By Ben Mapp
We can all agree that war is a terrible, terrible thing. Yet we pour it into our fiction too as a means of escapism, alongside other popular genres such as adventure, fighting and puzzle games. How do we distract ourselves from the horrors of war?
...Well, by playing war-themed video games of course!
We can all agree that war is a terrible, terrible thing. Yet we pour it into our fiction too as a means of escapism, alongside other popular genres such as adventure, fighting and puzzle games. How do we distract ourselves from the horrors of war?
...Well, by playing war-themed video games of course!
On this date in 1944 began a day unlike any other, a day which would forever go down in history as hosting one of the most bloody and brutal confrontations in all of World War II, the supposed 'war to end all wars,'
Now just consider for a moment how many gaming franchises there are in the world which revolve around war in some form or another. There are titles such as Call of Duty, Battlefield, Brothers in Arms, and even your more science-fiction-y titles such as Mass Effect, Halo or Fallout. Are we truly obsessed by that we wish to rid ourselves of? It seems like it. War has always been there as a tear in the many pages of our history, and it’s something we’re really having a hard time letting go of. The least we could to make up for using something as both tragic and terrifying as war as the foundation for our countless forms of entertainment is by portraying it earnestly. The most recent and iconic cinematic interpretation of the Normandy Landings in particular comes from the 1998 movie, Saving Private Ryan (directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Tom Hanks in the lead role).
The film’s influence can be seen in particular in the 2002 video game Medal of Honor: Allied Assault and its later sequel, Medal of Honor: Frontline (which recreated the same sequence in more detail), both of which were released for the PlayStation 2 five years after the film in question. In either game you adopt the role of an American soldier and the opening mission takes place during (and throughout the duration of) the Normandy Landings – dropping you right in the heart of the battle so to speak. The mission was quite challenging in itself, but made so much more intense by just how grim and authentic its depiction of the savage conflict actually was. Bear in mind that Frontline was released in 2002, and so graphically does not match up to the modern standards.
Take a look for yourself. From 0.40 you get an introductory sequence and from around 3.25 the actual gameplay commences.
Now just consider for a moment how many gaming franchises there are in the world which revolve around war in some form or another. There are titles such as Call of Duty, Battlefield, Brothers in Arms, and even your more science-fiction-y titles such as Mass Effect, Halo or Fallout. Are we truly obsessed by that we wish to rid ourselves of? It seems like it. War has always been there as a tear in the many pages of our history, and it’s something we’re really having a hard time letting go of. The least we could to make up for using something as both tragic and terrifying as war as the foundation for our countless forms of entertainment is by portraying it earnestly. The most recent and iconic cinematic interpretation of the Normandy Landings in particular comes from the 1998 movie, Saving Private Ryan (directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Tom Hanks in the lead role).
The film’s influence can be seen in particular in the 2002 video game Medal of Honor: Allied Assault and its later sequel, Medal of Honor: Frontline (which recreated the same sequence in more detail), both of which were released for the PlayStation 2 five years after the film in question. In either game you adopt the role of an American soldier and the opening mission takes place during (and throughout the duration of) the Normandy Landings – dropping you right in the heart of the battle so to speak. The mission was quite challenging in itself, but made so much more intense by just how grim and authentic its depiction of the savage conflict actually was. Bear in mind that Frontline was released in 2002, and so graphically does not match up to the modern standards.
Take a look for yourself. From 0.40 you get an introductory sequence and from around 3.25 the actual gameplay commences.
As you can see, the game also splices together actual footage from the era and shows iconic wartime figureheads such as British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, US President Harry Truman as well as Russian General Secretary Joseph Stalin. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler is also depicted at one of his infamous rallies in Germany, all during a brief description by narrator (Dwight D. Eisenhower) about the danger of the German War Machine and its effect on the world during this period of history.
When the actual mission begins after the intro ends, you are playing as a soldier aboard one of the landing crafts which is headed straight to Omaha Beach. Just about the only control you have so far is the freedom to look around at your fellow soldiers, some of whom are fidgeting with their weapons nervously or throwing up in careless anxiety. As soon as you finally get your bearings, your landing craft is upturned by German bombs from overhead and you must then swim to the shore from there, but not before you witness the rest of your comrades annihilated by a storm of bullets as soon as they are submerged in the water. Once you navigate through the fresh corpses and make it onto the beach at last, you are immediately forced to take cover behind the wreckage of another craft, alongside your commanding officer who also miraculously survived that first attack. This is when you get your opportunity to have a really long look around of the vast, dismal battlefield whilst all the time evading enemy gunfire.
Frontline has the advantage of being over ten-years-old now and as such the graphics are of a lacking quality, or at least they are by current standards. However this actually benefits this opening mission in some ways. For example, a grey mist swamps the beach (an effect actually in place because of the console’s limited draw distance), which instantly gives you a challenge visually.
