Why Aren't There More Civilians In Military Video Games? 431
Jeremy Erwin writes "A columnist for Slate asks why there aren't any civilians in today's military shooting games. Quoting: 'Mostly, they don't want to face the consequences of players' bad behavior. In an interview with the website Rock Paper Shotgun, Battlefield 3's executive producer Patrick Bach explained that he doesn't "want to see videos on the Internet where people shoot civilians. That's something I will sanitize by removing that feature from the game." Bach believes that video games are serious business but that players' irreverence is holding back the form. "If you put the player in front of a choice where they can do good things or bad things, they will do bad things, go [to the] dark side because people think it's cool to be naughty, they won't be caught," he said.'"
(Note that there are civilians in Battlefield 3, you just can't kill them, accidentally or otherwise. Despite this, the author's point stands: "By removing civilians from the picture, developers like Bach are trying to reap the benefits of a real-life setting without grappling with the reality of collateral damage.")
Duh. (Score:5, Insightful)
If I wanted to grapple with reality, I wouldn't be playing a video game.
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly, I thought that this was obvious?
Re:Duh. (Score:4, Insightful)
If I wanted to grapple with reality, I wouldn't be playing a video game.
Nice platitude, but in the end it's bullshit. Are front-line battles with civilian casualties considered "reality" in most peoples' lives? No. People play video games to simulate situations they couldn't or wouldn't otherwise experience, whether they are fantasy, or an aspect of reality they either can't or don't want to experience for real.
LS
Re: (Score:2)
Reality is for those who can't handle gaming.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
*Pulls out Carmageddon, Quarantine, etc* and starts killing civilians... ooo and I get stuff for it too!
[waits a bit]
Nope, no grappling with reality, no murderous feelings... a little nostalgia maybe... and I really want them to re-make Quarantine.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Duh. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know if it goes that far. Certainly, some videogames are more realistic than others (within reason of course... for instance, the original Deus Ex would have enemies simply collapse if rendered unconscious, but actually bleed a pool of blood if killed).
At the same time, the ability to have a "realistic environment" is always a strange goal. I will admit to laughing during Fallout 3 the first time a wasteland wanderer ran up to me to thank me for my work on the Wasteland Survival Guide, handed me a gift... and promptly ran off into the wilderness to be tackled and torn to shreds by the nearest Yao Guai. Not that I was laughing at the circumstance, more the combination of AI limitations and random spawn points that caused it to happen. (Don't worry. I killed the Yao Guai, then looted both corpses. Can't have a maneater running around willing to attack other humans after all.)
But as for the rest... Again, Deus Ex had civilians. Killable ones. So did the first two Fallout games (hell, if you weren't in Britain, there were killable KIDS). And you should expect that people will do stupid things. Sometimes it's going to the dark side in the game for a while. Sometimes it's wasting an entire clip of ammo on that freaking annoying Claptrap. Sometimes it's piling six dozen grenades under a Warthog to see how high it will flip.
Gamers push boundaries. They test things. Give them a sandbox and they (at least some of them) will diligently work to tunnel their way out.
Re: (Score:2)
You should see what I did to the desk clerk in my Deus Ex HR apartment building when I got tired of hearing her tell me that "No, we haven't fixed your bathroom mirror, yet".
Let me tell you, it wasn't pretty.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Duh. (Score:4, Interesting)
Gamers push boundaries. They test things. Give them a sandbox and they (at least some of them) will diligently work to tunnel their way out.
The trouble is that as you make games more and more realistic, you find that sometimes reality is deeply unsatisfying. Sometimes a soldier can intentionally kill civilians and get away with it. Or the consequence is a court marshal that does not come until after the end of the soldier's tour. Or is that the soldier's child is killed fighting the same war 20 years later because the civilian casualties turned the local population against you.
None of that sends an appropriate message or fits with the instant gratification/punishment model of most games. But the more you strive for realism, the more you have to face the trappings of reality.
Re: (Score:3)
Just set the rules that if you kill a civilian it will either immediately or eventually negatively impact your game. e.g. some time later in the game when you are found out, your player is executed for murder. But then, the AI would have to figure out whether it was accidental (usually forgivable in the fog of war) or intentional.
The AI getting it wrong would just make the game more realistic. It's not like there are no innocent people in prison or on death row.
