The Red Cross Wants Games to Respect The "Rules of War"

[lunavixen]

The whole regenerating health and respawning after death kneecaps the whole realism thing right out of the gate, also, if you want games to be held to these "standards" why not movies and TV shows? The thing is, games will never truly look like real life wars, no matter how good the graphics get.

Here's an idea Red Cross, free of charge; instead of worrying about fictional people dying and shooting others in fictional games, worry about the real soldiers and civilians who are injured and dying because of real war or other disasters in real life.

 

[Vylox]

As a military veteran, I understand the Geneva Convention and the "rules of war", however, there really aren't any actual rules once you are in a real combat situation.
The only real considerations that are actually abided by in conflict and real warfare tend to be things such as... don't overly torture note that torture in various forms still happens, some folks try to keep within reason for human rights.... with the exception being what happens to certain soldiers who might happen to get captured. Another thing that is watched for, but sort of ignored, is involving "civilians". There are times, and history has proven, that there are few actual non-combatants in and around places of conflict and war.

Let us not forget, that the majority of the countries and nations which are generally involved in various types of warfare have not actually signed the Geneva Convention, which means that they aren't bothering to follow these so called civilized "rules of warfare/combat".

Quite frankly, there is no such thing as rules or laws of war. As soon as you try to abide by them all, you end up getting your face stomped in. (I'll use some American history to illustrate my point). Take one of these "wars" Vietnam, Korean, French-Indian, American Civil war, and the American war for independence, all of these wars were fought with one side assuming that the other side would fight using the same general or basic strategies and ideas, and the sides that made those assumptions ended up having extreme difficulties and problems during those conflicts.

As soon as you attempt to apply rules or laws for combat within warfare, you will end up restricting yourself and your forces from being able to function to its fullest extent and abilities.


For those that might be interested in some of what actually happens to prisoners in war, talk to veterans and do some research. I believe many would be surprised at what kind of things are inflicted upon people. And honestly, knowing some of what I know and being strategically minded, I reiterate, there ARE NO laws or rules in war. Just as there are no real laws or rules when a person finds themselves in a true life or death/kill or be killed situation. When you are in that kind of situation survival instinct comes to the fore and many humanitarian concepts and ideas are shoved aside to make room for practicality.

 

[CthulhuCultist]

Interesting Stuff.

I guess that's where some of the problem lies. The people creating these rules will most likely have little or no experience in front line combat and there is a (High) probability that there are political motivations to them.

In the scheme of things. Soldiers can only control themselves.

 

[Vylox]

Without going into the entire list, here are some examples from the US Military: shotguns, flamethrowers, and fragmentation rounds are forbidden for use in warfare. They are not, however, forbidden for use by troops on our own soil. I would think a country okay with the use of these things within their own borders that didn't care about international law would use them anyway.

First I'll apologize for double posting ;>

Not so. Flamethrowers are the only item in that list that are not permitted in general combat situations. Shotguns and frag round (and frag grenades along with claymore mines) are allowed. And there are 3 MOSs in the US military that are trained in using them for combat situations. Flamethrowers are also allowed in some circumstances, and there are 2 MOSs which are instructed in their use for situations that fit those circumstances.

Please, before you make statements like that, look into it first. Or speak with military personnel, either active duty or veterans. For instance my AIT school taught the use of shotguns primarily for use in breeching, along with the use of fragmentation rounds, fragmentation grenades, ALL types of mines, each type of individual explosives, and using flamethrowers, all for combat situations. Not to mention the additional training one gets at their unit.

 

[Mycroft Holmes]

So they what? Want America's Army to be more popular?

One thing that I would totally be on board for though, would be a single mission of Call of Duty where at the end of it you are indicted for war crimes in a short trial segment where they list off all your offenses and then sentence you to be executed. Just for laffs.

 

[Saelune]

If they want to suggest, sure. But they dont have any RIGHT to stick their nose in any game's design. Plus most war games we end up playing as people outside the rules. Black Op's entire premise is that. And it would have no place in multiplayer, since its just a game mode.

 

[marurder]

I think there should be more games that explore these. Shooting medics comes to mind. However in terms of real gameplay, there needs to be more than just an instant-fail if you break one of the rules. Nice concept that I totally support, but needs to be discussed by more on the implementation phase. Too many comments I read above are fairly ignorant and selfish. OF course you can have a fun FPS with the rules. Just nobody has done it well (because programming it would be a feature rather than the core game - thus it gets a half-arsed treatment).

 

[Strazdas]

I want the red cross to respect games. Maybe after they do that we can talk.
If you want to have rules of war - join the military. we on the other hand want to have fun shooting at moving targets. you know, fun, a thing games are made for.

