Idle Thumbs 153: Blondie, Freckles, and Glasses

[Dijonjon]

The part I've bolded is really the crux of the issue for me, and I think it's awfully fucking uncharitable to your fellow human beings to think that all it would take for them to want to slaughter millions of people is to be enticed by a sharp-looking outfit. If you can't appreciate some of the aesthetics of the Nazi regime without by extension sympathizing with their ideology, that's something that's probably more of a personal problem, rather than something a video game developer can be held responsible for.

 

I appreciate the sentiment of giving other people the benefit of the doubt. But I feel like it's a bit reductive to put the entirety of the responsibility on the audience. To echo other responses in this thread, the issue seems to be one of carelessness and empathy. I agree that we shouldn't hold creators accountable for how people read their work. Yet, I do think that if you create something that might be challenging or troubling, you should have a good reason for doing so.

 

While I don't believe that Vlambeer tried to trick people into becoming Nazi sympathizers, I do think they are at fault (to a point). The way I see it either they didn't realize there was a parallel to draw between the Luftrausers and Nazism or they did but thought it was OK. About the latter point, I don't think they said, "Oh, people might think these folks are Nazis… fuck 'em". Although, it might have been more like, "Oh, people might think these folks are Nazis… but probably not." I don't think it matters which train of thought (or lack thereof) is to blame, I find both of them problematic.

 

Now, I could be wrong. Vlambeer might have a compelling reason for some of the aesthetic choices aside from it looking hecka rad. Though if that's the case, I don't think the game communicates it well.

 

Again I don't think there's any use in condemning Vlambeer, but I do think it's for the best to call them out on it. My only fear is that they may be more cautious about tackling challenging topics/contexts. I think the takeaway for them should be whether they have sound reasons for their choices, aesthetic or otherwise.

[Gormongous]

I'm not sure it's very uncharitable. We can get people to literally torture innocent people just by labeling one group guards and the other group prisoners. If you think human beings are magical rational creatures that don't let silly things like labels and aesthetics influence their actions then you're living in a fantasy land. There are a lot of neo-Nazis out there and I'm pretty sure none of them had actual, legitimate, good reasons for becoming neo-Nazis. The seductive aesthetic of the movement isn't some kind of accident. Neo-Nazis don't dress up in flannel jackets and sweat pants.

And this is one of the reasons that people are still super sensitive about Nazi related imagery.  Three murders in what is normally one of the more boring cities in the nation. 

I appreciate the sentiment of giving other people the benefit of the doubt. But I feel like it's a bit reductive to put the entirety of the responsibility on the audience. To echo other responses in this thread, the issue seems to be one of carelessness and empathy. I agree that we shouldn't hold creators accountable for how people read their work. Yet, I do think that if you create something that might be challenging or troubling, you should have a good reason for doing so.

 

While I don't believe that Vlambeer tried to trick people into becoming Nazi sympathizers, I do think they are at fault (to a point). The way I see it either they didn't realize there was a parallel to draw between the Luftrausers and Nazism or they did but thought it was OK. About the latter point, I don't think they said, "Oh, people might think these folks are Nazis… fuck 'em". Although, it might have been more like, "Oh, people might think these folks are Nazis… but probably not." I don't think it matters which train of thought (or lack thereof) is to blame, I find both of them problematic.

 

Now, I could be wrong. Vlambeer might have a compelling reason for some of the aesthetic choices aside from it looking hecka rad. Though if that's the case, I don't think the game communicates it well.

 

Again I don't think there's any use in condemning Vlambeer, but I do think it's for the best to call them out on it. My only fear is that they may be more cautious about tackling challenging topics/contexts. I think the takeaway for them should be whether they have sound reasons for their choices, aesthetic or otherwise.

 

And I think people have every right to feel uncomfortable about Nazi imagery, whether explicit or implicit. I've definitely come around since my earlier posts on whether Luftrausers is about Nazis and whether people should take offense. My question now is really, should they have made the game? Should anyone be able to make a game where you play a Nazi? It's an interesting discussion to me, because we've answered that question pretty authoritatively for every other historical evil in the Western world. You play a Soviet-style bureaucrat entirely complicit in the deportation and perhaps genocide of dozens in Papers Please. I can't imagine how it would be to play that game as someone whose parents were shot trying to cross from East to West Berlin or who were sent to Siberia for whatever. You can play a Confederate soldier and slave-owner in Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood. I can't imagine how it would be to play that game as a black person whose ancestors were bought, sold, worked, raped, and even killed by someone exactly like your character ingame.

