from PETA’s campaign against McDonald’s is sprinkled throughout, for example a chick tells your character, “Chickens who are killed by McDonald’s suppliers have their throats cut while they are still alive. You must save them from this cruelty!”

A kid-friendly version is available as well.

PETA notes that:

McDonald's American suppliers are under fire for using an outdated killing method that often causes birds to suffer the pain of broken wings and broken legs, to have their throats cut while they are still conscious, and to be scalded to death in defeathering tanks.

PETA is urging McDonald’s U.S. suppliers to adopt a more humane killing method that is being used in Europe.

Animal rights group PETA has posted a new online game designed to spotlight the use of animals in breast cancer research.

Breasts, Not Tests is a Whack-a-Mole clone. Players click on cleavage shots and try to avoid clicking the animals and, oddly enough, fruits that appear. As play progresses, tiles vanish with ever-increasing speed. High scores can unlock rewards such as wallpaper and banners.

So what message is PETA pushing with Breasts, Not Tests? From the game's web page:

We all know that breast cancer is a serious disease that affects most of us in some way (either personally or through someone we know), but did you know that it also affects animals?

 

It's true. Monkeys, rats, mice, rabbits, cats, dogs, and other animals often suffer and die because of horrific tests that are conducted in the name of breast cancer "research." Besides being cruel, the "research" is also ineffective...

THANKS TO: Brett Schenker of the ECA and comic book site Graphic Policy for the tip!

Animal rights group PETA, which long ago mastered the art of using video game criticism to garner publicity for its cause, is at it again.

Kotaku reports today that PETA has targeted an upcoming 2K series based on the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. A new campaign urges PETA supporters to petition publisher Take-Two to cancel planned circus games for the DS and Wii.

We've told Take-Two about Ringling Bros.' real-life, lengthy history of animal abuse and neglect and shown it undercover video footage of a standard industry training session, in which animal handlers used electric prods and bullhooks to gouge elephants in the most sensitive parts of their bodies.

Even though it knows that circuses are no fun for animals, Take-Two is still moving forward with its plan to create a Ringling Bros. Wii game. Please send a message to Take-Two CEO Ben Feder urging him to sever ties with Ringling Bros. Let him know that you'd rather play a game featuring a circus that does not beat animals for "entertainment."

In a follow-up report, Kotaku offers comment from Take-Two exec Alan Lewis:

As a matter of company policy, we don't comment on the business affairs of our licensors. We fully stand behind all of our products.

A Ringling Bros. spokesman contested PETA's allegations of animal abuse.

The increasingly game-aware People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals will hold a save-the-virtual-baby-seals event in World of Warcraft at 1 P.M. EST on Saturday.

According to a post on the PETA site:

Activists from across the Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor are banding together to put a stop to the atrocious seal slaughter. Anyone who slaughters baby seals for their fur must surely be in service to the evil Lich King.

 

You must be in the WhisperWind realm in order to fight... go to Northrend, where you will find a zone called Howling Fjord, where the baby seals live on glaciers and boats float in the fjords. This will be the battleground to stop the slaughter.

Unfortunately, casual WoW players will not be able to check the event out since characters need to be level 68+ to enter the Howling Fjord zone. One of the reasons why the Ron Paul WoW campaign rally was so successful was that it took place in a starter zone.

In addition, hardcore WoW fans have posted comments to the PETA article and its Facebook event listing pointing out other concerns:

I actually do find this somewhat ironic, as there is soooooo much animal killing involved during the levelling of your characters.

I am a little aghast that you chose Alliance; if you want to be environmental you really want to be looking at the Tauren mythology. They are one with the earth and they are very environmental. As someone who plays mostly Horde characters, this just comes off as prejudiced.

Whisperwind is NOT a pvp server, most likely you are just going to be a witness to the biggest in game seal slaughter and you will be powerless to do anything about it.

Whisperwind is already a very high population server, which means most PETA members are just going to see the queue screen like the Ron Paul people did.

If you're not up to date on the mini-controversy brewing around the need to shoot enemy attack dogs in Call of Duty: World at War, check out our previous story on animal rights group PETA's complaint about the game.