 

[Talvrae]

Well the things is that thouse are realistics in a lot of way... And the things is thouse famous rules of engagement are largelly ignored and violated regularly on the battlefields, and often the winner are never trialled for thouse acts.... Because it's more often them who are asked to apply them, they will happilly trial thouse of the opposite side, while brushing under the carpet theyr own wrongdoings

 

[Nghtgnt]

"Video games that are representing battlefields, contemporary battlefields, are very close to reality," Senechaud told the BBC [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-24318061]. "And actually it's very difficult to tell the difference between any real footage and the footage you can get from video games..."

This is true, just ask the BBC [http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-05-28-bbc-news-mistakes-halo-unsc-logo-for-un]:

"Masterchief, you mind telling me what you're doing in Syria?"
"Sir, finishing this fight."

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

You know, I realized something today.

Today, I learned that the vast majority of people on these forums don't know the difference between "Bill thinks Ted should stop drinking so much" and "Bill thinks there ought to be a law stopping Ted from drinking so much." Today, I learned that, when people anywhere make a casual suggestion about how it would be interesting if video games did something that deviates from the status quo, even just a little bit, there will always be hoards of people who somehow misconstrue this to mean that, soon, censorship boards will be enforcing ONLY the recommended idea. These people will misconstrue this suggestion despite any preponderance of evidence to the contrary, deluding themselves into thinking that people with important jobs in fields of life-changing work--like, you know, providing medical assistance to victims of war--give more than two seconds' thought about what pampered Westerners in positions of privilege are comfortable with as far as their electronic entertainment is concerned.

Actually, just kidding, that's been more or less common knowledge about these forum posters for a while now.

On an unrelated note, I don't see anything wrong with Red Cross's suggestion. Yeah, it would be cool to see a game that handles the gruesome reality of conflict with a touch more realism than COD's adolescent power fantasy. Too bad there isn't at least one game that does this. What a revolutionary sentiment...

People are complaining (rightly) abut the double standard that the Red Cross didn't include other forms of media, combined with the general media theme that 'vidya games ara bad!' mentality that sees Minecraft the quoted reason as to why a kid brought a gun to school rather than negligent parenting.

Gamers now see any form of 'suggestion' as an outright attack and honestly I don't blame them anymore.

And if you haven't already been quoted, try Spec Ops: The Line.

 

[jklinders]

Red Cross should focus on the real war crimes happening as I type this not the fake ones in video games.

That of course is assuming they can ever get past the very thick brick wall that is the reality that all nations treat the Geneva Convention as a polite fiction that they all pretend to follow. WMDs are only not used because if that little rule gets broken then the other side gets a free pass to use them as well. No one wants that. Mutually assured destruction has long and especially since WWII been a far stronger motivator than any treaty against misbehavior. Napalm and flamethrowers have been against the rules since before WWII that has stopped no one.

Bah! It's a game. If I want realism, I'll go outside. When I just want to blow off steam I play games. It's not that hard really.

 

[Nathan Josephs]

oh so games should but movies can do whatever they want? F*** off red cross. besides war crimes happen on a daily basis so it is a more accurate portrayal with them than without them lol

 

[Infernal Lawyer]

New Question For The Thread: Are shooters marketing themselves as more realistic than they really are? How might this be impacting people's idea of the actual military and warfare?

Substantially. It's a fairly common complaint/issue at army training camps. The DIs need to beat it into the recruits' heads that real life doesn't work like Call of Duty and they can't pull the kind of shit they do in-game or they'll end up dead. It's depressingly common IRL, thanks to our culture and media in general, and modern military shooters in particular.

Considering you end up dead a lot in Call of Duty MP games, is that REALLY surprising?

 

[Evil Smurf]

When the militaries of the world adhere to the rules of war, video games should. The bombing of civilians for example is a practice that should stop.

 

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

As a current serving member of the UK military, who, on a daily basis, uses the considerations of the Law of Armed Conflict and the Geneva Convention I have many times discussed this with colleagues.

For the most part, games do follow LOAC, and will stick to the Geneva Convention. It's a very complicated set of rules, that don't really prohibit much of what we do. What does limit us however are the Rules of Engagement, which are more policy based.

For ROE infractions games are far better than films are, and isn't much of an issue anyway!


I would only support more realism in games in terms of LOAC once they stop putting smoke trails (especially corkscrewing ones) on RPG's!

 

[Nielas]

So they what? Want America's Army to be more popular?

One thing that I would totally be on board for though, would be a single mission of Call of Duty where at the end of it you are indicted for war crimes in a short trial segment where they list off all your offenses and then sentence you to be executed. Just for laffs.

However, if you tried to make it realistic, the trial would probably end with you being acquitted of all charges provided you did not commit straight up atrocities like murdering women and children.

Developers and gamers tend to think in a binary pass/fail manner and that is not applicable to what happens in real life. If a medic or civilian catches a stray bullet during a fire fight, it is generally treated as a tragic accident and not a war crime.