JFK game strikes a nerve

This Internet image shows a screen from a new video game called JFK Reloaded being released today by the Scottish game company Traffic. PHOTO: AFP

An Internet video game that lets players kill former US president John F. Kennedy has been angrily condemned on its release Monday -- the 41st anniversary of the former president's assassination.

"It is despicable," said David Smith, a spokesman for JFK's brother Senator Edward Kennedy.

In the game, JFK Reloaded, players take the role of Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, controling a telescopic rifle sight as the Kennedy motorcade passes through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas.

"Concentrate, and think like a sniper!" read the instructions to the game which can be downloaded for US$10.

The creators are also offering a US$100,000 prize to the player who can perfectly recreate the timing and trajectory of the three shots fired by Oswald that resulted in the president's death.

The game was designed by Traffic, a company based in Glasgow, Scotland which insisted that it was trying to interest a new generation in a seminal moment in US history.

"We've created the game with the belief that Oswald was the only person that fired the shots on that day, although this re-creation proves how immensely difficult his task was," said Traffic managing director Kirk Ewing.

"We genuinely believe that, if we get enough people participating, we'll be able to disprove, once and for all, the notion that someone else was involved in the assassination," Ewing said.

Contestants points deducted if they accidentally hit former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy, whose digital image is clothed in her famous pink outfit with pillbox hat.