Re:Duh. (Score:4, Informative)
Thats kind of the point though your killing pixels...most know the difference enough that they want to keep fantasy and reality separate. However, a "more realistic" war-game might be a good idea just to show the real horror and consequences of war...just dont expect it to sell well and dont expect any good press no matter if it was made with good intentions.
Re: (Score:3)
Didn't one developer almost try that with that Fallujah-based game, and the sheer amount of bad press caused their publisher to drop them and their studio to basically collapse? I wouldn't expect anyone else to try it any time soon.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
In games I just want to be able to kill people without feeling guilty or sadistic.
Isn't that pretty much the definition of sociopathic behavior?
Note the use of the phrase "in games". That pretty much indicates that OP knows and respects the difference between game and reality.
Thus, not sociopathic.
Video Games = School Shootings (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
And it's sinful, don't forget.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
That's because you had been taught the consequences of antisocial behavior in Ultima 4 and 5 and 6 - After all you you wouldn't want to lose an eigth!
I think that this is what is missing from some modern games - lack of consequences.
Sure, it should be possible to rampage and kill civilians - but there should be in-game consequences - say, you get hauled up eventually for war crimes and are not able to complete the game. Likewise, NPC interactions with you should change if you are being particularly brutal -
This can be handled (Score:4, Interesting)
Also, it's a game and just pixels. Get over it. I did 4 years in the Marine Corps and it's pretty safe to say it's all unrealistic bullshit. Fun to play and fun to escape reality but its not real or realistic...
Re: (Score:2)
Unfortunately, as you might know from your experience, it's possible to act in accordance with the ROE and the laws of war and still kill civilians. That's not a message anybody wants to send, even those who oppose using games to "recruit" soldiers. I mean, who wants to teach everyone that civilians dying is an inevitable consequence of war?
Re:This can be handled (Score:4, Insightful)
Perhaps such games could be used to draw attention on how the ROE are callous with regards to civilian lives.
Look at the following stats:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Body_Count_project#March_2003_to_March_2005_report
37%. US-led forces killed 37% of civilian victims.
9%. Anti-occupation forces/insurgents killed 9% of civilian victims.
36%. Post-invasion criminal violence accounted for 36% of all deaths.
11%. Unknown agents (11%).
The USA until 2005 were those who killed the most civilians, way ahead of their enemies.
Now, most people typically believe that the USA killed about 10% of civilians while the insurgents killed 40% or more by using callous tactics such as placing IEDs and attacking US forces in the middle of crowded streets. (I was actually surprised by those numbers myself).
Also, in comparison, the USA lost only about 5000 troops while civilian casualties for the whole war are around 100,000 (possibly up to twice as many). Assuming the stats above did not change much since 2005, this means the USA killed 37,000 civilians while losing only 5,000 of their own troops...
I understand troops do a hard job, they want to get back home alive... BUT:
- The USA started the war, those civilians didn't ask for it
- Who's doing the fighting? The soldiers should be doing it, not the civilians.
Troops should be taking more risks than civilians. When I see so many civilians are dying, and I see the USA killed so many of them, I start to question the tactics used by the US military. I mean what, are they bombing entire buildings full of civilians just because an insurgent with a pistol is hiding inside and they don't want to risk sending troops to get him? What is going on? It's suspicious and I wouldn't trust the US military to tell me the truth... They've been caught repeatedly hiding facts that cast a bad light on them or the war, so they aren't credible. Now, if they were not afraid to come forward and admit their ROE sometimes endanger civilians, I'd have more faith in them.
Anyway, my point is, games that show the real ROE could be a good thing. I don't expect any war to be perfect, I know civilians will always suffer. My question is, how much do they really need to suffer? When are civilian casualties too many casualties? How many of these casualties could have been avoided? How easy were they to avoid, how reckless are the ROE exactly? Video games could help us have an opinion. Of course no game could be 100% unbiased, but it could still help us get closer to the truth.
There's a war going on for hell's sake! Innocent people are dying by the thousands and we're all busy trying to pretend it isn't happening because that would be bad for public relations. Let's have a sense of responsibility for a moment and admit to what is really going on. Let's discuss the issue, all of us, not just those suits in Washington! Let's all decide whether or not the US military are doing things properly or if they're needlessly endangering innocents. Let's show the American public what war really is, maybe next time they'll think twice before paying taxes so their government can start a war on some innocent people. Because that's what it's really about: we don't want Americans to know how murderous war is for civilians. We want the American public to think the USA are kicking terrorist ass while saving innocent civilians. We want to think US soldiers will gladly catch a bullet for an Iraqi child. Well in reality things are not like that at all and the American public should know.
