If you want peace, prepare for war.
So here it is, I have recently got the latest Call of Duty game in my hands, Modern Warfare 2. I must precise, I am not usually a violent person, but somehow, sometimes, it feels good to click like crazy to kill evil terrorists and invaders. No, I'm not crazy. I'm a girl, I'm soft and hypersensitive, but I also happen to be a geekette, a tomboy, and I have a lot of anxiety to let out. And so FPS games are good. No, they won't make me suddenly go mad and shoot people (I am a firm believer that violent video games do not make a kid violent, they merely make things worse for kids that already have mental issues). However, two things have bugged me with this game.
Firstly, I was quite interested to see a war game in which you eventually fight on American soil. That is, to me, a big difference with other war games I play, where you generally end up fighting in Europe in replays of World War II. Fighting in invaded America, even if it is very well done artistically wise, is extremely strange. It feels like playing through a sci-fi movie such as Godzilla or War of the Worlds, except with Verdun-style trenches. Very odd... I have come to realize that this must be extremely disturbing for American players, let alone the US soldiers who play it. But for us Euros? It just feels unreal. That said, it made me miss the architecture of the USA and wish I was back there. But Washington is prettier when not on fire.
Secondly, something has really, really struck me in the early stages of the game. One of the first missions lets you play an undercover CIA agent infiltrating a group of Russian terrorists, in order to save millions of lives. You have to follow them and do everything they say, of course. Except that includes breaking into an airport full of people, and shooting into the innocent masses of people to kill them all. Now, the reason for following the terrorists is clear and makes sense. But would you do it?
Personally, I could not even play through it. I walked and followed the guys, but didn't shoot once on the civilians. Turns out it has no impact on the rest of the game.
Then, about as disgusted as one can be, I talked to two US soldiers who played the game and whose names shall remain unknown about it. Both basically said they did it for the fun, because it's a game. Where does the fun begin and where does it stop? What is fun in pretending to kill dozens of unarmed innocents? Not quite the same as shooting evil terrorists, in my opinion. One of the reasons given to me was "You get an order, you execute it." Well, I suppose I'd be a good Frenchie on that one, and rebel against orders. The other reason was that it's just a game. It's possible that my conscience is too strong then. Or that I'm too soft of a girl. But hell, I wouldn't do it.
Judge for yourself with the video I put in this post. I'd love to hear what more Americans think about this, particularly the military. See if this is a general trend, and just hear opinions on it.
Addition: I just put up a little poll for this.
The reason people are freaking over this on the US side is because they have their head up their butt refusing to believe that a CIA agent would do this.
ReplyDeleteAs for the soldiers, they are trained to be like attack dogs. Go, kill, don't think about it. If they did, they would not live long.
I have yet to play COD:MW2, so I can't really say what I'd do in the mission, but I'd probably do it. I've played plenty of games where I've done some horrendously dickish things - talk to me about the Hitman series sometime. I love roleplaying, and more than a few times, I've roleplayed some seriously evil villains.
ReplyDeleteStill, watching that...in Hitman, even on the rare missions when you're after a guy who's at least not pure evil - rare - at least the people you fight try to fight back, but most of that thing was just butchery. Watching it, I've seen worse things in games - Postal, for example - but the reality of that makes me feel a bit queasy.
Just looking at it, though, the irrelevance of the whole mission, I can't shake the feeling that it was purely for the purpose of creating controversy, like pooping on a crucifix and calling it art.
I don't like FPS (except Unreal Tournament), but in general people don't kill civillians unless they have moral issues... even the little german soldiers in WW2 had trouble shooting civilians. (Not talking about those taking decisions.) This was difficult since each civilian could be a resistance member willing to shoot the soldiers in the back.
ReplyDeleteIt's those who agree to shoot civilians without flinching that should be shot!
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