Any support for Palestine is being called “terrorist” these days, so I’d rather make the judgment call for myself.
yeah, I’m sorry, but I disagree. That’s a conspiracy like Q-Anon, meant to make you feel like you’re something special, a “Truth-seeker” in a world of “global conspiracies”. This game was removed for valid reasons because it is an omage to terrorism and glorifies and validates that terrorism.
I recall from the interview when the UK blocked it the creator said “you do nothing in it you don’t do it Black Ops. But only mine is terrorism, it’s purely political.” (paraphrased)
I’ll confess that I’ve not played either of them, so I don’t know how true that holds. But I do know that a lot of those console shooters are very political and the world seems fine with it when it’s a US avatar shooting up Arabs.
Do you think Palestine sprung into existence on October 7? Why does every discussion of Israel being genocidal colonizers come down to an incident that happened decades after their oppression of Palestine began?
Do you think Palestine sprung into existence on October 7?
No. I think most people know that Israel and Palestine were both established by the League of Nations back in the 40s post the fall of the Ottoman Empire, after which they proceeded to start fighting each other for fucking decades of pointless holy wars.
I’m not sure how that’s relevant to the discussion at hand, however.
Why does every discussion of Israel being genocidal colonizers come down to an incident that happened decades after their oppression of Palestine began?
Uh, are we not currently in a thread specifically talking about an October 7th game or…?
The wording of the complaints has me wondering if the game actually does anything “wrong” by the normal standards of video gaming. Like, does it actually glorify violence specifically against Jews? Is there some mission objective to butcher a bunch of civilians? I glance at the Steam page and it looks like the political statement its creator claims it is.
I’m pretty sick of this “anything that isn’t hardcore pro-Israel is antisemitic terrorism” horsecrap. Either care about human life or don’t, don’t BS me and everyone else like the acts and atrocities committed in video games suddenly matter when characters who happen to be (presumed) Jews are involved.
Throw a rock into the FPS section of your local game store. At least one of the games you hit will allow you to play as a German soldier in World War 2.
I said “glorifying the Nazi invasion”, not “play as a German soldier in World War 2”. These are two very different things. Why the hell do I even have to explain this?
The game is called “Fursan al-Aqsa: The Knights of the Al-Aqsa Mosque”. How about a game called “Bliutzkrieg Poland: Heroes of the third reich”? In what store can I buy that one?
I’m willing to put $1000 that this game doesn’t glorify Nazis, and $100 more that it actively makes it clear to the player that while the game is played from the Nazi perspective, the game isn’t intended to glorify Nazis.
I’ve played neither games, so I cannot comment about their contents. The second part of your comment is specifically about titles.
“Knights of al-Aqsa”, as a title, does not have the same meaning nor implications of a your example. that would something more like “Bulldozing Israel, Knights of the Caliphate”, eventhough comparing the thrid riech to a caliphate is a stretch.
Knights of al-Aqsa mostlikely glorifies Hamas, along with any other faction fighting against Israel.
Panzer Corps probably glorifies Nazis as well.
but it doesn’t matter, as neither of us have played any of these games, nor will we ever. My whole point was about your choice of words for the nazi example.
“knights of al-aqsa” doesn’t have an explicit context, it comes knowledge of current events.
“panzer corps” doesn’t have an explicit context, it comes knowledge of historic events.
Bliutzkrieg Poland: Heroes of the third reich” has a very explicit context. The third reich specifically refers to nazi Germany.
Your example make it seems as if you think defending Al-Aqsa Mosque is inherently an act of aggression, murder, colonial expansion, and ethnic cleansing.
Great. as I said earlier - I’m willing to put $1000 that this game doesn’t glorify Nazis, and $100 more that it actively makes it clear to the player that while the game is played from the Nazi perspective, the game isn’t intended to glorify Nazis. Would you be willing to take that bet?
Bliutzkrieg Poland: Heroes of the third reich” has a very explicit context. The third reich specifically refers to nazi Germany.
Sorry, but if you think “panzer corps” doesn’t specifically refers to Nazi Germany, that’s on you. The first line from Wikipedia reads: A panzer corps (German: Panzerkorps) was an armoured corps type in Nazi Germany’s Wehrmacht during World War II.
