The news never rests. A third assassination attempt has occurred in the US this decade, all three against the same person: President Donald Trump. With his popularity plummeting even further after this assassination attempt, it does not seem that the president is garnering sympathy among his voters or compatriots. Not only because they have already tried to assassinate him three times.
The most curious thing about the whole situation, leaving possible conspiracies aside, is the identity of the accused. Cole Thomas Allen, a 31-year-old man from California, does not seem to align with any political extreme and appears to have been motivated by his perspective that Trump is “a pedophile and a rapist,” something the president has categorically denied in an interview with journalist Norah O’Donnell on CBS.
Although what stands out the most about this situation is that Thomas Allen also had a hobby. Developing video games. At least one of these video games was published on Steam and, although it wasn’t exactly popular before his assassination attempt, it gained popularity once the events of April 25 occurred. This has led Valve to take action.
A video game that has caused controversy
Under the name Cole Allen, on December 20, 2018, he released a game called Bohrdom on Steam. Defined as “an atomic fighting game,” it is an asymmetric fighting game based on chemical models where we have to choose to play as a nucleus or an electron and try to dodge the attack patterns of the opponent, or use the attack patterns to take them down. Mixing elements of pinball and shoot ’em up, the game is basic, graphically underdeveloped, and not very fun; it’s easy to understand why it didn’t stand out among the multitude of games on Steam.
With just two reviews after its release, the game was buried for years among the tens of thousands of video games available on the platform. Until the assassination attempt on Donald Trump brought the game to light. This gave it a new life.
In just over 24 hours after the attack, the game accumulated a significant amount of sales, which translated into just over 120 reviews of the game. Most of them were humorous comments about the assassination attempt on the US president, jokes about the relationship between the game and assassinations, or political comments, very few of them talked about the game itself. This led Valve to remove the game from the store and block reviews made after April 24.
Although Valve has not issued any kind of statement regarding this, it seems logical that they would withdraw the game from circulation when it is made by someone accused of murdering a high-profile public figure. Especially since Valve has a policy, since 2019, that in the event of a flood of reviews that do not correspond to the content of the game, they reserve the right to remove the reviews from a certain date, or even withdraw the game until they speak with the developers. Something that is now impossible for obvious reasons.
Right now, it is impossible to buy Bohrdom on Steam or any other platform. Although it is little more than a curiosity, since the game is not going to win any awards for its originality or quality, it demonstrates two things: how everyone is more about what they know and how the Internet will always turn everything into a joke. Although it may not necessarily amuse Valve.
