Selects: Night Trap: The Video Game Failure that Changed the Industry

# Summary

Night Trap is an obscure 1992 video game that became infamous not for its gameplay quality, but for sparking a major controversy that led to the creation of the video game rating system. The episode explores how this full-motion-video game—featuring actress Dana Plato and inspired by experimental theater and arcade classics like Dragon's Lair—was originally conceived as a groundbreaking interactive experience but faced ridicule from politicians who believed it glorified violence against women, despite the game actually being cartoonish and fairly tame by even 1990s standards. Listeners will discover how a seemingly dead project became a cult phenomenon that refused to die, eventually getting remade decades later for modern platforms thanks to a dedicated fan programmer.