 

One of these games is a deep study in the historical evil it trades on, the other is just superficial dressing. Like I pointed out in my first post, the criticism of Luftrausers and Brenda Romero's Train tells me that games about Nazis can get away with being neither. However rightly or wrongly, the Holocaust is too much a totem of the ultimate genocide in Western culture, the Nazis too much a totem of the ultimate historical evil for a game about either to avoid criticism. I suspect that Vlambeer knew that, but still wanted to make a game where you play as a doomed Nazi pilot anyway, for the aesthetic reasons that the Thumbs talked about. That's why the game's art so carefully eschews swastikas and crosses of any kind. What surprises me is that, when people still said, "Hey, you play a Nazi and that's fucked up," their apology was not about owning the game either as a superficial trifle or a wacky subversion, but instead about alternate histories and the multiplicity of valid interpretations. It felt and still feels mealy-mouthed to me. I don't see anything wrong with them having said, "Yeah, you play a guy who might be like a Nazi, but you don't commit any atrocities, you're not portrayed as the good guy, and you always fail and die in the end." That is the truth of their game and what makes it okay for me, although not for others and that's okay too. I just don't know what they thought making such an obviously controversial game and then not having a ready reason for it, not when there are ready reasons why there need to be games (and movies and books and songs) from the real or imagined perspectives of Nazis.

[Dijonjon]

And I think people have every right to feel uncomfortable about Nazi imagery, whether explicit or implicit. I've definitely come around since my earlier posts on whether Luftrausers is about Nazis and whether people should take offense.

 

No argument here!

 

My question now is really, should they have made the game? Should anyone be able to make a game where you play a Nazi?

 

I think I see where you're coming from, but I have a negative reaction to questions like these (though that may be a fault of my own). From what I understand, the point of these questions is to understand whether or not some subject matter should be off limits for art. I haven't thought about this a great deal, but I'd like to think that there's a great deal of good that can be done by tackling certain topics through a variety of mediums, if done responsibly of course.

 

It's an interesting discussion to me, because we've answered that question pretty authoritatively for every other historical evil in the Western world. You play a Soviet-style bureaucrat entirely complicit in the deportation and perhaps genocide of dozens in Papers Please. I can't imagine how it would be to play that game as someone whose parents were shot trying to cross from East to West Berlin or who were sent to Siberia for whatever. You can play a Confederate soldier and slave-owner in Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood. I can't imagine how it would be to play that game as a black person whose ancestors were bought, sold, worked, raped, and even killed by someone exactly like your character ingame.

 

I hadn't considered these other examples, but I think this is a really solid observation. While I don't think the question of "whether or not these games should have been made" is particularly interesting, I do think the realization that certain contexts can affect certain players in ways that you (the creator) might not understand is of extreme importance. Like I said, there's a minimum amount of awareness that I feel should be required if you're going to attempt to make a game (or film, or whatever) about certain people, places, or time periods. Although, this is also somewhat naive. If someone thinks an aesthetic or time period divorced of context looks cool, and doesn't understand the possible readings, well... that's just a being misinformed, and there's nothing anyone can really do about that except for pointing it out after the fact.

 

One of these games is a deep study in the historical evil it trades on, the other is just superficial dressing. Like I pointed out in my first post, the criticism of Luftrausers and Brenda Romero's Trains tells me that games about Nazis can get away with being neither. However rightly or wrongly, the Holocaust is too much a totem of the ultimate genocide in Western culture, the Nazis too much a totem of the ultimate historical evil for a game about either to avoid criticism.

 

Well, rather than this criticism being seen as negative, I like to view it as a positive. If not for any particular game than, for the medium as a whole. If you're making something that might be worth a damn, I feel like being put under scrutiny is sort of what you want. I don't think a game like Train was made with the hopes of getting away with it, but rather to create interesting discussions around the piece. There is an amount of intentionality and thoughtfulness that just doesn't exist in something like Luftrausers, and that's what I find troubling (personally).

