Should historic games have like world war two games avoid harsh subjects?

[Thyunda]

The funniest thing about this thread is that everybody has said "games should not avoid sensitive subjects" while beginning their posts with either 'yes' or 'no' because the question in the post is different to the question in the title.
But I agree. Games should not avoid sensitive subjects any more than film or writing should avoid them. These things happened. They are part of our history. If Sven Hassel can make a Wehrmacht soldier sympathetic, I'm sure we could fight alongside Nazis while not hating ourselves. If you're wondering, Hassel wrote from the perspective of a Danish prisoner-of-war fighting in a penal regiment. I say 'wrote from the perspective' because, even though he says he was there, his first book is eerily similar to All Quiet On The Western Front. And everybody died in it, then came back for the sequels.

I think a game dealing with sensitive matters would debut to criticism and then find itself heaped with praise - because everybody's first instinct upon hearing a new game is coming out is that it's going to be Custer's Revenge. For whatever reason. Trivial as this sounds, I think the term 'game' is becoming both obsolete and causing more trouble than it's worth, though I have literally no idea what it could be replaced with.

 

[someguy1231]

As others have said, no subject should be considered "taboo" or "off-limits" to video games, particularly ones with a focus on historicity. Ignoring those parts of history you don't like is myopic and absurd.

 

[Mutant1988]

Call of Duty has tried to depict the horrors of the Russian war machine in WWII. I suspect that recognising audiences aren't perhaps ready to play as Nazis, they can have you play as Communists, who were in some aspects far worse than Nazis.

The military conduct of the Soviet army had more to do with incompetence than anything else, largely owing to Stalin having executed most of the experienced military command.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge

The army, as soon as it got some capable leaders again (That could, you know, avoid being executed by Stalin), performed admirably. Far, far better than they did in the first World War, where they actually didn't have enough guns and ammunition to go around for pretty much the entire duration of the war and the lives of Russian soldiers were thrown away for absolutely no gain. That's a big part of the reason why that whole communist revolution thing happened.

You do need to make a distinction between the army and the regime though. What atrocities the army committed were in retaliation to the Nazis and wasn't a pre-emptive program of systematic extermination, like that employed by the Nazis.

The Soviet regime on the other hand, wasn't that much better than the Nazis. Stalin and his inner circle and loyal troops could only be considered "good" by virtue of fighting against the Nazis. Stalin was a monster and the regime he helped create was as monstrous as he was. The army might have helped maintain it, but they were just as much a victim of the party leaders as the rest of the Union.

victory was achieved by technological advancement, overwhelming resources, superior tactics and high morale. Not by drowning Germans in blood if believe Cold War-era American history textbooks.

Not sure if high morale is the right world. Stalin maintained discipline and loyalty through fear. But I can certainly believe that they were very motivated to fight, what with being on the receiving end of an extermination war. The common trooper might not even have been aware of the conduct of the Soviet leaders, but they most certainly were aware of what the Nazis were doing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Generalplan_Ost

I can also believe that morale improved significantly once they got some capable leaders, which they really didn't have at the onset of the war (Because Stalin). In the end though, they most certainly won with superior manufacturing capabilities/resources, superior technology (Isn't the T-34 considered the single best tank of the entire war?) and strategy.

 

[Something Amyss]

Games like spec ops the line were very confronting, but that wasn't a historic event.

And gamers had a fit. "They made me do X, and it made me feel bad!"

How do you think it'd go over if you actually worked a detail at a concentration camp? Well, actually, I'm kind of wondering if the community might be a little...too into that.

Games may be part of the public consciousness now, but they're still largely pewpew fests and the like, and the educational position you're taking doesn't mesh well with that. It's like that movie "The Condemned," where after over an hour of violence porn, a reporter who has been covering it asks "are we, in fact, the condemned?" A message that might have been better received if the movie and even the reporter hadn't been so thoroughly invested in the violent deaths of felons up to that point.

It comes off as insincere and tends to put off the audience. So it's pretty much lose-lose.

Should they be able to? Absolutely. I don't think this has to do with censorship so much as gaming is a juvenile media and trying to delver into these subjects is largely (albeit not completely) out of its grasp. Some games are capable of handling it. Ironically, they're the ones most pooh-poohed by "real gamers" when time comes to it.

