Where would you have a WW2 game take place?

[Rayce Archer]

I strongly suggest that both of you read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crimes_of_the_Wehrmacht

Well that was a depressing eye opener. As were the articles on British, U.S. and Soviet War Crimes in WW2.
An aspect of the war that no one ever talks about, and sadly war crimes are still committed and not talked about today.

Still, could one not make a game from the perspective of a good man, caught in the chaos of Nazi Germany and WW2? I doubt you'd find many people coming out of that game with a burgeoning love for Adolf.

How about a game where you play as THESE Germans then? http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/05/12/world-war-ii-s-strangest-battle-when-americans-and-germans-fought-together.html

Alternatively a stealth/survival game where you play as Leon Feldhendler would be amazing, if unbelievably dark: http://www.studentpulse.com/articles/285/the-sobibor-revolt-death-to-the-fascists

 

[Ingjald]

I'd like to see games focusing on the less "overdone" theatres of war; like a game from the perspective of a group of soviet partisans; guerilla fighters against nazi germany, so automatically underdog goodies, but had their fair share of atrocitities on their own conscience (attacks on civilians and ethnic cleansings among others) so unsympathetic baddies. veteran partisans were hunted down after the war for counter-soviety political ideas. Stalin no like!

Other theatres might include: asian countries that aren't Japan, the Nazi invasion of Norway, or maybe the life of volunteering Swedes on the finnish front (Sweden sent volunteers, not the actual army. Sweden was "neutral" because our king at the time thought Hitler was a pretty swell guy)

 

[DeepReaver]

I strongly suggest that both of you read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crimes_of_the_Wehrmacht

The thing is that people tend to forget the context for the atrocity's German solder's committed. Imagine that your country had just come out of a bloody war that you did not even start, a conflict that the world has told you that your nation needs to pay the cost for. You watch your nation fall apart, watch it threaten to consume itself. Then you start to hear murmurs of a group doing something, you go to a few of their speeches, you start to believe the rhetoric that it is not Germany's place to be beaten down so. You start to have pride in your nation again and start to agree that there are enemies within and enemies without.

This is the type of game i would enjoy to play, something that would humanize the conflict in the minds of people. There are far FAR too many people who like to think of WW2 Germany as nothing more than a snidely whiplash like villain, twiddling it's evil mustache till the heroic homegrown apple pie eating American comes and beats them down for the horrors they commit. They do not like to admit that the allies committed war crimes to, it is all overshadowed by what the Germans did but that is not how history should be remembered. The game i would love to play would teach those lessons, show that at the end of the day they were just people... Rendering people down to caricatures does not help anyone learn from the past mistakes of both sides.

 

[Albino Boo]

How about a game where you play as THESE Germans then? http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/05/12/world-war-ii-s-strangest-battle-when-americans-and-germans-fought-together.html

Alternatively a stealth/survival game where you play as Leon Feldhendler would be amazing, if unbelievably dark: http://www.studentpulse.com/articles/285/the-sobibor-revolt-death-to-the-fascists

I had quick look at the story and at least some of the "german" soldiers involved were osttruppen or Hilfswillige. Those kind of units were extensively used in "anti partisan" roles behind the lines on the eastern front. It would require extensive research on the full war records of the all soldiers involved not be walking into minefield of allegations of war crimes.

I strongly suggest that both of you read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crimes_of_the_Wehrmacht

Well that was a depressing eye opener. As were the articles on British, U.S. and Soviet War Crimes in WW2.
An aspect of the war that no one ever talks about, and sadly war crimes are still committed and not talked about today.

Still, could one not make a game from the perspective of a good man, caught in the chaos of Nazi Germany and WW2? I doubt you'd find many people coming out of that game with a burgeoning love for Adolf.

You would run the risk of being accused of continuing the myth of the German Army fighting a clean war and almost all German war crimes were the work of the SS and any excesses committed by the Army were only the product of a long and bitter war and were no different from Allied war crimes.

The thing is that people tend to forget the context for the atrocity's German solder's committed. Imagine that your country had just come out of a bloody war that you did not even start, a conflict that the world has told you that your nation needs to pay the cost for. You watch your nation fall apart, watch it threaten to consume itself. Then you start to hear murmurs of a group doing something, you go to a few of their speeches, you start to believe the rhetoric that it is not Germany's place to be beaten down so. You start to have pride in your nation again and start to agree that there are enemies within and enemies without.

