French video game targets U.S. insecurities

There is a violent French video game coming out this year with an interesting plot: The oligarchs of the world are fighting over oil. The U.S. wins, which prompts terrorist attacks on U.S. soil. The terrorists kidnap Senators and cause other mayhem, the aim of the game is to fight them off. Later in the game you find out that the U.S. is behind these attacks.

I downloaded the demo and was surprised that such a controversial theme made it into such a mainstream game. Leave it to the French.

Let me know what y'all think:

dlx.gamespot.com...

Yeah I've heard about this for awhile. Meh, nothing special. Looks like a 3-D Red Alert with terrorists instead of Russians. Graphics look crap too.

[edit on 25-1-2005 by Vorta]

Lets remember that is just it is a computer game with a sci-fi back story (and a rubbish one at that).

Loads of games are viewed as controversial, in poor taste or just a bit of fun, depending on your opion. Most of these aren't made by the French.

How many recent US made games are set in the Middle East and feature marines blowing up endless waves of people with olive skin and moustaches (Arabs). How do you think an Iraqi would feel seeing this, not long after the real thing has just happened, and there are still tanks outside their house?

Originally posted by Veltro
Yeah I've heard about this for awhile. Meh, nothing special. Looks like a 3-D Red Alert with terrorists instead of Russians. Graphics look crap too.

Dude are you kidding? The graphics look sweet. Have you downloaded the demo? I found it here: gamesdomain.yahoo.com...

Japan is comming out with a game Metal Wolf were you are in a gaint Mech and you must fight off the evil US military.

France is not really well known for making great games like Japan though. I checked out the screen shots and am not impressed looks like a mod on the half life1 engine.Ill stick to fighting religous fanatical aliens in HALO.

Hey! Half Life Original kicks ass! And with the whole series and video uprgrades it looks sweet as hell, not as good as HL2 though, god that is an orgasm for the visual senses.

Anyways, who cares? Japan still makes the best games, with America just a .0000000000000000000000000000001 second behind. Everyone else is at least a week behind Japan and America in game making.

I was talking about the very first version of Half life great for the time alittle dated now. Then when you compare it to Half Life 2

But looking more into the game its infact a strategy game like Command and Conquer so that would explain models looking alittle rough, Onscreen they are so small.

Originally posted by SplitPeaSoup

Originally posted by Veltro
Yeah I've heard about this for awhile. Meh, nothing special. Looks like a 3-D Red Alert with terrorists instead of Russians. Graphics look crap too.

Dude are you kidding? The graphics look sweet. Have you downloaded the demo? I found it here: gamesdomain.yahoo.com...

Bleh, looks like yet another C&C:Generals clone too me, with subpar graphics too boot.




Now AOE3 has GREAT graphics allthough not out yet...

There seems to be a lot of games like that out nowadays.

There was a game made by a Russian Muslim recently, where to goal is to liberate Chechnya.

MosNews
Vladimir Matveyev, a Moscow resident, developed “Ichkeria, Operation Flash-Point” as a game about the Chechen jihad, Ekho Moskvy radio reported, citing an interview with Matveyev.

Matveyev — who prefers to be called Shamil — described the game during the broadcast.

“This is a computer game about the Chechen jihad. The player has several challenges, including liberating Ichkeria and destroying aggressive Russian enemies.”

[edit on 26-1-2005 by AceOfBase]

Ah yes AoE 3... Awesomeness.

I'm playing Hearts of Iron 2 right now, awesome really really deep WWII strategy. Not for those with little patience though. Also playing around with Gary's mod for HL2...fun stuff. Waiting on Brothers in Arms which has no release date yet.

Originally posted by sardion2000

Originally posted by SplitPeaSoup

Originally posted by Veltro
Yeah I've heard about this for awhile. Meh, nothing special. Looks like a 3-D Red Alert with terrorists instead of Russians. Graphics look crap too.

Dude are you kidding? The graphics look sweet. Have you downloaded the demo? I found it here: gamesdomain.yahoo.com...

Bleh, looks like yet another C&C:Generals clone too me, with subpar graphics too boot.

I dunno, I think the storyline is pretty unique. It's by Dale Brown, a former Air Force pilot. He's supposed to release a book with the same theme as the game later this year. Act of War is supposed to have like 40 minutes of 35mm fake newsreel footage.

A French game written by former U.S. military that suggests that the U.S. was responsible for 9/11? Sounds like a conspiracy to me.

Well games and entertaiment mostly see US in good light, when its produced in US and mostly their markets, so why not some have little imagination and own story that might not always show US as good guy.

Japanese has always used US sort of warmonger who press nuke buttons easily toward others unless agreed with. Atlantic alliance was last what i saw and it was clearly reflected as US. But gotta love japanese endings, rarely ever happy ending.

But its good that theres freedom to create all sort of storys, think about how much US had used Russia and old soviet union member states in various movies and so on, while its so far from truth, or we had apocalypse centuries ago.

Originally posted by Observer83

But its good that theres freedom to create all sort of storys, think about how much US had used Russia and old soviet union member states in various movies and so on, while its so far from truth, or we had apocalypse centuries ago.

Very good points. The thing is - our government might not restrict the kind of stories that are allowed (aside from pulling funding for PBS when there's a show that features a child with two mommies, but those who watch PBS are the choir being preached to anyway), but our market economy certainly does. I'm not anti-capitalist - I just find it interesting that the media becomes a reflection of the ideas that are most palatable to the American consumer. Just think of all the things that can't show on network TV because it would spook the advertisers (who are only spooked because they are representing the common denominator of consumers - to them only the dollar matters).

In truth - we as a people don't want to hear stories that pit the U.S. as a bad guy. We are used to the small selection of plotlines that are most salient and when things outside of this come along we either wrinkle our nose or, more interestingly, absorb it without filters.

That's why this game Act of War is so interesting to me. It plays like a training for the military, but it has a nuanced political plot including fake news footage that is designed to make one question the government.

Can't be worst than 'Conflict Desert Storm' for Xbox/Ps2. Everytime I killed an Iraqi and got awarded for it, I knew something was just a little bit wrong with it. Oh and not to mention it was released by the US Army.

How about Fighting Carnivorous and Cannibalistic Brain in a Jar Alien Invaders infamous for their Godlike Intelligence level that makes up their lack of Physical strength and Dexterity but Brutal and Greedy people?