Why Spec Ops: The Line Mattered
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- Опубликовано: 31 янв 2024
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Spec Ops: The Line has been removed from all digital storefronts, due to licensing issues. Why was this game so important? Let’s understand the context surrounding its release.
GMTK Minis are short, scrappy videos designed to let me comment on noteworthy news events. Enjoy!
=== Sources and Resources ===
- Sources
[1] Spec Ops: The Line delisted from Steam | Eurogamer
www.eurogamer.net/spec-ops-th...
[2] We Are Not Heroes: Contextualizing Violence... | GDC Vault
www.gdcvault.com/play/1017980...
[3] Don't Be A Hero - The Full Story Behind Spec Ops: The Line | Polygon
www.polygon.com/2012/11/14/35...
[4] Shooters: How Video Games Fund Arms Manufacturers | Eurogamer
www.eurogamer.net/shooters-ho...
[5] Playing War: Military Video Games After 9/11 | Matthew Thomas Payne
www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt18j...
[6] Game Designer Dave Theurer on "Missle Command" | RUclips
• Game Designer Dave The...
[7] Hideo Kojima | Twitter
/ 1492797335256334336
[8] Spec Ops: The Line‘s lead writer on creating an un-heroic war story | Ars Technica
arstechnica.com/gaming/2012/0...
[9] Spec Ops: The Line - Learn about the story with lead writer Walt Williams | Games Radar
www.gamesradar.com/spec-ops-l...
[10] Dissecting the Horror: The Mysteries of Spec Ops The Line | 1UP (Archived)
web.archive.org/web/201606060...
[11] Special Edition Spoilercast: Spec Ops: The Line | GameSpot
www.gamespot.com/articles/gam...
[12] The touch that transcends violence and death | Chicago Tribune (Archived)
www.newspapers.com/article/ch...
[13] 87% Missing: The Disappearance Of Classic Video Games | Video Game History Foundation
gamehistory.org/87percent/
- Additional resources
Spec Ops The Line... 5 Years Later | Raycevick
• Spec Ops The Line... 5...
Spec Ops: The Line - A Literary Analysis | Games As Literature
• Spec Ops: The Line - A...
Errant Signal - Spec Ops: The Line | Errant Signal
• Errant Signal - Spec O...
How Spec Ops: The Line's Opening Manipulates You | Monty Zander
• How Spec Ops: The Line...
Having Fun is Wrong: An Analysis of Spec Ops: The Line | Professor Bopper
• Having Fun is Wrong: A...
=== Credits ===
Music provided by Epidemic Sound - www.epidemicsound.com/referra... (Referral Link)
=== Subtitles ===
Contribute translated subtitles - amara.org/videos/zq3te4KZz6ym/ 
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You make a movie, you pay for a licensed song, and the movie gets to live forever.
You make a video game, you pay for a licensed song, and it's only a matter of time before it's scrubbed off the internet.
None of this bullshit is fair. This is exactly why people pirate everything.
Video game companies are starting to catch wise that paying for a 10-year license (or whatever other length) isn't quite as "this is as long as anyone is going to care about this" as it may have first appeared.
GTA San Andreas ran into this same problem a few years back. Nobody at 2K, which published it on Rockstar's behalf back when Steam wasn't yet a thing and you needed a distributor to get games into stores, seriously expected anyone to still be playing a PS2 game by the time the license expired. Or if they were, they'd still have an old PS2. Nobody understood PC digital distribution, which gives San Andreas a pass.
But on the other hand, SOTL came out in 2012, and people absolutely should have known better by then. Again, I guess nobody thought anyone would still care about their little shooty game in 2024. And expirable licenses are cheaper by miles than perpetual licenses, so there's that as well.
As much as we all dunk on live service games, they at least got the suits thinking about the idea of long-tail product life cycles in video games.
@@SimuLord I don't really agree about your point on live service games. These games are the bane of videogame preservation, and that fact I imagine is a small yet existing consideration among many for why AAA studios are so into live services despite their bad reputation.
@@SimuLord the difference between a "live service game" and a normal game is that the latter can still be played by those who own it (and those who pirate it), whereas the former is destroyed COMPLETELY and PERMANENTLY for EVERYONE.
Videogame companies either just didn't expect they could be still selling their games years after release, or that an audience would still exist. Not so long ago there was no high speed internet. Games had a run for manufacturing, marketing and distribution and that was it. Same for movies. Is a small media broadcaster going to bother pay for storing and preserving broadcasts just because one day some people might be interested in watching them?
@@wallyhackenslacker I'm not suggesting live service games _themselves_ have any merit; I'm only saying that they popularized the idea in corporate boardrooms of creating a "forever game" for players and got the suits thinking in terms of what a game will look like in 10 years.
Which, in turn, shifts the thinking on games like, for example, Crusader Kings 2 (released in 2012, got DLC and patches right up to the release of CK3 eight years later), Europa Universalis 4 (released in 2013, still getting new updates today), Euro Truck Simulator 2 (2012, two DLCs in development and a third on permanent hold because it was to be set in Russia but then Putin started misbehaving)...
...all those games are the best of both worlds. Still getting content and making money for their developers after a decade, but also "you buy it, you keep it" for players. That, I think, is where the live service model is important for making sure the people who have to do any kind of licensing (music, real-world truck models, anything else where someone besides the dev owns the IP on whatever's in the game) can think in long enough terms not to have too short an expiration date on those licenses.
I had the chance to talk to Nolan North at a con, and he said that Captain Walker was undoubtedly his most "underrated" role in terms of fan recognition. He told me he thinks about his work on that game at least once a week.
He's also Merasmus.
But yeah, if we don't preserve this game Nolan's art will cease to exist.
@@Skeletons_Riding_OstrichesHUZZAH!
The next time I see him at a convention I was going to talk to him about it. Last time I saw him I didn't know if he'd be interested in talking about it, only for me to read later that it's always an interesting conversation with him when it's brought up.
He did a great job on Walker in the story. His voice acting really sold it.
For me, Walker is his best work. Like Nathan Drake is going to be his prominent role and I don't it's bad that people will always think of him as Drake, nor do I think he is unhappy that's what people approch him for. But his work as Walker to me is just great voice acting, it should be up there with some of the great acting period. Like I sometimes forgot that was Nolan North voicing him even though he doesn't even change his voice that much because he just disappears in that role.
When you think about what he went through, how his voice was coarse by the end due to having recorded all the lines back to back so he could really feel the character's exhaustion by the end. I'd definitely remember that shit, its like the Heavy Metal Choir for the DOOM Eternal OST, you don't forget being part of something like that
One of my favorite memories of this game was after the terrible phosphorous scene, I played the next few missions. I wasn't really paying attention because my mind was still on how I and my team just murdered a bunch of civilians. I was just playing like a zombie, going through the motions.
My roommate walked in and says "Oh, you're playing another hero war game? Whatever...", and just walks to her room.
Then a loading screen pops up as I had just finished a scene. And written on the bottom of the screen was "Do you feel like a hero yet?"
The first time a game had ever successfully taunted me. I turned off the game and went outside for a walk.
Yeah I probably would have done the same thing in that circumstance. The timing of just having done the WP scene, your roommate unknowingly referring to it as just "a hero war game", and then the game itself taunting you... I think I would have taken a walk in the woods to try and stave off existential crisis. A bit of hyperbole, but it would definitely have me thinking deeply about what just happened.
Also I kinda hope that you eventually shared the real hidden message behind the game with that roommate, purely because I think that this game has a message and meta-plot worth sharing. It really is such a unique game, and I think more people need to be made aware of it. Hit Start here on YT also made a video about the game, mostly going over the plot and how the turnaround from war game to psychological thriller/horror makes it possibly one of the most disturbing "war games" of all time. That's where I first even learned about the game, and even without playing it myself, it's been sticking with me for a while now - and I'm still not sure exactly what I feel when I think about it too much. I just know it's an important piece of media, and it did it's job flawlessly. I do indeed feel *something,* even without playing it. I just can't make sense of the feeling it evokes.
It gets even worse. WP scene is visually horrible, but you're somewhat detached from the violence (through the mortar's display, which reflects your face as you do it).
In a subsequent mission, you're trying to secure a water tanker - in a city that has no functional civilian architecture left, and you end up spilling all that water dooming the survivors to thirst. I genuinely felt guilty about playing FPS (especially because of how much I loved Battlefield 3 at the time) after this game. It's a shame that it's no longer on sale; it needs to be preserved but I doubt 2K would fork the cash to renew licenses (music probably?), Yager is close to folding as well sadly.
That's just... divine intervention.
I absolutely love that the game hated its audience, the genre it was in, and the power fantasy that the genre thrived on.
That WP scene is the perfect example of its anger towards all three, using those elements to set up an unquestioned war crime in the guise of said fantasy.
I'd imagine the devs/writers would really like to hear that story. It's like a distillation of the unwelcomed homecoming of soldiers from any unpopular war.
It's unfortunate that the game's lost its element of surprise and anyone who "enlists" knows about the war crimes they're destined to commit. People know more about what can go wrong nowadays, but you still have to assume this optimism that you'll be in the right place at the right time. Getting a bad draw and feeling "lied to" about what happens and being disgusted by the disconnect with oblivious politicians and stubborn commanding officers is kind of the cherry on top.