 

I suspect that Vlambeer knew that, but still wanted to make a game where you play as a doomed Nazi pilot anyway, for the aesthetic reasons that the Thumbs talked about. That's why the game's art so carefully eschews swastikas and crosses of any kind. What surprises me is that, when people still said, "Hey, you play a Nazi and that's fucked up," their apology was not about owning the game either as a superficial trifle or a wacky subversion, but instead about alternate histories and the multiplicity of valid interpretations. It felt and still feels mealy-mouthed to me. I don't see anything wrong with them having said, "Yeah, you play a guy who might be like a Nazi, but you don't commit any atrocities, you're not portrayed as the good guy, and you always fail and die in the end." That is the truth of their game and what makes it okay for me, although not for others and that's okay too. 

I just don't know what they thought making such an obviously controversial game and then not having a ready reason for it, not when there are ready reasons why there need to be games (and movies and books and songs) from the real or imagined perspectives of Nazis.

 

I don't know if I'd go as far to say that they intended to make a game about Nazis. The response feels a bit wishy washy, but I don't think they're lying when they say they didn't intend for people to read it that way. Again, I sort of see this as an indication that they didn't put as much thought into it as they probably should have.

[Gormongous]

Man, awesome post. Most of it goes without saying, especially how shitty it is for me to be like, "Well, can we have any games about Nazis?" That's what I'm asking myself, because I want to know, but it's not how I should phrase it in an intellectually honest conversation. I know there are bounds of taste, I just want to know precisely how Luftrausers crossed this one.

 

I don't know if I'd go as far to say that they intended to make a game about Nazis. The response feels a bit wishy washy, but I don't think they're lying when they say they didn't intend for people to read it that way. Again, I sort of see this as an indication that they didn't put as much thought into it as they probably should have.

 

See, the thing is, they're Dutch, as other posters have observed, so it's not like they don't know about the Nazis. They took the time to capture the Nazis aesthetic in the art of their game, while removing all swastikas, crosses, and other symbols, so they knew there was a line that could be crossed there. I'm not saying they did it intentionally and were hoping that no one would say anything, but to use the Nazi aesthetic and yet try to scrub it of its defining features speaks to a lot of thought put into it, in my opinion. I just wish that the whole "ZOMG Nazis" furor didn't prevent them from feeling they could be forthright about their creative intentions, instead of hiding them behind a smokescreen. I want to know why you chose the Nazi aesthetic, Vlambeer. Did you not want to use Jake's beefy American pilot in a game called Hellraisers and it just went from there? If you wanted to make a game and wanted to use Nazi imagery n it, that's fine, just say so. We can all talk about it without blame. Except not, I guess. I don't know.

[Bjorn]

I've mostly stayed out of this discussion.  I can see what is problematic with Luftrausers, and why it might bother some people, but I don't have any kind of personal reaction against it. My earlier link was just pointing out that continued concern about Nazi imagery is really valid for some communities.

 

But, something about the whole conversation feels...weird to me.  Video games have this insane, convoluted history with Nazis and WW2.  There is probably no other historical event that has appeared or been referenced in more games.  You can go back to the dawn of mainstream home consoles to find what is probably the first game where you can play as the Germans in WW2.  Of course our entire media and culture is obsessed with Nazis and WW2.  There have been so many WW2 movies made, that they have to split the list up by decade, and filter out television, documentaries and Holocaust movies into their own lists.  And that isn't taking into account the random use of Nazis and Hitler across all sorts of properties.  Shit, most of us may have never gone an entire week in our lives without encountering some reference to WW2, Nazis, Hitler or the Holocaust.  Lord knows how many books there are. 

 

That's not a defense, per se, but it is pointing out that millions of people have been capitalizing on Nazi and WW2 imagery for what is probably trillions dollars in revenue for the last 70+ years.  Think about that, capitalizing on WW2 and Nazi imagery is a trillion dollar industry.  And most of the time not a lot is said about that.  And even if they are cast as the villain, its not like most of these properties are trying to say something profound about fascism, or educate the public.  They are trying to turn a profit and using a convenient aesthetic that they know people already buy shit for.  I guess I don't see much of a difference between protagonist and antagonist when the end result is profit for companies and a maintenance of this aesthetic as a core cultural keystone.

 

So yeah, it feels weird to me for Luftrausers to raise a stir when there is probably something made, written, filmed or programmed every single week about WW2 that could be criticized for profiting from a Nazi aesthetic and maintaining that aesthetic in our culture.

[TychoCelchuuu]

So yeah, it feels weird to me for Luftrausers to raise a stir when there is probably something made, written, filmed or programmed every single week about WW2 that could be criticized for profiting from a Nazi aesthetic and maintaining that aesthetic in our culture.

