PLA Develops First Person Shooter With US Troops as Targets

An anonymous reader tipped us to a People's Daily story about the (Chinese) People's Liberation Army's new shoot-em-up game with US soldiers as targets, and that story led us to a more complete description of the Glorious Revolution game at the Daily Mail, which includes a nice video (in Chinese, of course) toward the bottom of the article that shows how the game looks in action.

Comments

We are their enemy

[Anonymous Coward]

and best customer all at once.

Re:We are their enemy

[cplusplus]

I guess that makes the US and China "frienemies".

Re:We are their enemy

[Platinum Dragon]

The word you're looking for is "rival".

Not surprising

[jonescb]

There are games where China is the enemy. Why is it suddenly a bad thing when the US are the bad guys?

Re:Not surprising

[0racle]

Because the US is always the good guys. It can't be the other way around.

Re:Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

There are games where China is the enemy. Why is it suddenly a bad thing when the US are the bad guys?

Citation needed for games where the Chinese army is the bad guy and the game is made by a world government.

Re:Not surprising

[Xest]

Because now Bin Laden is dead, and Al Qaeda has been rather unscary for a few years now, China is the new bogey man with which the US government prefers to beat it's citizens into submitting further to their control and scrutiny with.

That's why.

Re:Not surprising

[jonnythan]

Because those games are not created by the US government or US Army, nor are they used as training tools for actual soldiers.

Re:Not surprising

[Maxo-Texas]

So did the game developed by the US Army feature chinese and russian enemies?
Of the article is accurate, this game wasn't developed by some third party but was developed by the PLA.

Seems a bit revealing to me.

And folks tell me I'm wrong when I say there will be a significant war with china in the next 50 years. But this is how things start. The chinese have a fairly enormous racial superiority complex laid over a deep inferiority complex due to the 1800's and early 1900's. That kind of thing can boil over in a bad way.

The best thing to happen will be to get them away from the racially pure meme they are nursing. That kind of belief has lead to bad things very reliably over the last several hundred years.

Re:Not surprising

[schnikies79]

Battlefield 2 was created by DICE and distributed by EA, not the U.S. government.

Re:Not surprising

[SwordsmanLuke]

...And you don't think *that* would lead to a major war?

Re:Not surprising

[yurtinus]

We simply can't repay all the debt we owe at one sitting - that is as big of a problem for China as it is for us. Demanding all of our loans be repaid would wreak havoc in both economies.

Re:Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

Can they make us pay it all in one sitting if they wanted to? Bonds can't be redeemed until the maturity date, can they? Kind of like a bank can't make you pay off your mortgage all at once. The agreed terms have defined pay back times.

Re:Not surprising

[DarkOx]

and we could shitcan the Chinese economy in 24 secs announcing our intent to default on that debt, and stopping the purchase of their exports.

Re:Not surprising

[truthsearch]

Any attempt to seriously harm the US through economic methods would also hurt themselves.

Re:Not surprising

[truthsearch]

I disagree. I think the US will do anything to avoid all-out war with China. They can easily grow their army to tens of millions of soldiers and change their factories to building war machines.

Re:Not surprising

[tgd]

...And you don't think *that* would lead to a major war?

Not when we need to borrow money to pay for it.

Re:Not surprising

[mlts]

I fear a Sino-American war, and hope it doesn't happen. However, there are a lot of things that worry me:

1: Two countries, one set of resources. Almost always, this is what wars end up being fought over.

2: China's nationalism. Race is second, because there are a lot of races in China.

3: Revenge, especially of what Japan did to them last century.

I just hope old hatreds can be set aside, people here in the US start using nuclear power as opposed to fighting over dino juice, and that both countries get some wisdom of their own that trading is a lot better than chucking ICBMs.

China is also going through a cultural renaissance. Now that people can do art and music without being lined against a wall and shot (like in Mao's time), people there are more interested in education and developing their economy as opposed to military gains.

I cross my fingers -- in a lot of ways, China is a command economy, but it isn't an extreme country (now that the nuts like Mao are cozily dead), nor is it one that would sacrifice its children for religious dogma meaninglessly. I just hope it stays that way.

Re:Not surprising

[larry bagina]

US Government debt has fixed maturities; they can't call it in. They could stop buying new debt(*), they could sell off existing debt, but they can't demand $5 trillion in cash right now.

