HIstorical events you would like to see in Video games

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

War of 1812 on the side of the militia.

Which side?
Both sides used militias...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_1812
In contrast to the American militia, the Canadian militia performed well. French Canadians, who found the anti-Catholic stance of most of the United States troublesome, and United Empire Loyalists, who had fought for the Crown during the American Revolutionary War, strongly opposed the American invasion. However, many in Upper Canada were recent settlers from the United States who had no obvious loyalties to the Crown. Nevertheless, while there were some who sympathised with the invaders, the American forces found strong opposition from men loyal to the Empire.

I got to go with Team Canada in this matter.

I always go with Team Canada.

 

[Danish rage]

Between Age Of Empires and the Total War series, there is really nothing more to cover. Unless you want specifics.

 

[WolfThomas]

The Napoleonic Wars.

Those'd be pretty cool.

This, especially if its a FPS based on Richard Sharpe with Sean Bean doing the voice. It could have cool things like a reloading mini-game (similar to Gears of War) where you can reload muskets incredibly fast once you get the hang of it. As well as a heavy emphasis on melee combat (liked condemned 2), nothing like blocking a sabre with your musket and then bayoneting them while yelling "bugger off!". You'd have swords, pistols and your own elbows and knees as well.

As for the guns to balance their slow reloading they're all a gruesome one hit kill (which is largely true due to calibre and poor quality of the ammunition), at long range enemy would just miss you but up close you'd have perhaps a pseudo-quicktime moment if an enemy was about to kill you where everything slowed down, you see the spark in the pan of the musket and have to press a button which cause you to leap to the ground or to the side. This way you'd make it feel dramatic without breaking flow of the game with reloading a save if you died or breaching realism by having you surive mulitple shots. You'd also be able to snatch the nearest available musket off the ground but it may be empty.

Maybe this is just me not realising how offensive some people might find this, but I'd like to see a WW2 shooter played from the Nazi's perspective, probably just the fall of the third reich (D-Day onwards) because I can't see anyone managing to make the rise of the third reich tasteful.

I'm not saying "Let's teach gamers Nazi ideals", I'm just saying "Let's see it from the other side." In shooters, we're always the victors. We're always the sneaky, but professional SAS saving the world, or a faceless American marine, going on and saving the world all by himself etc. I'd kinda like to fulfill my objectives and be pushed back anyway, just for the experience of the game itself. Think of the cutscenes you could have. Nazi officers shooting your allies for attempting to retreat, or taking cyanide capsules to evade from capture. A level where you escape from a PoW camp or something. For a well documented defeat, there is alot of wiggle room. And of course, there could be an alternate history campaign where by completing hidden objectives in the mission, you'd switch into an alternate timeline, helping you overcome the enemy and maybe win the war. Likewise, alot of wiggle room, simply because it's a "What if?"

It might be a nice change for once.

This isn't offensive, only a minority of German were actual Nazi party members, I don't see why you can't play a scared Wehrmacht soldier on the Russian front who just wants to go home to his family.

I had an idea for a survival based shooter similar to Stalker (weight of guns, food, fatigue etc) where you play a small group of German soliders seperated in the retreat from Moscow. Your just trying to retreat to your own lines and choose when to fight or run, when to avoid villagers or steal their food.

It would be bloody, cold and inglorious. You would have to make decisions that might save you all or kill you, do you shoot an innocent villager because he might tell the Russian soliders he saw you? Depending on your actions during the game you're ending would be different, say if you were brave and cautious you might survive the war, but if your reckless (killed later on), too cowardly (
shot by own side) or bloodthirsty (e.g. taking own life from PTSD, war crimes trial etc) there's ramifications. But also you could pull a complete karma houdini if your lucky, just to reflect the contrary nature of war.

I've yet to see a game set in Afghanistan during the Soviet Invasion. Think about it: every FPS involving the Middle East or Russians always depicts countries in the Middle East and Russia as antagonists that you as an American soldier must fight. In this game, there's no Americans, just two of FPS developer's favorite punching bags together fighting each other.

Well there's always the American CIA operative giving the muhjadeen weapons. You'd probably have to make the main character one to get it published. But a story about "going native" would be good, he comes to give them weapons, his chopper gets destroyed and he's missing in action, he fights for a while before he gets into contact with the Agency and then decides he wants to stay and help them.

If there was 3rd person cover you could show him at the start as basically a stereotypical American operative, sun glasses, white panama suit, crew cut, clean shaven and a 9mm in a shoulder hoslter. But as he gets deeper involved he grows an epic bed, developes a tan, starts wearing combat gear, shemagh and wielding a trusty AK47. His voice could change too, at the start he's anxious/annoyed and pronounces things wrong, but eventually he calms down, starts knowing everyone greets them with "Shalom" and says things correctly. Avoid anything to do with him converting to Islam though, that would only piss off the anti-games groups even more.

 

[gl1koz3]

I think there's enough games about that. Time to move on.

 

[RobotSwordsman]

The Persian Gulf War. We need to cover more historical ground in the gaming medium, for sure.

 

[Tomo Stryker]

A well crafted historically accurate version of the Battle of Gettysburg, I love the Civil War. Even though war itself isn't pretty I would still like to see a campaign where you lead a small unit of the military into a sandbox battle field that will last at least two to four hours game time. Call me if they ever get that idea off the ground instead of this micro transaction bullshit that Valve is attempting in Team Fortress 2.