Most World War II games don't lift the aesthetic without also lifting the history. The reason Luftrausers is getting shit is because it took one part of World War II (the aesthetic of the Third Reich) and used it because it's appealing and interesting looking. In doing so it lost the context that explains to us why we should be wary of it.

When Call of Duty 2 includes a Tiger tank, it's not because they checked all the world's tanks and picked the most badass one, then carefully scrubbed all the identifying marks off of it so as to leave only the war machine. CoD 2 puts a Tiger tank in there because Tigers were in World War II. And we all know how World War II went, and why when we see a Tiger tank we should be thinking more than just "wow, badass."

If Luftrausers had just been a World War II dogfighting game it wouldn't have gotten shit, because the objectionable thing isn't making World War II dogfighting games, it's in lifting the aesthetic and divorcing it from its historical context in which it means something and moving it to a new context where all it apparently means is "check out how badass this looks."

[Chris]

I don't have time to dive deep into this discussion again, but regarding games treating this kind of subject matter in a way that goes beyond the surface style:

Anna Kipnis, one of my former coworkers at Double Fine, was born in the Soviet Union and came to the United States when she was young. She has told me how much she appreciates Papers, Please, since--despite the satiric angle--she recognized in it something really powerful and true about the experience of dealing with Soviet border control and immigration, and bureaucracy generally. She knew people who faced severe challenges in their attempts to leave the Soviet Union and felt the game addressed this in a meaningful and empathetic way.

[Badfinger]

I hadn't considered these other examples, but I think this is a really solid observation. While I don't think the question of "whether or not these games should have been made" is particularly interesting, I do think the realization that certain contexts can affect certain players in ways that you (the creator) might not understand is of extreme importance. Like I said, there's a minimum amount of awareness that I feel should be required if you're going to attempt to make a game (or film, or whatever) about certain people, places, or time periods. Although, this is also somewhat naive. If someone thinks an aesthetic or time period divorced of context looks cool, and doesn't understand the possible readings, well... that's just a being misinformed, and there's nothing anyone can really do about that except for pointing it out after the fact.

I feel schizophrenic throughout this whole conversation because I've been all over the place. I don't find the question of whether they should be made or not interesting either, because they should have been. If they're properly considered and executed in a way that represents things in a thoughtful way, then they should be made. If something's there that shouldn't be or is gratuitous for its own sake that's a different story.

 

 

I also don't think Luftrausers discussion is inflaming the world. It just happened to dominate this week's thread because it's an interesting, serious topic that can potentially have a lot of nuance.

[Gormongous]

If Luftrausers had just been a World War II dogfighting game it wouldn't have gotten shit, because the objectionable thing isn't making World War II dogfighting games, it's in lifting the aesthetic and divorcing it from its historical context in which it means something and moving it to a new context where all it apparently means is "check out how badass this looks."

 

I agree with you completely, but I wonder why that treatment is overwhelmingly applied to Nazis. There are hundreds of thousands of hammer-and-sickle, Mao, and Che t-shirts out there whose wearers have no idea what they really mean or maybe even who they are. Why is there no hue and cry over the many games that use Soviet aesthetics because they look different and interesting, like City 17 in Half-Life 2, or even just use Nazi aesthetics as a reductive shorthand for evil, like the Helgast from Killzone? Pretty much every game out there with any sort of flavor has ripped it from some historical context, but Luftrausers crossed a line with some and I want to know, with all curiosity and sincerity, where that line is for them.

 

I also feel bad because I know that pen-and-paper wargames have a very sophisticated and edifying discourse surrounding the ethics of playing and winning as the Nazis, but I'm not familiar with any of it or with anyone who could introduce it to me.

[Dijonjon]

Man, awesome post. Most of it goes without saying, especially how shitty it is for me to be like, "Well, can we have any games about Nazis?" That's what I'm asking myself, because I want to know, but it's not how I should phrase it in an intellectually honest conversation. I know there are bounds of taste, I just want to know precisely how Luftrausers crossed this one.

 

I'm getting the impression that I upset you, and I'm sorry about that. That really wasn't the reaction I was going for (the irony of this in the context of this conversation is not lost on me...) Anyway, I wasn't trying to imply that it was a bad/shitty/stupid question to ask. I was just trying to provide my viewpoint on it. Obviously, this was not done in an effective way. Sorry again.