* The treasury department has already hit the debt limit and cannot issue any more new debt, in theory. This year, 70% of all new debt was purchased by the federal reserve ("qualitative easing 2"). Helicopter Ben Bernanke would be just as happy to purchase 100% of it because Apple added new features to the iPad without raising the price so that proves there isn't any inflation, nevermind the price of things like food or oil or gold or silver.

Re:Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

Not Chinese, but American Army is pretty damn close as it's made by US Army. You're always playing US soldier and shooting down some middle east guys. And always meaning it doesn't mean which side you play with, you always see yourself as US Army and the other ones as middle east guys.

Re:Not surprising

[Nadaka]

All in due time. All in due time.

Re:Not surprising

[bl8n8r]

> nor are they used as training tools for actual soldiers.

Not quite. Watch the movie in TFA.

Personally, I don't care who's shooting who in the game. The intent behind the creation of the game would be more of a concern.

Re:Not surprising

[Martin Blank]

While I agree with you on the economic front, China would have difficulties if they tried something like getting Kim to invade the South. North Korea's military is something of a joke technologically speaking, relying on numbers. Their most advanced aircraft are a few dozen MiG-29s, and the remainder are 1970s and older aircraft. Their armor is even older than what the allied forces faced in Desert Storm. Besides, it's not in China's economic interest. Remember that message that was released by Wikileaks about China's thoughts on North Korea? While they see an advantage in having North Korea as a barrier between China and US forces, they're OK with South Korea running the entire peninsula, too, provided it comes about by peaceful means in large part because they don't want to deal with the refugee influx.

A Chinese invasion of Taiwan would be similarly disastrous. China does not have the landing capacity required to perform an invasion of the island. About eight or nine years ago, there was a paper published in China talking about how it could commandeer fishing boats, ferries, and other civilian vessels to cross enough soldiers for an invasion. The losses, however, would be extraordinarily high, and it's not at all certain that China could obtain air superiority over the island, or if it did, that it could retain it, particularly once US forces get involved. Maybe in 15 years they could (and that may be what the slow build-up of a blue-water navy is about), but not right in the immediate future.

Re:Not surprising

[idontgno]

1: Two countries, one set of resources. Almost always, this is what wars end up being fought over.

I assume you mean the resources currently in Chinese territory. I doubt we'd go to explicit war against a major military power with nuclear capability over resources. Easier and safer to bargain, like we have up until now.

2: China's nationalism. Race is second, because Han is the only race in China that matters.

FTFY. Ask the Uyghur about that. However, the concept of the Middle Kingdom is key to its foreign policy. China invented exceptionalism millennia before George Washington was born.

3: Revenge, especially of what Japan did to them last century.

I hope not. There's enough ancient hatred in the world as it is.

I still think the flashpoint will be when China decides it's put up with "its rebellious province" long enough, and the US will have to decide whether it will go to war on behalf of its little ally or just let it go, along with a fair bit of US military hardware and technology.

Re:Not surprising

[Nadaka]

There used to be a lot of races in China, most have been "ethnically cleansed" by the Han. The Han race is China is the Peoples Communist Party. Maybe things will go well, but they are pretty close to the Nazi party in the late 20's, so my hopes are definitely not up.

Re:Not surprising

[DarkOx]

Not the point; I was responding to

China actually could shitcan the US economy in 24 hours, either using currency manipulation, calling in the debt, or even military means

If they did any of those things to the extremes that would "shitcan" the US economy we would not be buying any electronics anyway. At that point it would simply be a matter of "if I am going down, I am taking you down with me."

China can't really call in the debt. These bonds they be sold on the market or redeemed. Redeemed is pretty close to "calling in the debt" but if the instruments are not mature something less than face value would be paid. The market lacks enough buys to absorb the assets if they were dumped at anything beyond firesale prices. China would lose a huge portion of their own savings, but it would turn the dollar into paper. They can't redeem them all at once at the Treasury either as they don't have the cash on hand to pay, and can't borrow it because we are in excess of the debt ceiling already. So we would default. That would again destroy China's savings and turn the dollar in to paper. With the even greater side effect of destroying our ability to borrow. T-Bills being reduced to a JUNK rateing would be a much bigger problem for our banks and private sector than those bogus valued CDO/CDS/MBS ever were, and still remain.