Bnut really, who cares about historicity, anyway? Gamers pretended there were no prominent blacks or women in Revolutionary France when ACU was controversial. We're fine with white washing, so why is the Holocaust any different?

 

[Gretha Unterberg]

Um...absolutely? As long as they take is seriously. I mean a game where a grizzled, handsome white male rides in on a flaming motorcycle, punches out Heinrich Himmler and then bangs Eva Braun and her twin sister while singing the American National Anthem should probably not be made.

That sounds like Wolfeinsteins version of Blood Dragon and it totally should be made.

The old problem with historical accuracy.

If it ain't over the top like this, but "inspired by historical events" then there is a significant risk that you recieve an outcry for for portraing something or someone wrong.
Company of Heroes 2, is the last one I can remember from the top of my head.It got a lot of heat for focusing to much on the negative side of the red army.

( What do you think? If valiant hearts wasn't designed like a cute comic, "that obviously can't take itself to serious" would people complain about the the american in the french army who wins the war by stealing the german monster tank ? )


If you stick really really close to what is assumed to be true at your place and time
then its rather challenging to make it interesting to anyone but history geeks.


Thats why fantasy and science fiction (or rather space fantasy) are so popular genres.
You can pick something like the war of roses and write a "song of ice and fire" with no strings attached.

 

[chuckman1]

I loved Spec Ops the line for making me use white phosphorous on civilians and its over the top "Let's save teh Arabs, oops I killed all teh Arabs" criticism of American militarism.

I'm sick of people white washing history, if we can play "bloody" hatred then I want a game about Mongol Invasions, could work from a soldier or civilian perspective. I'm not sure if the social conscience will move on past atrocities of WW2 to allow dark portrayals of the war beyond "SHOOT THE NAZIS THEY WILL BLEED OUT ANYWAY"-Reznov. But the people who were alive in the holocaust won't be around forever, and somebody will try making a game about it one day. Would be interesting to see a game from Turkey about WW2 Nazis that totally is filled with subtext about the Armenian genocide since if you're a Turk you have to pretend that never happened. Or to see what a Japanese person today would make of their imperial days. History is filled with atrocities, whether it's an emotional adventure game of trying to survive a death camp, or a Genghis Khan power fantasy, I want this variety in my games.

 

[LostTrigger]

Um...absolutely? As long as they take is seriously. I mean a game where a grizzled, handsome white male rides in on a flaming motorcycle, punches out Heinrich Himmler and then bangs Eva Braun and her twin sister while singing the American National Anthem should probably not be made.

But Amnesia A Machine for Pigs has the Machine reference the holocaust, the Vietnam war, 9/11, Argon Forrest, the Somme, and the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Absently, yes, but it still asks Mandus how far is he willing to go to prevent the 20th century. And that's not an easy question to answer. Kill all of London or let WW1 happen...

As an educational force? Maybe, maybe not. Games are somewhat happy, for lack of a better term. You couldn't make a Holocaust game from the perspective of a Jew without a little creative engineering. I mean, not to be offensive, but you could die at any moment and the game ends. They didn't get a second chance when the SS came to clear out ghettos; why would you?
But a horror game, about say...a Soviet conscript, getting left behind after the Reds retreat from a village and you slowly stumble upon a death camp and have to face the very real, very human not at all supernatural horror of the Holocaust. And you have to leave, having saved absolutely no one with only a small hope of reporting the camp to your XO...
I'd play that game with as many Black Russians as it'd take to not remember!

i would buy this grizzled, handsome white male rides in on a flaming motorcycle, punches out Heinrich Himmler and then bangs Eva Braun and her twin sister while singing the American National Anthem game. it sounds awesome

 

[Mister K]

Depends. If you want to make a dude-bro FPS in WWII setting, then why bother?
If, however, your goal is to be historically accurate, to show both sides of the war, to show both truths of it, to show it's horrors, tragedies and everything that makes people regret that such war even existed, then it's your goddamn duty to show harsh stuff.

But either way, QTE when you have to turn a gas valve is IMO tasteless and ought to be avoided.

 

[Lightspeaker]

But either way, QTE when you have to turn a gas valve is IMO tasteless and ought to be avoided.

I guess if you wanted to make a game about actually being part of it that gets more dicey. Like playing an SS officer or something. Very tricky to handle properly.

I think it could work; albeit very difficult and hugely risky. It'd definitely have to be a bit more sensitively handled than "Press F to Participate in Genocide".