I’m failing to get my point across, so I’m bowing out of discussion. However I understand your point, and partially aggree , but mostly disagreed with the phrasing.
If the Nazis had legitimate grievances against the Polish? Maybe. Your premise is flawed in that it assumes everything a Palestinian resistance fighter does is terrorism that can't ve glorified. Let me flip your question around: Woud you object to an Irish-made game that allows you to play as the IRA and car bomb the British?
If the Nazis had legitimate grievances against the Polish? Maybe.
Who decides what’s “legitimate”?
Parts of Poland belonged to the second Reich, but were taken away by force in the aftermath of WWI. From the Nazi perspective, they had every right to claim them back.
Edit: Wait, what just happened? Did you actually say saying you’d be okay with a game glorifying the Nazi invasion to Poland if they “had legitimate grievances against the Polish”? WTF?
Your premise is flawed in that it assumes everything a Palestinian resistance fighter does is terrorism that can’t ve glorified.
My premise assumes that every Hamas fighter that crossed into Israel on Oct. 7th is a terrorist. The “resistance fighters” that attacked military bases are the same people who raped party goers, burned to death civilians in their homes and kidnapped men, women, children and the elderly to be used as a bargaining chip and human shields.
Would I be for a ban of Fatah fighters attacking IDF bases? Maybe, maybe not. I probably wouldn’t argue over it with strangers on the internet, for what that’s worth.
Would you object to an Irish-made game that allows you to play as the IRA and car bomb the British?
Depends. is it called “Knights of the IRA” or glorify the IRA in any way? Then I would support the ban. Because the they were a terrorist movement that targeted civilians. Why would you even ask that? Are you seriously okay with glorifying terrorists if you happen to agree with their goals?
Edit: Wait, what just happened? Did you actually say saying you'd be okay with a game glorifying the Nazi invasion to Poland if they "had legitimate grievances against the Polish"? WTF?
I mean depends on those specific grievances by the hypothetical Nazis, yes, because then they wouldn't be Nazis as we know them.
My premise assumes that every Hamas fighter that crossed into Israel on Oct. 7th is a terrorist.
You'll need a source for that.
Because the they were a terrorist movement that targeted civilians. Why would you even ask that? Are you seriously okay with glorifying terrorists if you happen to agree with their goals?
Your terrorist is someone else's freedom fighter. Nelson Mandela was listed as a terrorist in the US until the 2000s. "Terrorist" isn't a bad word that makes a whole organization irredeemable human scum, and considering the IRA's contribution to North Irish liberation, I'd say the answer is yes. "Terrorists" are people you can love or hate depending on their specific actions and goals.
You just said you’d be okay with glorification of “theoretical” Nazis, but not if they hadn’t committed multiple war crimes, countless atrocities, murdering and incarcerating people based on mental health, ethnicity and sexual orientation. No, the thing you’re most with is that they didn’t have a good enough reason to invade Poland.
I was obviously (okay maybe not very obviously) talking within the context of their invasion of Poland. Anyway Nazis didn't have legitimate grievances with anyone they targeted (because they targeted whole ethnic groups), which is part of why they're hated so much and what illegitimizes the comparison between them and insert your hated organization of choice here.
From the link: “Video game available on Steam allows players to simulate being a Hamas teroist who k*lls Jews in the Old City of Jerusalem while shouting ‘Allahu Akbar,’” the account posted. In November, Nijm released an update called the “Operation al-Aqsa Flood Update,” which alludes to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel by having Palestinian fighters paragliding into an Israeli military base.”
No. You have given an opposite example. If you want to use historic comparisons it is Israel which proudly follows Third Reich, starting with racist laws and ending with genocide.
I said “Would you be against […] a game glorifying the IDF as it fights against Hamas terrorists in Gaza?” (and I would link to that if I could figure out how to do that…).
The main part of your message is just you saying “Israel are Nazis!!!”, which is besides the point.
You’re making a false equivalence, but regardless, I am fine with any of that, even though I hate Nazis and the IDF, because it’s a video game. It’s virtual.
