EA Cuts Taliban From Medal of Honor

[Christian Lerche]

Why not call them taliban? It's not like we'll hurt their feelings. Why are people upset eludes me completely...

 

[wooty]

Hmmm, I guess the phrase "power to the people" comes into mind here.

Ah well, back to the standard formula of just shooting random, faceless, nameless, godless, evil ragheads then.

I dont know if Id put godless in there, they tend to have much more god then we have, which is kind of the problem but its a moronic change but at least they arnt changing them to russians, how many times can games beat that dead horse, the cold war ended long ago

I was taking the fox news approach to describing the US's enemies, but I agree, there only ever seems to be choice of Russians or random Arabs as enemies. Unless its a sci-fi shooter in which case theres always the choice of aliens who want to conquer/destroy earth, or aliens who want to conquer/destroy humanity.

 

[Yoshemo]

Pathetic.. How is it offensive at all? I have friends in the military that have served in Iraq and Afghanistan and they have no problem with it at all.

 

[Hashbrick]

Well if they don't want to be true to their vision they aren't getting my money. I believe in freedom of design and choice and if people don't like it fuck them. It's all virtual no one is really getting killed or hurt, all people want is attention and to ***** cause that's the American way cry or sue until you get what you want. Fuck the system and fuck this game! Black Ops is only a ways off anyway and I'm sure will be much more enjoyable, good riddance.

 

[smeghead25]

Is it just me or does it seem a little more insulting to an entire race of people instead of just a few American ex-soldiers who know barely anything about the game anyway and are never gonna play it? Now instead of the 'Taliban', it's 'Evil Arab's'. With no specification of which country they're from or why they're fighting. Could just be innocent civilians protecting their towns for all we know.

 

[Sir Thomas Sean Connery]

Those cowards. EA really is just being cowardly in this. Infinity Ward kept their little controversial scene in and it was a victory for free speech in games. Granted, the section wound up being rather annoying, but just the fact that they didn't bend over for the media and Ice-T was good enough.

 

[Therumancer]

The differance being that World War II is over 50 years in the past.

I dont see how does it matters. I thought its about people personal feelings.

Where are the Nazis now? Dead.

Oh sure, there are some lunatic fringes out there, so called "Neo Nazis" but we pretty much wiped them out. The culture is gone, the leadership is gone, people (especially Isrealis) have spent decades hunting down survivors and exterminating them.

The differance is that your producing propaganda for a force that we're fighting right now, and in doing so being disrespectful to people who died recently for a cause that is still going on, with an uncertain resolution ahead.

In comparison World War II is over with, most of the people who fought it have passed on (though by no means all of them I'd guess). The resolution is not in doubt.

It's plain wrong to have guys playing a video game where guys are killing you off while your fighting a war for their benefit. That's irreverant, and just plain wrong.

 

[teisjm]

Dunno how it's better to get shot by "opposing forces" or "insurgence" than it is to get shot by the taliban.

Also, i dunno how it's not okay to have the taliban in multiplayer, while it's okay to have all sorts of other real life factions.

BF2 had real countries (though the terrorist one was called insurgence) and the special forces expansion had real life special forces as well.

Lots and lots of games has nazis as a playable side in multiplayer (prolly including earlier medal of honour titles, though this is just a guess) I don't understand how it's disrespectfull to veterans of the current war in afghanistan to have the taliban, but not to WW2 vets to have nazis.

 

[Captain_Pancreas]

You know what annoys me most here? its not that theyve stood down. its that all the newspapers and media outlets criticising the game will not report the change. the fact that theyve made a MORAL decision and proved to be more than a market for what are viewed as 'antisocial geeks' wont be looked upon favourably. It'll just be ignored and remain a game to bring up as an argument against videogames anyway, despite the change....

 

[mr_rubino]

I think a name change of some sort was inevitable, because even if they had decided to keep the Taliban and ignore the wishes of the armed forces and the families of the fallen, then they would have had no right to call their franchise Medal of Honor.

How are video games suppose to be taken seriously as a media (and even an art form) if the industry can't demonstrate even the most basic feelings of empathy and compassion towards the majority outside itself?

