[HN Gopher] UK counter-terrorism unit demands Steam withdraw con...
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UK counter-terrorism unit demands Steam withdraw controversial
shooter from sale
Author : healsdata
Score : 38 points
Date : 2024-12-01 22:13 UTC (46 minutes ago)
(HTM) web link (www.eurogamer.net)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.eurogamer.net)
| medo-bear wrote:
| accusations of anti semitism has become a meme because of israel
| halJordan wrote:
| First middle east flare up?
| ethernot wrote:
| This is irrelevant really. If they produced a game that was IDF
| killing Palestinians, well we might have the same view.
|
| Both are fucking tasteless and morally questionable.
| fakedang wrote:
| Well, he quoted Black Ops 6, where you play an American going
| to Iraq to kill Iraqis...
| ethernot wrote:
| Yeah I'm not queuing up to buy that either.
|
| What happened to killing demons on Phobos?
| echoangle wrote:
| I didn't check the game but killing people isn't all equal,
| do you kill civilians in Black Ops 6, and do you kill
| civilians in the banned game? The better comparison would
| be COD MW2 (with the famous ,,no Russian" mission), which
| was controversial for exactly this reason.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| >which was controversial for exactly this reason
|
| Only among stupid people. Most gamers yawned in boredom.
| somedude895 wrote:
| To kill Iraqi soldiers, not murder civilians.
|
| The proper analogy to this would be if in COD you played a
| Blackwater operator during the Nisour Square massacre.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| >Both are fucking tasteless and morally questionable.
|
| A game has to be fun, not tasteful or moral. But I doubt that
| the gameplay is good. Political people making a statement
| suck at producing good art.
| talldayo wrote:
| > "I do not blame Valve nor Steam, the blame is on the UK
| government and authorities that are pissed off by a video game,"
| Nijm said. "On their flawed logic, the most recent Call of Duty
| Black Ops 6 should be banned as well. As you play as an American
| soldier and go to Iraq to kill Iraqi people. What I can say is
| that we see clearly the double standards."
|
| Love him or hate him, he does make a principled point.
| riiii wrote:
| The UK ban is taking care of UK interestst. I don't think
| anyone would be surprised if Iraq would request a ban on BO6 in
| Iraq.
| rimeice wrote:
| Yeh, not really double standards. If you banned a game
| because anyone got killed in it, there wouldn't be many video
| games...
| talldayo wrote:
| Britain hasn't had a sovereign interest in the Levant for
| over a century. Their citizens deserve access to uncensored
| media to form their own opinions, even if the media is satire
| that would make Matt Stone and Trey Parker blush.
| whenc wrote:
| Pedantry: Cyprus is in the levant, and the UK has two
| sovereign areas there.
| ethernot wrote:
| I think we can probably make do without a game that
| glorifies the 7th of October massacre. Or any as a matter
| of fact.
|
| I mean I pretty much made my mind up about that one
| already. It didn't take a lot of effort.
| pessimizer wrote:
| We can make do without any games. Or any books.
| amarcheschi wrote:
| "I think we can probably make do without a game that
| glorifies the 7th of October massacre. Or any as a matter
| of fact."
|
| The developer of the game is complaining about a double
| standard. Given the fact that we have shooter games
| glorifying some abhorrent us activities, and we are okay
| with that, we do have a double standard. We could discuss
| for ages whether it's wrong or right, but we can't hide
| behind "oh no it's a terrible thing" because we have been
| representing terrible things since decades, but this time
| apparently it's bad because it's not our faction doing
| the funny (it's not so funny anymore, isn't it?)
| throw310822 wrote:
| Sure, if you admit that the information and the entertainment
| available in one's country should align with that country
| "interests", then there is no doubt about it. However the
| West markets itself exactly as the place where such thing
| doesn't happen, so that's where the problem lies.
| ralph84 wrote:
| Not the West, just the US. Free speech outside of the US
| isn't really a thing. The UK in particular has been very
| aggressive in censoring speech recently.