 

Most World War II games don't lift the aesthetic without also lifting the history. The reason Luftrausers is getting shit is because it took one part of World War II (the aesthetic of the Third Reich) and used it because it's appealing and interesting looking. In doing so it lost the context that explains to us why we should be wary of it.

When Call of Duty 2 includes a Tiger tank, it's not because they checked all the world's tanks and picked the most badass one, then carefully scrubbed all the identifying marks off of it so as to leave only the war machine. CoD 2 puts a Tiger tank in there because Tigers were in World War II. And we all know how World War II went, and why when we see a Tiger tank we should be thinking more than just "wow, badass."

If Luftrausers had just been a World War II dogfighting game it wouldn't have gotten shit, because the objectionable thing isn't making World War II dogfighting games, it's in lifting the aesthetic and divorcing it from its historical context in which it means something and moving it to a new context where all it apparently means is "check out how badass this looks."

 

Yeah that's true. Though, I think it's important to note that I don't think there's a World War II dogfighting game that puts you in the position of the Axis, let alone the Nazis (I have not fact checked this, so if I'm wrong please let me know. That would be an interesting point of comparison). Making Luftrausers explicitly take place during World War II would probably result in the player assuming the role Nazi, which would be even more problematic. Unless you meant it was just a World War II dogfighting game where you also play the Allies.

[Gormongous]

I'm getting the impression that I upset you, and I'm sorry about that. That really wasn't the reaction I was going for (the irony of this in the context of this conversation is not lost on me...) Anyway, I wasn't trying to imply that it was a bad/shitty/stupid question to ask. I was just trying to provide my viewpoint on it. Obviously, this was not done in an effective way. Sorry again.

 

Oh no, I'm not upset, not at all. In fact, I'm more just perversely pleased that you pointed out the exactly the part of my post with which I was least happy myself. I hate it when people say, "So we can't make jokes about rape, is that it," because of course you can, but they have to be sensitive and informed and compassionate, because the subject matter's so problematic. I didn't mean to ask the same thing about Nazis, but I do enjoy having a bunch of smart people here hash out why games where you play a Nazi are problematic and where the bounds of those problems exist, so I'm fine being the one who's dumb or obtuse to drive discussion.

[Bjorn]

Most World War II games don't lift the aesthetic without also lifting the history. The reason Luftrausers is getting shit is because it took one part of World War II (the aesthetic of the Third Reich) and used it because it's appealing and interesting looking. In doing so it lost the context that explains to us why we should be wary of it.

When Call of Duty 2 includes a Tiger tank, it's not because they checked all the world's tanks and picked the most badass one, then carefully scrubbed all the identifying marks off of it so as to leave only the war machine. CoD 2 puts a Tiger tank in there because Tigers were in World War II. And we all know how World War II went, and why when we see a Tiger tank we should be thinking more than just "wow, badass."

If Luftrausers had just been a World War II dogfighting game it wouldn't have gotten shit, because the objectionable thing isn't making World War II dogfighting games, it's in lifting the aesthetic and divorcing it from its historical context in which it means something and moving it to a new context where all it apparently means is "check out how badass this looks."

 

As Gormongous just pointed out, there are plenty of games that lift the aesthetic without lifting the context.  And even CoD did stuff like "Nazi Zombies", which is just capitalizing on "Nazis" without any relationship to history and without any kind of other redeeming feature other than being a fun arcade mode.  Or a movie like Dead Snow.  Or Star Wars. Or the Nazis in Indiana Jones (which isn't at all about historical context, its about using a convenient antagonist and drawing on the mythology of the Nazi party and false historical context). 

 

TV Tropes has a huge list of Nazi-standins that use Nazi iconography that are divorced from historical context, including a couple of dozen video game examples.

 

Using the aesthetic of Nazis as a stand in for Nazis is just about as old as making movies about Nazis, and older than making games about Nazis.  So that doesn't seem like a terribly strong line of reasoning for why Luftrausers went wrong. 

[CaptainFish]

While the aesthetic is divorced from the terrible things the Nazis did, it does tie in very specifically with their invention and manufacture of all sorts of bizarre weaponry/vehichles during WW2. They didn't only choose it because it looks cool.