 

[Aerosteam]

If they want, sure, they can talk about concentration camps, napalm strikes or whatever.

A game should never be forced to talk about the horrible stuff during wars as well.

 

[Mister K]

But either way, QTE when you have to turn a gas valve is IMO tasteless and ought to be avoided.

I guess if you wanted to make a game about actually being part of it that gets more dicey. Like playing an SS officer or something. Very tricky to handle properly.

I think it could work; albeit very difficult and hugely risky. It'd definitely have to be a bit more sensitively handled than "Press F to Participate in Genocide".

What I actually meant is that I am fine (and pro, actually) playing as a German soldier, because I doubt that more than 20% of Reich soldiers were believers of race theory and were actual Nazis. I think most were simply, well, order-obidient meat (sorry for bluntness). So showing the War from point of view of a person, who at the very least simply does what he is told and at the most is against his country's policies, but is afraid to be charged with treason (or something) could be at the very least interesting.
I wouldn't mind if playable character was to to do something horrible in a cutscene, but yes, "Press F to gas the Jews" QTE should not be created.

 

[Olas]

Of course not. I'm pretty sure if you made this into a poll you would exactly zero yes votes. Certainly not all games SHOULD dabble in these subjects if they aren't mature enough to properly address them. But to say that any subject matter should just be off the table entirely is just artistic treason. And as pragmatic as I may be sometimes, I still have a bit of an artistic soul in me.

 

[Barbas]

War games should start showing a lot more of what happened. They should show the distrust, the atrocity, the disastrous and suicidal battles, the horror, the moments of all-consuming hatred, the engineered starvation, the torture, the barbarism and the absolute shattering of any notion of chivalry or any semblance of order to the proceedings. They shouldn't leave out the basements of raped German women, the British nurses bayoneted to death or the frozen corpses of Russian conscripts, propped up to stand like morbid scarecrows. They should be a chilling reminder of just how lucky anyone is not to be born into war.

But they should do it when they're ready, and they're not ready yet. Baby steps.

 

[MysticSlayer]

Well, yeah, I don't have a problem in theory with a game doing it. But in the current environment, I probably won't trust any game that starts talking about how it will try to show what the Holocaust was like. Actually, it isn't so much that I won't trust it, since we do have games that are willing to tackle tough subjects in war, so I'd at least give it some consideration. It is that I'd be very wary of any game that advertised that or that I figured out had it. I'd just be too concerned that they'd either turn it in to a standard shooting gallery, revel in its "edginess" and/or "trigger warning buffet", or try to be too deep and ruin the potential impact.

That said, if a game can handle all of those subject matters well, I'd definitely support it.

 

[Ugicywapih]

Eh... Holocaust as such may still hold considerable shock value, but it's not really a difficult subject - it has been widely accepted as fact (not without good reason, I do hope we don't have a stray holocaust denier wander in here). What I really think we should see is a historical game that's not afraid to show the atrocities many people would rather not remember, usually the kind committed by the "good guys" (alongside those of the opposing side, of course). Nazis may have committed some of the most heinous war crimes in human history, but many people in Wehrmacht at the time were both innocent and ignorant of the fact - but nonetheless, Soviets put them into forced labor camps, Poles were notorious for executing German prisoners and western allies bombed Dresden, a city of minor strategic, but major cultural significance, into oblivion, at a point in the war, where German surrender was all but assured anyway. And that's just WWII, if I am to point out a few extra things, say, US is guilty of, I could mention stuff like My Lai, mining civilian harbors in Nicaragua, staging coups and overthrowing legitimate, stable governments to install US puppets, in some cases leading to violent backlash from the locals, when said puppets turned out to be woefully poor choices, thus indirectly causing rise of such regimes as the People's Republic of Cuba and the Islamic Republic of Iran. It wasn't all done by unhinged individuals like Walker from Spec Ops: The Line either, it was mostly regular Joes.

Honestly? I'd say most people have it in them to become murderous bastards, all it takes is just the wrong set of circumstances and it disturbs me how eager we are to forget something that's so important to remember.


...Guess I went off on a tangent there, huh?

 

[darkcalling]

Meh games shouldn't shy away from such things but I also don't think they should go out of their way to include such things. If itls important to the story then absolutely. But leave it out if it's just for shock value.

 

[Tony2077]

If it fits the story they shouldn't be scared to put it in but they should be careful about how its put in.