The DEFLATION that would trigger would be so incredible that nobody could find a dollar spend and few would have anything of enough value to trade for one if such a dollar was found. The ONLY spending that would be happening is completely on inelastic products like staple foods.

No US money would be purchasing electronics from China through intermediaries or otherwise.

Meanwhile in China FoxCon and friends have a problem. Their biggest market has vanished overnight. The only markets large enough in population to replace it (their own domestic and India) don't have a standard of living which would permit many to buy these products. The only way to fix that overnight would be a sudden and extreme revaluation of currency which would alter the political landscape so rapidly their governments could not survive. If they don't revalue until most citizens can buy and IPad, well everything grinds to halt. Workers go home because there is no need to build more inventory, wages are not paid to workers not working, farm products don't get bought even though people are starving, the farms collapse and then everyone is starving.

So yea its essentially a non-nuclear MAD arrangement.

Re:Not surprising

[DA_MAN_DA_MYTH]

I don't know how many games have turned killing Chinese into entertainment value? This isn't a game made by a game company. This was developed by the PLA. Did America's Army developed for the US Army attack Chinese, or really anyone? Propaganda is propaganda.

Re:Not surprising

[ZankerH]

It's called America's Army. And yeah, that's pretty disturbing.

Re:Not surprising

[Johnny Mnemonic]

So yea its essentially a non-nuclear MAD arrangement. +1 Insightful. Whether by decision or by accident, be assured that this is more likely than an other consideration to keep China and the US at peace.

We would almost certainly cancel our debt obligation to the Chinese if they were to do something overtly hostile, like invade Taiwan. And everyone knows it. Now--do we start a war with China just to have the legal precepts to cancel that debt, and erase the US deficit overnight? A war with China would probably be even more expensive, so doubt it.

If when China begins selling our debt, be aware that one of the hurdles to WW III has been removed.

Re:Not surprising

[TheTyrannyOfForcedRe]

I fear a Sino-American war, and hope it doesn't happen.

It's not going to happen. The US and China are BFF's. They're practically twins. They're the two "most capitalist" countries in the world. Both are authoritarian regimes run by close parings between business and closed political parties. All the other political shit (communism/democracy) is purely for show. China is America's Eastasia. America is China's Eastasia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four

Re:Not surprising

[SuricouRaven]

They might do that one day. China plans long term - I wouldn't put it past them to cause such an economic collapse, with the intention of hurting their competitors more than they hurt themselves. Having a centrally planned market would give them some advantage in the ability to plan ahead - they could have stockpiles built up years in advance, employ blatant protectionism to help domestic industry recover faster. They government could spend vast amounts of money propping up unprofitable industries for a decade so they are ready the moment recovery starts, while the rest of the world is founding new companies and building new factories. It'd hurt their economy, yes - but if it hurts the rest of the world more, it's still a valid plan for financial warfare. Collapse the economy, recover faster than anyone else, and use the window thus created to take over foreign markets and purchase what competition remains. The end result would be a situation where most economic activity, even that not performed in China, would be by Chinese companies.

Re:Not surprising

[Danny Rathjens]

The best thing to happen will be to get them away from the racially pure meme they are nursing. That kind of belief has lead to bad things very reliably over the last several hundred years.

Luckily this is already happening thanks to DNA. There used to be a fairly strong belief that was promulgated by the PRC that the chinese evolved separately from the rest of the world based on the discoveries in china of some homo erectus fossils - a.k.a. peking man. But:

A 1999 study undertaken by Chinese geneticist Jin Li showed that the genetic diversity of modern Chinese people is well within that of the whole world population, which suggests there was no inter-breeding between modern human immigrants to East Asia and Homo erectus, such as Peking Man, and that the Chinese are descended from Africa, like all other modern humans

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peking_man#Relation_to_modern_Chinese_people

Re:Not surprising

[SuperDre]

But 'terrorist' is something in the eye of the beholder, for one it's a terrorist for another it's a soldier.. There are enough countries and people who consider the US to be terrorist with their 'You have to do what I say or else' attitude.. Which country was the first and only country to use atom bombs on civilians? yes it was the US..

Personally I don't care which ever side you can play in any game or how horrific a game can be, it's all just virtual reality, and as long as it stays there, I don't care.. And I like the US countryside, only sad thing is, there live so many 'not so intelligent' people there (next to a lot intelligent, but it seems those haven't got anything to say)..

