Konami Digital Entertainment has decided not to publish the controversial tactical FPS, Six Days in Fallujah.
The game, announced a few weeks ago, tracks events in November 2004, a month that saw heavy resistance from insurgency fighters against the US occupying force, with over 2000 people killed.
"After seeing the reaction to the videogame in the United States and hearing opinions sent through phone calls and email, we decided several days ago not to sell it," a PR representative from Konami said. "We had intended to convey the reality of the battles to players so that they could feel what it was like to be there."
Dan Rosenthal, who publishes the GamesLaw blog and who fought in Iraq, is one of the game's opponents. His point of view is that "In order to make the game fun... it simply has to sacrifice some amount of realism for fun factor. When you do that with a war game based on a real war, with real people, you run the risk of dishonoring their memories and sacrifices, and I think that this game has a dangerous potential to do that."
It is still unclear if the game's developer, Atomic Games, will seek another publisher or cancel the game altogether.