Also, a game that presents US troops as the bad guys could be interesting too. It could show the perspective of the civilians and the insurgents, and people would realize it's not all black and white but very grey. Yes, even insurgents have good reasons to fight, sorry to break it to those of you who didn't realize that. Kicking the asses of people who came in your country with
Re: (Score:3)
It's likely a massive underestimate of the civilian toll.
Cold War troops can't fight insurgencies. (Score:4, Insightful)
The reason civilian casualties were so high in the initial years of Iraq is because the US military had been deliberately equipped and trained to fight conventional wars against ex-Cold War opponents. The US military had NO INTEREST at the highest levels in counter-insurgency or "small wars" as a result of Vietnam and Operation Gothic Serpent (aka Black Hawk Down). If you go back and look at Gulf War I the leading Generals tried to get their Arab partners to carry most of the load because they did not want to "get involved" and end up with another Vietnam (and all those guys were Vietnam vets, so they knew the reality). In the Balkans conflicts the US tried to limit its involvement to an air campaign only, despite such an approach probably increasing civilian casualties (as you don't have eyes on the ground to verify targets).
This led in the early 21st century to a military that was not equipped in the slightest to fight either a counter-insurgency OR fight in a way that limited civilian casualties. It was trained in the Cold War style where a commanders number one priority was carrying out the mission and keeping his troops alive, even if this meant dropping a 1000 pound bomb on a village with two snipers in it. In conventional war civilians have always got the worst of it, the various bombing campaigns of WWII mostly did no real military or industrial damage and just slaughtered civilians.
This is way so much of the direct fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan after the invasions fell to Special Forces units as they were trained for counter-insurgency and limited warfare. But Special Forces soldiers take a long time to train.
You can't take an 18 year old, give them 6 months to a year of basic infantry training, and expect them to be able to fight a counter-insurgency with low civilian casualties. Especially when, politically, every friendly casualty costs you more then a thousand foreign civilians dead, which is the reality of the modern media war.
Re: (Score:3)
Part of the reason so many civilians were killed is because the insurgents would hide from and attack US troops from civilian buildings such as houses, buildings, mosques, schools, hospitals, etc ... And in many cases civilians actively helped the insurgents. So of course any legitimate retaliation by US troops would injure and kill civilians.
Now, I don't mean to defend some of the truly cowardly, crimes against humanity type of actions which were perpetrated by American forces, but it's too easy to entirel
Simple. (Score:5, Insightful)
Most game developers don't want to show up on Faux News' front page with the headline "X is promoting killing of civilians!"
Combine player freedom with a clueless and/or biased press and you'll see why devs mostly just don't want to deal with the hassle. The only ones that do, do it because they actually LIKE said "scandals". Rockstar's thrived on scandals.
Re: (Score:2)
Consider how Wal-Mart would probably boycott them as well. You can't be boycotted by the god of retail.
Al Gore wanted to restrict access to games (Score:3)
Most game developers don't want to show up on Faux News' front page with the headline "X is promoting killing of civilians!"
I don't think you got the politics of that correct. It was Al Gore and his wife that were behind the 1980's crusade to restrict access to music and movies they thought inappropriate. Parents Music Resource Center and all that crap. They later expanded into video games. I believe that during the 2000 presidential campaign Al Gore threatened the music, movie and video game industry to "clean up their act" or a Gore/Lieberman administration would introduce legislation to *compel* them to "mend their ways".
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think you got the politics of that correct.
No, he got it right. Both major parities have censorial tendencies. Occasionally they overlap.
For example:
McCain [ontheissues.org] (just the first major GOP politician I thought to google)
"I can take you to a video game being sold to our children where the object of the game is to kill police. I understand the importance of weapons, but to define that as being the major cause [of youth violence], there’s a whole lot of causes."
Following the Littleton school shootings, McCain was one of four lawmakers who wrote Clinton
The more interesting issue is the assumption (Score:3)
For some strange reason, people tend to think it's just the conservatives who want to ban things and violate rights. The reality is that each side loves to do it, has its own preferred demons, and sometimes they overlap.