Re:Not surprising

[Suiggy]

The recently released FPS game Home Front features the PLA as the enemy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homefront_(video_game)

In fact, I would hazard a guess that this new game pitching the US as the enemy is a direct response to Home Front.

Re:Not surprising

[Maxo-Texas]

Armies and navies don't really matter to the US or China. It's impossible to mass a force when the enemy has nuclear weapons. Any concentration of ships is just a really expensive future coral reef.

But it wouldn't take much to disrupt food transportation and kill millions on both sides. Biological attacks are possible but have the risk of backfiring. Not sure of what form it will take.

As for bonds-- nations can and do just change the terms on bonds. In the past they have arbitrarily turned 20 year bonds into 50 year bonds.

The question is to what degree the american right wing will behave insanely and to what degree the chinese right will will behave insanely. If either side pushes too hard and "wins" economically, it could cause the other side to lash out.

The fact that the chinese have been putting out a lot of chinese nationalist propaganda over the last 15 to 20 years is a warning sign. They could talk themselves into doing something unwise.

Re:Not surprising

[jackbird]

It recalls the old saying "If you owe the bank a million dollars and can't pay, you have a problem; if you owe the bank a billion dollars and can't pay, the bank has a problem."

Re:Not surprising

[Kelbear]

Per your link, the enemy in Home Front is not China, it's North Korea.

"The antagonists in Homefront were originally intended to be Chinese, but were later replaced by a unified Korea for two reasons: a possible backlash by the Chinese Ministry of Culture and the reality of economic interdependence between America and China that made the Chinese "not that scary"[8] said Tae Kim, a former CIA field agent and consultant on the game's backstory."

Re:Not surprising

[Red Flayer]

I don't think they'd play that game. In the current economic downturn, China is already having problems with a restless out-of-work population. The level of downturn we're talking about would lead to civil unrest, and possible overthrow of the government.

Yes, the economic revival of China is a matter of intense national pride among the Chinese people. But the excesses of those who have gotten very wealthy, and the growing economic disparity in China, would pose real problems should sentiment in the lower Chinese classes turn negative. Younger people in China feel the promise of economic growth, and hope to better their situation. But don't forget that older people remember Mao, and his message -- the New Left in China is growing in popularity as their economy continues to stagnate while the rich get richer. For all the reforms instituted by Deng Xiaoping, for all the stock we place in their planned economy, the people of China would have to support their government through VERY lean times for this plan to work.

TLDR: The government of China would be too afraid of overthrow or revolution to support such a drastic scheme.

Re:Not surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

No, actually, most of them became the Han. Chinese history plays like a broken record: the Chinese do really well and grow rich, then grow lazy, then get invaded by outsiders. The outsiders live in tents and wear furs and eat yak meat for a few decades, but pretty soon the palaces and fancy clothes and delicious food start to seem pretty sweet. They learn Chinese language and history and literature and whatnot, and before you know it they're calling themselves Han.

Seriously, major Chinese dynasties that were started by non-Chinese (or borderline, yokel Chinese): the Qin (from whence comes the name 'China'), the Sui, the Tang, the Yuan, and the Qing. Those are only the major, China-wide dynasties; there were also the Jin, the Liao, etc, that just controlled major parts of China at some point or other.

Being 'Han', to a Chinese person, means more or less being 'Chinese'. Certainly, that's always the way it was. There were never really 'a lot of races' in China in the sense that you mean.

The flip side of that is that calling yourself something other than Han was kind of rebellious. And yeah, groups that did that had a tendency to vanish.

Re:Not surprising

[denobug]

You realize Foxconn is really a Taiwanese company and China won't care if it dies overnight right? It'll just be replaced by another real Chinese company and absorb all the talents and equipments and run as usual, replacing Foxconn.

Re:Not surprising

[Max Littlemore]

That's how a country turns into a basket case that no one trades with. How do you think the rest of the developed world would react to the U.S. throwing a toddler-style hissy fit and demonstrating that they have no integrity and their word is not worth shit?

Whose economy would suffer from that?

Re:Not surprising

[The Snowman]

The Abu Ghraib incident wasn't even a fraction as bad as this:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-kill-team-20110327

I used to support the troops, but now any time I hear that phrase, I just think of the guys in that article, and how the government tried to cover for them. Our soldiers are really no more than a bunch of murdering thugs, and any soldier who doesn't want to be painted with that brush needs to get out now.

