There are some folks who don't appreciate the grimy, gritty, and often criminal spin a lot of games have taken. To those people, the first offense of many in modern games is: no more blue skies.

Welcome to the Blue Sky in Games campaign. To quote the campaigns opening statement, "Games need BLUE SKIES! Games need BRIGHT YELLOW SUNS! Games need RED AND BLUE THINGS in them!"

This particular idea of throwing games back to how they "used to be" came about courtesy of the website UK: Resistance (ukresistance.co.uk). Along with their illustrated list of complaints they included a list of suggestions to get game developers going. It's not yet known whether or not big-time game designers have taken such suggestions as, "Change everything that's gray into blue" or "From now on, everyone wears red shoes".to heart. Even if the entire campaign was supposed to be a joke, reflecting on how far games have come in the last thirty years is surprising.

Gamers seem to agree with not only the lack of color in modern games, but the underlying message that the Blue Sky campaign touches on. One gamer commented, " Even if it's more or less presented as a joke I think this is actually a serious issue and that the author sees this. I am certainly tired of the "gritty and realistic" (read: morally ambiguous, violent and unhappy) approach to gaming, how many times do we need to see the same negative stuff repeated?" The author of the campaign is credited as Gary Cutlack, a.k.a. Commander Zorg, and is one of the founders of UK: Resistance. Cutlack and the website became award-winners as of last year's inaugural Games Media Awards, taking home Best Writer In Specialist Media, as well as Best Non-Commercial Website or Blog.

If you would like to take up the banner, figuratively or digitally, head over to the campaign home page at
http://www.ukresistance.co.uk/2005/11/blue-sky-in-games-campaign-launched.html or go to ukresistance.co.uk and click on the "No Gangs In Games" icon. Maybe if enough people prove that they want blue skies back, they might actually come back.