Mass Effect 3 kills a kid and no one bats an eye

Let's talk about double standards — specifically when it comes to some heavily criticized storytelling elements in gaming.

After playing the Mass Effect 3 demo, one thing bothered me. A child dies in the demo. Now, the act of killing a child in the game isn't what bothers me; what bothers me is the fact that no one seems to mind when BioWare does it in Mass Effect 3, but Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 and Dead Island were heavily criticized for doing so.

I'm trying to look for answers as to why this might be. Maybe it's because BioWare has a reputation for really good storytelling and plot execution, while Call of Duty games are full of shock value and 'gotcha' moments. Dead Island merely used it to rope people into the game.

Then, one of my fellow GameZone writers said, “Well, you don't see the kid die in the ME3 demo. He's in a ship and you see that explode. In those other games you see it happen.”

You watch the zombification of a little girl in the Dead Island trailer.

You watch a little girl and her mom get killed by an explosion from a terrorist attack in MW3.

In Mass Effect 3, you see the kid's face, him board the ship, and then that ship getting rocked by the Reapers, resulting in an explosion.

I can see how someone would think it lessens the effect of the death, but then why have it in there. They're trying to show the horrors of war, much like MW3 was trying to do.

This argument is like being taken against your will — yea, it's really bad, but being sodomized against your will is so much worse. Dead Island and MW3 sodomized; Mass Effect 3 didn't. ***GameZone does not endorse the act of sodomy or any act against someone's will, unless it's eating ice cream cake. Ice cream cake is f**king delicious***

A child still dies, regardless.  I want you to know, in no way am I offended by the death of a child in a video game.  They do it in movies.  A video game isn't real; the kid isn't real.  They're just trying to get an emotional response out of you and have you feel the impact of the invasion.  I'm just baffled by people that are.

The point is, BioWare isn't getting any backlash at all for this death of a child. Unless it wasn't a child. Maybe the person that died had that Gary Coleman thing going on. If that's the case, ignore everything I wrote.

You can follow Lance Liebl on Twitter @Lance_GZ