“Expiring licenses” are 2 words that make me fear for the eventual digital only distribution of video games as we’ve witnessed game publishers and the big console creators do not care about preserving their own art……all other forms of art are preserved for future generations to enjoy but not games for some reason
And most of these expiring licenses are music licenses. It's almost as if Devolver or some other Indie giant (not Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo; ESPECIALLY NOT SONY - they already have a massive record label) should start a music label and offer more permissive terms so that games don't disappear 5 or 10 years post launch, whilst musicians still get compensated fairly for licensing their work.
Games are not yet treated like most cultural objects of art. They should be sent to national archives and libraries, much like books and movies. Also, copyright law should be adjusted to allow distribution and emulation of abandoned games whose legal purchase ceased to be possible. It would allow both governments and people to preserve and access these works.
Unfortunately, this requires that the gaming community unites around it. Since the community has been often coopted into far right culture wars, anti government and pro corporation talking points, it's a very tough idea to implement. As it requires political and organizational work, the only solution for normal people is to spread awareness. Hopefully, someone influential will pick up on it and won't be drowned out by said pro capital positions.
I'm not sure how it is on Playstation or Steam, but on Xbox, when a game gets delisted, it stays in the store. You just can't buy it, unless you get your hands on a code for the game. And if you bought it you can install it whenever you want. I own several delisted games at this point.
@@GIVEUPYOURMILKYeah Spec Ops is still in my library
One day the servers will be oversaturated so they probably won't allow this anymore because of the lack of space... people tend to forgot data is not weightless and it's increasing in numbers at incredible speed ever year... data centers do cost a fortune in electricity too because you need computers running H24 with low temperatures so they don't crash (so permanent air conditioning which is also quite expensive)
But yeah for now you can still download all the games delisted you already own on steam (unless it need servers which got closed by the publishers, steam has nothing to do with that tho)
Do they want us to pirate games or something?
They want us to forget about games so they can resell them for 60$ in the future.
Been feeling the same about movies and TV series tbh. I'd need 10 different subscriptions and then still risk not being able to watch the thing that I want.
I stopped pirating in the early 2010s, but lately I had to to watch specific 70s, 80s, and 90s movies.
I certainly do! It's morally correct!
"if buying isn't owning, piracy isn't stealing."
Fuck modern marketing, I only buy indie things now.
I pirate games, youtube premium, spotify, movies, tv shows... And I get a better experience than my paying friends.
"Do you feel like a hero yet?"
All you have to do is not play...
@@geofff.3343 That is not really a valid answer with games, because of the fact that you bought it. More often than not you can't get a refund, so you better get your money's worth out of it, no matter how shit it is. It's like buying a music cd, but not being allowed to listen to the last 3 songs on it.
Such a good line.
@@geofff.3343 Which is ironic, because the message of the game doesn't hit nearly as hard if you don't play it to the end.
@@colt1903 Yeah but there's literally a "Stop! turn back!" sign in the opening level. So they're warning you pretty early on.
I've played Spec Ops : The Line when it came out. I was 20, and I had the idea that I could write a book about a civil war for water in a Dubai covered in sand after disastrous sandstorms. So when I saw that the game set up was exactly what I had in mine i bought it, just to see what they did with it.
And I do believe that this game, that left me with such a sense of awe and dread by the end did actually deeply modify my perception of what I was playing. It did make me realize how much people I was killing in Assassin's Creed, how much detachment I had regarding killing humans in video game and etc. As I continued to grow up It became genuinely hard for me not to feel a bit disgusted by some titles, and it oriented my choices of game towards way more family friendly titles. Actually, now that I think about it, Spec Ops : The Line is in fact the last military shooter I ever played.
It didn't happened overnight like I had some kind of holy revelation, but yeah Spec Ops : The Line did revolutionize my personnal approach toward the medium and what I looked for in video games.
Same experience, but with Undertale. Now I long for a game where I can play a good guy. but for real
@@raph2550you’re already living that game. There’s nothing better than being good to the people around you.
@@hichemfantar1965 Sure but I want dragons, and the ability to have a victory
You should definitely try Psychonaut 1 & 2 then, the story of the two games revolve around healing self and other, and they are great action/plateforme games, very wholesome ! :) @@raph2550
I have to disagree with you, which is healthy in my opinion because this is art and people take away different things from it.
For me the entire game fell flat. I went into it years after release and I was told by people that I would have my views challenged and it would make me think. Instead I was mostly left frustrated as the game forgot entirely that for cause and effect to be impactful you yourself have to be the cause for whatever happened.
Instead of raging at myself for making bad calls, I was raging against the game for forcing me to make those calls because it simply would not progress otherwise. It was such a missed opportunity from making a game where you could and most likely would fuck up and thus reflect on your own actions to making one where I seriously questioned the sanity of the game Devs.
When I played it, I was one of the people for whom the White Phosphorous section fell flat. I saw in the overhead camera a large group of people, not moving, all bunched together, while a huge battle is going on a few feet away from them. I thought "those are civilians" and didn't fire the last shots but it wouldn't let me progress until I did.
But yes that's also the point too. Yeah it works as a surprising reveal if you don't see it coming, but if you do see it coming the fact you can't do anything about it is just another bad thing you have to do because war leads to nothing but horrible outcomes. You're not making these decisions- the general, the politicians, the leaders who sent soldiers into a place equipped with White Phosphorous made that decision. It's not a secret hidden stockpile that is found and hauled out in a dire moment, it's actively set up on the battlefield with a mortar and targeting system ready to go. And prior to that point I had been happily using it against human beings already. Those soldiers were also people, and no one deserves having White Phosphorous happen to them.
So I saw it coming and balked at it being forced, but that's real life. When it gets to the point that a country is sending soldiers into a place like that with those weapons, the outcome is easy to see coming. Seeing it coming and doing it anyway is the decision this country makes. Because war crimes aren't accidental, they are deliberate. That weapon is there to be used.
You have the choice to shut the game down and not continuing to play. And I think that's the point the game is trying to make. Nobody forces you to buy and play CoD, but people do it regardless.
The "just following orders" defense has never been justifiable.
That weapon is meant to be used **like it's supposed to**, that is, with proper target identification. The fact the game railroads you into fucking up makes it way fundamentally less morally impactful than an average JTAC fucky wucky in an Arma op that isn't even meant to bear moral meaning.
As for "you could have stopped playing anytime", that's basically chastising the audience for actually investing themselves in the story you've written, which is dumb. Undertale's approach to "you should have quit fucking around while you could" is dramatically better, since the bad ending requires an extremely dedicated investment, with plenty of opportunity to give up, and most importantly, **the right decision being self-contained within the game**.
@@xKumeiI never got why that’s the case. If it’s between me getting punished for disobeying orders and some random civvies I’ve never heard of before, I’m committing as many war crimes as it takes to keep myself alive.
Do people have an obligation to throw their own lives away when their commanders are the ones at fault?
That's why the Homefront WP scene is better.
Honestly, I don't think the fun gunplay hurts Spec Ops as a piece of art. If you talk to veterans, many of them say that actual combat can be a real rush *at the time*
Well, adrenaline can be addictive after all.
Can confirm fighting for your life is the most fun you'll ever have - if you make it out alive.
Yeah and I think violence of the 'subjective violence' violence which Zizek talks about can be stylised in a way which accelerates the adrenaline to add a new level of horror to it.
Combat being a thrill in an anti war game shows its ability to subvert the human psyche into becoming a thrilling participant. I think there's a lot there to explore with that. I'm particularly reminded of how punk and industrial bands like Killing Joke made audiences uncomfortable with the violence of the imagery or how J.G. Ballard pushes violence to the extreme to show the thin veneer we place in front of it. If anything the thrill of those serves them well as a piece of art and I'd apply that logic to Spec Ops
Same goes for Metal Gear Solid, especially 4. A lot of the times you'll see some people debate whether the franchise and MGS4 in particular is anti-war or glorifying war, and oftentimes they'll mention how going lethal is often the easier and more fun way to play than non-lethal, but to me it feels more like by glorifying war to an almost fetishistic extent it only achieves its anti-war message more successfully. It also addresses one of the criticisms Spec Ops: The Line got that was mentioned in this video: yes, going lethal can be easier and more fun, but in MGS it is ultimately your choice, and sometimes the game will even directly call you out on it later (MGS3).
The game was fun?
The way media can just be made unavailable (at least via official means) is disconcerting. It once again shows that preservation, even in legal grey areas, is important.
All art in this world has a right to exist and be seen, and when we allow companies and governments to just remove that stuff from existence, that's something that can truly destroy and malnourish the free flow of information
@@drakep.5857 does art that the artist wishes to be destroyed have a right to exist and be seen?
yeah, cuz fuck that artist in particular. Preservation is preservation, even if it means going against the intention.
I guess it could be done... somewhat ceremoniously (eh?). Release an archived version 1-10 years after the author's death / end of the project, all of the sudden, without announcing it (but with the permission of those who is mentioned in the piece, if any).
If somebody wants to do that kind of thing, then they shouldn't ever consider posting it on the Net, or sharing it with anyone who could post it on the Net. Unus Annus' biggest mistake is creating the project on the Internet. If they shared CD-disks, casette tapes, or made it Patreon-or-othet-support platform-only, it would've somewhat achieved their intention. Maybe. I guess. I don't even know what the intention was, to be fair
Maybe the time has passed for this kind of stuff
I'm thinking about maybe they could just sell it on their own website? Steam doesn't have any licensing.