When the actual mission begins after the intro ends, you are playing as a soldier aboard one of the landing crafts which is headed straight to Omaha Beach. Just about the only control you have so far is the freedom to look around at your fellow soldiers, some of whom are fidgeting with their weapons nervously or throwing up in careless anxiety. As soon as you finally get your bearings, your landing craft is upturned by German bombs from overhead and you must then swim to the shore from there, but not before you witness the rest of your comrades annihilated by a storm of bullets as soon as they are submerged in the water. Once you navigate through the fresh corpses and make it onto the beach at last, you are immediately forced to take cover behind the wreckage of another craft, alongside your commanding officer who also miraculously survived that first attack. This is when you get your opportunity to have a really long look around of the vast, dismal battlefield whilst all the time evading enemy gunfire.
Frontline has the advantage of being over ten-years-old now and as such the graphics are of a lacking quality, or at least they are by current standards. However this actually benefits this opening mission in some ways. For example, a grey mist swamps the beach (an effect actually in place because of the console’s limited draw distance), which instantly gives you a challenge visually.
The genuine difficulty and confusion about how to head onwards and complete your objective – which is to infiltrate the fortress of your attackers and take over the beach - is unclear. Obviously there’s no way for a video game (or any medium for that matter, interactive or otherwise) to perfectly capture the fear and horror as felt and seen by the actual heroes who fought that day, But Frontline’s experience certainly gives a soft depiction of the basic Normandy Landing. The only things missing really are the rest of the army (as only a few soldiers are there fighting with you due, once again, to hardware limitations), as well as the mounds of shot-up bodies. Because this battle has been reconstructed in a way that can be both brutal and entertaining, it calls into question the initial thought process which went into designing the mission itself as well as its inclusion in the game or, more rather, in any game whatsoever. D-Day turned into a successful military operation, but at the loss of over four-thousand soldiers from both sides of the conflict.
Perhaps the only reason we can now morally justify taking such a traumatic, historical event of almost modern times and then transform it into a fun, intense and interactive experience is because it is our own unique way of dealing with war in general, which is something we know (when we stop and think about it) will always be a constant in our lives, whether it is on our TVs or close-by.
Perhaps the only reason we can now morally justify taking such a traumatic, historical event of almost modern times and then transform it into a fun, intense and interactive experience is because it is our own unique way of dealing with war in general, which is something we know (when we stop and think about it) will always be a constant in our lives, whether it is on our TVs or close-by.
The inclusion of the Normandy Landings in both Allied Assault and Frontline is not demeaning to any of the soldiers who were actually there on D-Day, but it is in fact an example of high praise by game developers and by the fans of these war-themed games. By allowing the player to assume the role of one such soldier who was there on the day, the developers (EA Games) are giving the player the opportunity to fulfill a fantasy of – for once – playing the role of a ‘real life’ hero, as opposed to a space-based action hero or the recently more popular brooding antihero of a lot of modern sandbox games. Whilst it's certainly true that the descendants of men who fought on the German side during the battle could well argue that it is unethical of EA Games (or any other developer) to allow players to brutally kill the attacking Nazis as seen in this game's opening mission, it is also true that all of the Germans represented in-game are generic and as such are just as 'evil' as those portrayed in several Hollywood films. Since the War's end, in general the Nazi Party has developed an entirely deserved reputation for being the ultimate 'evil' for their countless atrocities committed throughout Europe and the world during a time when the world itself was starting to melt into its current, largely more civilised form - and that chilling reputation has stuck.
I would argue back to those descendants that this depiction of the Normandy Landings is actually fair for both sides, as (apart from the political figureheads who each appeared in the intro) all of the characters out there on the battlefield with you are purely fictional having been based on, again, the generic Nazi soldier.
Frontline was released in HD along with 2010’s Medal of Honor reboot, which placed the action in Afghanistan as opposed to World War Two. The franchise has seen entered a period of dormancy after its latest sequel, Medal of Honor: Warfighter, was both a critical and commercial disaster, leaving the future of the series uncertain.
I would argue back to those descendants that this depiction of the Normandy Landings is actually fair for both sides, as (apart from the political figureheads who each appeared in the intro) all of the characters out there on the battlefield with you are purely fictional having been based on, again, the generic Nazi soldier.
Frontline was released in HD along with 2010’s Medal of Honor reboot, which placed the action in Afghanistan as opposed to World War Two. The franchise has seen entered a period of dormancy after its latest sequel, Medal of Honor: Warfighter, was both a critical and commercial disaster, leaving the future of the series uncertain.
Never in the history of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few...
War is never a good thing, yet we rely on the very concept of its to fuel our many forms of entertainment. Do you think our analysis above was fair? Or do you massively disagree? It's a sensitive subject after all! Either way, we'd love to hear from you.
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