This is the type of game i would enjoy to play, something that would humanize the conflict in the minds of people. There are far FAR too many people who like to think of WW2 Germany as nothing more than a snidely whiplash like villain, twiddling it's evil mustache till the heroic homegrown apple pie eating American comes and beats them down for the horrors they commit. They do not like to admit that the allies committed war crimes to, it is all overshadowed by what the Germans did but that is not how history should be remembered. The game i would love to play would teach those lessons, show that at the end of the day they were just people... Rendering people down to caricatures does not help anyone learn from the past mistakes of both sides.

I am more than aware of the history of interwar Germany but there IS NO CONTEXT ON THIS PLANET THAT JUSTIFIES A 4 YEAR CAMPAIGN OF SYSTEMATIC LOOT, MASS RAPE AND MASS MURDER. In the east between 1941 and 1944 the German army committed in the region of 10 million rapes. 2.8 million Russian POWs died while under the control of the German army.

 

[Johnny Thunder]

- Kokoda Trail campaign - Australians vs. Japanese in New-Guinea - nice jungle enviroment, for the Australians it was the battle to safe their homeland from invasion. Juicy detail: when the Japanese were starving they ate dead Australians...

 

[rutger5000]

If it's done historically than I'd really like to play a WW2 game set in Poland and fight for the Polish underground army. I'd like to know more about that, and I think some of the most interesting battles (Though not necessarily important) have been fought by Polish resistance.

 

[clippen05]

I don't know, playing as a young german man forced into military service could serve as an excellent commentary on the nature of warfare and the realities of WW2. Everyone talks about killing Nazis being okay, because they were evil, but in most games you don't fight Nazis. You fight Germans under Nazi rule, unless you're fighting the Waffen-SS.

Yup. Most German soldiers were just ordinary people drafted into battle by the government. The problem is to focus on this without the media watchdogs taking one look at the premise and go wild because 'ZOMG NAZI GAEM WTFBBQ!11ONE'.

Maybe a game based on the books of Sven Hazel would be more accepted?

Hazel's novels revolve around the exploits of a group of eccentric soldiers who are only trying to survive each day, and don't usually give a fuck about following orders unless the commanding officer is actually pointing a gun at them. The stories are both poignant and grotesque, somewhat disturbing, yet darkly comical - all the while painting a very vivid picture of what it might be like to actually be a human cog in a continent-sized war machine controlled by faceless lunatics.

And that's text, on a page. Just imagine it as a game!

I strongly suggest that both of you read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crimes_of_the_Wehrmacht

Wow amazing source wikipedia that is. Amazing how you are so quick to chastise the Germans when the Soviets committed equally atrocious if not more so warcrimes. But you have no qualms about playing as them in games? The Brtis and Americans are also not innocent; they too were not angels in the war even if their crimes were not on the scale of the Germans. Nazis committed crimes; conscripted German soldiers did not (necessarily). There is a difference.

 

[RiseUp]

What I'm seeing far too few requests for is a game that uses the war as a backdrop rather than a central element of conflict in gameplay. Think The Devil's Backbone and you'll get the right idea.

 

[ultratog1028]

I started a playthrough of World at War recently, which got me thinking: I really want to see more WW2 games. Remembering all of the WW2 games in the past, however, I realized most seem to take place in the same locations playing as the game nations. Americans in Western Europe, Soviets in Stalingrad, and Brits in North Africa. WW2 was so massive and covered so many different parts of the world with so many nations participating, it's kinda dissapointing that there aren't a lot of WW2 games that take advantage of this. Call of Duty 3 did do this, which I'm happy about, but it's unfortunate that the gameplay was... not so good.

So Escapists, if you could decide where a WW2 game takes place and what nation you'd play as, where would it take place and who would you be? Genre doesn't matter either; it can be a first person shooter, third person shooter, RTS, etc.