@@mechanicalmonk2020 That's a good question. My instinct is to follow "death of the artist" rules and say it has a right to exist no matter what, but I'm sure there are a lot of scenarios that would make me question that...
I think my main point is that the Star Wars Holiday Special should exist no matter how much George regrets it. xD
One fact that I remember that showed how committed to the premise they were: the fatigue you hear in the main cast's voices over the course of the game is real. They recorded all of their parts in order, in a single day-long marathon recording session. As a result, you can hear their voices progressively break down over the course of the game until they're all totally blown out and can barely talk anymore. It's brutal to hear, but it really drives home how broken the characters themselves have become by the conclusion.
wow video game crunch is so cool.......
@@thecoolestofthe834s2I think it's made that way on purpose, with the approval of the VAs...
@@thecoolestofthe834s2being a lazy bastard and complaining about your boss forcing you to do your job is not cool.
@@thecoolestofthe834s2it wasn’t crunch, the VAs purposely did it that way
@@spazemfathemcazemmeleggymi272 Eah, mate. That's totally what they complain about. And not about 80 hours work weeks and a general sorry state of the industry and a treatment of workers in said industry.
Nice bait btw, I took it
The part that made me go "oh, hmmm.." is not the phosphorus scene, it's a part near the end where I went through a window and immediately shot a guy before he had the time to get his weapon. Then the narrator in the earpiece said something like "Why would you do that? He was not armed" and the character answers like "how do you know that" or something like that, and it was at that point that I realized the narrator was actually speaking to me, the player, and not the in-game character.
It's because Conrad had been dead the entire game and Walker was hallucinating hearing and seeing him.
@@RustCohle072 Wasn't it something like fade to black was real and fade to white transitions were hallucinations? Been a while
thats a horrible line tho. when everyone you’ve encountered has been hostile that person is probably also hostile
@@UndeadFleshgod
I think you mean the zipline part when the hallucination happens
I remember vividly this game, not for the phosphore scene but for a gameplay moment
You just went through a long and exhausting gun fight, you're walking in a corridor then suddenly something moves and sprints towards you. You shoot, it drops dead, and your teammates start yelling "what are you doing ?". You just shot a civilian. Not in a cutscenes, you're the one who pulled the trigger
I honestly had to take a pause after this moment because it was so brilliantly done I felt at a small scale how civilian's casualties can happen
In some games, that would cause an instant failure and make you play again
I got in a discussion with a student at the time and my initial standpoint was that did not "like" the game. We kept talking and I described the exact scenario you just described. From calm to startled to the cleanest headshot I've ever pulled off in a video game. However, I reloaded the save. I found it unfair to have accidentilly killed a civilian.
And that's when the person I was talking with remarked that the game never was intended to be fun and that I had played it as it had been playing me. My mind was forever blown.
I sometimes find myself thinking about the game in general, the inciting incident in particular, but especially the conversation that added to my understanding of games as a very, _very_ capable medium.
Detroit broke me with a scene like that. Searching for a rogue android, finding them, chasing after them, getting into a fistfight, I pick up a gun - and the adrenaline and the urgency and the tension are ratcheted up so high.... - *I* pulled the trigger.
I realized that if pushed far enough I could... pull the trigger. It was a harsh look in the mirror and I didn't like what I saw.
I still haven't recovered from that.
But what I think makes it worse... I *knew* what I was doing. I wasn't manipulated into it by some disembodied voice on a radio, I wasn't shooting at a sudden shadow. I was looking that android in the eyes and I pulled the trigger.
I had forgotten about that! I remember I pulled the trigger so fast and thought "Oh shit. I wasn't supposed to do that, was I?" and expected a GAME OVER screen... but the game kept going.
There's an article out there written by Jacob Geller about that exact moment (youtube doesn't like sharing links, so just google "Five years of guilt with Spec Ops: The Line" on Cane and Rinse), and its also the moment that stuck with me. The white phosphorous scene is so overwrought and melodramatic that it barely left an impact, but that woman running out in terror and getting shot... that's something I actually did do, and it actually had an impact on me.
The WP stuff always came off as the game thinking it was saying something rather than actually saying something. It's memorable because of the spectacle
One of the most interesting things I've learned about Call of Duty as a franchise is that there's a scene in one of the games that has you walking through a destroyed highway strip that was bombarded by Russian troops, which was called the "Highway of Death" in-game, and this on its own doesn't seem too bad...
...only the "Highway of Death" was a real historical event where a highway strip was bombed in the Gulf War, and it was an event carried out by American troops
Call of Duty is jingoistic propaganda at best and a shitty recruiting tool for America's terrorist military cabals at worst.
Though the highway of death irl is a bit of a more complex matter than directly bad or good.
@@Creepernom Sure but it's still hard not to see it as revisionist history
@@onlysmiles4949 I haven't played CoD, but I'm guessing that the context is quite different from the real highway of death, with the only similarity being a bombed highway with a very obvious name.
Using that kind of name doesn't feel like revisionism because it's an incredibly obvious and logical choice, considering how stuff like that usually gets named. You have a big blown up road with (probably) lots of broken equipment and dead folk, what name fits this kind of landscape better?
this was an acceptable application of a creative license. why? because for Americans, this is an atrocity. for Russians, it's Tuesday.
At the end of the 80s and during the 90s many game dev companies and publishers closed and the game rights they made and sold got lost in a legal void and disappeared. Moreover most players didn't care about old games back then, the retro-gaming wasn't a thing yet as all the players were young and they wanted the latest thing. Despite that, there was always a community who cared and preserved those games. They did things as incredible as creating emulators to replicate an old computer into a PC, and dumping old code from arcade boards, cartridges or cassette tapes into PC files. And they did a great job keeping the past alive.
My point is, games won't be preserved by big companies, they will be preserved by players. And I know Spec Ops: The Line will be there, somewhere in the internet, in some abandonware website. It won't be lost.
Piracy despite its nature can also work as an attempt to preserve the game.
It goes to show, we aren't losing another one to the corpos.
@GregorianMG it's only piracy if they are making money off it. They de-listed the game so it's no longer making money. What's being stolen at that point?
@@scratchguns It's still stealing if somebody else owns it, it's just more morally justified.
My thesis is on the archival and preservation of games and their cultural impact. The super boiled down conclusion is that fans are the biggest factor in preserving games. Ideally, there should be movements so that games are sent to national archives and libraries, much like books and movies. Also, copyright law should be adjusted to allow distribution and emulation of abandoned games whose legal purchase ceased to be possible. Finally, I am studying a possible standard file for preservation, such as a PDF-A, so that games can be stored in an efficient and integral way. My first subject was Vimm's Lair and they are a great place to visit.
Those loading screen tips that start saying shit like "Do you feel like a hero yet?" and "You are still a good person." is what I remember most vividly from playing this game, and I would argue is one of its most effective subversions of tropes. Because those tips are always about gameplay mechanics, either meta conceits that are part of the loop or control details, things that are really zoomed in and very detached from characterization or motivation, so skipping loaded moral challenge messages directly to the player that way is quite explosive.
Those are what I remember most about the game, too, but for exactly the opposite reason. It was like getting trolled on a message board you had to read but couldn't post on, by someone who thought they were way more clever than they were.
@@NeutralDrow fair 🤣
From what I understand, it's being removed because the licensing for certain songs used in the game is coming to an end.
Here's what I don't get, when you pay the licensing fee to have a song in your movie, the song is part of the movie forever. Why isn't this also the case for video games?
Depends of the agreement. They knowingly agreed to a limited time license for some reason. This could happen with a movie too there is no legal difference. Movie people just don't make that mistake.
Yeah that always seems to be the reason. Videogame companies probably cheap out on licensing because they don't care about preservation
It's a matter of money. You can choose to lease a property for X years at a MUCH lower cost than buying said property outright. When game companies talk about licensing coming to an end, what they're telling us is that the terms they "leased" the assets for are coming to an end. Given the rise of MBAs in video game development, this type of thing is a ticking time bomb in a lot of AAA gaming, and we have ZERO idea when these bombs might go off.
Always comes down to profit. If they can pay even slightly less to license for 5 or 10 years than a lifetime license, they will, even if it doesn’t make sense for the media
There's another aspect to this discussion that I'm not seeing raised. When you use a licensed song in a film, it's embedded into the sound data of the video and can't be easily extracted without also carrying dialogue and sound effects from the movie. When you use a licensed song in a _game,_ you have to ship the _exact data_ of the song with your game, without any other sounds in it, so that the game program can play it at runtime and layer all other sounds on top. That means players who are intelligent enough can figure out how to extract the song, then pass the method on to other players who can get ahold of it easier. I'm sure music rights holders are aware of this and aren't quite fond of it.
THIS IS WHY ARCHIVES AND LIBRARIES ARE IMPORTANT! always save a backup, somewhere, somehow. information and knowledge is priceless and precious.
Wait I have it on steam what will it happen?
@@alessandrolamera8857 nothing at all people want to be dramatic about everything
@@alessandrolamera8857If you already own it, you can play it like normal
@@alessandrolamera8857You already bought it, so it will remain in your library.