Making a game about a specific attack that, at best, was purposefully indiscriminate, and at worst, directly targeted civilians is a bit more than the normal fare though. COD probably came closest with their false flag airport mission and that was a fictitious event.
Thanks for the information. I really didn’t know about that attack and was on my way out at the time so I was more reacting to generalities and what was right in front of me.
I don’t mean to suggest that anything and everything should be socially acceptable as freeze peach, just that I feel some people are being disingenuous and should be expected to point out an actual problem like “Look here, the rewards you get vary based on the racial and religious background of every civilian you kill!” Killing civilians who happen to be present regardless of other matters is murder. Killing opposing military personnel regardless of other matters is battle. Killing people because they’re Jewish is murderous antisemitism. Not wanting something seen doesn’t make it a crime… but I think some people are so stuck picking sides that even mention that there’s another point of view offends them 🤷
That said, could be Hamas is pure evil for all I know and there’s just no way to present anything they do without it being disgusting. I just… bleh, maybe it’s an autism thing. There’s a nit there that I can’t help but pick 😅 I want more sincerity and sense in this world.
To be fair I think the hostages/dead civilians are more because they’re Israeli than their religion. There’s definitely anti-Semitism in Hamas, but Hamas was founded to resist brutal occupation tactics.
Making a game about a specific attack that, at best, was purposefully indiscriminate,
I mean it also targeted the Israeli military so it definitely belongs in a game where you play as a Palestinian resistance fighter. Also the game was made in 2022 and only has a level about October 7.
Yeah that’s a good point, we play Vietnam games with zero recognition of what probably happened to the villagers. I think it probably comes down to what someone thinks the main purpose of the attack was.
I see the matters as connected: I figure people who flip out about “antisemitism” at anything even mildly unfriendly to Israel are serving (deliberately or not) to defend, justify, or even glorify its vile actions. That is, I think it’s not “zomg those poor pixel Jews!” but rather “Shhh, don’t talk like people are fighting against the IDF for a reason! (Let’s just accept that they’re all horrible evil sub-humans who must to be exterminated for the good of our wonderful, beloved friends and allies!)”
U.S. Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) is calling for Valve to pull the controversial game Fursan al-Aqsa: The Knights of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, which has players acting as a Palestinian resistance fighter, from gaming platform Steam.
The game, created by Brazilian developer Nidal Nijm, has already been removed from Steam in several countries, including the United Kingdom, following a request for removal from the U.K. Counter-Terrorism Internet Referral Unit, 404 Media reported. Nijm also said that the game is blocked across the European Union due to EU violations flagged by the French government’s cybercrime unit. In an email from Valve that Nijm showed to Polygon, the violation is of Article 3 of Regulation (EU) 2021/784, which addresses the “dissemination of terrorist content online.”
I think the funniest thing here is that this game was made by a Brazilian and it went relatively unknown until some skrub said it was anti semetic after Oct 7, despite having been published since 2022.
The issue is, once again, about the difference between buying and licensing games
Two Californian gamers are suing Ubisoft in a proposed class action lawsuit over the developer and publisher’s recent shutdown of racing game The Crew. Ubisoft released The Crew in December 2014 and shut down its servers after a decade due to “server infrastructure and licensing constraints.” After the servers shut down, the game became totally unplayable due to its lack of a single-player, offline mode. When the shutdown was announced on Dec. 14, 2023, Ubisoft did offer refunds to people who “recently” purchased The Crew, but given the age of the game, a lot of players were unable to participate in the offer.
“Imagine you buy a pinball machine, and years later, you enter your den to go play it, only to discover that all the paddles are missing, the pinball and bumpers are gone, and the monitor that proudly displayed your unassailable high score is removed,” lawyers wrote in the lawsuit, which was filed Nov. 4 in a California court and reviewed by Polygon. “Turns out the pinball manufacturer decided to come into your home, gut the insides of the pinball machine, and remove your ability to play the game that you bought and thought you owned.”