The actions of the few don't mean everyone engages in such behavior that is flagrantly illegal per U.S. laws, rules of engagement, as well as human rights treaties ratified by the Senate (e.g. the Geneva conventions and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights). I am more troubled by the Pentagon's coverup at first, and foot dragging later on.

As a veteran, I always hated the term "support the troops" when I was active duty. One aspect of a fascist regime is blind support and patriotism for the military. I hate to see our country go down that road. We should respect people of all occupations: why don't we have yellow ribbons and sayings for the electrical workers that have been working day and night to restore power to the Southeast, ravaged by tornadoes? Their job, in my opinion, is far more important than anything I ever did in the military. They are serving their country very well, and in a far more important capacity than carrying out orders to attack foreign nations in direct violation of our Constitution.

Re:Not surprising

[Grishnakh]

The actions of the few don't mean everyone engages in such behavior that is flagrantly illegal per U.S. laws, rules of engagement, as well as human rights treaties ratified by the Senate (e.g. the Geneva conventions [wikipedia.org] and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights [wikipedia.org]). I am more troubled by the Pentagon's coverup at first, and foot dragging later on.

If this group of thugs were immediately taken into custody by the Pentagon and prosecuted severely for their actions, then I would by the "actions of the few" argument. The fact that this incident, and also Abu Ghraib, were in fact covered up and not harshly dealt with by the Pentagon shows me that the people in charge actually condone these actions by their silent assent.

We should respect people of all occupations: why don't we have yellow ribbons and sayings for the electrical workers that have been working day and night to restore power to the Southeast, ravaged by tornadoes? Their job, in my opinion, is far more important than anything I ever did in the military. They are serving their country very well, and in a far more important capacity than carrying out orders to attack foreign nations in direct violation of our Constitution.

Exactly right.

Lots of other games

[gad_zuki!]

have done this. You can shoot US soldiers in Battlefield if you play the other team. In fact, I prefer playing the MEC in BF2 because the sniper weapon is just better. Not sure why this is news, other than getting censorship blowhards and right-wing nuts agitated. I'm sure we'll see this on Fox News tonight wrapped in a typical "Are liberals to blame" bullshit.

Not convinced...

[vlpronj]

Where are the screenshots of US soldiers as the enemy? I.E., American flag on uniform, American flag or markings on the Apaches? Apaches are heavily exported, the "enemy" could be one of many nations the US has sold them to.

Re:Not convinced...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nowhere in that video did I hear anything about the US being the enemies. Actually it sounds like this is a PLA developed game for PLA soldiers (for training... or however military forces justify making video games these days).

I would assume that the enemies are 'OPFOR'. There is a scene with an Apache(?) going down, but frankly that could be an allied aircraft; what are the chances you will ever hear that spin in the west.

Is it Really US Troops?

[Sonny Yatsen]

I can't quite listen to the Chinese audio since I'm at work, but based on the video alone, is it really against American troops? I only saw very generic urban warfare tactics in a very generic Chinese city and a very generic set of bunkers and pillboxes. The only "indication" that it was against American troops was a very fuzzy helicopter that might be an Apache or might be something else entirely.

In any case, so what? We in the US has been playing games where the Chinese Army was the antagonist for ages. Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising and Battlefield 2 are two that I can name off the top of my head.

Re:Is it Really US Troops?

[gman003]

Not to mention actual wargames. 11th Armored Cavalry (to name one, can't remember the others) is actually dedicated to acting as a training enemy during training/wargames. Up until '05 or so, it was a replica Soviet unit, with tanks modified to look like T-80s and transports modified to look like BMPs. Right now, they're a mock-insurgent unit, but I wouldn't be surprised if all the heavy gear is being modified to mimic Chinese gear (shouldn't be hard - most PLA infantry gear is derived from Soviet gear).

Re:Is it Really US Troops?

[Sepultura]

I personally don't like violent video games or other violent entertainment for myself. But I don't assume that those who do, especially when we're dealing with pretend like in video games, are necessarily going to be violent or "evil" persons themselves.

However, someone who takes issue with the fact that it was a person of their nationality that was targeted does scare me as it reveals to me that they (1) don't understand that it's not real and (2) they don't have an issue with one of them being killed.

Re:Is it Really US Troops?