People forget the left participation in wars against smoking, guns, music and games, and their desire to control what you eat. They've even joined in on the War on Drugs, although some factions are softening a bit. Prohibition was across the board, considered a progressive cause by many, and
Re:Al Gore wanted to restrict access to games (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's Fox "News", just last week, talking about how educational games such as Sim City are produced by a left wing conspiracy with the goal of frightening young children into protecting the environment: link. [kotaku.com]
Funny, because when I played Sim City I made it my #1 goal to cause a nuclear meltdown without using the disaster menu.
The professional liars then go on to cherry pick the example of "McDonald's: The Game", made by these guys [molleindustria.org] as a representative example of the sort of games kids play.
Of course, a more popular game would be Modern Warfare. I haven't played one of those titles in MW2, but I distinctly recall a scene in which torture is used to get important intel from a bad guy, after abducting said bad guy from the streets of a sovereign nation (Brazil, I think). Which message would you rather expose your children to: "Torture is okay as long as the government says so!" or "Cities that bulldoze all their greenspace and get all their electricity from unregulated coal power plants end up with smog."?
Actually, if you watch Fox News, I'm guessing I won't like the answer....
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Most game developers don't want to show up on Faux News' front page with the headline "X is promoting killing of civilians!"
Somehow I don't think the ultra-conservative Fox network is going to be the problem here.
Pandora's box (Score:2)
Players do bad things because: (Score:5, Insightful)
There are no consequences. Make the players endure a court martial and maybe their actions would change.
This is another reason why the Elder Scrolls series is so incredibly good: if you're seen killing an innocent, you instantly get a bounty on your head, guards chase you relentlessly, and you have to pay the price (although there are ways around it for cheaters).
But I suspect developers of FPS games aren't that interested in moral realism, just graphics and sound.
Re: (Score:2)
That's all well and good, but it's also incredibly stupid. No one knows I stole that fork, because there was no one in the building when I took it. But no one will buy it, because it's stolen. That's dumb.
No one also knows I killed that guy, because I was 100 miles from anyone / I was alone with them in their home, and when I exited, no one was on the street.
It's just silly. Sure, they can pretend they caught you by having some magic ward, but if they already have that, why does anyone even need guards? Jus
Re: (Score:2)
Well, I didn't RTFA, but I remember Delta Force: Black Hawk Down, there were civilians, you could kill them but if you killed too many you failed the mission. And they would run into your line of fire or even throw rocks at you (and you took damage from the rocks!)
That's incredibly unrealistic. (Score:5, Funny)
They should make it more realistic than that. If you kill a civillian, your superiors should help you cover it up. If a private leaks it to an international whistle-blowing organization, they then through the whistleblower and the head of the organization in jail on trumped up charges, while you face no repercussions. Problem solved.
Re: (Score:2)
But you'd have to tread a fine line between getting away with it, and becoming the patsy.
Objective Complete: Blackmail General Halftrack.
Re:Players do bad things because: (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, there's no civilians in America's Army (the US Army's propaganda game), but, during the training missions, shooting a superior officer (surprisingly hard to do, since the game enforces basic range safety) leads to a short cutscene of the player in a cell in Fort Leavenworth, awaiting court-martial.
Re: America's Army (Score:2)
Well you'd fscking well better not frag Lt. Niedermeyer....
Re:Players do bad things because: (Score:4, Interesting)
This is another reason why the Elder Scrolls series is so incredibly good: if you're seen killing an innocent, you instantly get a bounty on your head, guards chase you relentlessly, and you have to pay the price (although there are ways around it for cheaters).
But if you're not seen killing, then you don't get a bounty. And it's not all that hard to not be seen. Then there's Gray Cowl of Nocturnal, that lets you go on a rampage in plain sight. And, finally, you can just wipe the guards out - might makes right and all that.
Even better is Fallout 2. Kill a civilian or several in the wastelands? no-one knows, no-one cares. Kill one in a civilized city such as NCR or Vault City? the guards will be all over you. Kill one in a pit of crime such as Den? unless it's a gang member, unarmed witnesses will just run away, and armed will ignore you. But there is a catch either way - if you kill too many, your reputation as a murderer will build up even without direct witnesses, and you'll start meeting bounty hunters in your wilderness trips.
And you know what? That's a big part of what makes these games awesome - freedom of choice, and the ability to deal with the consequences. Getting a "game over" dialog box is no fun. Getting into a gunfight with a bunch of guards which outnumber you and are better equipped is, even when the chance of survival is essentially zero, anyway.
