Monday 27 May 2019

Editorial | World at War: Humanity at its darkest moment.




By Sam Coles:

The Call of Duty series is often met with a resounding sigh, where the user then takes a shot of whisky to brace themselves for the horrendous business practises, but I digress. Back in the day Call of Duty were war shooters that respected the subject matter, where they showed what war was like and it’s not just a game. Back in 2008 Treyarch produced one of the darkest games in the series, and that game was Call of Duty: World at War. World at War was an unforgiving depiction of the Second World War, where it showed the atrocities in unflinching detail and questioned the actions of what you were doing. I want to take a look at World at War’s depiction of war, and yes I did touch on it briefly in article a few months back, but I want to go into more detail.

Most World War 2 games generally show that America is the greatest country in the world, not to stomp on the efforts of the United States in the war but they do get a lot of attention in war entertainment. Not in World at War where it doesn’t even start with a patronising tutorial, no you are POW of the Japanese army where your friend is tortured and then has his throat sliced wide open redecorating the wall to his immediate left. I remember this opening absolutely shocking me back in the day, I was 15 at the time when this game came out and thought yes Call of Duty games are violent but not that violent.

Call of Duty: World at War sees the perspective of two soldiers, first there is Private Miller for the USMC fighting in the Pacific theatre and then there is Dimitri Petrenko a soldier in the Red Army pushing back the Nazi war machine in Eastern Europe. Before the Call of Duty series went on a week-long cocaine binge with Modern Warfare 2, it was a fairly grounded depiction of war. World at War is very unforgiving with how it shows the Second World War, the game goes I don’t care about your feelings, people get their arms blown off and get burnt to a crisp by flamethrower, that was what World War 2 was like. It’s this approach that makes the narrative haunting, coupled with the chilling musical score that adds to the oppressive atmosphere.

The game has two parts to it gameplay and narrative, let’s start off with gameplay which is emphasised more when you are playing as the Americans fighting through Japan. In most first person shooters at the time enemies would plink away at you from cover, but the Japanese don’t just shoot at you they Banzai charge you. Yes, what added to the gritty nature of Call of Duty: World at War was the fact that they used the battle tactics of the time when it came to the Pacific theatre. Enemies would use guerrilla warfare tactics, they would hide in long grass, play dead and snipe from trees, and it added an extra layer of depth and tension to the gameplay.

However when it came to the Russian side of the campaign the gameplay was standard, but this is because they put an extra focus on the narrative where the Germans would fight in a less barbaric fashion. The story focuses when the Nazis invade Stalingrad and the Soviets push back into the heart of Germany, at first it is for the people of Russia and Europe however when you get closer to Berlin everything spirals into darkness.
The hypocrisy from the Red Army shines true when they get to Berlin, because like the Nazis they start to execute soldiers in cold blood even when they are surrendering. To quote Sgt. Reznov “We will flush out every rat, the young, the old and the weak. If they stand for Germany, they die for Germany”. It’s this depiction of World War 2 that really got to me as I knew the Russians were ruthless in the invasion of Berlin, but to see it happen on screen in my favourite art medium was haunting and unflinching.

Even some of Reznov’s men start to question his methods, as what some of them saw what he was doing was unjustified and cold blooded murder. To quote Chernov “This isn’t war, this is murder”. Chernov is Reznov’s biggest critic throughout the campaign as he disagrees with his methods, such as shooting soldiers that are bleeding to death, shooting their enemies in the back as it is dishonourable and executing soldiers that are surrendering. They constantly but heads and Reznov sees him as a coward as he sees him constantly writing in his journal, to quote “What do you think will win this war? Fighting or writing about it? If you lack the stomach to kill for your country, at least show you are willing to die for it”.

At the end of the campaign of World at War you win the conflict, but I had similar feelings I had with Spec Ops: The Line where I thought were my actions justified? What makes this hard to stomach in this game is that this actually happened in human history, how humanity can be so cruel and twisted, to watch a fellow man suffer clutching open wounds is disturbing and haunting. World at War shows humanity at its darkest moment, where sadism was normal currency because it justified getting the job done.

Call of Duty: World at War is a game that you should experience, as it is an unforgiving, brutal and gritty depiction of the Second World War. Game designers do not have the gonads to release a game like this these days, as most would be immediately offended. It respects the era, however it does not shy away from the dark subject matter as it wants to show you how it was back then.

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