First of all I've not been here long so if a similar topic was posted here recently feel free to link it and call me names. I'm into military sim games and flight simulators. For example DCS, ARMA and Rising storm 2: Vietnam. I really like the gameplay, but I sometimes can't help thinking about the real world atrocities that were committed with the simulated war machine I'm using.
For example, I'm googling the name of an Air-to-Ground missile so that I can find out its effective range or something, and the wikipedia page has paragraphs about how it was "really effective" in bombing bridges in Vietnam, or how it was used extensively in Iraq. Less often it's something more wholesome, like how improper handling of a Zuni rocket resulted in a huge and very destructive fire on a US aircraft carrier while it was deployed in the South China sea during the Vietnam war.
It doesn't help of course how any story or campaign on such games is basically unapologetic NATO propaganda. It's also interesting how games like Call of Duty don't usually trigger this for me, because their mechanics are so far removed from reality it's basically an arcade game with a "realistic" coat of paint, no different from DOOM or whatever.
Anyway, those feelings aren't enough for me to stop playing those games, nor do I think they're fundamentally unethical or something. I'm just wondering if anyone here had similar experiences.
One of my fave games of all time is/was the original Operation Flashpoint set in '85 against the soviets. I've played all its Arma sequels where the baddies are Russians or their proxies. Ironic for games developed in Czechia, I must say, but thems the breaks.
As a communist now, I'm conflicted, but nonetheless I still, to this day, want a good Soviet mod for Arma 3. So I can play as the good guys (the USSR).
That sounds cool. I've personally only played Arma 3, which I loved just because it's basically the only big-budget game set in modern Greece (I'm Greek) and they did a pretty good job with the environment. The story was the usual cool American operator shit that's in every FPS from what I remember, but I still enjoyed it. Fun fact: Two of their developers got arrested back in '12 and charged with espionage because they were visiting Lemnos and were caught taking pictures of military installations to put in the game lol.
There is a good Soviet mod for Arma 3! There is a mod campaign called Operation Peacemaker where you play as Soviet peacekeepers sent to help stabilize a chaotic socialist republic with a suspiciously well armed rebel army (hey is that a stinger missile?) I highly recommend, and I also loved the original Operation Flashpoint, though I liked the Resistance campaign especially.
Man, I played the shit out of OFP back in the day; one of my favorite games, too. It was such a shame that they actually included a Soviet campaign with Red Hammer, but you ended up defecting part way through to join the Resistance faction. Such a cop-out move.