Or there's one more approach, as seen in the recent Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Plenty of civilians around in all city hubs, and all but the few quest NPCs are killable. Of course, if you do start shooting them in open sight, the cops will go after you, and of course you can subdue them as well if you want to. But the game actually encourages non-violent approach to things, and I don't just mean civilians: you get more XP if you use non-lethal takedown means against enemies, for example - even if they are trying to kill you! There is even a special achievement, "Pacifist", for completing the game without killing anyone (except for the four boss fights, where you have to kill to move on) - the game is specifically designed to make this possible.
Of course, it can still be fun to go on a murder rampage in DXHR just for the heck of it. Alternatively, take it as a challenge - after completing the game as "pacifist", I immediately started over as a "maniac" - the rule is, if it breathes, you kill it. Note, no excuses like "this guy needs to stay alive for quest to count as completed" or "I need the merchant so I can sell loot to him" etc - by the time you leave the map, it must not have any living being on it except for the player. And you wouldn't believe how quickly you run out of ammo (which is pretty scarce in that game) when you start deliberately chasing civvies. Which, I guess, is a counterpoint to your claim - there are obvious consequences here, and the game is easier if you don't take that route, but it can be fun in the same way any challenge is.
In any case, what's the big deal? So a bunch of pixels on the screen changes color, and somewhere in your RAM a boolean flag goes from "true" to "false" - and?..
Re: (Score:2)
Thomsen mentions Haze, which apparently features drug addling psychoses-- making it harder and harder to be effective in combat. Perhaps military simulations could include PTSD.
Kill a civilian, and your character might not be very playable. Some might take this as a challenge though.
On the other hand, if the NPCs don't trust you to behave responsibly, you won't get assigned to the interesting missions. Earn the respect of your CO, and you might go far.
Re: (Score:2)
They aren't. By and large, that's a different genre -- which is why you had to reach for Elder Scrolls as an example.
I love Oblivion, and Skyrim and I have a date for release day. They're fantastic games, and a large part of the reason is the large amount of freedom the player has to play how they want: Good or evil, fight your way out of trouble or talk, etc. But that doesn't mean I don't also enjoy
Re: (Score:2)
> But I suspect developers of FPS games aren't that interested in moral realism, just graphics and sound.
Yeap, its the same reason you don't see children in Left for Dead, nor in MMO's.
Re: (Score:2)
But... games like that will make people murderers and/or make them temporarily have aggressive thoughts (which is just so "horrible")!
OK.
Subjective
Civilians that may die in games? (Score:5, Interesting)
If games now don't have civilians in them is just because the games distributors don't have the balls or the will to take a little heat from stupid people that don't understand that a deaths in a video game are just as bad for your development as seeing a nipple: not at all.
If you put the player in front of a choice where they can do good things or bad things, they will do bad things, go [to the] dark side because people think it's cool to be naughty, they won't be caught
And that's bad because...?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yep, when I get immersed, I'd follow a similar pattern. Which pissed me off in GTA because many times it was just, hey, kill that person and I felt like, wtf, man, I'd rather handle you and and your goons than go murder that witness.
Modern Warfare 2 (Score:3)
Yeah. The one level in Modern Warfare 2 that people objected to? Yeah. That was shooting civilians.
It seems censors don't like shooting civilians.
Good vs Evil (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think it's fair that it is just assumed that people will choose to do bad behind closed doors. I think the problem is the reward system is off balance. If a game truly implemented a true eco system of consequences and rewards for doing good vs evil you would see a different picture.
I, for example, played the game "Black & White" and your kingdom would morph to how you portrayed yourself. I actually was good "all the time" while I played that game. I slowly learned that the rewards for being good the whole time was limiting vs what could happen when you were evil. I only tried being evil once the reward for being good seemed to stop the gameplay.
If a game fully implemented repercussions for hitting civilians or doing evil, people would choose to do good. But when there are either no repercussions or just pure "cool eye candy" for killing people without consequence, people are really just looking to explore the dynamics of the game, they're not trying to do evil. So ultimately it comes down to the game designers making evil actions more appealing than doing good. That's the paradigm that would need to shift ...
Just think, if you killed a civilian in a mission you had to sit out a round or two in multi-player ... or if you had to go through an extra training course... This could also playout to be repercussions for 'friendly fire', instead of just disabling friendly fire all together. People would pay more attention to the goals of the game and stay more true to the role they're playing.