Personally, I'd love to see more of the campaign in Italy. Playing as Canadian tankers/troops or even Italian soldiers that fought for the Allies would be really neat. A game centered around tank combat with you playing as the Germans would also be really interesting; partially because there aren't a lot of games where you get to play as the Germans, and partially because German tanks during WW2 were really, really cool.

8 years ago I would have punched you in the throat. WW2 games then were modern war games now. I've stormed normandy so many times it's boring. They've done most of what they are willing to do with WW2.

You want to know what they totally could do though? Play as Russia. First few levels are the early fights. Act 2 requires you to slash and burn as you get invaded, until winter comes in act 3, when you slowly push Germany out.

Of course you could also do the controversial view as playing as Axis. Maybe even psuedo Papers Please style gaming where you play as a Nazi and are forced to choose between following orders, or death of those you care for. Or (if done correctly, but it probably won't be) playing as someone in a camp (either American or German. Yes we did terrible things in World War 2 also) and have to survive. Or even a game trying to sneak out of Nazi Germany. Really bring the struggle to life. Again I said controversial. The media would have a shit storm on these topics.

Edit: or a game where you have no idea which side you fight for. Just a Generic Shooter. World war 2 tech, don't even mention countries or what not. Slowly add more tough moral choices. In the end, you find out your character is Axis all along. (though it might be a little close to Spec Ops the line)

 

[Inglorious891]

I strongly suggest that both of you read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crimes_of_the_Wehrmacht

You mistake the Wehrmacht with the entire German army, and indeed with all of German men from 1933-1945.

Demonizing the entire German army because of one organziation is like demonizing the entirety of the American army for the bombing campaigns the USAAF launched against German and Japanese cities.

- Kokoda Trail campaign - Australians vs. Japanese in New-Guinea - nice jungle enviroment, for the Australians it was the battle to safe their homeland from invasion. Juicy detail: when the Japanese were starving they ate dead Australians...

I like the sound of playing as Australia; mainly because I don't know much about the role Australia played in the war. Sounds really interesting.

 

[g7g7g7g7]

I'd like to the Commonwealth troops in particular the Indian Army, their War in Ethiopia against the Italians and the re-conquest of Burma would be a really interesting and rarely covered part of British and Indian History.

 

[Albino Boo]

I strongly suggest that both of you read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crimes_of_the_Wehrmacht

You mistake the Wehrmacht with the entire German army, and indeed with all of German men from 1933-1945.

Demonizing the entire German army because of one organziation is like demonizing the entirety of the American army for the bombing campaigns the USAAF launched against German and Japanese cities.

Oh for god sake man please try to do a little research before posting. The wehrmacht is what the German army was called between 1935 and 1945. Committing 10 milion rapes in 3 years requires mass particption. You are just plain factually incorrect and repeating the lies spread by German generals post war to save their own necks.

British historian Ian Kershaw wrote that the genocide and extreme brutality used by the Nazis was their way of ensuring the Lebensraum ("living space") for the people who met the strict requirements of being part of Hitler's Aryan Herrenvolk ("Aryan master race") and the elimination of the Slavic people:

The Nazi revolution was broader than just the Holocaust. Its second goal was to eliminate Slavs from central and eastern Europe and to create a Lebensraum for Aryans. ... As Bartov (The Eastern Front; Hitler's Army) shows, it barbarised the German armies on the eastern front. Most of their three million men, from generals to ordinary soldiers, helped exterminate captured Slav soldiers and civilians. This was sometimes cold and deliberate murder of individuals (as with Jews), sometimes generalised brutality and neglect. ... German soldiers' letters and memoirs reveal their terrible reasoning: Slavs were 'the Asiatic-Bolshevik' horde, an inferior but threatening race. Only a minority of officers and men were Nazi members.

Wow amazing source wikipedia that is. Amazing how you are so quick to chastise the Germans when the Soviets committed equally atrocious if not more so warcrimes. But you have no qualms about playing as them in games? The Brtis and Americans are also not innocent; they too were not angels in the war even if their crimes were not on the scale of the Germans. Nazis committed crimes; conscripted German soldiers did not (necessarily). There is a difference.

