Six Days in Fallujah: Sony reportedly worked on controversial shooter
Six Days in Fallujah
With Six Days in Fallujah, Highwire Games is bringing a military shooter onto the market that is supposed to depict a real military strike carried out during the Iraq war in video game form. It is a brutal attack carried out by British, American and Iraqi troops against the insurgents in the eponymous city, which was populated by civilians at the time of the operation. As a basis for the game, numerous US Marines involved in the mission were consulted by the development team. Originally announced for a 2010 release, Six Days in Fallujah was dropped by then-publisher Konami after protests from veterans, their families and the conservative British newspaper The Daily Mail. Twelve years later it will now be distributed by Victura Games and come onto the market as a first instead of a third person shooter.Here you can find our column about the (new) controversy about Six Days in Fallujah
As David Jaffe claims in his podcast, the title is said to have been in development at Sony for a time. In the Santa Monica Studios, where God of War was also developed, is said to have been worked on the project. Jaffe had already claimed this in 2012. At that time he wrote that the project had been included in the Sony portfolio under the direction of Allan Becker before he left the Santa Monica Studios for Japan. In the course of the process, however, the publisher is said to have made a different decision. Jaffe and guest John Garvin (Days Gone) stated that the nature of the game is probably too delicate to satisfy a large studio and the demands that come with it.
Recommended editorial content At this point you will find external content from [PLATTFORM]. To protect your personal data, external integrations are only displayed if you confirm this by clicking on "Load all external content": Load all external content I consent to external content being displayed to me. This means that personal data is transmitted to third-party platforms. Read more about our privacy policy . External content More on this in our data protection declaration. "Every time the game got what [the developers] wanted, a realistic look at war, companies said 'no thanks'," said Jaffe. "In the climate we're in, you're literally stepping on landmines," Garvin added. The Days Gone developer previously called Six Days in Fallujah "hurrapatriotic" (timecode: 2:16:00), but noted that he found the idea of a shooter from the perspective of a foot soldier quite exciting. However, he would like a focus on the story and a less one-sided presentation.
Source: Youtube / David Jaffe, Playstationlifestyle.net
Six Days in Fallujah: the keys to the controversy of the game set in the Iraq War
Six Days in Fallujah: The game was canceled by Konami a decade ago, but its resurrection in 2021 has brought with it the same moral dilemmas.The Iraq War began in 2003, the year the United States and its international allies invaded the country under the pretext that Saddam Hussein’s dictatorial regime had weapons of mass destruction. On October 21, 2011, the then US president, Barack Obama, announced the withdrawal of troops from that territory. Six Days in Fallujah, a video game that has returned to the media spotlight today, was canceled prior to that date. Given that it was a real conflict and very close in time, the controversy did not take long to emerge. At that time, Konami was the company that was going to be in charge of publishing it, but after analyzing the situation they backed down. The project was left in limbo, although Victura Games has rescued it and is willing to commercialize it again. A decade later, the controversy is far from dissipating. What are the reasons?
Atomic Games, the original developer, broke down after the project was canceled, although Victura was founded by Peter Tamte, the former CEO of the original team. Development has passed into the hands of Highwire Games, a small studio that is developing the project with current systems in mind. To understand what is happening in the present it is important to review the events of the past, because they are practically the same.
In 2009, Konami reported on its decision not to launch Six Days in Fallujah: “After analyzing the reaction in the United States and learning the opinion about the game through phone calls and emails, we have determined not to sell it.
The arguments that Atomic Games used to defend their production were not very different from those they use today. Tamte argued that “any type of medium has grown up producing content about real events”, those whose potential lies in their relevance. “Movies, music, and television have helped people learn about the complex issues of our time. Are we only manufacturers of high-tech toys or are we communication companies capable of producing content as relevant as movies, music and television? ”.
Different perspectives or just the North American one?The point is that all history has different prisms. However, at Six Days in Fallujah we manage US Marines, so we live the story from that point of view for most of the time. In that original project, Tamte said that when the soldiers returned from Iraq, some asked them to “tell their story through the most important medium”: it referred to video games. “Six Days in Fallujah is not about whether the US and its allies should have invaded Iraq. It is an opportunity for the world to learn the true stories of the people who fought in one of the world’s greatest urban battles of the last half century ”. The creators of the titles assert even now that the idea is not to investigate the whys, but to reflect the personal stories of the protagonists who have shared their experiences.
The game concept has not changed much. In the press release announcing his return, the team collected the statements of Eddie GarcÃa, one of the soldiers wounded during the battle: “Sometimes, the only way to understand the truth is to experience the facts for yourself.” commented the sergeant, the same one who proposed the original project. “War is full of hard and uncertain decisions that are difficult to understand if we see them on television or in a movie, where they already make the decisions for you.” Video games can give us a new perspective on the events that occurred in reality in a way that other media cannot teach us ”. Now it is added that in addition to the soldiers, civilians have participated in the creative process with their personal stories, photographs and video recordings. The playable part will be complemented by a documentary.
The main criticism that has prevailed is that the content will be biased and very in favor of the interests of the United States, since everything seems to indicate that the focus will be centered on the Marines. Victura recalls that “multiple countries” were part of the city’s forces. They argue that in the game there will be “some very intense stealth missions”, in which we can play an Iraqi civilian. The editor has also denied that the project is a propaganda tool at the service of the US Government or a recruiting method: “The US Government is not involved in the game and there are no plans to use it to recruit,” they mentioned. “The Iraqi Marines, soldiers and civilians who have helped us do so as citizens, the game is being independently financed.”
Politics as an inherent part of the video gameAnother problem is that as in the past, the team led by Peter Tamte has tried to avoid that the video game emanates political issues. This specific aspect affects many companies in the sector such as Ubisoft or Activision, which have said actively and passively that their games are simply entertainment products that do not intend to go beyond that. “For us as a team [the game serves] to help people understand the complexity of urban combat. It is about the experiences of this individual who is there for political reasons. And we want to show how the decisions politicians make affect the decisions [a Marine] needs to make on the battlefield, ”but without questioning those political decisions. Tamte has said not to be interested in “making a political comment” within the framework of the reflection of whether going to war was a good idea or a bad idea.