With "counter-strike", people choose (or get selected) to be on either the terrorists or counter-terrorist groups... same thing with most all multi-player games. In a way the "counter terrorists" are the good guys, and the terrorists are the bad guys... The bad guys kill the good guys here. Why not put civilians in the terrain and in the city? If a terrorist killed a civilian they would leave a blood trail behind or have to hide the body, or someone would scream and they would be easier to find, etc... There would be real repercussions for doing this. And if a 'counter-terrorist' killed a civilian by mistake or because it was a hostage or something, he would need to sit out for like 2 minutes or something before being allowed back in....
So the long and the short of it is, it's impossible to base people's decisions to do good vs evil with the games designed today. There is ONLY reward for doing anything the game lets you do. And people like to push limits to things to see what the developers created. Once they get their hands slapped for doing it, they probably won't do it again -- and if they do, they will have to work extra hard to undo the damage they had done.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, but really, what's the point of punishing them for those things (in a way that stops the gameplay and/or forces them to be "good")? It's a game. Who cares if they kill innocents?
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think it's fair that it is just assumed that people will choose to do bad behind closed doors. I think the problem is the reward system is off balance. If a game truly implemented a true eco system of consequences and rewards for doing good vs evil you would see a different picture.
And how many real soldiers have been tried & convicted in the last decade for killing civilians in Iraq or Afghanistan?
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Well, since you mentioned Counterstrike, I'll point out that there are civilian hostages in some missions, and if you kill them you lose money and have to spend the next round or two armed with a pistol. Oddly enough, the only time that it's good to kill hostages is if you're playing as the good guys. As long as you've rescued one of them, you can kill the rest to win the match!
Re: (Score:3)
I guess I'm an anomaly since even in games with no penalties for being 'evil' or even an 'evil path', I just can't stomach being an ass most of the time. So I inherently do 'good'. From some psychology and sociology work I'd say I'm not alone. About 10% of people even under stress always chose to do 'the least harm' or 'the most good' in situations. Their is little need for repercussions for these types. A real problem in games tends to be the fact that people find it hard to empathize with characters in th
Obvious answer, convuluted (Score:3)
The obvious answer is that most companies don't want to deal with the shit-storm that COD Modern Warefare 2 and Battle for Falujah. It has nothing to do with the supposed moral recrimination of shooting innocent bystanders as far as the actual players are concerned.
Why do the cards not crush in racing games? (Score:3)
The same argument can be said about racing games. You can crash into walls going 100MPH and just bounce off.
The people vs. car thing is a little different but comes down to the same thing. In the car world, a manufacturer doesn't want their car to ever be seen as inferior or have damage to the car. In the war model, we want to always be rewarded for shooting the gun. Negative feedback is bad.
The reality is that until we start enforcing negative feedback we are encouraging and training a new generation of people that will lack a sense of duty and responsibility and instead will lack a certain understanding of right and wrong.
Re: (Score:2)
Here's a hint - it's not the developers (Score:5, Interesting)
The developers, in general, want to do this. I recall one game designer (for an Iraq-war-setting game) wanting to add a mission where the player went on a lengthy patrol through the city. Civilians would be everywhere, doing normal civilian things. Shooting them, obviously, would lead to a game-over. But the twist was that there would be no actual enemies - you'd go out and see several things that might startle you into shooting (potential car bomb, etc), but it would basically be ten minutes of the player expecting enemies at every corner, yet never finding them. It was supposed to show what actual soldiers deal with daily - almost all patrols go without incident.
The game shipped without it, but that's hardly the only one where the developers wanted to add civilians, either for realism, or for mood, or even just because. But it's almost always stopped by the publisher, AKA the guys spending the money on the game. It's just far too much of an economic risk. Very few military games do it (without doing something like making them invinsible), simply because of all the outrage the media would cause. Modern Warfare 2 really only included it (in one mission) because of the outrage - they wanted the publicity and the shock.
Re:Here's a hint - it's not the developers (Score:5, Insightful)
If I wanted to kill civilians (Score:4, Funny)
It's easier to go to war (Score:2, Insightful)
It's easier to convince your citizens to go to war if they can't see the suffering of innocents. The bible makes a Big Deal of Herod and all, what would those oh so pious Americans think if he lived in the White House?
