JFK: Reloaded, a game released in 2004, lets the player play as president Kennedy’s assassin Lee Harvey Oswald. Sitting in the schoolbook repository, your aim is to try and recreate the famous shots that killed Kennedy and wounded the governor.

The creators, Traffic Games, say it’s an ‘edutainment game’ to “establish the most likely facts of what happened on 1963-11-22 by running the world’s first mass- participation forensic construction“. I say it’s a nice little simulation, and quite the challenge to get the shots right. Actually, scratch that, it’s more fun creating chaos and getting cops and FBI ran over by cars gone crazy in the chaos.

But if you are more inclined to actually play it the right way, this is what you are trying to recreate:

According to the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassinations, as President Kennedy waved to the crowds on his right, a shot entered his upper back, penetrated his neck, and exited his throat. He raised his clenched fists up to his neck and leaned forward and to his left, as Mrs. Kennedy put her arms around him in concern. Governor Connally also reacted, as the same bullet penetrated his back, chest, right wrist, and left thigh. He yelled, “My God, they are going to kill us all!”

That’s one hell of a shot, and you’re never going to do it right. But it’s actually fun trying, how morbid that may be. After every attempt, you can watch the replay and view a nice ballistics report on in which way every shot ricocheted, and who it killed/wounded. Afterwards you get graded on how historically correct the shot was.

If you get bored there’s an option to let cars behave ‘exaggerated’, or ‘chaotic’. This will let the cars run wild, and in the case of the presidential car eject the esteemed passengers into the air after their inevitable crash into something during their frantic escape. Bonus points (from me) if you get them to eject into the little pool on the side of the road.

There are a few mods for this game, and I have included the one which has a fast accurate rifle and the timer disabled, and one which puts a crowd watching since it’s kind of weird having noone around.

  JFK: Reloaded (16.4 MiB, 173 hits)

Gameplay Video: