9. Modern Warfare 2's "No Russian" Level
In the days leading up to the release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, reports began to surface that the game included a level in which, while working undercover with a Russian terrorist cell, players were forced to participate in a massacre at an airport, with newspapers like the Daily Mail erroneously reporting that the game was a "terrorist plotting simulator". The mission nevertheless sparked a provocative debate about gaming's place in the cultural milieu, and whether Infinity Ward had taken things too far with this mission. On the flipside, steps were taken to protect consumers; the game has a freaking 18 rating for Christ's sake, players are also given the option to skip the mission entirely, and finally, players are not "forced" to actually participate in the murder themselves; they can simply watch it unfold. Was the level rightly controversial? Of course, but it managed to rise above being mere shock for shock's own sake, and is in many ways a watershed moment for gaming's potential to inspire debate about art's position in our world.