http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/08/10/medal-of-honors-taliban-multiplayer/
There is a lot of commotion about DICE's decision to allow players to play as the Taliban in the next installment of the MoH series.
Getting things like 'kill streaks' and headshots on coalition soldiers would seem like a thorny issue indeed.
Dan Whitehead from Eurogamer seems to take a particularly strong stance:
“Watching virtual Coalition troops gunned down by insurgents in the ruins of Kabul, I felt more than a little weird, especially since a friend lost his brother in Afghanistan only a few weeks ago. This is a real war that is happening right now, real blood is being shed, and simulating that for fragfest fun while being rewarded for kill streaks… Well, there’s just something a bit icky about that. In single-player, there can be a story that adds context and meaning to the carnage. In multiplayer, it’s all just for fun.”
Unfortunately, I was not able to find a similar blurb from Dan and his weirded out feelings regarding the 'No Russian' mission from Modern Warfare 2 (I am disregarding his single-player "excuse" as laughable by the way).
Your thoughts?
My thoughts are "whats the big deal?", in MW2 you gun down marines, rangers, seals in multiplayer when your on the opposing team so? Also if you're going to take that kind of stance on killing in a video game you should probably be against violence in general, because it seems a bit hypocritical to be all mad because you can play as Taliban and kill coalition troops and on the other hand not mind when you play games that you constantly gun down "taliban like" opponents. At the end of the day its humans killing humans so why would you care on one and not the other?
Don't play Civ games either, cause there you can nuke countries, including *gasp* American civilizations. Oh and I have several family members and close friends that are active service atm.
I agree, there is no reason why we shouldn't be able to play as the Taliban. Even if you are killing the "Good guys", it is just a game, though a lot of people tend to forget that when touchy subjects like this come up. If it bothers you, just never play as the Taliban or don't get that game.
Exactly. That's why i didnt get all that hoopla about 6 days in Fallujah.
While it really doesn't matter, you pretty much know they're specifically doing it to expose the game. Lots of games pit you against US troops in Multiplayer (hi, Counterstrike!), but it's just as easy to call it OpFor or similar, which is how most games do it. Naming it Taliban specifically is nothing more than a viral publicity stunt, and it's obviously working.
this
ya don't play any WWII games either. I mean.. either Americans or Germans are going to die, and my American grandpa just died a couple weeks ago and so did my German grandmother. I mean, those are real people I knew on both sides.. it was a real war back then, not this pussy shit. Millions died back then.
Oh bo-ho.
Come back when I finally get German WW2 campaigns.
Its (very) bad taste, but should not be illegal in my opinion.
and use the historically accurate Swastika instead of the Malta Cross on Germany's WW2 era flag
When will some studio make a WW2 fps game from the side of the Germans??
I lived in NYC during 9/11 and was a huge CS fan at the time. After that, I couldn't play the terrorist side. Sounds crazy, but it's true. I doubt I could ever play the Taliban, certainly not when the war is going on.
For the German - WWII analogy, you need to really think about who the Taliban are and what they stand for. I doubt I would play a WWII game as a Nazi, but I can handle playing as the Wehrmacht.
...whenever I hear things like "that's in bad taste"....or "what were they thinking?"...or "that shouldn't be allowed".....etc. etc....
I can't help but think about the movie "Demolition Man" and its huge comedic value (as I see it) when applied to the current P(olitical) C(orrectness) trend sweeping the western world.
Here are a few quotes courtesy of (www.uselessmoviequotes.com) I just get an absolute kick out of:
Simon Phoenix: I'm sorry to say that the world has become a pussy-whipped, Brady Bunch version of itself--run by a bunch of robed sissies.
Lenina Huxley: Anything not good for you is bad, hence, illegal. Alcohol, caffeine, contact sports, meat . . .John Spartan: Are you shitting me?A computer: <BEEP> John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the verbal morality statute.John Spartan: What the Hell is that?A computer: <BEEP> John Spartan, you are fined one credit . . .Lenina Huxley: .....bad language, child play, gasoline, uneducational toys, and anything spicy. Abortion is also illegal. But, then again so is pregnancy, if you don't have a license.
Edgar Friendly: I've seen the future. You know what it is? It's a 47-year-old virgin, sitting around in his beige pajamas, drinking a banana-broccoli shake, singing, "I'm an Oscar Meyer wiener.
Edgar Friendly: According to Cocteau's plan, I'm the enemy, 'cause I like to think, I like to read. I'm into freedom of speech, and freedom of choice. I'm the kinda guy that likes to sit in a greasy spoon and wonder, "Gee, should I have the T-bone steak or the jumbo rack of barbecue ribs with the side-order of gravy fries?" I want high cholesterol! I wanna eat bacon, and butter, and buckets of cheese, okay?! I wanna smoke a Cuban cigar the size of Cincinnati in the non-smoking section! I wanna run naked through the street, with green Jell-O all over my body, reading Playboy magazine. Why? Because I suddenly may feel the need to, okay, pal?
