Battlefield 3 Banned In Iran

dotarray writes "Iranian gamers hoping to get their hands on Battlefield 3 will be sorely disappointed, as the country has officially banned EA's latest shooter. Why? The game features an American war force launching an assault on Iranian capital city Tehran."

Comments

Seems Reasonable

[blackpaw]

Pretty sure a shooter involving taking down the Trade Centre would be banned in the USA.

Given the current USA/NATO warmongering mutters re Iran they probably view it as an attempt to get people used to the idea of the USA invading Iran.

Re:Seems Reasonable

[Anonymous Coward]

Right. It wouldn't be banned.

Instead it would be rated AO, and no one would sell it.

Yay freedom of speech!

Re:Seems Reasonable

[forkfail]

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Re:Seems Reasonable

[bky1701]

When basically every distribution system uses the "optional" system, yes. Corporate censorship is still censorship. It isn't right just because it isn't the government doing it.

Re:Seems Reasonable

[forkfail]

The question at hand was whether corporate based censorship was on par with Government censorship. My (round about) answer is, yes to that question.

In answer to your followup question, no in the manner you phrased it, yes when a consortium of corporations and retailers effectively destroy any entity that doesn't follow their rules.

The point a lot of folks who are so anti-government seem to miss is that the private sector is equally capable of the evils so often attributed to governments when there is no government to counterbalance them. The main difference is that when corporations get out of hand, you cannot vote them out, nor can you stop doing business with them, as by then, they tend to be effective monopolies.

Re:Seems Reasonable

[bky1701]

"Businesses cannot (legally) use threats to coerce your behavior and force you to do things...the government can. The government, like the mafia, uses the threat of violence against you"

They can't? Every had your electric shut off, threatened to be disconnected from the internet, sued by a business for something, received a C&D, etc? That's not even getting into the fact businesses have and DO use force on the scale of the military. The only reason they do not currently use it on a mass scale is that, heaven forbid, they have lawsuits to fear should they abuse the rights of people. Look up Pinkertons, you'll be amazed how alike business and government can become when unregulated.

You'll see, I hope, why I say they are not different. The only reason the difference you cited exists is because the government has disallowed businesses to violate certain rights. It is not a part of the concept of businesses in general.

"Businesses may do a lot of shitty things, but they don't have the power to take your money through taxes or revoke your right to freedom/life."

They can, however, fix prices in order to take your money, or just throw you out on the street to die of hunger.

"Money is really your life energy (you trade your time/work in exchange for money)...the fact the government takes 40% of it is a true crime."

Ah, makes sense. Your opposition to the government is the typical libertarian spiel, not an actual respect for personal rights: "I do not want taxed."

Not surprising...

[AngryDeuce]

I mean, they would probably want to ban a Chinese game that allowed the player to kill American citizens and destroy American landmarks.

Not saying it's right, but it's probably what would happen. Personally, I'd love to play a game about the United States from a Chinese perspective. It would probably be hysterical...

Re:Not surprising...

[Sasayaki]

I've always wanted to play a serious World War II shooter from the perspective of a German soldier. I mean, we've stormed Omaha beach so many times... it'd be interesting to defend it. And we'd get to participate in some really unique content that hasn't been completely done to death by every shooter ever.

Or even an alternate history, something like Modern Warfare series, but in World War 2 where some critical decision -- such as Hitler not deciding to turn the ME-262 into a bomber and mass produce it -- causes the stop of round-the-clock bombing, which leads to a revitalization of German industry, and a swing of the war against the Allies...

That'd be interesting.

Re:Not surprising...

[swanzilla]

I'm still holding out for a game about Italian-American plumbers from a Japanese perspective.

Re:Not surprising...

[Nidi62]

Personally, I'd love to play a game about the United States from a Chinese perspective. It would probably be hysterical...

I have actually always wanted to play a WW2 game from the perspective of the Germans. Imagine sitting on the beach on Normandy watching thousands of ships headed towards you, or the chaos of having troops dropping out of the sky at night randomly, and not knowing when you will run into an enemy patrol. Or moving into Russia, fighting on the outskirts of Stalingrad, then having to fight your way out before you are cut off and doomed to be captured (of which only about 5,000 out of around 100,00 ever made it back to Germany, the rest died in captivity). Finally defending Berlin as it is slowly overrun by the Russians. It could be done well, and done tastefully, without touching on all of the Holocaust stuff and other atrocities (of course, when CoD:WaW came out, no one made a fuss about playing as the Russians, even though they murdered thousands of German and other civilians, as well as working to death thousands more German POWs), but of course there would still be a huge controversy. A shame really, a game like that could actually have some really powerful moments to it.

