Philippines Temporarily Bans GoreBox After Tacloban School Shooting

Philippine authorities have temporarily banned the mobile and PC game GoreBox after police said one of two teenage suspects in a Tacloban school shooting that killed three students had played the title before the attack. The country’s Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center, or CICC, ordered the block on Tuesday, June 23, less than 24 hours after the shooting at San Jose National High School.

Investigators are still working through what role, if any, the game played in the attack. The CICC has not announced an end date for the ban, and Paraiso has called the move a “precautionary measure.” Developer F2 Games, the German independent studio behind GoreBox, has not publicly responded to the allegations or to the government’s decision to block access to the game in the Philippines.

The Tacloban Shooting and the Game That Surfaced

Two teenagers armed with a Glock 9mm pistol and a .38 caliber revolver opened fire at San Jose National High School in Tacloban at approximately 9:20 a.m. on Monday, June 22, while classes were in session. Three students were killed and 20 others were injured, with at least 15 of those struck by gunfire. One suspect was arrested at the scene, restrained by teachers and students at the school; the other was caught after a manhunt that ended when a neighboring tricycle driver escorted the suspect to a police station.

The suspects were identified in police filings as 15-year-old “Rod” and 14-year-old “Nash,” and only one of the two was a student at the school. The Glock pistol belonged to the aunt of one suspect, a police officer assigned to the Eastern Visayas Police Regional Office. The revolver was registered to a security agency in Cebu City and had been kept by the grandfather of the other suspect, a former security guard. Police recovered two empty magazines and roughly 40 shell casings at the scene. The 14-year-old had reportedly visited a shooting range before the attack and knew how to operate a firearm, remove a magazine, and reload ammunition.

Investigators initially cited a “grudge” over bullying as the motive. The Department of Justice later said it was also weighing whether the attack fit a pattern of nihilistic violent extremism, in which minors are drawn to violence through online communities. Police found that the two suspects had researched the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Act before the shooting and planned the attack as early as May 1, believing they would not face jail time because of their age.

What GoreBox Actually Is

GoreBox describes itself, in its own marketing, as a “physics-driven sandbox game where creativity meets unrestrained destruction.” The International Age Rating Coalition assigned it an R18+ rating for depictions of extreme violence, including the showing of blood and dismemberment. Steam warns users that the game contains mature content such as realistic blood effects, severed limbs, and graphic depictions of violence, and the Android version carries an option to tone down the gore.

The game was built by Felix Filip, a German independent developer working under the studio name F2 Games. It runs on Windows, Linux, and Android devices. On Steam, where the game launched on July 22, 2023, the title costs P304.95. The Android version is free to download, supported by ads and in-app purchases. Rappler’s explainer notes that the Android version still allows players to experiment with weapons and explosives against blocky versions of other humans, similar in style to titles like Roblox and Minecraft.

Per the developer’s own store page for GoreBox, a central tool called the “Reality Crusher” lets players spawn, manipulate, and destroy anything in the game environment, with firefights, explosions, custom maps, and ragdoll physics layered on top. The game also includes lifestyle items such as cigarettes, alcohol, and fictional syringes, plus a “Body Inspector” status display and a mutating “Uncoha Virus” that turns characters into ravenous mutants. The multiplayer mode was removed in March 2026 after F2 Games said it was “losing” the fight to keep the mode secure against exploiters, bot raids, and security vulnerabilities.

Why the Cybercrime Agency Hit Pause

The CICC issued its temporary block on Tuesday, June 23. Undersecretary Alexander “Aboy” Paraiso, the agency’s executive director, framed the move as an attempt to keep other children away from the game while investigators finish their work, per the CICC advisory on the temporary GoreBox block. “We are blocking GoreBox temporarily as a precautionary measure pending the investigation,” Paraiso said. “Within the day, expect the app to be blocked.”

The decision followed a direct identification by Police Regional Office-Eastern Visayas director Brig. Gen. Jason Capoy. “As per our investigation, it was GoreBox,” Capoy said, describing the title as a highly violent shooting game featuring firearms and graphic combat scenarios. The CICC stressed that no causal link between the game and the attack has been established. The agency has not said how long the block will remain in force, and Paraiso urged the public to report cyberbullying, online threats, and other harmful online activity through Hotline 1326. The agency’s Threat Monitoring Center has begun coordinating with the Council for the Welfare of Children and other bodies to monitor GoreBox and similar platforms more closely.

Three Years, One Discord, and a Developer’s Silence

GoreBox launched on Steam in July 2023. By the time of the Philippine block in June 2026, an active community had formed around it. F2 Games runs a Discord server with over 205,000 members, a place where players can discuss the studio’s other titles and, per Rappler’s explainer, “potentially find similar-minded GoreBox communities outside of the official Discord.” A separate Steam Game Hub dedicated to the game holds about 14,000 members.