I want more civilians in video games. (Score:2)
Pretty much what it says on the tin.
I enjoy story with my games. Games like Serious Sam never appealed to me, and I got bored of the multiplayer content of Call of Duty pretty quick; I was really only in it for the stories. Yes, I played the "No Russian" mission and yes it affected me, but isn't that what we play games *for*? To explore things we couldn't explore in real life?
I don't like the idea that there's no consequences for my actions. The games I've really enjoyed playing: Fallout, Fallout 2, Baldur'
There used to be more... (Score:2)
But I shot 'em all.
False premise (Score:2)
Maybe it's not technically a "military" shooter, but whatever.
I Just Assumed... (Score:2)
Civilians in Video Games: Carmageddon (Score:2)
Probably one of the last games where you could do ultimate rampage of helpless civilians (or cows) and nobody complained. Nowadays in the super whine nature and youtube, twitter, etc this is just unthinkable.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 anyone? (Score:2)
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 anyone?
On one mission you play as an inside CIA agent whom has infiltrated a terrorist inner circle who go on a shooting spree at an Airport. You get to mow down endless Civilians. Though the mission is skipable. And you actually succeed in the mission, even if you don't shoot anyone and just let your compadres do all the civilian killing.
See for more details: http://callofduty.wikia.com/wiki/No_Russian [wikia.com]
Why aren't there more lawyers and logistics? (Score:2)
So why aren't there more lawyers, logistics SNAFU's, medical illnesses, auto accidents and pettifogging government bureaucrats in a war-video game?
Why isn't there a video game of Working Pathetic Service Jobs At Low Wages To Pay Off Your Student Loans And Medical Bills?
Unless you get to shoot them, it just Is Not Fun At All.
Peter Molyneux says... (Score:2)
Hasn't Peter Molyneux (creator of Black and White, Fable, and other games with open-ended player ethics) said he's always found in games where players could choose good or evil that most people will choose good? I remember playing Back and White, the most frustrating thing was that the controls were imprecise enough that it was easy to accidentally kill people (this may have been by design) and I felt bad that the people had died.
The GTA series would tend to go against this notion, but I think that's not q
GTA complaints about war games (Score:3)
Or horror movies, whatever. More politically correct crap. Everyone has to find something to bitch about.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
if you put civilians on the screen to kill then you need to lessen the enemies since the hardware can only do so many triangles at once. what would be the point of having objects on the screen you shoot for no reason other than to kill them that don't fight back?
Re:what? (Score:4, Interesting)
Because in some cases, it doesn't make sense for the streets to be vacant. If you are just walking around a city, you will expect people to be about doing their own thing. If battle erupts, they will be running all over the place for cover, or holed up in some corner somewhere. Two armies don't face off in a sterile environment. There needs to be external life around. Adding such things opens up the possibility for more in depth gameplay. Killing civilians gets you a reprimand, or a failed mission, or perhaps results in civilians reacting to you differently, closing off some options and opening others. Preventing civilian deaths earns you things, like better weapons. Perhaps enemy combatants are hiding among the civilians.
If your reasoning for not adding additional NPCs is due to triangle count, then you need to broaden your horizons, and realize that games can be about more than just high quality graphics.
Re: (Score:2)
GTA was very entertaining though. Did anyone seriously play the story line? I didn't, I just went on rampages and jumped stuff, crashed vehicles, etc, etc. Nothing like carjacking a moped.
Re: (Score:2)
I feel no need to "be bad" as the author states. I'm sure a certain type of person would. But I am not that type of person.
Re: (Score:3)
Hmm....a "certain type of person?" Are you judging yourself or others by how you play a video game?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Kind of sad commentary on the fucktards who think killing innocent people is fun. Even if it is in a video game, it reflects your values.
On another note, they could introduce killing civilians in video games in an "ethical" manner. Just set the rules that if you kill a civilian it will either immediately or eventually negatively impact your game. e.g. some time later in the game when you are found out, your player is executed for murder. But then, the AI would have to figure out whether it was accidental (
Re: (Score:2)
they could introduce killing civilians in video games in an "ethical" manner. Just set the rules that if you kill a civilian it will either immediately or eventually negatively impact your game. e.g. some time later in the game when you are found out, your player is executed for murder.
The Iraqi and Afghani (heck, even Vietnam) wars should have taught you that not everyone who looks like a civilian is Joe Farmer who wants nothing more than to tend his garden.