Re:Not surprising...

[Nidi62]

You know, when I played World at War, and I'm playing the final Russian missions where you're attacking Berlin and storming the Reichstag and all that, all I could think about was that, in real life, those German soldiers defending Berlin were mostly 14-16 year old boys and 40-60 year old men. Not only were they completely untrained, but they were using horribly made weapons (worse even than many of the later war year manufactured Japanese weapons). The Volkssturm weapons showed just how desperate the situation was: for example the Volkssturmgewehr VG.1-5 (http://world.guns.ru/rifle/autoloading-rifles/de/vg1-5-e.html) and the Volkssturmkarabiner VK.98(http://world.guns.ru/rifle/autoloading-rifles/de/vk9-e.html).

Off topic, I know, but with a little knowledge of history, these games have a lot more impact and a lot more emotion in them. If people knew a little bit more about history, we would have games such as what you and I want, where we get to play as the Germans. However, it has become PC to dehumanize the Germans and the Wehrmacht particularly, and downplay the fact that many Germans and most of the military weren't fighting for Hitler, or an Aryan nation without Jews, they were fighting for what pretty much every soldier fights for: their family, their country, and their comrades.

Re:Not surprising...

[Nidi62]

interesting would be how they pitch a game that in the end you lose, no matter what.

What do you think happens in war? End the end, no matter what, you lose (particularly for the kinds of people you play in these video games, the front line grunts). Your friends are dead. You might be wounded. If you aren't, then you are certainly going to be plagued by nightmares of some kind (whether reliving your friends dying, or seeing the faces of those you had to kill), as well as other emotional trauma. You've lost several years of what would be the best, most productive years of your life. Your country has spent millions, if not billions of dollars, and your or someone else's country has suffered a large amount of damage.

I play these war games all the time, I enjoy them a lot. But I worry that games such as these desensitize people to war. I personally think war is a legitimate and useful tool of statecraft, but should be used sparingly, and never lightly. To quote a man that was a hero and great man in every sense of the word (he loved his country, the land of his birth, his family, and the men he commmanded): "It is good that war should be so terrible, lest we grow too fond of it." Sometimes, I feel like we have forgotten how terrible it is, partly due to games such as these, and partly because soldiers have in a way become domestic political tools.

Re:Not surprising...

[Hatta]

However, it has become PC to dehumanize the Germans and the Wehrmacht particularly, and downplay the fact that many Germans and most of the military weren't fighting for Hitler, or an Aryan nation without Jews, they were fighting for what pretty much every soldier fights for: their family, their country, and their comrades.

This is intentional. If people understand that the Germans were just like us, they would understand that we are subject to the same forces that the Germans were. With that awareness, we might look around us and see what is happening. If we learn that they control us by manipulating our allegiances to family, country, and comrades, then we're less likely to be affected by such manipulation in the future.

It's an uncomfortable truth we have to accept if we're going to stop atrocities. Most people, in the right circumstances are fascists. Consider the Milgram experiment, 65% of people will obey an order to kill a man on the flimsiest of pretexts because of their deference to authority. Or the Stanford prison experiment, where people who took roles of authority became cruel simply by taking that role. We have to be aware of these tendencies in ourselves, and reject them. Do not accept or obey any more authority than is absolutely necessary.

Re:Not surprising...

[Wahakalaka]

As a Jewish kid growing up one of the most important lessons I learned about the Holocaust was not to dehumanize the Germans as a people or as individuals for what happened, as that would make me no different than the Nazi's themselves, rather I should understand why and how they did what they did so that I could do my part in preventing it from happening again. When I try to apply that logic now to Islamic extremism, and Israeli extremism for that matter, I'm surprised at the vehemence of the pushback I get, even from people that really ought to know better (I think deep down they do, that's why they deny it so hard). To say that we "can't understand terrorism or extremism so don't even try" is insane to me. They're just people. Hell international business and finance these days is way more complicated and at least as sinister as any terrorist...

Re:Why ban it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Americans already consider _real_ war to be a game.

Maybe the Americans you hang out with, chief. There are plenty who have seen it first-hand who think otherwise.

KH2002 License

[Anonymous Coward]

I want to know if EA/DICE paid money to the Iranian government.

All weapons appearing in the game (sp and mp) are licensed, meaning the owners got paid for permission to use the guns likeness. The KH2002 is a bullpup assault rifle designed and produced by the (government run ) Iranian defense industry which appears in the game as a usable weapon. Who did EA/DICE pay to license this gun? Is this in violation of any embargo, considering there is a complete ban on any weapons exports (presumably including designs) from Iran?

