What is the predominant feeling upon seeing the words: "mission complete" at the end of a videogame level? Take a moment to ask yourself what those words would look like, how they morph with different genres, picture them in all their multitude forms and shapes.
Does it look like this? Like this perhaps? I imagine most of you thought of, if not those specific examples, similarly triumphant ones.
Every mission in Dawn of War begins with the Space Marines, humanity's most elite forces, devising a new plan to stop the enemies of the Imperium of Man. That is, everyone besides the Imperium itself; whether those be ferocious space orks, the devious Eldar, or the Great Enemy, the forces of Chaos. Each time, the plan inevitably involves the slaughter of enemy forces, asking the player to walk the delicate balance of any good RTS: resource managing, base building, micro.
Every mission in Dawn of War ends on the same note: the space marines win, the enemy is routed, at least from that particular theatre of war. Yet something is amiss. Your actions endanger huge swathes of civilian populations, cause the destruction of gigantic cities and settlements, see the fate of entire worlds being sealed. Words of doubt are cast by powerful and paranoid inquisitors over your actions, the dire warnings spoken by knowledgeable Eldar farseers go unheeded, the schemes of Chaos sorcerers endlessly unfold. All while your own plans reveal their faults when it is too late to remedy.
Every mission is punctuated by a fade to black, the music reduced to whisper and quickly to silence. Two words bleakly manifest themselves onto the screen: "Mission Success". A taste of ashes in your mouth, a feeling of having made a terrible mistake once again.
Are we the baddies?
If you have any knowledge of the nerd space (and you're on a videogame logging site so you're way more invested in games than you might care to admit), you've probably seen a Warhammer Space Marine. If you've never looked into the series, they always look like the heroes of the setting. Imposing armour and weapons, a honourable facade, serious, (mostly) white male faces. Stereotypical 7th gen videogame heroes. In Dawn of War, they are the stars of the singleplayer campaign, the only faction you're allowed to control in the base game outside of free battles. But if you've read so far (boobies!, ha!, got your attention sucker) you might have realised there's something more sinister under their "perfect" image that the series' iconography seems to be obsessed with.
There is an adage stated by players of Warhammer 40.000's original tabletop game: a child walks into a store, sees a game being played, asks: "Who are the good guys?". The players stifle a laugh: "There are none. 'In the grim darkness of the far future there is only war'". In a sense, they'd be right, the game is (sometimes) written and thought of as a wargame first, where the major concern is: "how does every faction get into a fight with every other faction, itself included?". Writing each one with varying degrees of unreedimability is a great method to do so, as if nobody is overtly good, then us players can drop all pretenses of moral righteousness and just focus on having a good time with our overpriced plastic miniatures.
The player who then decides to dedicate more than two braincells to even just surface level aspects of the background can realise that, for example, space marines are essentially indoctrinated into an ultrafascist, fanatical ideology. How could they be the good guys?
Marketing baby, that's how, who-hoo!
Space marine miniatures are easy to paint, have an all-rounder gameplay style, look human (more recognisable to us, therefore more appealing) and are highly customizable. Ever since 1987 they have been the face of Warhammer. They grace videogame boxarts, books, shirts, fucking Panini sticker collections.
It is the far easier, lazier, marketable and profitable solution to paint the horrible space marines as actually heroic and noble. Many go this route, fans included. As much as I love the setting and its aesthetic, I am disgusted by certain parts of the fandom that blindly worship the Imperium of Man, a regime that gets a perfect 14/14 points in Umberto Eco's list of a fascist states's features. (some of the most reactionary, anti-SJW Internet figures often profess their love for Warhammer. Take a wild guess which faction they tend to love the most). It would be like a Fallout: New Vegas fan siding with the Legion because they believe IRL in what Caesar stands for ideologically.
This is why Dawn of War is great. Not just for being a solid as hell rts, which manages to take the strengths of its source material, creating something wholly new with it. Not just for having an amazing presentation that still puts 90% of other licensed titles to shame. Dawn of War GETS Warhammer 40.000. It realises it's both a dumb toy soldier game with space elves and mushroom orcs, while also being the stylized, depresssing picture of a world of obscurantism, a possible fate derived from our aggressive apathy.