It's funny, but the people who are complaining that EA should have just said "Fuck You!" to the armed forces and families of the fallen are the same people who complain that the industry is being demonised and portrayed in a bad light.

Yeah, all 5 who complained. Jesus, people. "QQ troops QQ" doesn't work when most of them did not ask for any changes.

 

[Evilproduct]

Damn you EA. You gave in after a little hating? Are you kidding me? Sure you create Project Ten Dollar and then you try to buy back our respect by allowing the Taliban to be playable characters in Medal of Honor and now you just back out!? You have officially lost all of my respect EA, not that I had much for you to begin with.

 

[Worgen]

Hmmm, I guess the phrase "power to the people" comes into mind here.

Ah well, back to the standard formula of just shooting random, faceless, nameless, godless, evil ragheads then.

I dont know if Id put godless in there, they tend to have much more god then we have, which is kind of the problem but its a moronic change but at least they arnt changing them to russians, how many times can games beat that dead horse, the cold war ended long ago

I was taking the fox news approach to describing the US's enemies, but I agree, there only ever seems to be choice of Russians or random Arabs as enemies. Unless its a sci-fi shooter in which case theres always the choice of aliens who want to conquer/destroy earth, or aliens who want to conquer/destroy humanity.

I think the aliens have a point

 

[YouCallMeNighthawk]

What is so bad about beig able to pay the taliban? It's a frickin game for crying out load!!!!!

 

[beddo]

I'm not hugely surprised but I am a bit disappointed. People will never take games seriously if we shy away from the difficult topics.

 

[Piflik]

I am concerned about the inclusion of American soldiers in this game...

What's next? People complaining about American Soldiers being able to be killed in the game?

 

[mr_rubino]

This just shows how stupid people are.

"They're called 'Talibans', that horribly wrong, you hate America, you fucker!"
"What if we don't change anything, except that we rename them to 'Opposing Force'?"
"Well then, that's alright."

Well, it remains to be seen if it's going to be alright that was as well. Just because EA says that it's "fine" at the momenet doesn't mean that it is, I mean the annoucement is still fairly hot off the presses.

To be entirely blunt, I am one of those who was against the entire idea, and I think they shouldn't even have a playable arab faction for multiplayer. Heck, I'd even go so far as to say that they probably should release without multiplayer at all if that's what they want to do with it.

I understand the perspective (mostly left wing) on these forums. However at the same time I find it deeply disturbing that people had issues with "Seven Days Of Fallujah" which had US/Allied troops shooting Muslims, but for some reason think that it's a good thing to have playable Taliban who can kill US/Allied troops in this game.

I don't think anyone has talked about gamers hating America, but at the same time if someone DID say that, it wouldn't be entirely out of line. Looking at how things have been playing out, one can certainly get that impression.

I think the problem is that there is so much anti-war rhetoric out there tied to the left wing, and attempts to portray this as a right wing war, as opposed to an American war... not to mention all the "peace at any price" junk which Democrats are infamous for... that people are getting hyped up for anything that seems contreversial and against the war that they aren't stopping to think about how tasteless something like this is.

I personally hope that EA decides to further relent and make Multiplayer a simple contest between genetic looking special forces guys or something, rather than including any kind of muslim themed faction given the theatre the game is set in and the current conflicts.

It's as if you moral relativists literally cannot help yourself from being snide and painting everyone with more relevant points as devils even as you're attempting to make a point.

 

[DTWolfwood]

Copped out. Not buying this game.

 

[One of Many]

EA...

God Emperor! Ogryns do exist!

OT: Damn you EA, you pack of cowards.

 

[Towels]

It's not like they were being forced to do anything. They chose to heed the wishes of many people who's lives have been changed by their interaction with the Taliban?

I wouldn't have minded either way really, but it sounds like they at least used good reasoning and judgment in this call.

I agree. This "Controversy" has been around for a long enough for EA to have the chance to cave in to politicians and other authorities, but they didn't. According to their statement, EA caved into the people they are trying to glorify through this game. All Medal of Honor games have a strong flavor of patriotism in it, so its only fair for EA to want to please their source material.

If this was just pure marketing, wouldn't EA want to make this decision well before they released the game so as to avoid British politicans and other countries from campaigning to ban the game completely?

They just changed the name. That's pretty weak for censorship.