[Opportunist]

Well, technically, after all we're talking about a communist country, whether it's a company or government doesn't matter since they are the same.

Finally something different

[Hultis]

The enemies in FPS games are always whoever the US doesn't like at a given time (this includes most titles produced outside of the US as well), be they russians, germans, vaguely-middle-eastern-something, vietnamese, chinese, the list goes on. Now we finally get a game where the roles are changed. I can see why some Americans are upset, but frankly it's about time.

Re:i always complain about false equivalency

[DBNickel]

I think the controversial point is "Glorious Revolution, which is used as a training tool for People's Liberation Army (PLA) soldiers" + "US Soldiers"

Re:i always complain about false equivalency

[Anonymous Coward]

but this is entertainment, not government policy

Actually, since it's being used as a training tool for the army, this does count as government policy. On the other hand, I have to admit that I have a hard time getting offended, since it looks more like Call of Duty than a useful training tool. If China really wants to equate mouse accuracy with martial readiness, who am I to persuade them otherwise?

Re:i always complain about false equivalency

[Anonymous Coward]

i always complain about false equivalency morons posting on slashdot and elsewhere. you know, the morons who say "but the u.s.a..." whenever the issue of chinese internet censorship or human rights violations comes up. even though chinese internet censorship and human rights violations are genuinely orders of magnitude worse than in the west. not that the false equivalency morons can see that. whether out of intellectual dishonesty or genuine stupidity, who knows.

Funny thing that, by conflating genuine criticism of US actions with false equivalency you join the ranks of those false equivalency morons. And all the times I've seen you do it, it sure looked like wilful intellectual dishonesty on your part. Far easier for your id to paint those you disagree with as "unable to see" than to consider that the arguments are more nuanced than you'd like.

Re:So what?

[GPLHost-Thomas]

You should rephrase: are Americans scared to face the reality, which is most people on earth think they are the evil? Look in the last 60 years, and see who's fought the most wars, corrupted so many regimes, and the entire world economy, and you have the big picture. When I was a kid, the USA imperialism was even one of the topic I had to discuss to graduate from high school.
DISCLAIMER: I make a distinction between governments and populations.

Re:Platforms?

[gman003]

Well, since that game console is banned in China (as is the PS3, although since Nintendo partnered with a Chinese company to distribute there, the Wii isn't), I would venture to say "no".

That is how the Chinese view us.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's just a game people - time to teach the imperial dogs a lesson! ;)

Yes, the Chinese people do believe that we're imperialists - and I can't really blame them. We do, after all, have military bases all over the World, two wars and military support in the Middle East, control of NATO, and pretty much a military that rivals several countries put together.

Bad summary: No US troops, only a drill

[NekoYasha]

The game is named Glorious Mission, or sometimes Mission of Honor, not Glorious Revolution, and the plot follows a soldier's life through military camp and cumulates in the eponymous large-scale drill, as reported by China Daily. No US Troops anywhere.

It also supports 32 person multiplayer. You can watch footages of the game on YouTube here.

Download?

[Anonymous Coward]

Where is the free download link?

If it's not free and FOSS, it's COMMUNISM.

Re:Fair enough

[gad_zuki!]

>For years in USA had the URSS (and viceversa), then URSS dissapeared and three years later it was Irak,

Ah yes, the United Republic of Soviet States. They were truly an incredible enemy. Remember when they launched a theremin guided tesla space coil at Atlanta and it turned everyone into an ape for 10 days? Or when they landed on Mars only to find an ancient race of rock-based life who beat them back with mud weapons? Or when Kennedy and Khruschev fought each other telepathically on national television to win control over the the Fidel Castro android that was running Cuba?

Oh man, don't get me started on Irak. Lord Irak himself killed my grandfather in a electric sword duel. Those were the days...

Re:i always complain about false equivalency

[gman003]

Slight disputes here (I generally agree with you, this is all technicalities):

"Glorious Revolution" (as it's been translated here, I've also seen "Revolution of Glory", "Battle of Glory", "Glorious War", etc.) is produced by the People's Liberation Army. It is, in effect, a government product, and cannot be directly compared to American entertainment-only products.

However, we can compare it to America's Army, the game produced by the US Army. Current version (AA3) does not have a foreign force - it is all American-vs-American combat. The story is that it's a training excercise. Rather boring. If I remember correctly, though, the last major version (AA2) was US vs vaguely-middle-eastern-insurgents. Still no actual story, though, so it could be anywhere from Morocco to Pakistan.