@@alessandrolamera8857 you can still install it
There was a great video essay about Spec Ops: The Line that really opened my eyes when it came to video game violence. Went something like this, Spec Ops: The Line was never about punishing the player for there deeds in the game but rather asking questions on how they viewed it, the big one was "do you feel like a hero yet?". Now before I continue look at games like Dishonored, Cyberpunk 2077, Splinter Cell Blacklist and many others that give you the options of Lethal vs non-Lethal, now how many games don't give you that non-Lethal option? How many games gives you that opportunity to split you opponents in half with a chainsaw? How many games give you visceral gory feedback? As I said before the game SOTL isn't trying to punish you and say "Look he/she is a psychopath." But it's questioning you on how easy it is to pull that trigger against a pixel, was it easy using the throwing knives or the machete? Did you choose to slit you opponents throat or blow their limbs off them? Was it badass or gross when you snap someone neck and hear a meaty crunch? Was the reaction you elicit a bit of disgust and awe? Developers can and should always have Violence as one of there tools for game making. BUT the true measure of us (the consumer) is whether or not we acknowledge that line/violence.
Example from personal experience: I remember being as brutal as a warmonger in Cyberpunk, I tore, shredded and killed anything that either I didn't agree with or cause I wanted too. Then for some reason I decided to be as pacifist, knocked people out, tazed others, avoided and used other avenues to complete a gang hideout without killing everyone, then after a week in I remember pulling out a revolver and splattering a punk's brain matter all over the wall, and to see that gore after so long of keeping people together, I wasn't mortified, or crying, just an audible "Damn." came out of my mouth. Spec Ops: The Line is asking as well as questioning, how far are you willing to go for an objective, and is it easy to reach into your heart of darkness to kill people if you know they aren't people/real people, where do you draw The Line.
My Favorite Quote from this game (I might butcher it, so sorry) was, "We drew the line, that was our starting point."
It's also really about the highly rigid, dichotomous distinction we the player set when it comes to facing/handling violence in the real world and violence in the video game world... _that we all use in order to justify and take for granted the latter._
It's as if we enforce an apartheid upon game characters in the sense that because they are merely digital, soulless, fictional constructs and nothing more, they are subhuman outcasts, that we shouldn't take things too seriously about them, that it's unnecessary for us to assign sympathetic sentiments to them unlike with real-life entities, and therefore we can do whatever we want with them (be it violence or sexualization), with a peace of mind via those "reassurances."
Essentially, video games like this drive home the point of how human empathy must be universal and unconditional, one that applies beyond all the beings we encounter in the physical real world.
Dang, I'm a pretty tiny youtuber, so it was a surreal moment to see my video pop up in the scroll near the end! Spec Ops the Line is one of my favorite games of all time, so I'm glad it's being talked about more again, even though it's for ultimately a sad reason.
This War of Mine makes you suffer the horrors of war. Spec Ops: the Line makes you commit the horrors of war
Both wrong, you cannot compare a game to real life. You can kill 1 million babies in a game, it means nothing. Lose 1 person in real life and it's a huge life event.
This War of Mine made me suffer the horrors of trying to use stairs without the pathing glitching out
Let's not forget about being so unhealthily good at "This War Of Mine" that you could turn Anton into the traumatic event and make all violent actions into nostalgia.
@@nunyabiznes7446 So by extension, Spec Ops: the Line makes you commit stairs.
Well said.
I know it sounds anti-consumer and very dumb in other contexts but I wish there were more Trojan Horse games like Spec Ops: the Line. Games where you go in, expecting to get the experience you want, only to leave overwhelmed, experienced something you didn't think you needed. AAA games with impact like this are very rare and it's a huge loss to the artform that they're disappearing for new audiences.
Spec Ops: The Line 🤝 Doki Doki Literature Club
Advertise themselves as something fun and seemingly normal games only to turn into the most disturbing and horrifying experiences when you least expect it.
This is a lot more common in indie games, since they have lower budgets and can afford to piss off some of their intended audience. Even so, I don’t know of any other games that are direct criticisms of their facade genres, usually just an interesting twist on them.
"Games where you go in, expecting to get the experience you want, only to leave overwhelmed, experienced something you didn't think you needed."
This sounds like Metal Gear Solid 2. And Braid.
I mean, that's kind of what Last of us part 2 tried in a way. But the early leaks ruined the "surprise".
It is absolutely needed. Because a lot of the time, the customers don't know what they want. So you gotta make that decision for them.
I really hope this becomes like Allen Wake where a few years ago it was delisted for "licenses" but got added back due to popular demand.
I think I'm gonna yell (or cry). I had the game in my Steam wishlist and I really, really wanted to play it. I wish I bought it sooner and seeing this notification made my heart drop.
I have San Andreas on my Steam wishlist and it’s never going to be relisted
@@liammcnicholas918 Gosh darn! I've had the game in mind but never got around to searching for a way to play it. Was it taken down in favor of the definitive edition?
@@MambaMfupi I think I'm going to try getting my hands on a physical copy. :D
Pirate that shit.
@@chillydonuts someone has to have it "archived" somewhere. if they refuse to sell it you can just go get it for free.
The problem with The Line is that its main selling point cant be sold
I realized that during the opening segment. If you know the game, you know the twist.
That's why it's remembered
brilliant
I think people miss out on themes of self justification and how some collectible tell a narative of decay.
Yeah. It was never going to stand out enough from the crowd to reach its target audience. The majority of people who bought it ended up being the ones spoiled on it to one degree or another, and already agreed with its message.
Product vs Art >:(
It's one of the best "Heart of Darkness" stories ever made in videogame form.
It's the only true game adaptation IMO. Different games have taken influence for sure, but Spec Ops is actually a careful retelling.
As far as I'm concerned it's not only the best "heart of darkness" stories in videogames, it's one of the, if not the, best narrative in games, period. I have not seen any other game that does narrative quite like Spec Ops has done. The slow and gradual decline into madness, the slow and gradual backstab of the actual player of the game (in terms of expectations vs reality), the constant fourth wall breaking, the various shock moments, all of it is an absolute master class in narrative story telling in video games. If I had to pick one single game that I could entirely forget and then replay, it'd be this one. It's severely underrated and it deserves so much more attention and so many more people playing the game.
Either this or far cry 3
@@peacfl9610 Ah yes, who can forget that memorable bit in Conrad's novella where he assists a native woman in uncovering her husband's gay affair? 🤣
I think you’re missing a comma there. The way you have it now it can imply that it’s not a good adaptation actually 😅
This game broke me at the White Phosphorous scene and yet I couldn't.. not finish the story. A decade later and I still think about it every now and then. I'm still an avid "shooter gamer" but I look at campaigns differently now.
Spec Ops holds a special place in my heart because I actually learned and internalized something from it. "Your good intentions mean nothing, when your actions are monstrous"
So to see this monumental game vanish because of some licensing BS... It REALLY sucks. :(
The dialog right before the prompt that leads to the white phosphorus scene is so brilliant.
It's obvious that it's asking the big question of whether simply turning off the game is a valid choice.
it's so cool! and regardless of the technique, all we get is discussions about whether it should have asked the question at all. of course it should have - it's an essential part of the game! but people will go "but it cost money" and it's like ok then go ahead and finish the game then, you aren't really hurting real people! if spec ops the line's messaging made you literally unable to complete it, then you got your money's worth. it's clear all this is an intentional part of the (very good) narrative
This game and Metal Gear introduced me to the idea of chemical warfare involving civilian casualties and the horror of ethnic cleansing - especially today when white phosphorus is still used on civilians indiscriminately. Games can be powerful tools of ideological influence and understanding humanity and it's devastating to see this game go away when it is EXTREMELY topical in the current age.
Tbh, even if you turn off the game, it doesn't mean anything. The story only plays out one way by that point. You're just removing your ability to observe it, like an ostrich burying its head in the sand.
I honestly think undertale pulled this off way better - When you complete the game's true pacifist ending, you get told that you've given everyone in the game the best possible ending, and there's only one thing that can take that away - You. If you continue to play, continue to to prod at all the content you can find, you'll eventually find the way to ruin that happy ending. The game literally begs you to stop playing, to give up and not see what's left to find. If you continue playing and try to find the game's last path, the No Mercy path, you're ignoring the game telling you not to. You've already had at least two full playthroughs, you've gotten your money's worth. Can't you stop, and let them have their happy ending?
And of course, as gamers, the answer is invariably "no."
@@Arkouchie Me trying to 100% the dictionary at any cost. Gamer moment inbound.
See also the entirety of the Drakengard/Nier series. For 20 years, Yoko Taro has been trying to draw attention to the fact that a lot of video games as we know them today are geared towards embracing the psychopathy of being a serial killer.
Only played automata
Spoiler
I actually enjoyed how every side quest has a bad ending, did I miss a message?
The credits sequence of Nier: Automata's Ending E was certainly a meta-level milestone in the series' cornerstone themes on killing in video games.
Seven years on, perhaps its premise of scapegoating and dehumanizing the game's real-world creators as players go on to do the equivalent of raining down white phosphorus rounds upon them to get the outcome the players wanted so badly was already an overt telltale sign that the ending in question was anything but feel-good or humanist.
The first Nier made me feel so bad for killing like no game ever did before or after, it was brilliant.