Why Ban it For That?

[Greyfox]

They should just not ban it and instead imprison any Iranian team who loses on Defense (Or wins on Offense, for that matter.) That would be much more fun, from a Department of Rightness and The Iranian Way perspective!

"So... Ahmed... I see you lost in Battlefield on defense of Tehran... Why do you hate Iran, Ahmed?"

Re:A selling point?

[Synerg1y]

If this game was released in Iran, it would demonstrate to the Iranian people that despite the government's reassurance, Iran actually can't do much against an invading USA. Political motives for invading Iran aside, the concern is probably that the people will lose faith in the regime and go the way of egypt and syria. It works a little different when your government relies on censorship and misinformation to make itself look good in what is technically a desert, so things like bf3's portrayal matter a lot more in their culture than they do in ours. Then again you don't see a whole lot of games where the states are being invaded by anything besides aliens and even then the Americans always win, just not a good selling point I guess.

Future Perspectives...

[Phrogman]

It is entirely possible that 200 years from now historians will agree that the US invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan was entirely brought about for economic reasons and to benefit US corporations who had supported the Bush Administration(s) by letting them rake in some of the missing billions of dollars spent in Iraq, or test weapon systems, or for a myriad of other reasons. We may learn enough about the Extraordinary Renditions program and use of torture that the people of that future environment agree that the US was an Evil entity at the time - not the people, but elements of the ruling elite (Government, Corporate, 1% whatever you want).
Or just the opposite could happen as far as history is concerned. Probably the biggest deciding factor will be who writes the history - i.e. the dominant culture/country of the time.
As for the Germans in WWII, many if not the majority of them were not aware of what was being done in the extermination camps. I am sure they knew that Jews were being taken away wholesale, but I imagine many thought they were being taken to "labour camps" as was promulgated at the time. Not everyone was a Nazi supporter, and its a shame we have to demonize the entire nation for the actions of its vile government (which were truly evil no question). We should never forget what happened there, but we should also try to understand it. Demonizing all Germans of the time does not help understanding.
Likewise the demonization of all Muslims for the actions of a small percentage. It will not help in the end to alienate 1 billion+ people because it serves the interests of the government in power to focus the population's attention on a foreign threat just so its easier to get elected.

Re:lawl

[mjwx]

Oh no! They're missing a great opportunity to be called gay by 12 year olds on the internet! And single player is shit (except visuals).

There's the reason it was banned, there are no gays in Iran so how can anyone be called gay.

Perfectly logical, right? In all seriousness, oppressive Mid-East government bans popular western game. Not news. I wonder if I can get BF3 in other ME nations with strict religious governments, like Saudi Arabia.

Re:A selling point?

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed with the last part.
When I look at the war in Iraq and the huge civilian death toll, I don't really enjoy playing war video games where the USA are the good guys. I'd feel the same playing the Nazis in Medal of Honor.

I'm fine with games where you can choose your side and all sides are portrayed equally (i.e. your perception of who are the bad guys and good guys changes depending on which camp you play in). But being forced to play the USA only, and having to endure all the We are right/Our army should be worshiped propaganda really annoys me.

I also hate games that cast the Russians as the bad guys. The cold war has been over for a few decades, the Soviet regime has been overthrown by the very people who live in Russia today, and despite what people like to think, Russia is a lot more peaceful than the USA when it comes to military invasions. Unfortunately, everything that goes on there is deformed by Western media to sound terrible (and for the record, I'm from both Western Europe and North America, I'm not Russian).
Casting Russia as the bad guys is both old and close-minded.

I'd gladly pay $200 for a video game where I have to shoot Marines for indiscriminately bombing people and otherwise endangering civilians. Don't get me wrong, I don't support Al Qaeda or the Taliban but something has to be said about starting a war that ends up killing 100k civilians, 30k enemies and less than 5k of your own troops. And before anyone here wants to point out that US soldiers are just following orders, that's no excuse. No troops = no war. When you are given the responsibility to use heavy weapons, you should have a high enough sense of responsibility to refuse to fight when needed rather than to hide behind the politicians who gave the green light for the war.

Re:Modern Warfare 3 starts with New York being hit

[Luckyo]

The game paints russians as bad guys and american soldiers as valorous heroes defending their homeland.

Hell, it even plays like a Rambo movie. Go out, kill a whole lot of russians, black guys and other non-american trash. The only good guys are americans, brits and a few russians, who, get this - betray their country. Turn this concept on its head and you won't sell a single copy in US, because no one will do the commercial suicide of putting it on the shelves. It would offend the very core belief that America is just and a force for good.