It is relentlessly user-hostile, taking time out to insult the reader wherever possible (it opens with the words, "Welcome to Violence, you degraded turd") and uses a system where the user can buy experience points for cash from the designer or publisher.

[2]: 306 In August 2005, Costikyan released Violence under a Creative Commons license,[2]: 307  and made it available for download.

Set in the modern day, Violence lets players do dungeon crawls into places like the homes of illegal immigrants, kill them and take their stuff.

"[2]: 306 In his 2023 book Monsters, Aliens, and Holes in the Ground, RPG historian Stu Horvath noted, "The book is grotesque, sneering, and snide, explicitly calling itself disgusting and questioning the moral fiber of anyone willing to read it.

It's often quite funny but also gets at a deep frustration regarding the centering of violence in all sorts of play — tabletop games, videogames, make believe.