Publisher Activision has just forwarded a response to GamePolitics:

In order to create believable, real-world scenes and heighten the game playing experience, “Call of Duty: World at War” depicts the ruthless and gritty combat of World War II.  

 

Dogs are included in the game for authenticity since they were used extensively by German, Japanese, U.S. and Soviet troops during the war. Activision in no way endorses or condones cruelty to animals, and we don’t believe the game will encourage cruelty in any way.

Last week GamePolitics reported that a group of animal lovers at a Massachusetts high school were outraged by the need to shoot enemy attack dogs in the best-selling Call of Duty: World at War.

Animal rights organization People For the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has now joined Academy of Notre Dame students in their criticism of the World War II shooter. In response to a request for comment, GamePolitics received this statement from PETA:

Not since we were pitted against Nazi attack dogs when we first escaped from Castle Wolfenstein 17 years ago have we seen such barbaric treatment of dogs in gameplay as we did in Call of Duty, World of War.

 

To help the folks at Activision Blizzard learn about the ethical treatment of animals, we're offering to let them take PETA's "Developing Empathy for Animals" free of charge and are sending a package of Nintendogs games to their office.

UPDATE: PETA has blogged about their objection to the canine killing in CoD:WaW

Animal rights organization PETA has named Xbox 360 role-playing adventure Fable 2 its Most Animal-Friendly Video Game of 2008.

In announcing its 6th annual Proggy Awards, PETA recognized "companies, people, and products for innovative and animal-friendly achievements." Of Fable 2, the activist group gushed:

Fable 2 is a vegetarian's dream come true. Why? In this virtual fight between good and evil, characters powered by tofu are just as powerful as their meat-eating counterparts—and are more fit and attractive to boot.

 

Featuring a strong pro-vegetarian theme, eating a plant-based diet helps you rack up "purity" points, whereas eating meat makes your character fat and evil. A fun and innovative game, it's also an effective tool that teaches gamers the real-life benefits of a vegetarian diet.

UPDATE: Edge points out that players can kick chickens and shoot bunnies in the game, which is just the kind of behavior that one might think would anger a group like PETA.

Dan Shannon, a representative for the animal rights group, told Edge:

I'll be honest, it's not our favorite part of the game. But what we like about Fable II and why we gave it the award is because the game presents you with choices, and then you see the repercussions of what those choices are. This is what the awards are based on, and that’s what PETA’s philosophy is—for people to understand how their choices affect the real world.

It’s not like people eat meat to score evil points, but you are supporting an industry that is cruel to animals. People need to be aware that their choices affect the world. We like that message in Fable II.

[The Chicken-Kicking] is done in a light-hearted manner. I don’t think anyone’s going to go out and start kicking chickens in their yard because of this game. Just like real life, you can go kick chickens if you want to, but we don’t think most people get off on that.

GP: Could just be that PETA, which has clearly recognized that talking about games is a good way to create buzz, didn't do its homework on Fable 2?

Last week GamePolitics reported on Holiday Snowball Fight, an online game which lampooned, among other celebrities, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

Apparently the game, created by PETA, provoked a bit of a dust-up between Palin's people and the animal rights organization. Although details are sketchy, a PETA blog claims that the group was threatened with legal action over the game:

This morning, PETA's Policy Department received a Scrooge-like phone call from someone purporting to be from Gov. Sarah Palin's office threatening legal action against us if we don't play ball...

In real life, the moose and other animals Ms. Palin blows to smithereens don't stand a chance... Though this game is just a bit of harmless payback, Palin's real-life hunting habit is no joke...

The Alaska Report has more, including transcripts of a nasty e-mail flame war between Palin spokeman Bill McAllister and PETA president Ingrid Newkirk. From the e-mail exchange, it appears that the Palin camp claims no knowledge of the alleged legal threat.

GP: Thanks to reader Raymond Martineau for the tip!

As we've found out recently, animal rights group PETA has increasingly taken to spreading its message though the use of video game parodies.

Last month, for example, PETA garnered major attention with Cooking Mama: Mama Kills Animals, a Flash offering parodying Majesco's light-hearted kitchen game series.