The multiplayer shutdown in March 2026 was presented by F2 Games as a maintenance decision, not a content one. “Over the past months, exploiters, bot raids, and security vulnerabilities forced us to shift our entire development focus away from content and bug fixes toward keeping multiplayer functional and secure,” the developer wrote at the time. “Development of actual content and bug fixes took a back seat for longer than we would have liked, and we appreciate your patience through that period.”

On Discord, members are now debating the Philippine ban. Rappler noted that it was “difficult to determine if users are pigeonholing the shooting as being caused by the game, or fostered by a community or subgroup that plays it.” Because Discord does not list identifying features of members to a particular server, it is hard to know who inside the channel is connected to whom.

F2 Games itself has stayed quiet. As of Tuesday evening, the developer had not publicly responded to the allegations or the Philippine government’s decision to block access to the game.

The Debate Now Swallowing Manila

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. told a Cabinet meeting that one of the suspects was “heavily exposed to violent online games,” according to Palace press officer Claire Castro, who said the administration is open to proposals that would ban such games for minors. “Actually, that has been discussed; it has been reported that these children are addicted to playing violent online gaming,” Castro said at a Tuesday briefing. “So it was discussed that those kinds of apps should be banned in the Philippines. So that’s a good suggestion, and I hope the president can enact a law soon and is open to such proposals.”

Lawmakers are using the case to push two related fights. Senate Majority Leader Juan Miguel Zubiri said Congress should study whether minors involved in “heinous crimes such as murder and rape” should face prosecution similar to adults in certain circumstances while keeping due process and rehabilitation safeguards in place. Sen. Robinhood Padilla, who filed Senate Bill No. 372 in 2025 to lower the minimum age of criminal responsibility to as young as 10 for the most serious offenses, has used the shooting to revive that push. Under Republic Act No. 9344 and its 2013 amendment RA 10630, any child 15 or under at the time of an offense is exempt from criminal liability, with offenders below 15 routed to mandatory intervention programs. Offenders aged 15 to 18 can still face criminal charges if “discernment,” or the capacity to understand that one’s actions are wrong, is established.

Sen. Francis Pangilinan, one of the principal authors of RA 9344, pushed back on the assumption that minors who commit grave crimes go unpunished. “There is really accountability under the law,” Pangilinan said during a Facebook livestream. He cautioned against misinformation suggesting that minors involved in grave offenses are automatically released. Police are widening the net: PNP Public Information Office chief Col. Allen Rae Co said investigators are looking into the suspects’ social media activity and online groups, beyond gaming, that may have motivated the attack.

On June 25, the day after the CICC ban took effect, the Department of the Interior and Local Government said it had thwarted a separate plot by a 14-year-old Grade 10 student to stage a mass casualty attack at Tolosa National High School in Leyte, following a tip from Senator Bam Aquino. The CICC said it is now probing other violent online games in the wake of the Tacloban shooting. Paraiso set the agency’s line plainly in the original advisory:

Our priority is the safety and well-being of Filipino children exposed to the internet.

That was from CICC executive director Alexander “Aboy” Paraiso, speaking in the agency’s advisory issued the day after the San Jose National High School shooting.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is GoreBox?

GoreBox is a “physics-driven sandbox game” built by German independent developer Felix Filip under the studio name F2 Games. It launched on Steam on July 22, 2023, and is also available on Windows, Linux, and Android, with the Steam version priced at P304.95 and the Android version free with ads and in-app purchases. The International Age Rating Coalition rated it R18+ for extreme violence, including blood and dismemberment.

Why did the Philippines ban GoreBox?

The Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center ordered a temporary block on Tuesday, June 23, 2026, after police identified GoreBox as a game played by one of two teenage suspects in the San Jose National High School shooting in Tacloban. The CICC called the move a “precautionary measure” while investigators probe whether online influences contributed to the attack. The agency has not established a causal link between the game and the shooting, and has not announced how long the ban will remain in force.

Who made GoreBox, and have they responded to the ban?

GoreBox was developed by Felix Filip of F2 Games, a German independent studio. As of Tuesday evening, F2 Games had not publicly responded to the Philippine government’s allegations or its decision to block access to the game in the country.

What happens to the two teenage suspects?

The 15-year-old, identified in police filings as “Rod,” was charged on June 24 with three counts of murder, three counts of frustrated murder, and multiple counts of serious physical injuries. The 14-year-old, “Nash,” is exempt from criminal prosecution under Republic Act No. 9344, which sets the minimum age of criminal responsibility at 15. Both suspects were to be turned over to government welfare officers after the investigation because of their age.

Could GoreBox be permanently banned in the Philippines?

Not on the current order. CICC officials have described the block as temporary, tied to the investigation, and have not given a date for review. The agency has begun coordinating with the Council for the Welfare of Children and other bodies to monitor GoreBox and similar platforms. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s administration has said it is open to proposals that would bar violent games for minors, but no such law has been passed.