Japanese trade officials strictly regulated the export of the PlayStation 2 console in the year 2000 because they feared its powerful internal components could be repurposed to guide real-world military missiles.

A closer look

Japanese trade officials strictly regulated the export of the PlayStation 2 console in the year 2000 because they feared its powerful internal components could be repurposed to guide real-world military missiles. The emotion engine processor inside the sleek black plastic box was supposedly sophisticated enough that foreign adversaries could theoretically use it to run complex targeting calculations for weapons of mass destruction. Saddam Hussein was even rumored to be stockpiling the consoles to build a supercomputer, though this was later debunked as sensationalist nonsense. Watching global superpowers absolutely panic over a machine designed specifically to let stoned college students play Tony Hawk's Pro Skater remains a peak milestone in early millennium technological paranoia