Automata made keep one alive the worst choice
Pascal
@@TheNobodyNamedDubyaBeeEnding E was incredibly corny. Honestly im really dissapointed how yoko taros games have a reputation for having dark endings but if you just replay the game a thousand times and collect a bunch of weapons then *you too! can have a disney princess happy ending*
Where as The original/first endings to replicant and automata are actually in line with the tone and story of the game.
I was lucky to buy Spec Ops The Line on a deal at GOG just the day before it was removed from digital stores, since I had feared this would happen very soon, and I was right. I have had it on Steam for several years and finished it, but I wanted to officially get a no-DRM copy!
Same. Snatched that shit up the minute I heard about it. Not only did GOG still carry it, but it was on sale. Double win.
I’m glad I still have the physical version for consoles. But yeah this is why DRM free versions in PC and physical disc versions for consoles are important. Where already seeing games only like a decade old being pulled away from stores and libraries and it’s only going to get worse. I don’t want my library to turn to dust so ways to preserve purchases will always be important to me, and hopefully others too
Same here
I was gifted this game in high school by a friend. After finishing the first playthrough, I stared blankly at the screen long after the credits rolled, mind filled with questions. Over time, I felt an itch to play it again. And again. I've replayed it about 5 times, and completed each difficulty - even if it was frustrating. Progressed halfway through the multiplayer, but unfortunately there were few opponents. It was a blast. This game, and also my friend, are now a distant past.
I had a similar argument with an old acquaintance over the original Dishonored. They were so *mad* that the game had all these cool powers and different ways to kill enemies, but then "punished" you for using them. He just could not see that power and it's abuse was a major theme of the game.
On one hand that is a theme of the story, on the other non-lethal takedowns weren't even a thing early in development, it was something they implemented much later on. Dishonored 2 had non-lethal in mind from the start and you could tell.
“With great power…”
Dishonored I consider a very different story.
In dishonored it isn't 'evil actions' or even the use of the powers that gets you high chaos.
Its disrupting the society, leaving corpses for the disease to spread, killing civilians ontop of guards, etc...
Your punishment is a realistic consequence of actively making the city worse and its only a 'punishment' in so far as the story is concerned which playes who went out of their way to be a killer rather than an assasin, as per the story, really should care less about.
Spec ops by contrast has no options for the player, the game holds them at fault for playing the game regardless of their actions within the game.
Even if you think the white phosporus is a bad idea there is no way to circumvent doing it and then the game directly asking the player "Do you feel like a hero?". If it was just about Walker it be fine as a character study but pivoting over the 4th wall then pose the same questions to the player directly feels unearned.
My takeaway from that game was that using power and stealth killing everyone and ruining society is way more fun than tiptoeing around everyone and you should just do it and look up the good ending on RUclips.
@@11cat123 it may not have been a thing early in development, but it's absolutely a thing in the actual game and was very intentionally integrated into the game's design. I mean I even did a playthrough and got achievements for completing the game without unlocking any powers (Mostly Flesh and Steel), alerting anyone (Ghost), or killing anyone (Clean Hands).
Here in Italy during the 5th year of highschool we have to create a "Tesina", a term paper of variable length about a random subject.
I picked "Are videogames a form of art?" and Spec Ops:The Line was my starting point. (I'm glad I did, I would've failed that year if it wasn't for that damn term paper that bumped up my score to a passing grade)
I used it to connect various school subjects like the obvious inspiration it took from Heart of Darkness and consequentially Apocalypse Now, managed to connect it to the "4th wall breaking" writers of the early 1900's in Italy like Pirandello and then science, history ect ect.
I hold very very close to my heart this incredible title that is often talked about but rarely seen. It created a great atmosphere, didn't outstay its welcome and told a memorable story. It's a damn shame that all of that for most of the public will become much harder to experience.
It is one of "Those games", those games that once you've finished you feel weird. Not accomplished, not happy nor sad. Empty? Sad? Nothing at all? Very few games can make someone feel like that, this was definitely one of them.
I can only hope that some sort of compromise or other action will allow the game to stay on Steam and other major platforms for I can only wish for people to experience what a ride this game was
Gran bel argomento di tesina, complimenti! Non mi dispiacerebbe darle una lettura :)
You still have that paper on you bro? I'd read it with curiosity, even if not in English I'll manage
A sense of Enui perhaps?
Fossi stato parte della commissione ti avrei promosso subito 😂 ottima scelta!
sempre bello vedere argomenti originali agli esami, complimentoni per la scelta, mi porterò sempre nel cuore sto gioco
I wish they would just patch out those 2 bits of music they no longer have the license for... better to have silence then no game at all.
Also: there's another reason a lot of media portrait the us military as "heroes"/the good guys": the US military!
Since shortly after WWII they ended up having a last say whenever a movie etc. got made and could practically direct/censor what american companies produced.
The creators usually got "help" from the military in form of borrowing material/knowlege from them. But if your movie did not look the way they wanted it wouldn't be able to be made.
*”Do you feel like a hero yet?”*
That very line shall haunted me forever to reminded me war is brutal to the point that stripped away humanity inside.
*"The US military does not condone the killing of unarmed combatants. But this isn't real, so why should you care?"*
WELP! Gotta boot up my PC to continue seeding again, the ratio is gonna be crazy lol
Hero
Thank you for your service o7
goat behavior thank you for your service
Amazing brother
Godspeed
I was able to snag it off GOG just before the take down. The fact that it went down without warning is just despicable. I'd say 2K should be ashamed, but we know that's not possible.
I don't understand why they didn't make an announcement beforehand? It would also make business sense to get that one last boost of sale
One thing i loved about SOTL was how it showed Walker slowly going insane without using scripted cutscenes that shoved the insanity down your throat
At the start of the game, all members are tactical
Lugo pointing out the enemies' locations practically and Adams informing you about his situation calmly
On the other half of the game, specially after the white phosphorus scene, Lugo is screaming the enemy whenever something is going on, and Adams is always scared and angry
But the best goes for Walker himself
At first when he executes his targets, the executions are clean and fast, and he just says "Target Down"
But after the phosphorus scene, his executions are much more bloody, like purposely shooting the target in the knees and then shooting them in the head. He also either screams, or tries to justify his actions by saying it was the Enemy's fault
Spec Ops: The Line reminds me of one scene in the movie "Brothers" featuring Tobey Maguire as Sam and Jake Gyllenhaal as Tommy. Sam was captured as a PoW and forced to bludgeon a fellow American soldier to death with a pipe while being recorded for terrorist propaganda. When Sam is free and returns home he has a meltdown due to the psychological effects of war, he's confronted by police who try console him, calling him a war hero. He responds with "I'm no fucking hero, I'm no fucking hero! Do you _know_ what I've done?". That line has always stuck with me and kind of mirrors the one in Spec Ops; Do you feel like a hero yet?
Media like Spec Ops and Brothers highlight how military action is romanticized. Being showcased as admirable, heroic and veterans suffering the psychological fallout of combat are told generic phrases like "thank you for your service" by people who are none the wiser to what they've been through. For characters like Walker and Sam, they're anything but people worthy of admiration.
I don't agree with the notion you're nearly making that soldiers are terrible people (again, you ALMOST suggested this). If there is one thing I suggest telling soldiers instead of "thank you for your service", it would be "thank you for doing what you had to do, and what I could never do".
I was of the impression that "thank you for your service" was a counterreaction to the fact that Americans were actively abusing Vietnam War vets, despite the fact that many of them were conscripted and then were ordered to do and otherwise survive terrible things that even they regret.
I think a lot of people miss that the game isn't about war, but war video games. it's not "what if we took a military shooter and then showed the actual ramifications of being in a war", it's "what if we took a military shooter and then showed the actual ramifications of being *the protagonist in a military shooter video game"*
like so many games have you play as some group of good guys, then go through a gameplay section where you murder 30 people, then in the next cutscene you're the same good guys, then you go through a gameplay section where you murder a hundred people, and you go on like that without ever acknowledging your body count and it never effects your character or their crew. but in spec ops, you go through a gameplay section where you kill 30 people and then in the next cutscene your teammates are like "oh my god did we just kill like 30 people" and then you go through a gameplay section where you kill 100 people and they're like "holy shit that was so many people how is this even real" and it goes on like that until your crew fractures and you completely detach from reality. people complained that the shooting was repetitive but i think that was part of the point, to drive home that you were killing an unrealistic number of people.
by the end of the game, you have killed nearly EVERY PERSON in the city on BOTH sides. it's not a realistic commentary on war, but it IS a realistic sendup of war video games. people say the white phosphorus section is forced, but how many video games require you to end an unimaginable number of simulated human lives as a necessary part of your interaction with the work? the game makes you recognize that the gameplay violence is happening in the same narrative as the rest of the game, and looks at how the world would actually react to the average mass murdering video game protagonist.
I've always said that spec ops isn't about how video game violence desensitizes us to real life violence, but about how video game violence desensitizes us to **video game violence**
People complained that the shooting was repetitive because the gunplay was bad. That's why it felt like a bore. It committed almost every sin in generic 3rd person shooters.
People saying it's bad on purpose is retroactive cope. Were all generic third person shooters making a point? Or it was just a game design quirk from that console gen?
Also I literally did not know that WP was used on civilians before this game - as troubling as that is to include in entertainment, I think it's something that for me was a huge catalyst for looking at both America and war much differently. And is still something that happens, as recently as 4 months ago, it's enraging to see such an enduringly relevant piece of media get lost like this.