John Spartan (Sylvester Stallone)Simon Phoenix (Wesley Snipes)Edgar Friendly (Denis Leary)Lenina Huxley (Sandra Bullock)
hehe
the Monk
They did once...I thought..called Super Soldier or something ..you were a German Super soldier mutant type, fighting the Russians..but you had a change of hearts and started killing Naxis...typical.
The only way I saw a FPS playing Germans was Battlefield 1942 and co...
But RTS games playing Germany a dime a dozen
It's pretty easy to tell what they were thinking though. If it *wasn't* named Taliban nobody would care and nobody would talk about it. But they named it such, and now there are articles popping up talking about the game. Lots more media exposure for no advertising dollars spent. Sure they might "offend" some people, but let's face it, the vast majority of those are not their target audience to begin with.
Free viral advertising for the win?
I'm not disagreeing with you Anny I'm just pointing out that I'm about as anti-PC (political correctness) as one can get....of course one could argue that me taking offense at all the PC-crap floating around these days is intolerant as well!
And right now, there's a bunch of Taliban hiding in caves going "How come we're stuck playing coalition soldiers in the new MoH? My sheeps got bombed by them last month! How could EA allow this!"
Of course, you should be able to play as a nazi in a WW2 game, immediately after being announced I would pre-order it.
Seeing as most people these days equate Wehrmacht/German with Nazi anyway (albeit incorrectly) what's your point exactly?
Just that all sides of WW2 should be represented in a game. You always play the same side on them.
In general I'm not a fan of political correctness, but there's also a difference between "PC" and "Things you shouldn't morally do". Political correctness is when you get told that "We're re-evaluating our long term goals and approach to business, so we have to downsize", instead of "You're fired 'cause we don't have enough money.". It's putting flowery language in place of the actual thing. Like if I pointed out that you weren't short, just vertically challenged
So this Taliban thing isn't really about political correctness, it plays much more on the morality of playing the bad guys during a currently ongoing conflict and being able to shoot the "good guy" US troops. It doesn't really bother me personally, but my point is that not everyone who doesn't like it is necessarily a PC-enthusiast either
Sure, but aren't you then arguing a relative (ie. "good guy" or "bad guy") point? Morality in all of its iterations is subjective and therefore relative to each individuals perspective.
While I agree that the world would be a much better place if everyone conducted themselves in a moral (based on a general consensus on what can be defined as "moral") manner I think morality is up to the individual personally and how/if they choose to apply same in their daily life (ie. if you feel playing such a video game is immoral then don't support the devs by purchasing it). That said, I believe PC (political correctness) to be the social commentary that results when groups of people seperated by "moral" differences forced to "agree to disagree" feel the need to make their displeasure with oposing opinion known anyway and (as you stated) want to lessen the blow.
Personally I believe there is nothing "moral" about business. Business is business.......my personal life and how I conduct myself on an individual case-by-case basis is as moral (or not) as I choose to make it. One cannot be forced to be truly "moral"......nor should anyone attempt doing so. True morality as is the case with true charity come from within and cannot be instilled as it were.
Anyway, I digress.....suffice it to say.....I obviously don't take issue with what EA have done. I also won't be buying the game......but that has more to do with EA's general business practices and not the new MoH.
It is relative if you exclude all other considerations, but not if you take it in context of the game. The game is marketed to us, and not extremist militant groups, and thus the vast majority of the target audience sees the Coalition as the "good guys". It can't really be a relative point when the "good guy" side makes the game for the "good guy" side where you can play the "bad guy"
It's a f'kin video game...gees. Hell, I'm American and I might play as a Taliban just to laugh at people who get pissed off over it. Cry me a freakin river...boof'kinwhoooo. Was I sad when 9/11 happened? Sure. Am I pissed off we haven't killed Binladen yet? Sure. Does that need to affect a freaking video game and how it's played? Nope.
.....and then we're back to square-one. Namely "business", and I stated above.....I believe business is business and morality (ie. good vs bad) has no part in business even if the product of said business in fact does depict "good vs bad" scenarios.
I get what you're saying, I just don't think "morality" as such can/should be applied to business. If we did, I'm afraid we'd find reasons to shut the doors on most if not all "big business" for reasons based on morality.
Its fine.
It hate hypricyits. (and people who can't spell!)
Dons't matter if its called 'Opfor', 'Taliban' or 'Generic AK-47 waving Islamic extreamist' - we all know what it REALLY means.
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