More recently, PETA launched Holiday Snowball Fight. The online game begins by having players target fur-wearers like Madonna and designer Donna Karan, and ends with Sarah Palin as the focus of PETA's ire. Palin, of course, is an avid hunter. The 2008 Republican vice-presidential nominee has been criticized by some for taking part in the practice of shooting wolves from airplanes.

What's next for PETA and video games?

Was Link somehow unkind to Epona?  Is it okay to shoot those killer attack dogs in Call of Duty: World at War? Does a Wookie count as an animal?

gamesindustry.biz reports what GamePolitics readers may have already surmised: Advocacy group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals is finding that video game controversies are a terrific way to stir up publicity for their cause. An unnamed PETA spokesperson told gi.biz:

We use games to highlight the cruelty to animals because they appeal to people who are interested but may be turned off by more direct appeals... We first turned to videogames years ago in an effort to reach out to young guys, but as we dug deeper, we realised that the gaming audience was much bigger and more diverse than we had initially thought. Given the huge success that we've had with Super Chick Sisters and Mama Kills Animals, we will definitely be creating many, many more games.

We plan on continuing to use videogames as a way of engaging the public, both by continuing to create our own games and by engaging with gaming companies, as we did when we approached Sega with the request that it not use apes in its adverts. Gaming, both casual and hardcore, is on the rise, and we recognise that as a medium, gaming is as important as music, movies, and television.

We're not taking aim at Majesco specifically, or the Mama character. We only want to raise awareness that the world - be it real or virtual - is very meaty. We want everyone, including Majesco, to offer more cruelty-free, vegetarian options...

Our game isn't an attack on the videogame industry. It's an attack on the meat industry. We love games (that's why we've created so many), and we love the Cooking Mama series."

GP: Like many other advocacy groups, PETA is using games to deliver its message. What's fascinating, however, is that they have also trained their sites onto games.

That was quick.

On Monday, Animal Rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) took a bite out of Majesco's new Cooking Mama title for featuring too many meat-eating recipes.

By Wednesday, Majesco had issued a rather mild response, pointing out that roughly half of the recipes in Cooking Mama: World Kitchen are meatless.

Eager for the last word, PETA closed out the week by petitioning Cooking Mama to commit to an all-veggie edition of the popular game franchise:

Dearest Mama,

 

…It’s great to hear that you want to “make the world a happier place,” because that’s pretty much what we want to do too (though it seems that we might have different tactics …). I do hope that you seriously consider making a vegetarian diet a part of your strategy for world happiness.

 

By adopting a vegetarian diet, you can save more than 100 animals per year. Plus, vegetarians live longer and have a considerably lower carbon footprint. I know that—as you are a digital being—these benefits don’t exactly apply to you, but I still urge you to take the pledge to be veg for 30 days.

-Reporting from San Diego, GamePolitics correspondent Andrew Eisen...

UPDATE: Popzara has an interview with a PETA spokesperson on the Cooking Mama saga...

Earlier this week, animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) took a bite out of Majesco’s Cooking Mama: World Kitchen. 

To make its point, PETA offered Cooking Mama: Mama Kills Animals, a parody which features a blood-thirsty Mama coaching the player through slicing and dicing a Thanksgiving turkey (already dead, despite the title).

PETA apparently took issue with the new Wii title's meat-heavy menu, calling the game "so heavy on dishes that are made from dead animals that the only things missing are the blood and gore...”

Not surprisingly, Majesco disagrees with that view. Yesterday the game publisher issued a response to PETA:

[Of 51 total recipes] Cooking Mama World Kitchen includes more than 25 vegetarian-friendly recipes including delicious breakfast, dinner, dessert and snack options.  And, while Mama is not a vegetarian, she fully supports the humane treatment of animals, particularly for her canine protégé Max who makes his doggie debut in World Kitchen.

While a press release is not as awesome as responding with a parody flash game of its own, Majesco still had a bit of fun by including a quote from Mama herself:

I would never put rat in my Ratatouille. Like any accomplished cook, I create my recipes to appeal to a broad range of tastes and preferences. My only goal is to ensure you leave the table well fed.

-Reporting from San Diego, GP Correspondent Andrew Eisen is an omnivore…