[Dijonjon]

Oh no, I'm not upset, not at all. In fact, I'm more just perversely pleased that you pointed out the exactly the part of my post with which I was least happy myself. I hate it when people say, "So we can't make jokes about rape, is that it," because of course you can, but they have to be sensitive and informed and compassionate, because the subject matter's so problematic. I didn't mean to ask the same thing about Nazis, but I do enjoy having a bunch of smart people here hash out why games where you play a Nazi are problematic and where the bounds of those problems exist, so I'm fine being the one who's dumb or obtuse to drive discussion.

 

Ah ok, I'm relieved! (Sorry, I'm new to the forums and really didn't want to disrespect or upset anyone).

 

Yeah it is an important, interesting, and more or less subjective boundary to try and dissect. I run the risk of repeating myself, but just thinking it through plays a huge part in my eyes. if you're going to cast someone in a controversial role or setting, you had better have something that needs saying or provide the audience or participant with something very compelling to think about afterwards. This is why I don't think the potential criticisms of games like Train, or Papers, Please in the same ballpark as Luftrausers. 

 

Using the aesthetic of Nazis as a stand in for Nazis is just about as old as making movies about Nazis, and older than making games about Nazis.  So that doesn't seem like a terribly strong line of reasoning for why Luftrausers went wrong. 

 

I think the issue is due to the fact that it's participatory, and forces the player into that role as opposed to the role of the spectator. I haven't played all the games listed on TV Tropes but I don't know of any other games that put the player there. Gormongous alluded to table top games, and I hadn't considered those. It's a really good point, but the only table top games I know of are so large and abstract (i.e. Axis & Allies) that I'm not sure they have the same sort of impact.

I could be wrong though, it's just as likely that some people are offended by a game like Axis & Allies.

[Bjorn]

 This is why I don't think the potential criticisms of games like Train, or Papers, Please in the same ballpark as Luftrausers. 

 

Yeah, I really haven't seen how Papers, Please has any role in the conversation.

 

 

I think the issue is due to the fact that it's participatory, and forces the player into that role as opposed to the role of the spectator. I haven't played all the games listed on TV Tropes but I don't know of any other games that put the player there. Gormongous alluded to table top games, and I hadn't considered those. It's a really good point, but the only table top games I know of are so large and abstract (i.e. Axis & Allies) that I'm not sure they have the same sort of impact.

I could be wrong though, it's just as likely that some people are offended by a game like Axis & Allies.

 

The Star Wars games where you play as someone in the Empire would be a good example.  The Empire clearly draws on Nazi iconography, and commits terrible, genocidal atrocities.  If I remember it right, Tie Fighter practically revels in presenting the Empire as a force of good (or at least stability).  And The Horde in WoW (for awhile at least, I'm not super familiar with all the evolutions in WoW) developed very Nazi vibes to it. 

[TychoCelchuuu]

I agree with you completely, but I wonder why that treatment is overwhelmingly applied to Nazis. There are hundreds of thousands of hammer-and-sickle, Mao, and Che t-shirts out there whose wearers have no idea what they really mean or maybe even who they are. Why is there no hue and cry over the many games that use Soviet aesthetics because they look different and interesting, like City 17 in Half-Life 2, or even just use Nazi aesthetics as a reductive shorthand for evil, like the Helgast from Killzone? Pretty much every game out there with any sort of flavor has ripped it from some historical context, but Luftrausers crossed a line with some and I want to know, with all curiosity and sincerity, where that line is for them.

The Mao and Che shirts are kind of gross when the people wearing them don't know what they mean, so yeah, I agree. Half-Life 2's use of Soviet aesthetics was presumably to drive home the oppression and hellishness of a world controlled by the Combine, which I think is different than Luftrausers, which is using the aesthetic because it looks bitchin'. The whole "Germans = evil" thing is definitely worrying and thus the Helgast are maybe not the most conscientious design you could come up with, but at the very least I'd prefer "Nazi Germany = automatically evil" over "let's scrub the Swastikas and not even talk about morality," which is what Luftrausers does.

As Gormongous just pointed out, there are plenty of games that lift the aesthetic without lifting the context.  And even CoD did stuff like "Nazi Zombies", which is just capitalizing on "Nazis" without any relationship to history and without any kind of other redeeming feature other than being a fun arcade mode.  Or a movie like Dead Snow.  Or Star Wars. Or the Nazis in Indiana Jones (which isn't at all about historical context, its about using a convenient antagonist and drawing on the mythology of the Nazi party and false historical context).