The lawsuit alleges this is “exactly” what happened when Ubisoft shut down its servers for The Crew in 2024 — suddenly leaving consumers unable to access something they purchased and assumed they owned. The lawsuit says players were duped in two ways: First, by allegedly misleading players into thinking they were buying a game when they were merely licensing it — even if a player bought a physical disk. Second, that Ubisoft “falsely represented” that The Crew’s files were on its physical disks to access freely, and that the disks weren’t simply a key for the game. Ubisoft is violating California consumer protection laws, the lawsuit alleges.
Both plaintiffs purchased the game well into its lifespan, in 2018 and 2020, respectively, on physical discs. The lawsuit says neither would have purchased the game “on the same terms,” i.e., price, knowing the game’s servers could be taken down, rendering The Crew totally unplayable even in an offline mode. The lawsuit also covers the backlash to Ubisoft’s decision to shutdown the servers and not include an offline version of the game; it cites several games that turned servers off but patched in an offline option, like Knockout City and two of Ubisoft’s own games, Assassin’s Creed 2 and Assassin’s Creed 3. Ubisoft responded to the criticism and vowed to include offline versions of its existing games in The Crew franchise, like The Crew 2 and The Crew Motorfest — but the lawsuit says this does nothing to amend the problem of The Crew’s server shutdown.
The plaintiffs are looking for the court to approve the lawsuit as a class action, meaning other The Crew players may get involved. They’re looking for monetary relief and damages for those impacted by the server shutdown. The lawsuit follows a campaign from YouTube creator Ross Scott to urge companies to “stop killing games,” a movement that kicked off after The Crew announcement was made. The Stop Killing Games movement is petitioning the European Union to force game companies to keep games in playable states. It currently has more than 379,000 signatures.
As media continues to go more and more digital, the issue of owning vs. licensing — especially in video games — becomes more of a problem. While some people are taking games into their own hands (like with the player-created The Crew Unlimited), the onus is largely on companies and what they do to preserve their games and servers. But in California, Gov. Gavin Newsom recently signed a bill into law that requires companies to tell consumers they’re buying licenses, not games themselves, in online storefronts. The law itself, introduced by California assemblywoman Jacqui Irwin, is actually partly inspired by Ubisoft’s shutdown of The Crew. The law, however, doesn’t do anything about the fact that games are licensed and not purchased outright, nor does it stop a company from rendering a game unplayable, but it does, in theory, offer transparency on the issue.
I think we need a very strict regulation, where the wording is never “purchase” or “buy” or “own”. It should always be “rent”. Because that’s what it is.
And like other time-limited services outside entertainment, the duration should be made clear. I’d personally like something as clear and blunt as:
"We guarantee access for at least X months/years after paying the license.
After service is suspended we will release all information and code necessary to set up a private server or otherwise restore function."
And for the worst kind:
"We make no guarantees of access duration, and can revoke your access immediately after paying the license.
After service is suspended we will not release information or code necessary to set up a private server or otherwise restore function."
Ideally the last type dies out completely, or becomes exceedingly rare.
These always online, server-dependent, licence-limited games are very unlike what we used to deal with; Books, DVDs, CDs, and other games on disk/cartridge or with a simple download that you can keep and use for as long as you live as long as they’re still stored and in readable condition.
They’re very different, and should be treated like it.
There should be a very clear visual difference when looking at the box or store page of a game that is made to simply last as long as you keep the code stored, and a game that won’t. A consistent warning design. Maybe two color codes.
Lets be real, while I love the idea of users making informed choices… how big do you think the labels on cigarettes to say “they will give you cancer and kill you”. People aren’t bright, you can warn them until the cows come home, they want to play a game, they will buy it. Very few of them would have listened to any warning no matter how blatent.
People are stupid… for 99.9% of people “we’ll send out the code and let you set up private servers”, is really no different than we’ll shut down the servers and you can never play again. There’s not a huge overlap between people who understand how to create a private server and/or set up their routers to allow incoming connections, and people who actually can convince friends to join their servers.
Now maybe the “the servers are guaranteed to remain until X date”, is a reasonable one. Very least tells people their games have a shelf life and not to buy it after a certain point in time.
polygon.com
Aktywne