Lets examine the opening post to which I replied too shall we

I don't know, playing as a young german man forced into military service could serve as an excellent commentary on the nature of warfare and the realities of WW2. Everyone talks about killing Nazis being okay, because they were evil, but in most games you don't fight Nazis. You fight Germans under Nazi rule, unless you're fighting the Waffen-SS.

This statement if factually incorrect and I was responding by pointing out that the Wehrmacht was up to its rotten neck in war crimes. You are the only person to mention Soviet war crimes, no one else, and you are making the assumption that I give the Soviet union a free pass based no evidence whatsoever. The post was about the German army and I responded with facts about the German army. The 25 million dead under Stalinism is an entirely different subject and not relevant to that particular statement.

 

[Malpraxis]

Berlin, as a german child soldier drafted to defend his country as the last line of defense against the reds and the blues.
It'd be closer to survival horror. The dreadfulness of being put in a terrible situation with no possible good way out.

It'll never get made, but it'd be crazy awesome.

 

[carnex]

I strongly suggest that both of you read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crimes_of_the_Wehrmacht

The thing is that people tend to forget the context for the atrocity's German solder's committed. Imagine that your country had just come out of a bloody war that you did not even start, a conflict that the world has told you that your nation needs to pay the cost for. You watch your nation fall apart, watch it threaten to consume itself. Then you start to hear murmurs of a group doing something, you go to a few of their speeches, you start to believe the rhetoric that it is not Germany's place to be beaten down so. You start to have pride in your nation again and start to agree that there are enemies within and enemies without.

If you are talking about the first world war, Germany is anything but innocent. Yes Gavrilo Princip shot Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie and that was a starting bang but that's actually relatively insignificant event. What happened before was that Russia was humiliated several times over her ties to Serbia buy having to throw Serbia under the Austro-Hungarian bus. Austro-Hungary, on several occasions, stopped any expansion of Serbia since they are not stupid to let someone who publicly declared their intention to break them apart grow larger and stronger and allies forced Russia into forcing Serbia into giving up. So Austro-Hungary and Russia had to much to lose by not jumping in. On the other hand, Germany was planing for eventual war with France and Russia forever. They always felt surrounded by enemies (and they were right) and Bismarck who created Germany and who could help masterclass in foreign affairs to anyone in history was gone, banished by kaiser Wilhelm II. Kaiser who wasn't exactly the brightest, managed to get the Russia, one power Bismarck always had on his side in any possible scenario against Germany wanted that war for several reasons; including complex of inferiority from France and UK holding over 50% of land mass of earth in their possession and Germany having few tiny poor colonies and paranoia level of fear from encirclement that he shared with German people. When the war was finally proclaimed German people, together with kaiser, were joyous on streets.

So, The Great War did not pull in innocent Germany. It had to happen anyway and Germany wanted it as soon as possible (there are other strategic reasons why they needed that war yesterday). And it really kicked off by Germany invading Belgium.

So, no, they were not inocently pulled in, although unresolved tensions did ensure WWII was a thing. And about Wehrmacht and their atrocities? That story makes detailed explanation of origins and start of WWI (which I butchered here till its hard to recognize) simple.

Let's just say that every aspect of Wehrmacht did commit what people see as atrocities but what those atrocities were was significantly different between groups. Totenkopf division (within which operated einzacgruppen which were tasked with exterminating racial enemies of Reich in field and Kampfgruppe "Eicke" who were concentration camp guards) actually made up a tiny part of Wehrmacht but committed most of atrocities.

Captcha: feeling blue
damn right I'm feeling blue after writing these

 

[Techno Squidgy]

I strongly suggest that both of you read this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crimes_of_the_Wehrmacht

Well that was a depressing eye opener. As were the articles on British, U.S. and Soviet War Crimes in WW2.
An aspect of the war that no one ever talks about, and sadly war crimes are still committed and not talked about today.

Still, could one not make a game from the perspective of a good man, caught in the chaos of Nazi Germany and WW2? I doubt you'd find many people coming out of that game with a burgeoning love for Adolf.

You would run the risk of being accused of continuing the myth of the German Army fighting a clean war and almost all German war crimes were the work of the SS and any excesses committed by the Army were only the product of a long and bitter war and were no different from Allied war crimes.