@@ChucksSEADnDEAD I actually found the gunplay pretty nice and fun. My only grip was that vaulting was on same button as execution which felt weird ohh and ı played on KM.
@@noobguy9973 I'm pretty sure the guy you're responding to isn't actually here to have a discussion. Look at how aggressive, insecure and arrogant he's acting. The whole point is to bait you into responding so that he can find more ways to insult you. Maybe I'm wrong and he just had a really bad day or something, but in my experience people don't act like that if they're actually willing to converse like a well-adjusted person.
@@Wveth XD at least ı voiced out my opinion about the game and a person or two read it and seems to agree with me looking at likes.
Piracy is, as always, a great way to preserve art
Sure... for "preservation" lol
@@erikheijden9828 well yeah, how do you even play most old games right now without paying millions for original hardware and game copies on eBay or something like that?
That's why I horde indie games for future generations
@@AugustCrossroads the hero nobody will ever know
@@AugustCrossroads Don't suppose you snagged Volta-X before it was delisted? A very obscure one, but one I regret not playing.
That mortar scene actually soured me on Spec Ops a bit. Did I choose to blow up those civilians or *did the game make it impossible for me to continue without doing so*? I suppose you could just quit the game then and there but a game should let you see the outcome of your choices. When the game later tries to shove it back in my face like I’m supposed to feel bad, it doesn’t land because that scene was essentially railroaded. I still thought overall the game was good and it’s theme was a real change of pace even if it didn’t quite stick the landing.
I played this game while home from work, having just had major dental surgery. I was sweaty, dizzy from all the painkillers I was taking that only slightly numbed the constant pain, and had to think about holding the bloody gauze in my mouth. I played the game for about 10 hours then collapsed, had a restless sleep of no more than 4 hours, and woke up and finished it. I felt about as sane as the player character when I chose to believe I could go home at the end. An unforgettable and harrowing experience.
If this story really played out the way you described it, it sounds like a damn bad trip alright... did you manage to recover, at least partially?
I just checked, and I've only got 3.5 hours in SOTL, but it already left a huge impression.
Early on you are fleeing through an old hotel, and go through the remains of a civilian camp. I'm running down a hall, feeling the pressure of being separated from my squad, and a figure runs around the corner. No time to think, just act. Shotgun. BAM. Bogey down.
It was just a woman. A resident in fear, desperately running from the chaos of war. If it's hesitated she would have run away, if she'd been a threat and I hesitated is be dead.
I had to put the game down after this, because it hit so hard that I had just accidentally killed a non combatant out of sheer stress and fear. Well done, SpecOps
Lol it's just a game, who cares. You didn't kill or hurt anyone (well maybe yourself...)
@@erikheijden9828But that displays the empathy of OP, sometimes we don't want to hurt people (even digital ones)
Oh man war baaad
Or something
I had been thinking of this one scene from Family Matters lately where the son wanted to join the police force his dad was on. He was so proud of how he well could shoot even after his dad told that some of the cutouts in the shooting training were dressed up as civilians. Later, he had his son go through the shooting training again only he replaced a civilian cutout with a cutout of the son's sister which the son only stopped shooting after shoot this cutout. Father went "you just shot your sister"
Powerful lessons that people just don't think about.
@@erikheijden9828 So what it's just a game? Dumbest argument ever. Art is meant to make us feel things and games especially are a great safe space to explore what we'd do when put in certain scenarios. To explore our own instincts and emotions. And seeing yourself act in a disturbing way can be disturbing.
NO MATTER what media. everything should be available to the public. Movies, Pictures, Games, Music...
There's so much lost media that i part of our history and a snapshot of the time.
Abandonwares should become public domain.
Yes.
Or at least after people stop selling it (at a reasonable price). We need some sort of digital art preservation laws and we need stuff to be more consumer-friendly.
Welp, time to pirate the game...
@@Skeletons_Riding_Ostriches WEll, all the big Companies HOARDING IP's and never doing anything with them is a big problem
I really appreciate your courage in tackling such a sensitive topic, and the usual politeness and expertise with which you did it. Honored to be a patron of yours. Thank you, Mark.
This game had such a huge impact, not only on the industry, but on me individually. It was the first video game I played that criticized my actions in the game, like GMTK said, it was kinda groundbreaking in war game story telling. I was in college at the time, and spec ops helped me understand that games can be art, even if they aren't a stereotypical "art" game. It's hard to put into words how upsetting it is that it's just gone from stores.
I've been waiting for years for you to get to this game! I can't wait to see what you have to say. Let me share my story with the game:
I was at a boring part of my life, not much to do, so I went looking for a fun game to torrent (don't pirate kids). I saw The Line trending, so I downloaded and started it. I loved the graphics, and the characters were more talkative than I'd experienced in other shooters, so I was having fun. Then it all started to go to hell... I pushed through and finished the game, hoping it would get better. I didn't know what to feel. I'd been gaming for 20 years but hadn't experienced anything like that. So I went to cleanse my pallet by playing Star Wars Jedi Academy, for some fun action... But I couldn't! I was at a point in the game where I was supposed to drop down and ambush some stormtroopers, but they were just chilling and talking about speeders they liked... I did kill them. But then I felt sick. So I stopped playing. And didn't play any single player killing games for years.
I read a book about the game too, Killing is Harmless. It was helpful to understand what The Line did to me. It notes that the only way to "win" the game, is to stop playing.
Anyway, the Line changed how I think about games forever.
As someone who grew along side war all my life you see things differently. As a kid me and my friends were playing call of duty and it was fun, we did it sometimes to escape reality as games should do. As I grew older and held an actual rifle - firing in training with tears in my eyes, it helps you see the world differently and especially those games. The actual noise, recoil, dust, heat, it is something that video games have never been able to pull off and shouldn’t (for obvious reasons), to see death with your eyes (something that a lot of my friends suffer from) or just hearing every other week that another friend around my age died while fighting…
Its kinda nice hearing about a different game that open your eyes to those feelings without actually taking you to a war zone.
honestly ive been in combat too but this game isnt it the phosphorus scene wouldnt happen and the game is just wow you kicked the puppy after i forced you too horrible 6 days in falujahs campaign does it better in no game have i had an actual door kicking experiance where a kid with a sten gun is the caliphates strongest soldier and by golly gee are you gonna kill him j just like i did irl and there is no "omg morality moment" you just tag him one of your guys laughs at his mom crying saying "theres your ISIS super soldier look bitch" the other pukes then gets shot at by terrorists i swear they used the exact house was the one i kicked where a very similar thing happened
@@thecoolestofthe834s2😂😂😂 Sounds like something I'd hear straight out of Generation Kill. Little Isis Super soldier
I remember playing Spec Ops: The Line back when it released and being blown away with the direction the game went. I had played the previous Spec Ops games and always thought they were just pretty decent shooters. Then they dropped footage of The Line and it was now third person and I was like, "oh, cool twist" and then when I'd watch developer interviews on Gametrailers and such. The devs would focus on the setting, with sand, and how you could shoot out windows to let sand pour in and such. That was the stuff they focused on, nothing about the story, it was pitched as just another badass shooter. They did so well with hiding the dark turns.
I am so happy I picked up this game before this happened. I bought it on a whim years ago, not thinking much of it, but when I finally played it it changed my life.
I knew then, that I wanted to be a game developer.
I do not fear as much for old games, but I do fear for any potentially good game somehow coming out of modern AAA studios (hey, anything is possible!) since they are slowly moving to online-only, un-"backup"-able entries.
We'll all have to learn how to write server emulators.
I went into this game back in the day excactly as descibed in the video. It came to me via a friend along with a few other shooting games. I had no idea about its plot. The transformation of the story as you progress through it was subtle but I often caught myself thinking "what the hell is going on here?" By the time I reached the end, I was blunt. completely speachless. I remember it to this day as one of the best games I've played when it comes to storytelling. I keep recomending my friends to play it yet they think it is just another shooter, despite my attempts of telling them otherwise.
I did actually quit the game. It was at the “choose one of the hanging lads to shoot” bit. It wasn’t that it was more reprehensible than what I did leading up to that moment, it was the last drop. It felt like the game ‘had won’. I didn’t want to do this anymore. It felt like the point in the story where my imagined self would refuse to do anything but sit down in the sand and let whatever was about to happen to me happen.
IIRC this is actually a legitimate choice in the fiction of the game and not just its metatext, Walker can simply not choose and that is a valid outcome the ending will respect.
Didn't expect Mark to talk about things other than gameplay design and game story. Definitely should talk more about the moral side of gaming and how games affect the society.
You are the best, never stop making videos plzz
The moral side of gaming is dangerous ground on which to tread. At its best, it's a necessary commentary on art.
At its worst, it's Extra Credits' infamous "you didn't choose to be a Nazi" video.
Very cool seeing you link Professor Bopper's stuff, he's got be of my favorite voices in video game analysis/essays and has lots of thoughtful vides on game design, narrative, mechanics, and gameplay.
