'Twas the night before Christmas 2006, and my brother and I were flunking science class. We'd just been collared by a prefect for attempting to play hookey in a trash can, but feeling like an actual problem child in Bully – or, as our PAL version of the PS2 game was called, Canis Canem Edit – has always been one of the game's biggest draws for a goodie two-shoes like me.
It's been years since I first took to the streets of Bullworth as Jimmy Hopkins, and through this scrappy transfer kid-turned-antihero extraordinaire, I lived out my most rebellious pre-teen fantasies. These included (but were not limited to) breaking into a psych ward, being halfway decent at math, and punching the everloving crap out of dumb bullies who don't pick on losers their own size. The game's playful script and quirky quest design means that I've dipped back into it countless times since 2006, either on PC via Steam or whenever I can be bothered to dust off the old PS2. But I don't need to replay Bully every year to remember what a gem of a game it is; its legacy is testament enough.