However, the point was made elsewhere that it might not be explicitly America in Glorious Revolution. American equipment, yes, maybe even American styling, but it doesn't seem to be American flags and American symbols. So it could be compared to how, in the 70s-90s, the stereotypical villain country was always vaguely Russian, but usually fictitious (look at, say, the GI Joe cartoon, how COBRA sounded/acted rather Eastern-Europe without (IIRC) actually being such).

Just my $0.02.

Re:i always complain about false equivalency

[Hatta]

Why is that controversial? Shouldn't it be entirely expected? I'm more surprised that the US army doesn't* have training sims that include a Chinese adversary.

*Do they? I know they have terrorist simulators, they ought to have commie simulators too. Same for central american drug lords, middle eastern oil barons, and anyone else the US is likely to go up against.

Most important question:

[DF5JT]

Does it run on Linux?

Re:Fair enough

[MysteriousPreacher]

>For years in USA had the URSS (and viceversa), then URSS dissapeared and three years later it was Irak,

Ah yes, the United Republic of Soviet States. They were truly an incredible enemy. Remember when they launched a theremin guided tesla space coil at Atlanta and it turned everyone into an ape for 10 days? Or when they landed on Mars only to find an ancient race of rock-based life who beat them back with mud weapons? Or when Kennedy and Khruschev fought each other telepathically on national television to win control over the the Fidel Castro android that was running Cuba?

Oh man, don't get me started on Irak. Lord Irak himself killed my grandfather in a electric sword duel. Those were the days...

Where can I buy this game? I must have it!

Always troublesome, too many single males

[Shivetya]

China has a significant imbalance in its female to male population. Which is a source of unrest. So their government will need to keep them busy, distracted, etc.

Now this would be more troublesome to local adversaries than remote ones, simply because moving that many men is a logistical nightmare. So I would think that should they need to be aggressive Taiwan is toast of course quickly followed by Korea. Will they? Not while they have relatively stable finances, but if it implodes like a house of cards that some suspect they will need an outside bogeyman to keep those in power safe.

No I didn't...

[pla]

Thanks for the writeup, guys, but really, I have nothing to do with this.

More of an RPG and puzzle game fan, anyway.

Don't forget...

[MrEricSir]

...we're also one of their largest investments.

And it should be noted

[Sycraft-fu]

The US Army HAS created a game. It is called America's Army and is free for all to play. You play as US forces, of course. So who is the enemy OPFOR, basically the generic professional opposing force the Army itself has. Whatever side you play on always appears as US Army, the other side always appears as OPFOR. No country is the "bad guys" in their game.

The Army game doesn't make a political statement, and indeed is based off of the Army's own training idea and methods.

No they can't

[Sycraft-fu]

The people who act like that are just people who don't understand the world economy. They see it on a narrow, personal, level and think it is like a loanshark situation: China gave the US money and can call it due any time. That is wrong, what actually happened is China chose to invest in US securities and bought them. They pay defined rates at defined times and there is no ability to "call in the loan."

Also important to understand is that US securities pay in US dollars. So if the government chooses to inflate their way out of it, you are SOL. A note pays a fixed dollar amount and unless it is a TIPS or inflation protected one, and long term bonds are not, then it isn't paid in adjusted dollars. If you have a note that pays $1 million then that's what you get, doesn't matter if that $1 million has 1% of the buying power as when you purchased the note. Means there's a reason for holders of these to not want the US economy to tank.

Now what China could do it sell the securities on the open market. While the government doesn't pay the balance on a note until it is due, you can sell it to other investors. Ok, but if they unloaded all their securities at once, it would cause a massive price depression which would mean a massive loss of money for China. If they tried to unload securities with a face value totaling a trillion, but could only get people to pay ten billion because of oversupply and people being worried, they'd take a massive financial hit.

There's more to this (like the fact that default is an option for the US, or that the notes are all just accounting entries managed by the treasury, not physical notes) but what it comes down to is it is not a situation of "They loaned a lot of money and can hold it over your head." It is rather a situation of "They have invested a ton of money in your securities and need those securities to do well so they don't lose their investment."

Cover! We don't need no stinking cover!