Having no volition in a horrible experience can definitely be a stumbling block for the medium in attempting to do this kind of thing. So many developers keep grasping unto film one to ones in narrative conveyance but the distance between character and passive viewer in that medium lends itself to this narrative better than an interactive experience.
you make a great point.. many of this type of game would probably work better as a movie. If the gameplay isn't compelling and you can't actually do anything about it, then that's kinda the same as sitting in a movie cinema and watching, not being able to do anything about the characters on screen.
Well, that's the thing, you do have volition, but you just believe if that choice ends in failure, then you have no choice but to do the bad thing. That's the an excuse a lot of people that commit war atrocities use, I HAD to do it. Even in the infamous WP scene, you have the choice to attack the camp with firearms. It will eventually end in failure after sniper climb to high ground and take you out, but failure always has to be an option if your sense of honor or morals mean anything to you. There has to be an action you would rather die than do.
Gigantic kudos for nailing such a huge concept within Metal Gear that's often misunderstood, and yes, Spec Ops is indeed a modern masterpiece.
It's cool to see you do a video on the softer art/narrative side. Your videos are often pretty mechanically focused (and excellent) but I appreciate the change of pace
Man, that hurts, I've never played the game seen it countless times in YT videos praising video games, always skipped those parts cause I wanted to buy it and experience it's story some day, never managed to due to other titles going in the way.
And now I won't be able to experience it, like, ever? That's devastating
You still can, but you'll have to pirate it or play a second hand physical copy on an old console. Don't feel bad for pirating a game that's not even for sale anymore.
Yeah, I might need to consider that, as you said there is no reason for feeling bad about pirating a game you can't even buy.
avast ye matey!
Old Humble Bundle keys might be floating around if you're the collecting type.
Someone else in the comments mentioned that he got it through a Humble Bundle just the other day, so it might be worth a try
I’m honestly glad I got this game on a whim during a sale on Steam; never thought the game would ever just disappear online. It’s a really big shame it’s not available online; the setting of a Dubai lost to the sands is unique but the game also tells a very dark but compelling war story (a video game “Apocalypse Now”) that deserves to be told or preserved for discussions or our own explorations. (At least, for players who can get through the more shocking parts of the game, since it does get pretty gritty.)
Hotline Miami has a similar point, I feel, but as I understand it's not just one specific moment that it tries to do this with
There's hallucinations, character development that suggests your character doesn't want to be doing this anymore (read the infamous "Do you enjoy hurting others?" line)... but it also goes for the route of slowing itself down and making you take in the sights
After every stage you have to walk back through the leftovers of the rampage you conducted - blood splatters, battered bodies, everything - and there's nothing to do mechanically at this time beyond just, walk from point to point, so you just have to soak in the fact that _you_ caused this mess, and you couldn't- no, _didn't_ stop in the moment to contemplate what you were doing
ShyCorn did a great video about HM 1 and 2, would recommend
What I love most about Spec Ops is that the game just completely refuses to let you feel like a hero, like most other games do.
It is, I'd argue, the only game where you play as an actual terrible person. Most other games, even when you play as bad people or you can make terrible choices, at least let you justify your actions on some level or signpost the choice as bad. Meanwhile, what makes both Walker and the Player horrible in Spec Ops is that you want to be a hero, which leads to more suffering than you could ever cause intentionally.
But most importantly: There isn't even the option to be "good". Walker will always be a monster, what does that make you?
Edit: clarified my position on the relation between player and Walker a bit.
If there's no choice for the player to avoid bad things happening, then there won't be any guilt over their actions. What's the purpose of understanding the anti-war seniment if understanding it has no bearing on the actual game? It actively removes the player from the equation, turning it into yet another linear roller coaster, but this time with text saying "Don't you feel bad yet?" plastered on the walls
@@fleshchild I never got this argument about choice. Has anyone that played a CoD or Battlefield game ever wished they had the choice to stop the war? Why would you expect a deconstruction of military shooters to have said choice? All Spec Ops did was follow the script military shooters follow, but removing the glorification and propaganda.
@@fleshchild The point isn't "don't you feel bad" the point is more so "why do you keep going even though we won't give you the savior narrative that you want?". If you genuinely believe that you are not at fault, the game let's you express that by shooting Konrad at the end.
You are not at fault for Walker's crimes, but the game wants to make you question your relation to them. Are you an impassive observer or are you a bit more involved than you'd like to admit. Both are equally valid responses.
Fallout 3 came out four years prior and part of me feels like at least once, one of the Spec Ops writers was like "You SEE that, Emil? THIS is how you do player-plays-as-bad-guy."
@@relvean5626 this is exactly why i think its pretentious, i dont know anyone who plays call of duty games ( or any games for that matter) to feel like a 'hero', people just wanna shoot shit! its a cool idea but it feels pedantic in the fact that its taking itself so seriously in doing the bait and switch thing.
There is a scene in Hot Shots 2 where the heroes are shooting up the place, killing bad guys, the kill counter is going up like a video game and one of them looks at the camera and says "War, It's fantastic!" While done in jest, the meaning is the same.
spec ops and Silent hill 2 both really changed the way I look at games and what they "could" be. and both are now hard or impossible to play. It makes me realize how important game preservation is especially in this all digital world we live in where we don't really own anything. the problem is only getting worse and it makes me sad to think how many great games may be lost to time or eventually become unplayable.
Remember everyone, Piracy is a moral imperative!
Still have my physical xbox 360 copy (so glad it's backcompat).
I remember liking it when I first played through it but hating how some of the choices you have are forced to always have a gruesome outcome, which by the time I finished the game I muttered to myself: "It wasn't my fault".
But upon replaying it, seeing how the game makes you choose through actions instead of quick time events/dialog options, noticing subtleties in the levels/characters and watching retrospectives/analyses of it, I started respecting the game even more.
It has some flaws, but it's a game everyone should experience at least once.
Won't be long when we all start singing "Do what you want 'cause a pirate is free, You are a pirate!" when it comes to Digital-Only goods.
not if the game relies on the company's server.
@@arsenii_yavorskyi improvise, adapt, overcome
@@arsenii_yavorskyiKinda reminds me of how someone revive a nfs (insert years here) where they have the game and the server to play it again.
I loved this game when I played it. The more and more I played, the more I could see the "simplistic AI" behind the game; enemies are clearly going to spawn from THERE, because there is cover HERE. The further in the game I went, the less fun the combat became; not repetitive in a "time for 5 guys to spawn with grenades for the 50th time" way, but in a "wait... *another* combat? Again? But...why? Why are they just flinging themselves at you, what are they doing?" sort of way...which was the point of it all...that War wasn't "Fun".
I tried to get my friend to play it. He huffed and replied "nah, its boring, the WP scene was annoying, I didn't get it, its just manipulative 'cus it wants you to Feel Bad"...which was annoying, because usually he's good about seeing these types of things in games.
P.S. I had Walker survive [didn't shoot at the end] because someone needed to tell the story of what happened....because I NEEDED to carry on.
Piracy really is the ultimate form of game preservation. That and emulation.
I would like to add that even Metal Gear Solid, while heavily critical of the military industrial complex, nuclear warfare and the way governments exploit their soldiers and cast them aside when they are no longer useful, it still falls into the traps of idealizing soldiers as a concept, gushing over how cool military hardware is such as fighter jets, tanks and guns, romanticizing the ideas of military duty and camaraderie, and even downplaying the role of PMC's in sustaining suffering and warfare when it's the MSF or Diamond Dogs doing it.
Also the act of tactical espionage action being as fun as it is downplays the overall message, that's a problem that is a burden that games will always struggle with it, how fun/engaging gameplay system is too much that just overwrites the intended feeling that the story wants to evoke.
I still don't think fun is a diminishing factor at all. Seems like a low brow write off. Since when is fun the moral meter for anything? We all carry sadism and callousness in our hearts, by default, that's normal. We all instinctually laugh seeing others get hurt in a lot of contexts. We all justify and ignore the incredible suffering of millions to enjoy minor conveniences for ourselves. You think a game has to dodge those twisted sides of ourselves to make a valid point? Are people so blind to self-criticism that they can't simultaneously acknowledge the weight of their responsibility and the fact they feel no emotional incentive to act otherwise? Is that not the scariest part?
@@dopaminecloud It doesn't completely mute the point of a critical piece of media but it does distract from it, and that's fine, it's okay to do it but it has to be acknowledged as a byproduct of being a videogame and that the ultimate vision for it, even beyond the central critical topics, it's to be fun or engaging, and that's okay.
I fail to see the issue with that at all.
The romanticisation isn't just a thing for the player, it plays an in-universe role for its themes and messages.
Its what the members of the Diamond Dogs see themselves as and helps you understand their view of the world including how they eventually fell apart at the hands of solid snake.
@@dopaminecloudThey are that blind to self-criticism, actually. Truffaut's point was basically the same as the joke about "Excited to announce we've finally recreated the Torment Nexus from the sci-fi classic 'Don't Create the Torment Nexus'".
Despite being relatively short compared to some of GMTKs other videos, this is still possibly my favourite.
"Can you remember your squadmate's name?" was one that got me.
So lucky I bought it like 2 months ago...
Thanks for this hommage, really deserved!
I played Spec Ops a while back. I remember thinking it ran into the problem a lot of games run into when trying to do 4th wall breaks or meta-narrative, which is blaming the player or trying to make them feel guilt for things that are required to continue the game. Like 'turn off the game' I don't think counts as a valid option most of the time, because that's not a choice within the space it's exiting the space. You don't stop the in-universe war crimes in Spec Ops by turning the game off early, you just stop your own perception of them. I think the choices they give you and the horrors presented might have worked better through a lens of 'this stuff is fucked up' more than 'you should feel bad'. But that is my perspective.
