It’s hard
to play through this game with a straight face. Everything the characters say
is, at best, a point of ridicule. Every word your commanding officer says is
some variation of the word “cocksucker”. It’s Life Free or Die Hard, complete with the catastrophic destruction
and cyberterrorism.
One of the
games most laughable points is its repeated attempts to mention recent
political events. The game takes place on board the state of the art battleship
Obama (despite his desire to cut
military spending). The terrorist leader repeatedly mentions rallying the 99% against
the 1%. Even David Petraeus makes an appearance after his recent disgrace. Noriega
shows up as well. It’s one of those games where they say words without really
knowing what they mean, but they still bring it up.
However, I
think the real trouble that Call of Duty presents
is not the fact that it’s poorly written and boring to play, but that it
creates an idea of masculinity that is outright ridiculous. The men in this
game are presented as an ideal to strive for. They are the best of the best of the
best, the shield of freedom, etc. These people barely emote, and even barely
register the consequences of their actions (and US foreign policy), until it
comes back to bite them in the ass.
The U.S. Military is clearly the
star of this game. However, it’s really hard to support them when the first
level of the game has you mowing down Angolans with machetes with a helicopter.
Afghans on horseback charge at your automated drones only to be mowed down by
the hundreds. When you use your billion dollar drones in third world countries
to enforce policy and essentially go after a personal vendetta, it’s pretty
easy to see the 99%’s argument. I don’t support the protagonist, but the
terrorist begins to make a pretty clear case.
I was surprised when I saw the one
of the writes on The Dark Knight Rises
helped create the main villain in CoD, but I saw the similarities between him
and Bane almost instantly afterwards. He’s a bad guy who presents high ideals
but has low motives. Standard. The US military is Batman, diving in from above
with fancy toys.
The key difference here is there is
no real emotion other than overly macho posturing. It’s over-the-top to the
point of comedy, and any options for serious dialog or an honest discourse
about the costs of being a soldier are quickly brushed aside in favor of more
excessive violence. In a game that centers so heavily on the idea of the “Call
of Duty”, any real mention of what it means to those around you to answer is
quickly swept under the rug.
One of the biggest missed
opportunities in game comes in a brief expository moment, where you walk in on
a husband and wife arguing about his duty to the military versus his duty to
his family. It’s a surprisingly powerful moment that isn’t given the time it
really deserves. It’s interrupted by more macho posturing and a few jokes about
wives and forgotten entirely. This was a completely missed opportunity by the
story team to actually add some actual realism and sincerity to a game that
desperately needed it.
Call
of Duty is a game that desperately needs some form of contrast in all the
high-testosterone posturing, but any opportunity for actual discussion is
completely missed. I’m not saying that every game needs to be deep or poignant,
but mercilessly and robotically shooting foreigners makes me feel uncomfortable
after too long.
Gamers deserve mainstream titles
that challenge their views and beliefs the same as comics. Only this way can we
actually grow as a medium and get some actual credibility.
(Yes I am familiar with Spec Ops:
The Line. I’m playing it next week and going to revisit this.)
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