[Quiet_Desperation]

The glorious People's Army does **NOT** take cover!!1!!2! They charge! And charge! and charge again until the dishonorable barbarian enemy lies trampled with lamentations and impotent penises!

Cover taking is for weak, pampered Western pig dogs with their silly chain saw guns and thermal clips.

Re:China Nonsense

[tnk1]

There is nothing outsized about the US military at all. It just happens to be the military that represents the world's largest economy and it's premiere superpower. Note that:

1. As a percentage of the US GDP, the US Military budget is in the single digits and much smaller in proportion to dozens of other countries. It must be remembered that the US GDP is massive. There is nothing out-of-proportion about the US military in relation to the size of its economy.
2. The percentage of the US population that is militarized is significantly smaller than other countries as well. While the US military is big, the US also has a population of 300 million people. There are countries that have significantly higher proportions of their population in the military. The US also no longer makes use of conscripts like many other countries do. The draft still exists, but its unlikely to be used except in the case of WWIII.
3. The US maintains its forces around the world in various places in agreement with the various countries that are hosting US installations. It's silly to pretend there is nothing in it for the US in these arrangements, but it is similarly silly to believe that the local governments derive no value from it either.

Should people fear the US military? They'd be stupid not to, especially if they oppose US policies. That doesn't mean that the US is some sort of hypermilitarized state. It just means that the US military is qualitatively better than any other force on Earth today due to superior equipment, training and motivation. What it is not, however, is the dominant influence in the US.

As for China, China cannot call in their debt, as it is structured, not on-demand. They cannot foreclose on the US government. There are some things that China could do, but the fact is that such a thing would bury them as fast as it would bury us. Indeed, we probably have more actual options than China does, including significant currency inflation or outright default, both of which means China would be holding billions in worthless paper and they would instantly lose their largest trading partner leaving them with heavy industries that churn out cheap products that their own people cannot afford to buy. Make no mistake, China may be doing well, but they are still playing our game.

Re:Remember Anchorage!

[Mindcontrolled]

Meh, alien blasters. Those are positively UNAMERICAN. Take the true Fallout approach - Duster, Sherrif's hat and a six-shooter! Your ideological purity leaves something to be desired, citizen.

The next step

[Walt Dismal]

I'd hate to see anyone develop an FPS with bank and oil company execs as the targets. That would be so wrong. Bankster gibs all over the place; oil exec, headshot, horrible. Just horrible. [cough]

USA

[G00F]

U.S.A. government, http://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/clientsum.php?id=D000033404&year=2009

Or we can look up BSA or other "not for profit" orgs they use to buy the government with.

Re:Fair enough

[GameboyRMH]

goberment is also how someone with Spanish as a first language might pronounce government :-P

Re:Not in our name

[Max_W]

far from all

Re:Well documented that PLA thinks US the enemy

[Maxo-Texas]

This AC is worth highligting...

They said..

The following book (written by university profs and heavily documented with references) contains numerous references to high ranking PLA officers referring to the US as the enemy, well at least in internal chinese language publications.
http://www.amazon.com/Death-China-Confronting-Dragon-Global/dp/0132180235

If China can make realistic computer games,

[Paul Fernhout]

and all that implies about their technological capacity to use cheap computing to create endless new resources, than what are they worried about fight over? Naturally, I could, and have, said much the same about the USA:
  http://www.pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html
"Likewise, even United States three-letter agencies like the NSA and the CIA, as well as their foreign counterparts, are becoming ironic institutions in many ways. Despite probably having more computing power per square foot than any other place in the world, they seem not to have thought much about the implications of all that computer power and organized information to transform the world into a place of abundance for all. Cheap computing makes possible just about cheap everything else, as does the ability to make better designs through shared computing. I discuss that at length here: http://www.pdfernhout.net/post-scarcity-princeton.html
    There is a fundamental mismatch between 21st century reality and 20th century security thinking. Those "security" agencies are using those tools of abundance, cooperation, and sharing mainly from a mindset of scarcity, competition, and secrecy. Given the power of 21st century technology as an amplifier (including as weapons of mass destruction), a scarcity-based approach to using such technology ultimately is just making us all insecure. Such powerful technologies of abundance, designed, organized, and used from a mindset of scarcity could well ironically doom us all whether through military robots, nukes, plagues, propaganda, or whatever else... Or alternatively, as Bucky Fuller and others have suggested, we could use such technologies to build a world that is abundant and secure for all. "