Agreed, context is everything. I don’t think games like GTA (perhaps somewhat), Hotline Miami, or even (from what little I know of it) Postal, can be reasonably accused of causing violence.
Call of Duty on the other hand- well, I’d argue it pushes both the legitimization of war crimes and atrocities (against civilians no less, so long as they’re “not western” ie. “deserving of human rights” in the series’ eyes) and the accompanying exceptionalist (and thus anything, any horror done is legitimized) ideology of the US/west.
As for Spec Ops the Line- while it’s been years since I last played it, I think I’d recommend it still. It thoroughly shits on the “crusading hero” mentality of other western, US military FPS games, and the settings and mechanics to my recollection were incredibly cool (Dubai if I remember correctly- but immersed by sand, words won’t do it justice IMO). Though going into it you should also be aware that it has mild(?) gore at a certain point, it actually makes the player aware of the consequences of such actions many other games give a clean, Hollywood, Disneyfied sort of whitewashing over (CoD included).
They’re not wrong in this case. Call of Duty is the same franchise which:
has you shoot up Russian civilians (“no Russian”)
whitewashes American war crimes… by protraying them as Russian instead (the highway of death)
has missions where you either shoot civilians (non-western, naturally) as you storm their homes, or be shot by them in turn
It’s basically boot camp for war criminals, and naturally what was intended for overseas makes its way back home.
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Some evidence to back up the connection:
https://x.com/AlanRMacLeod/status/1593709638708613123
https://www.mintpressnews.com/call-of-duty-is-a-government-psyop-these-documents-prove-it/282781/
Couple examples from the linked thread:
CoD’s biggest problem is the narrative it pushes. The violence otherwise doesn’t faze me one bit.
Agreed, context is everything. I don’t think games like GTA (perhaps somewhat), Hotline Miami, or even (from what little I know of it) Postal, can be reasonably accused of causing violence.
Call of Duty on the other hand- well, I’d argue it pushes both the legitimization of war crimes and atrocities (against civilians no less, so long as they’re “not western” ie. “deserving of human rights” in the series’ eyes) and the accompanying exceptionalist (and thus anything, any horror done is legitimized) ideology of the US/west.
As for Spec Ops the Line- while it’s been years since I last played it, I think I’d recommend it still. It thoroughly shits on the “crusading hero” mentality of other western, US military FPS games, and the settings and mechanics to my recollection were incredibly cool (Dubai if I remember correctly- but immersed by sand, words won’t do it justice IMO). Though going into it you should also be aware that it has mild(?) gore at a certain point, it actually makes the player aware of the consequences of such actions many other games give a clean, Hollywood, Disneyfied sort of whitewashing over (CoD included).
Exactly, violence is never the problem, but westoid propaganda and narrative it pushes.
I mean Spec Ops the Line could have similar missions but since it has a different narrative, I might give it a try.