Nazi Zombies are weird but I'm not sure they're doing anything gross with the aesthetic. Those are not attractive zombies. I've never seen Dead Snow. Star Wars was doing the opposite of Luftrausers - the aesthetic in Star Wars is used because it signals evil, whereas in Luftrausers it's entirely divorced from the evil. Indiana Jones didn't divorce the Nazis from a historical context in order to use their bitchin' aesthetic for the movie. It made them the bad guys.

Everyone seems to be seizing on a tiny part of what I said ('Luftrausers divorces the aesthetic from its context') but my overall point is just that this is the reason Luftrausers is getting shit, not that any divorcing of the aesthetic from its context is bad. There obviously are ways of divorcing worrying aesthetics from their context that are perfectly fine, but Luftrausers isn't that. Luftrausers just grabs one of the things that makes Nazism seductive and used it because it looks cool. Indian Jones didn't stick Nazis in there because they had the nicest uniforms.

[Dijonjon]

The Star Wars games where you play as someone in the Empire would be a good example.  The Empire clearly draws on Nazi iconography, and commits terrible, genocidal atrocities.  If I remember it right, Tie Fighter practical revels in presenting the Empire as a force of good (or at least stability). 

 

Wow, that's a really really interesting point that definitely deserves more consideration than I'm able to give it right now. I think part of it has to do with the fact that Star Wars was such a well established property by the time Tie Fighter came out that people probably didn't give the same amount of thought to it. Also, Tie Fighter is 20 years old. Games criticism, not to mention the internet, as we know it today didn't exist. 

 

 

I think if Luftrausers came out 20 to 30 years ago the discussion around it might be very different. I think it's just a sign that the medium is in its adolescence, and more and more people are starting to take it seriously.

 

(I only played WoW for a couple months so I can't comment on that).

[Badfinger]

Wow, that's a really really interesting point that definitely deserves more consideration than I'm able to give it right now. I think part of it has to do with the fact that Star Wars was such a well established property by the time Tie Fighter came out that people probably didn't give the same amount of thought to it. Also, Tie Fighter is 20 years old. Games criticism, not to mention the internet, as we know it today didn't exist. 

 

 

I think if Luftrausers came out 20 to 30 years ago the discussion around it might be very different. I think it's just a sign that the medium is in its adolescence, and more and more people are starting to take it seriously.

 

(I only played WoW for a couple months so I can't comment on that).

 

The stormtrooper helmets were conceived to resemble German WW2 helmets. That it's taken to more concrete conclusions in works beyond the movies is not incidental.

 

All this talk about Nazi aesthetic and Luftrausers being essentially about the crazy conceived stuff from "the other side" has been making me think about My Tank Is Fight for a week. One of the things in my brain that pushes back against the "they werre real people not outsized science fiction" is the Germans really did have some completely insane ideas about technology in various stages of testing and reality. The Allies also had some crazy stuff, but in my mind they aren't even close to stacking up.

 

http://www.somethingawful.com/news/my-tank-fight/

[Bjorn]

Everyone seems to be seizing on a tiny part of what I said ('Luftrausers divorces the aesthetic from its context') but my overall point is just that this is the reason Luftrausers is getting shit, not that any divorcing of the aesthetic from its context is bad. There obviously are ways of divorcing worrying aesthetics from their context that are perfectly fine, but Luftrausers isn't that. Luftrausers just grabs one of the things that makes Nazism seductive and used it because it looks cool. Indian Jones didn't stick Nazis in there because they had the nicest uniforms.

 

Ah, I was taking as a rather firm stance.  Though in this case, I'm not convinced that Luftrausers is itself a bad example. 

 

Going back and reading their apology/explanation, they do clearly say that they didn't intend for you to feel like you were playing a "Nazi."  But they did very, very much want to convey that you were on the wrong side of history, the bad guys, the evil empire.  And they did that by trying to draw on imagery associated with historical context (including Soviet and Nazi Germany stuff).  Clearly what they finished on cleaves mostly, or even wholly, towards Nazi imagery.  To the extent that looking at the splash screen on Steam, I would just assume this was a WW2 dogfighting game.  That it is that clear doesn't feel like it is as divorced from historical context as you've claimed. 

 

You've made the argument that they went with that aesthetic because it was badass and/or seductive.  But their explanation holds as much water as your accusation, that they wanted you to immediately identify that you were on the evil side.  Which drawing on the iconography of Nazis is an easy (even lazy) way of doing that.