Re:Because then... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
insurgencies who hide within the local population to avoid retaliation, not implying that there were no innocents.
You realise this is a propaganda line right? In reality they are the local population defending their patch of fields. Not all of the civilians join the fight but those that do can not be said to be "hiding" among their friends and family. Where else could they go? Did the US military offer to buy them all fancy uniforms before the war kicked off, and build them nice military barracks with the national flag flying on the roof?
Re:Because then... (Score:5, Insightful)
Funny, what they taught me was that if Joe Farmer gets shot or or bombed or captured by Westerners while tending his garden or defending his family, the US government will announce that he was a terrorist and Al Qaeda will announce that he was a martyr, or if he gets shot by the Taliban then the US will announce that he was a friendly civilian and the Taliban will announce that he was an infidel traitor.
And if Joe Farmer is carrying a rifle, if he's in Texas the US right wing will say he's protected by the Second Amendment, but if he's in Afghanistan, they'll say he's a terrorist, whereas realistically, if he's a goat herder then of course he'll be carrying an AK47, because otherwise the Taliban or the government's army or the local warlord or some other guy with an AK47 will steal his goats.
Re:Because then... (Score:5, Insightful)
So being an actor in a play as "the bad dude", or enjoying a novel about an assassin is bad, or watching a movie about a terrorist is bad, or killing a character you don't like in Sims3 by putting furniture around the pool is bad, or playing Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards (late 80s game, I think) to seduce as many women as possible in an evening is bad? your viewpoint is ridiculous, it reflects your absurd values. Plenty of normal people like escapist entertainment where they get to play or imagine themselves the crazy or bad or naughty or slutty person.
Re: (Score:2)
Makes us, as a whole, look rather primitive.
I already thought we were to begin with, but why does this specific thing make us look "primitive"? I see it as nothing more than a preference.
Re: (Score:2)
Some games do allow it, the Assassin's Creed series and Infamous both let you do it if you want to. In the latter, one of the paths you take encourages that sort of bad behavior.
Personally, I think that cleaning up and sanitizing war games is the last thing we need. If people want that, then they should be playing against the Strog or various aliens, considering how much glorification there is of war in the popular media, you're not going to damage anybody emotionally by depicting things with a tad bit of a
Re: (Score:3)
"Kind of sad commentary on the fucktards who think killing innocent people is fun. Even if it is in a video game, it reflects your values. "
Kind of sad commentary on the fucktards who are so mentally inept they can't separate reality from fantasy.
If think actions in a video game have any relation to real life values then it's really going to hurt your brain to know that whilst I think killing civilians in the original Syndicate was part of what made it quite funny sometimes, I've been staunchly for avoiding
Re: (Score:2)
Not if you put the game on rails.
Re: (Score:2)
Should I be worried that you put a qualifier on where you don't kill people?
Re:I don't (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah, they're minus 100 points.
Re: (Score:2)
It looked cheesy, the first one was fun though. I loved how people whined about it. Yet these same people will be glued to the TV to watch some real life violence happen in the news. The Supreme Pizza Court ruled that it's all protected speech, so why hasn't someone broke out of their chicken suits and made something off the charts violent?
I want a Potato Gun like Baby/bomb launcher; FOOOOMP!!! WAAAAAaaaaaaaa..........KABOOOM! Stick a Planned Parenthood sticker on the side of it.
Suggestions? Requests? Shal
Re: (Score:2)
If I recall correctly, Postal 2 had missions like going to the store and buying some milk, picking up a paycheck, etc. I think the designers intentionally made it so that you could get through the entire game non-violently, but all of the actual "fun" in the game came from playing violently.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You even HAD to kill chuckles (the annoying but innocent court Jester) to loot a key of his body to rescue a Princess. (Ultima 1 didn't quite have the plots of its successors).
Re: (Score:2)
You're saying people don't want to have the ability to shoot whatever moves?
Zombies are *Usually* Civilians (Score:2)
I'm glad somebody got to the zombies before I did! I mean, I think I'm glad... they didn't bite you, did they? Because sometimes the zombies aren't civilians, they're your buddies who've been bitten, and then you've got to shoot them before they get you. You're not an Anonymous Coward, so you're not a Non-Player Character, but your user number's kind of high - were you wearing a red shirt when you left the house this morning?