| wds wrote:
| So, should the UK be considered to be on the same level as
| Iraq for freedom of expression now, or?
| elmerfud wrote:
| Have you taken a look at some of the draconian speech laws
| that the UK has passed? They are definitely on the same
| level as Iraq or even Iran.
| echoangle wrote:
| How does that follow? The main problem with freedom of
| expression in Iraq isn't the censorship of video games that
| include actions against Iraq. If that was the only
| censorship in Iraq, the UK and Iraq would be on the same
| level.
| ReptileMan wrote:
| UK is turning into Oceania. Police are knocking on people's
| doors for tweets. And in a way in Iraq chances are you will
| have greater freedom of expression because the state
| capacity is low. UK can enforce shit.
| bigfatkitten wrote:
| The UK has never, at any point in its long history, hidden
| its authoritarian tendencies.
| ipaddr wrote:
| A principle point would be going after the Brazilian army but
| that would get him arrested. Safe principled point?
| amarcheschi wrote:
| Also, call of duty had and has ties with the army that sees is
| as a potential recruitment tool. [1]
|
| Furthermore, in one call of duty a real event was narrated -
| although if in a fictional scenario - as if it was made by
| Russians [2], while in real life it was a us led attack on
| civilians, prisoners, and non fighting combatants. Google
| highway of death
|
| Another article that has a broader view on the history of how
| defense and entertainment sector have ties [3]
|
| [1] https://gamerant.com/call-duty-modern-warfare-recruitment-
| to... [2] https://www.newsweek.com/call-duty-modern-warfare-
| highway-de... [3]
| https://www.thenation.com/article/society/call-of-duty-penta...
| tdeck wrote:
| From what I can tell in the screenshots all the targets in this
| game are military. I'd be curious if that's indeed the case.
| jsheard wrote:
| That's what the linked 404 Media article says, that the
| enemies are all IDF soldiers and the player is penalised for
| killing _unarmed_ soldiers (though the developer undermined
| themselves there by showing an unarmed prisoner being
| executed in the trailer, which supposedly doesn 't happen in
| the actual game).
| Aeolun wrote:
| I came in prepared to defend the game and all, but then I read
| the subject matter, and just walked away thinking it's a miracle
| it's available anywhere.
|
| Sure, he's right that that's double standards, but still.
| 0_____0 wrote:
| They added in the Oct7 attacks?! Pretty abhorrent. That being
| said, I'm not sure what counter-terror objective blocking this
| game actually has.
| echoangle wrote:
| Pretty wild guess but maybe to prevent radicalization and
| recruitment? If you have a game like this and get the players
| onto your discord, you might move over some of them to do
| something in real life.
| dmix wrote:
| COD famously did this for the airport scene. I see these Steam
| indie games like standup comedy, a lot of smaller/younger devs
| try hard to push boundaries to get attention in a sea of
| thousands of generic games coming out every month. It is
| sometimes where good ideas come from. Or maybe another analogy is
| porn where there's a million niche things for everybody's
| perverse interests.
| pessimizer wrote:
| The difference between this and CoD is that the government
| supports, advises, and might even invest in CoD. It's the right
| kind of killing.
| neom wrote:
| This is the description I lifted from steam: "Fursan al-Aqsa: The
| Knights of the Al-Aqsa Mosque is a Third Person Action Game on
| which you play as Ahmad al-Falastini, a young Palestinian Student
| who was unjustly tortured and jailed by Israeli Soldiers for 5
| years, had all his family killed by an Israeli Airstrike and now,
| after getting out from the prison, seeks revenge against those
| who wronged him, killed his family and stolen his homeland, by
| joining a new Palestinian Resistance Movement called Fursan al-
| Aqsa: The Knights of the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
|
| This game is greatly inspired by Hideo Kojima's Metal Gear Solid,
| Call of Duty Modern Warfare, Insurgency Sandstorm, Max Payne and
| Goldeneye 007."
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(page generated 2024-12-01 23:00 UTC)