[CaptainFish]

Everyone seems to be seizing on a tiny part of what I said ('Luftrausers divorces the aesthetic from its context') but my overall point is just that this is the reason Luftrausers is getting shit, not that any divorcing of the aesthetic from its context is bad. There obviously are ways of divorcing worrying aesthetics from their context that are perfectly fine, but Luftrausers isn't that. Luftrausers just grabs one of the things that makes Nazism seductive and used it because it looks cool. Indian Jones didn't stick Nazis in there because they had the nicest uniforms.

 

I'd argue the mystique around Nazis and the occult and their easy status as villain was a lot of why they were chosen. Which parallels Luftrausers' player faction regarding their strange military tech and instant identification as antagonistic.

[Gormongous]

Sorry, I was the one who injected Papers Please into the discussion, as an example of a "serious" treatment of a historical evil and as a counterpart to the superficiality of the Red Alert series. I honestly think of it as a game that handles a horrific theme quite well, mostly by making the player voluntarily complicit in its evils. We don't have to keep explaining why it didn't get the same criticisms that Luftrausers did.

 

Ah, I was taking as a rather firm stance.  Though in this case, I'm not convinced that Luftrausers is itself a bad example. 
 
Going back and reading their apology/explanation, they do clearly say that they didn't intend for you to feel like you were playing a "Nazi."  But they did very, very much want to convey that you were on the wrong side of history, the bad guys, the evil empire.  And they did that by trying to draw on imagery associated with historical context (including Soviet and Nazi Germany stuff).  Clearly what they finished on cleaves mostly, or even wholly, towards Nazi imagery.  To the extent that looking at the splash screen on Steam, I would just assume this was a WW2 dogfighting game.  That it is that clear doesn't feel like it is as divorced from historical context as you've claimed. 
 
You've made the argument that they went with that aesthetic because it was badass and/or seductive.  But their explanation holds as much water as your accusation, that they wanted you to immediately identify that you were on the evil side.  Which drawing on the iconography of Nazis is an easy (even lazy) way of doing that.

 
Ugh, that makes me wish they'd actually done more to evoke what they claim than just sand the swastikas off the Nazi imagery. I just rewatched Inside Llewyn Davis and it reminds me how I truly love any sort of fiction that captures the feeling of being on the wrong side of history, either by being left behind by it, as Llewyn was, or by opposing it outright. That's why I like Pyrrhus of Epirus, Charles the Bold of Burgundy, Charles V of Hapsburg, Erwin Rommel, and the entire family I'm studying for my dissertation, the Aledramids of Montferrat. Luftrausers' aesthetic of ever-increasing but still futile technological escalation is great for a game where you're playing the loser in the eyes of history, but maybe they just didn't go far enough? I could think of several different ways that Vlambeer could have driven home that you're always going to fail because that's how the deck is stacked, but how impressive is your failure going to be?

[Problem Machine]

And The Horde in WoW (for awhile at least, I'm not super familiar with all the evolutions in WoW) developed very Nazi vibes to it. 

Okay: What?

[Bjorn]

Okay: What?

 

The TV Tropes article mentioned it, I looked up a couple of forum posts on it.  Apparently the Horde were taken over by a new leader for awhile that some viewed as bringing Nazi vibes (racial purity and superiority, along with some other stuff).  Like I said, I'm not a WoW player, so no first hand experience. 

[Problem Machine]

The TV Tropes article mentioned it, I looked up a couple of forum posts on it.  Apparently the Horde were taken over by a new leader for awhile that some viewed as bringing Nazi vibes (racial purity and superiority, along with some other stuff).  Like I said, I'm not a WoW player, so no first hand experience. 

Hm. I only played the original WoW and first expansion, so after my time I guess.

[Gormongous]

The TV Tropes article mentioned it, I looked up a couple of forum posts on it.  Apparently the Horde were taken over by a new leader for awhile that some viewed as bringing Nazi vibes (racial purity and superiority, along with some other stuff).  Like I said, I'm not a WoW player, so no first hand experience. 

 

To be fair, this is probably less Blizzard cashing in on Nazis and more Blizzard cashing in on that segment of genre fiction from the sixties onward that was way too eager to retell twentieth-century events through the tropes of fantasy. If I ever read another elves-in-concentration-camps-run-by-orcs mass-market paperback, it'll be too soon. Unless it's in The Witcher, that's the only one I can trust.