A series of television ads run in the UK for the PlayStation 3 game Heavy Rain rankled a few feathers due to their timing and violence.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) [URL=http://asa.org.uk/Complaints-and-ASA-action/Adjudications/2010/5/Sony-Computer-Entertainment-UK-Ltd/TF_ADJ_48460.aspx]reported receiving 38 complaints[/URL] in response to four Heavy Rain ads, with viewers criticizing the violence of the ads and a perceived glamorization of violence. The objectors also worried that the ads were run at a time of day when children could view them.
The last complaint about the ads was that they were run around the same time that a shop keeper in Huddersfield was killed in an armed robbery. The Heavy Rain ads all depicted a scene in which a shop keeper was repeatedly threatened by an armed man with Heavy Rain character Scott Shelby watching. The versions differed in how the Shelby reacted to the situation; he either intervened, attacked or negotiated with the armed robber.
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