The world is a beautiful place. Don't let the bastards make you lose hope. Fight.
Does it look like this? Like this perhaps? I imagine most of you thought of, if not those specific examples, similarly triumphant ones.
Every mission in Dawn of War begins with the Space Marines, humanity's most elite forces, devising a new plan to stop the enemies of the Imperium of Man. That is, everyone besides the Imperium itself; whether those be ferocious space orks, the devious Eldar, or the Great Enemy, the forces of Chaos. Each time, the plan inevitably involves the slaughter of enemy forces, asking the player to walk the delicate balance of any good RTS: resource managing, base building, micro.
Every mission in Dawn of War ends on the same note: the space marines win, the enemy is routed, at least from that particular theatre of war. Yet something is amiss. Your actions endanger huge swathes of civilian populations, cause the destruction of gigantic cities and settlements, see the fate of entire worlds being sealed. Words of doubt are cast by powerful and paranoid inquisitors over your actions, the dire warnings spoken by knowledgeable Eldar farseers go unheeded, the schemes of Chaos sorcerers endlessly unfold. All while your own plans reveal their faults when it is too late to remedy.
Every mission is punctuated by a fade to black, the music reduced to whisper and quickly to silence. Two words bleakly manifest themselves onto the screen: "Mission Success". A taste of ashes in your mouth, a feeling of having made a terrible mistake once again.
Are we the baddies?
If you have any knowledge of the nerd space (and you're on a videogame logging site so you're way more invested in games than you might care to admit), you've probably seen a Warhammer Space Marine. If you've never looked into the series, they always look like the heroes of the setting. Imposing armour and weapons, a honourable facade, serious, (mostly) white male faces. Stereotypical 7th gen videogame heroes. In Dawn of War, they are the stars of the singleplayer campaign, the only faction you're allowed to control in the base game outside of free battles. But if you've read so far (boobies!, ha!, got your attention sucker) you might have realised there's something more sinister under their "perfect" image that the series' iconography seems to be obsessed with.
There is an adage stated by players of Warhammer 40.000's original tabletop game: a child walks into a store, sees a game being played, asks: "Who are the good guys?". The players stifle a laugh: "There are none. 'In the grim darkness of the far future there is only war'". In a sense, they'd be right, the game is (sometimes) written and thought of as a wargame first, where the major concern is: "how does every faction get into a fight with every other faction, itself included?". Writing each one with varying degrees of unreedimability is a great method to do so, as if nobody is overtly good, then us players can drop all pretenses of moral righteousness and just focus on having a good time with our overpriced plastic miniatures.
The player who then decides to dedicate more than two braincells to even just surface level aspects of the background can realise that, for example, space marines are essentially indoctrinated into an ultrafascist, fanatical ideology. How could they be the good guys?
Marketing baby, that's how, who-hoo!
Space marine miniatures are easy to paint, have an all-rounder gameplay style, look human (more recognisable to us, therefore more appealing) and are highly customizable. Ever since 1987 they have been the face of Warhammer. They grace videogame boxarts, books, shirts, fucking Panini sticker collections.
It is the far easier, lazier, marketable and profitable solution to paint the horrible space marines as actually heroic and noble. Many go this route, fans included. As much as I love the setting and its aesthetic, I am disgusted by certain parts of the fandom that blindly worship the Imperium of Man, a regime that gets a perfect 14/14 points in Umberto Eco's list of a fascist states's features. (some of the most reactionary, anti-SJW Internet figures often profess their love for Warhammer. Take a wild guess which faction they tend to love the most). It would be like a Fallout: New Vegas fan siding with the Legion because they believe IRL in what Caesar stands for ideologically.
This is why Dawn of War is great. Not just for being a solid as hell rts, which manages to take the strengths of its source material, creating something wholly new with it. Not just for having an amazing presentation that still puts 90% of other licensed titles to shame. Dawn of War GETS Warhammer 40.000. It realises it's both a dumb toy soldier game with space elves and mushroom orcs, while also being the stylized, depresssing picture of a world of obscurantism, a possible fate derived from our aggressive apathy.
The world is a beautiful place. Don't let the bastards make you lose hope. Fight.
DELETED
1 year ago