You could certainly be accused of that, but the game I have in mind would have you, not necessarily participate in, but certainly be witness to the crimes of the Wehrmacht. Consider CoD: World at War, where in the Soviet campaign, you're standing in the eyes of Chernov, and how he subsequently writes about you in his diary, are affected by your brutality or mercy. I am not envisioning a "fun" experience here. I'm thinking of something very dark, a WW2 survival horror, if you will.

EDIT: I'd just like to quickly point out that in my original post, where I made the distinction between the Waffen-SS and the rest of the German forces, I in no way meant to say that the Wehrmacht did not commit war crimes. I didn't know the horrific scale of the Wehrmacht's crimes, but my point was, the Waffen-SS were all NSDAP party members, correct? (If I've gotten this wrong too I'm going to be embarrassed) As such, they would have all agreed with the ideals and ideology of the party. The rest of the army was made up of career soldiers and conscripts, my idea would centre a game around a conscript in the German army, someone who was fighting because they had no choice, not because they believed in the superiority of the Aryan race and the thousand year reich.

 

[Albino Boo]

You would run the risk of being accused of continuing the myth of the German Army fighting a clean war and almost all German war crimes were the work of the SS and any excesses committed by the Army were only the product of a long and bitter war and were no different from Allied war crimes.

You could certainly be accused of that, but the game I have in mind would have you, not necessarily participate in, but certainly be witness to the crimes of the Wehrmacht. Consider CoD: World at War, where in the Soviet campaign, you're standing in the eyes of Chernov, and how he subsequently writes about you in his diary, are affected by your brutality or mercy. I am not envisioning a "fun" experience here. I'm thinking of something very dark, a WW2 survival horror, if you will.

EDIT: I'd just like to quickly point out that in my original post, where I made the distinction between the Waffen-SS and the rest of the German forces, I in no way meant to say that the Wehrmacht did not commit war crimes. I didn't know the horrific scale of the Wehrmacht's crimes, but my point was, the Waffen-SS were all NSDAP party members, correct? (If I've gotten this wrong too I'm going to be embarrassed) As such, they would have all agreed with the ideals and ideology of the party. The rest of the army was made up of career soldiers and conscripts, my idea would centre a game around a conscript in the German army, someone who was fighting because they had no choice, not because they believed in the superiority of the Aryan race and the thousand year reich.

I'm not saying that you couldn't do it but its big risk financially. If you have the choice of two WW2 games both the same development budget you would chose the one that wouldn't run into trouble. In eastern europe, in particular, these are still live issues. Look at the trouble surrounding the film defiance for an idea of the sort of problems that you could get into http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defiance_(2008_film)

Moving on to the SS, the reality is that the lines are blurred. Originally the SS was the second paramilitary arm the NADSP after the SA. The waffen SS was formed as the NADSP private army. However the SS was later banned from recruiting in Germany and then started recruiting amongst foreign nationals. You had French, Norwegians, Swedes, Dutch, British, Belgium, Biosains, Ukrainians and even white Russians left over from before the communist take over. Later in the East the SS started recruiting at gunpoint and the soldiers where subject to arbitrary execution by their SS sargent. The SS Einsatzgruppen, who did the main mass murders of jews in the east before the advent of the final solution, had considerable numbers of ordinary german police amongst their numbers. All members of the german police force were drafted into the non waffen SS by the decree in 1936. So a lot the massacres in 1941-42 were committed by people who had been until 6 months before had been investigating burglaries. There also the fact that a lot logistic support for SS Einsatzgruppen came for the regular army. The vehicles that were used to transport 33,771 jews in two days to their execution site in Babi Yar where driven by soldiers of the German 6th army. You can't just neatly divided up responsibility between the SS and the wehrmacht or assume that the every member of the SS was a nazi. Captured German Soldiers' letters reveal that the consensus of opinion was that Slavs were 'the Asiatic-Bolshevik' horde, a subhuman but threatening race that is was necessary to exterminate for Germany to gain living space. Basically in the East there was no consequence for rape or murder of a non German and when there is no law the norm becomes set by those who are most extreme.

 

[SexyGarfield]

Mexico. The proposal detailed in the Zimmerman note [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimmermann_Telegram] is accepted and the Mexican army catches US completely by surprise.