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[havoc00]

The unreleased fighting game follows a handful of demented characters who have been vanquished to hell and must fight in a grizzly tournament for a chance to be reincarnated on Earth. Each character represents a vice or mental illness such as lust, psychotic behavior or gluttony. Players must perform gory finishing moves called “thrill kills” to move onto the next stage. The thrill kills are very similar to the fatalities in Mortal Kombat but fail to give players the same frenzied satisfaction.

Originally, Thrill Kill's creators wanted the game to be the first AO rated title in video game history. They did everything they could to push the limits of video game censorship. Characters dressed in risqué outfits, thrill kills were as violent and bloody as possible, and lewd content became commonplace. After realizing most retail stores refused to carry AO rated games, Thrill Kill’s development team dimmed down the game's more controversial elements.

Virgin Interactive planned on publishing the game in 1998 but ended up dissolving into EA after Electronic Arts purchased Westwood Studios, a developer Virgin Interactive owned at the time. After seeing Thrill Kill's graphic content for the first time, EA immediately canceled the project despite it being a finished product. EA thought Thrill Kill would tarnish its image and didn't want to deal with the immense backlash the game was destined to receive.

Thrill Kill: The Story Behind the Banned PS1 Fighting Game

Thrill Kill is one of the most controversial games of the 1990s. The fighting game was so graphic that it never received a physical release

www.cbr.com

 

[acm2000]

played like crap, didnt look much better but had some novelty value.

 

[havoc00]

played like crap, didnt look much better but had some novelty value.

How much of an improvement was the wu tang game over it?

 

[acm2000]

How much of an improvement was the wu tang game over it?

well wutang came with its own controller, thats something right?

 

[havoc00]

well wutang came with its own controller, thats something right?

i dont remember i just know for whatever reason i pre oreded the wutang game, lol and when i went to pick it up they only got like 2 copies and took like a half hour to find mine.

 

[DeepEnigma]

Yes. Have a "retail" copy with my cracked PS1 I got from HK Chinese shops in Chinatown back in the early 2000s.

 

[Blitzmangoman]

Had my fun with the game but I can see why it got cancelled.

 

[Esppiral]

I did have that beta back in the day god knows we're it is now

 

[Braag]

I learned about it through Matt's video



It's funny how tame it is compared to stuff these days. Like yeah the setting is kinda disturbing and EA didn't want to deal with the PR and the AO rating, but we have worse stuff these days I feel like.

 

[acm2000]

i dont remember i just know for whatever reason i pre oreded the wutang game, lol and when i went to pick it up they only got like 2 copies and took like a half hour to find mine.

behold in all its glory

 

[theStartupSound]

Is it possible that it was on one of these demo discs? I have the feeling, I have played a demo of it back then.

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

I played a bootleg copy of what would've been the release version of the game. It was bad. Even for shock value, the amusement wore off almost immediately. I can see why EA would cancel it given the image they wanted to maintain at the time, but the world didn't miss out on much either way.