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Comment by zefhous | Hacker News Reader

Isn't the word "solely" the key here?

> 15.3 “Enemies” within the context of a game cannot solely target a specific race, culture, a real government or corporation, or any other real entity.

If you could play as both sides it seems like they would allow it. While this rejection seems irrational, I don't think the point is that Germans and Russians are targeted, but that they are depicted as the only enemy.

Every conflict has at least two sides, and it's unthinkable that any game doesn't offend a group of people. However, it seems more reasonable that they should require "fairness" in the sense that both sides should be playable. This takes a game from having a perceived ideological stance to being more neutral, and I think that's the whole point here.

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Russia and Germany are two separate nations. Nations that were on opposite sides of WWII, no less. I don't see how the game "solely" targets one specific group.

"Nations that were on opposite sides of WWII"

Not all of WW2 - they jointly invaded Poland:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molotov%E2%80%93Ribbentrop_Pact

It was after the Soviet invasion of Poland that the infamous Katyn Massacre occurred:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katyn_massacre

Which included 7000 prisoners executed by a single man:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasili_Blokhin

Sure, but they were on opposite sides for most of the time, and they inflicted horrendous casualties on each other (Germany suffered almost as many casualties in a single battle in the east as the entire war in the west, and Russia more so) and both committed horrible massacres on the civilian population of any neutral, conquered or enemy nation.

Given the numbers, saying Russia and Germany were on opposite sides in WW2 seems pretty accurate to me.

Why are you so polite to him?

He doesn't even know about alternative theory of Khatyn's massacre because Wikipedia doesn't say so.

Maybe there's a reason why it's not mentioned in Wikipedia? Like, eg. it's not founded on any reasonable sources?

Since you mention Wikipedia, are you suggesting all of the below are false as well?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_invasion_of_Poland http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_the_Baltic_states

Why presume that the context of the game is the entire war? A lot of games and other media relating to the war focus on specific points in the war, and so your last statement doesn't necessarily apply to the game given the information conveyed in the article, specifically regarding the implication of historical inaccuracy.

Yes, all of WW2 they were opposing each other. Just because they split Poland doesn't mean they weren't enemies, it was nothing more than opportunism.

While Hitler was busy carving up Poland, he was planning the entire time for how to bring Russia to its knees. At no point did he plan for anything but eventual confrontation with Russia.

If I give you a ride home today, while plotting your demise for tomorrow, we're not pals.

That's hindsight. They were allies. They signed a pact, and they traded. True Hitler was plotting to invade Russia, but from the Russian perspective Germany was not the enemy.

If the Russians hadn't been on the opposite side against the Germans, we'd be speaking German now.

Some of us would, perhaps. Not the British though (although you have to wonder about what would happen if Germany got the bomb first). America would definitely be speaking whatever the hell the wanted to.

Lucky that... Now only half of Europe was enslaved for generations :-(

I wonder how non-Stalin or non-Communist Russia would have done vs. the Germans. Purging military leadership wasn't helpful, but industrial production was.

"...Tank Battle: East Front 1942..."

Mindless pedantry is one of the most irritating features of "hackers". Yes, we know you know a lot of stuff. Do you expect us to be impressed?

why? It's the game's name, and it says a lot. It looks like a tabletop wargame, and they are many times named like that.

I believe it's usually because they focus on a single battle, a specific zone and/or a specific time. That title helps the buyer quickly know what the game is about (Wargamers are, many times, history buffs)

[EDIT] I stand corrected. I sometime get lost in the tree-like way the replies are showed.

I should have been more clear. I was responding to "Not all of WW2 - they jointly invaded Poland", the reference to Katyn, and in fact the entire ensuing discussion which ignores the fact that the game is set in a period in which the two countries were at war, in favor of demonstrating who has command of the most precise irrelevancies.

If only one nation is playable in the game, the other nation is singled out as "the enemy". If you can only play Germany, Russia is your enemy in the entire game.

However, I think that's a silly distinction to make - you can't just swap nations in every game, since the game mechanics for managing a Soviet nation or army could well be different from those of managing the 3rd German Empire.

Yes it looks like you are correct. By 1942 they were fighting against each other. I don't know what the game allows, but reading the article I got the impression that those entities were only depicted as enemies. If that's not the case then it appears to be a misapplication or mistake according to the app store rules.

It does if the player can only play as one of the factions. Especially if the factions are really called "Germans" and "Russians". The war was fought between the Axis and the Soviet Union, which included plenty of nations besides Germany and Russia. Also, "Germans" and "Russians" are not the same as "Germany" and "Russia" (there were Germans, for example, who fought against Germany too).

But the article doesn't say much about the game, so I don't know if this was the case.

Imagine you've got a game where the goal is to liberate prisoners from concentration camps being operated by a particular race. You're telling me Apple would be more likely to approve it if you could play as a defender of the camp and the attackers are the enemy.

We like having "bad" people to kill in our killing games. Having some moral (imaged or not) highground makes us feel justified in our killing. If we remove the perceived ideological stance and make the game more neutral doesn't that make the violence pointless? I like to feel good about my violence damn it!

I concede that the point you make is right. However...

DO NOT create computer games about the Holocaust. Even if well-intended, this would be incredibly tasteless.

One can certainly debate whether or not games about WW2 are problematic, but in the case of the Holocaust... trust me. It doesn't matter how elaborate and well-thought-through your argument for making the game is. It is still tasteless.

There are many films and books about the Holocaust, I don't think games should be treated any differently.

I do agree with the general sentiment that making games about the holocaust is probably not a good idea, but if someone did it and did it well, I wouldn't hesitate to play it. Not all games have to be trivial.

Agreed. Just throwing in some concentration camps and gas chambers in a tower defense game would be unneeded and tasteless. However an realistic game where you had to escape from a concentration camp or aid escapees that employed a lot of stealth(Thief) elements with realistic/gritty world (DayZ comes to mind but without Zombies) and the sequences could be based on some of the true life stories.

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