Either way, I'm sad to see it go, or at least become harder to acquire. Whatever I think of the details, it's definitely a thought provoking game that brought important issues to the fore.
Just wanted to mention that Truffaut’s quote definitely applies to the 4 “anti-war” movies mentioned earlier 8:06 , as well as a whole bunch of literature.
Wow, I had no idea it was pulled from stores. I bought it just a few days before it happened and I'm so glad I did
good sir, i am speechless... hands down. not going into details, but you touched something very important here. in a very fair and significant way. much love. keep up the great work
It was really important to me as I played it in 2013. In 2012 I did a combat tour in Afghanistan. I saw and participated in some pretty horrible things. Put a gun in my mouth and pull the trigger to stop seeing them every time I close my eyes things. This game helped me, somewhat, come to a finality over how I felt equally for things I did as the things I saw. The ending where you put a gun in your mouth and pull the trigger acted as a proxy - a fucked up outlet for that impulse. Convincing myself the mortars I called for in Afghanistan never did what the mortars did in the game helped the mental bleeding a bit until I could get help and properly work my way through those feelings. In some ways overblowing things I did to the level of the things you see in the game helped me walk back from the edge a bit. I felt like that monster, maybe even rightfully so, but understanding the gulf between a monster and feeling like one is quite wide and there might be room to heal.
I don't know, maybe it was a stupid game, I haven't picked it up again since 2014 or so and conflating my own problems with it was a silly way to realize I badly needed help. Killing yourself at the end of game should feel shocking not relieving.
So curious that you mentioned Silent Hill and Jacob's Ladder on the same video as JL was one of the inspirational pieces to create Silent Hill
I feel like this is one of those games I’ve watched a video essay on and then forgot about. I think I’ll go out and play it
Moder copyright law is a cancer which does not protect anyone from plagiarism and benefits mostly huge corporations if anyone at all.
Piracy is ethical is this circumstances.
Ethical according to you.
@@erikheijden9828 What is unethical about it, when it doesn't hurt original authors?
I bought more games because I pirated them first, than I bought because I couldn't.
@@erikheijden9828 It's no longer being sold, which means no one is being benefitted from buying it secondhand. There is literally no way to play it on PC legally now, so "piracy" is the only option.
@@erikheijden9828 It's ethical according to me as well
@@erikheijden9828Found the corporate bootlicker, you must loooove the phrase "you'll own nothing and you'll be happy".
I had so many opportunities to grab it for $7. I'll just have to remember my experience playing it on ps3
unrelated, of course, but ps3 emulation is quite mature now
Indeed
This depiction of duabi is far more interesting then all bf2042 maps combined
ive played this game for over a decade, played it first as a kid, as my first shooter
and now as a adult i still repeqtwdly go back, sad to see it taken down. i would love to see a remaster or remake
Drakengard, Shadow of the Colossus, NieR, and Spec Ops. The OGs of game deconstruction if you want more games like this, love the video
Didn't this same thing happen with Driver: San Francisco a couple years ago?
(Getting removed from Digital Storefronts)
Indeed it did. And in turn raised the price of the game by proxy. I was able to find a copy at a local game store for 80 usd. I didn't hesitate and I purchased it of course for I haven't seen a copy of it in years
Games get removed all the time
The one I regret is an Adventure Time zelda-like. I was unemployed at the time and couldn't spend funds on games. Played it years later on the Vita and wish it was in my Steam Library.
@@erikheijden9828 Indeed they do. Marble Blast Ultra for the XBox 360 is another example. This one is made worse by the fact it never had a physical version. (Thank God the PC port exists...)
Alan Wake some years ago too. I also see some old youtube videos being reuploaded or removed due to copyright claims.
Also this game inspired one of the first full length books written to analyse a video game. Killing Is Harmless by Brendan Keogh. I enjoyed that read, although I wish Brendan had tied it together with more overarching thematic analysis.
The way I always saw the choices the game forces you to make, and the things it makes you do, is that its intended to drive a split between you, the observer, and Walker, the main character. Its particularly blatant in the white phosphorous scene where you see his face reflected in the targeting panel, as well as in the cutscene following where your perspective shifts to a handheld camera POV as to suggest that Walker himself is the driving force for all of these acts while you can merely spectate.
The ending in particular makes that separation pretty apparent.
Also I want to point out that reviews at the time claimed that the actual shooting was mediocore at best. It was compared to contemporary shooters and seems subpar in terms of how „fun“ it was.
Hard to believe these days, but most reviewers really did not get it at the time. The title was a financial disappointment and never really got the appreciation it deserved outside of a few videos like this one. I found extra credits through their review of spec ops actually because they were one of the few that really „got it“ even back then.
That Truffaut quote reminds me of a story I heard that when Kurt Vonnegut told his wife he was going to write a book about his war experiences she told him not to because there was no way to do it that didn’t make war look appealing.
That would certainly explain how Slaughterhouse Five became Nazi propaganda.
@@silentdrew7636 wait what?!? What the FUCK did I miss? I know the firebombing of Dresden became a thing nazi apologists in Germany try to use to both sides stuff but do they cite Slaughterhouse Five?
I always remember the scenes in Call of Duty: World at War where it was clear the war sucked, horrible things happened, and people realized that. "Someone should read this." It was an oddly formative game for me as it was pretty much my first big name FPS.
I finally got around to watching this video, and I just wanted to say I feel like I've missed my chance to experience this game, even though I already know what happens.
I saw Spec Ops on sale not too long before it got removed.
I remembered seeing a previous video about it, maybe yours or someone else's, so I considered picking it up.
I decided I'd get it another time, as I already had games I wanted to play through first.
A bit later, I saw this video in my feed when it was originally posted.
I immediately checked Steam and saw the game was removed.
All the people criticizing Spec Ops: The Line for not giving you a "choice" in committing the various horrible acts are frankly missing the entire point of the game.
The game is a criticism of the military power fantasy, where your actions are ultimately heroic, and necessary, that criticism would completely fall apart if you could "avoid" using the white phosphorus.
The game is trying to say "you want to be the hero so badly? here's what that actually entails!" and people got mad the game essentially didn't let them be the hero.
It's ironic.
Exactly. Like, Walker yelling about how Konrad "made him" do these things. Joker blaming Walker for "making" them into "fucking killers." The whole point is that everyone involved is complicit, and players who think they get a pass from that are missing the thesis statement of the game entirely.
When most people think about "games about choice", they think of Telltale/Dontnod/David Cage "choose your own adventure" games with a tree of a storyline. Spec Ops is about choice in a different way. It's less about the choices you make, but rather _the act and context of choosing._ It's why whenever Walker is confronted with doing the terrible things he's done, he repeats to himself "I didn't have a choice" - the very same sentiment going through the player's mind.
So a useless point since it was forced, and "just quit" means I would get my money back right?
Exactly. Lazy stuff some people like to pretend is deep. They made a mid game and hid behind this
I like that kinda. It's frustrating and unfair but it tells a good story. I even went back and tried to kill all of the enemies in the white phosphorus section, but the game eventually started spawning an infinite amount of snipers which kill you nearly instantly. I've been in similar situations with games like CoD4's big Chernobyl fight but those eventually end. No matter how hard you try with war though, sometimes the only results are bad ones.
Kinda reminds one of some of the current rhetoric in the current Palestine situation where Israeli supporters say that Palestine never backs down and never stops attacking so of course they have to fight and oppress them. Obviously I don't know literally every detail, but I wouldn't doubt that the events that fuel that rhetoric are true.
"There's always a [good] choice."
"No, there's really not."
You don't need to refund the game, but you can recognize what the game is trying to convey and keep that in mind as you continue. Would you also criticize the movie Fury for "forcing you" to watch the various warcrimes committed in the movie by the American troops?
And, the game might be throwing tomatoes at the game industry and by extension, the player, but it's also remarkably graceful to that same playerbase.
After all, what's one of the third wall breaking loading screen messages?
"You are still a good person."
That's talking about the player, not Walker. @@OhNoTheFace
The old CoD's actually had real commentary on war too you're thinking of the new CoD's that make you a super hero
I don't know if they continued to do so but the first few ones had quotes between each chapters. Those that stuck with me since are not exactly pro-war.
They were Patton's "The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his." and attributed to Unknown : "Never forget that your weapon was made by the lowest bidder."
I don't remember when was the first quote but the other one was in Modern Warfare apparently.
The DoD has policies to prevent anti war movies from being made. They have an office dedicated to liaison with film makers. Make an anti war movie, or act as a store front for one, and they’ll never help you again. That’s no subject matter expertise, no access to bases, etc. They will shut you out.
Think about it - it’s been 23 years since 9-11. Everyone knows, even guys like me who deployed five times, that it was all for lies. What movies or games have we got that even touch on it?
This needs to be seen more.
I had this game in my library for years and never touched it, then one day a few years ago I was bored a land thought eh why not - I was blown away lol, the gameplay was pretty average but the story had me hooked and shattered me at the end
I have the game and I played it and until right now I didnt know it was delisted.....thank you for letting me know...this hurts