 

[Nickolai77]

I think if someone can make an effective first person sword/bow fighting et cetera game that doesn't devolve into a button masher then that really opens a lot of opportunities.

Oblivion had a pretty decent first person perspective at sword fighting, it was pretty basic but i felt it worked well enough. If you could make sword fighting in games more sophisticated then you could really open some doors for gaming.

I imagine a lot of people would like to see a Crusades game, and especially because of the times we live in, a game themed around the West's relations with the Islamic World would be particularity interesting.

But, due to my own historical interests i would love to see games in these following areas:

-Roman invasion of Britain, played from the perspective of both sides. It would be most interesting, i feel, to put the gamer in the shoes of one of Boedica's warriors during the pillaging of Colchester. It would also make a very good graphical experience.

-Either the Saxon or Danish invasion of England.

-Charlemagne's Empire, focused around the Battle of Tours.

-Hundred Years War- Battle of Agincourt.

-Renaissance Italy


Nb: Games set in the past like this would have to be particularly story driven to make the game interesting. For instance, if you were to make an historically-accurate game about being an English archer at Agincourt say...well you'd just unleash volley after volley of arrows into the air before strolling across no mans land to cut the throats of downed French knights. Likewise, being a Roman legionary would get pretty boring after a while if all your doing is blocking with your shield and stabbing another foe all through the game.

You'd need to make historical-story driven games from the 1st person perspective particularity story driven and give the player a broad range of combat styles (such as bow, throwing axe, maces, axes, flais, hammers et cetera) and situations.

 

[GWarface]

WW2 WOOOHOOOOO!!!!!! seriously though, they should ditch modern warfare and gowith WW2. WW1, and vietnam for now


i never tire of WW2, i love it so much...

Im with this, those three wars were the only real wars in modern time imo. Now its just pushing a button and laugh at the video of it..

Also a Viking game, whats more awesome than playing a game where you sail the North Sea and plunder and rape England?
Ok, maybe not the rape part, but you get the idea..
And no offence to the englishmen but us danes really gave you some beatings back in those days..

 

[IBlackKiteI]

This isn't offensive, only a minority of German were actual Nazi party members, I don't see why you can't play a scared Wehrmacht soldier on the Russian front who just wants to go home to his family.

I had an idea for a survival based shooter similar to Stalker (weight of guns, food, fatigue etc) where you play a small group of German soliders seperated in the retreat from Moscow. Your just trying to retreat to your own lines and choose when to fight or run, when to avoid villagers or steal their food.

It would be bloody, cold and inglorious. You would have to make decisions that might save you all or kill you, do you shoot an innocent villager because he might tell the Russian soliders he saw you? Depending on your actions during the game you're ending would be different, say if you were brave and cautious you might survive the war, but if your reckless (killed later on), too cowardly (
shot by own side) or bloodthirsty (e.g. taking own life from PTSD, war crimes trial etc) there's ramifications. But also you could pull a complete karma houdini if your lucky, just to reflect the contrary nature of war.

I was thinking the other day, about ten years from now some dev will make a brilliant game with a fully fleshed out world, an excellent plot and moral choices which ACTUALLY WORK.
But I was wondering when and where would this awesome game be set?
Now I cannot think of a more perfect spot for it after reading your post.

 

[badgersprite]

There should be a game where you get to smash down the Berlin Wall, Red Faction: Guerrilla style.

 

[ultimateownage]

WW1

*first level starts*
*spend an hour trecking through mud*
'This must be really building up for something'
*sit in a trench*
'I can feel the tension!'
*walk in lines towards a machine gunner, get mowed down and killed instantly.*
'Huh.'

 

[WolfThomas]

I was thinking the other day, about ten years from now some dev will make a brilliant game with a fully fleshed out world, an excellent plot and moral choices which ACTUALLY WORK.
But I was wondering when and where would this awesome game be set?
Now I cannot think of a more perfect spot for it after reading your post.

Thank you very much,

Spoiler: I elaborated on the idea about a year ago

My game would be a survival fps with pseudo rpg elements (inventory/equipment but no leveling or skills, much in the way of STALKER), about a party of four ordinary German soldiers in the retreat from Moscow. As they are fighting Russians, the Germans can speak (accented) English for the sake of the players.

They would be a squad of the usual stereotypes a cynical (and older) WW1 vetran, a fresh faced boy straight out of hitler youth, maybe a communist sympathizer and yourself, who is a blank slate.

You'd have varying degrees of squad control (including inventory control) to choose from. You wouldn't have to stick with the characters, but they would provide safety in numbers and other advantages (like a watch system while you sleep), but then again they require more food, ammo and draw more attention.

The goal would be to get back to the safety of your own lines by whatever means necessary. You have avoid/fight through Russian soldiers and perhaps in rare encounters German military police that want to hang you for cowardice. Food, water, sleep and protection from winter exposure would all be important things. Food could be found, stolen or scavenged. Food and water also take up weight.

Weapons would be the range available at the time, mainly bolt action rifles, machine pistols and pistols. Guns and ammunition would take up weight, leaving you to decide do whether to take a rifle or mp40 or both and sacrifice the amount of ammo/food and other stuff you can carry. Weapons would be useful in their different ways, rifles more reliable and able to pick off enemies, machine pistols good for close quarters ambush and pistols concealable.

What you wear would also be important, probably reduced to headgear, uniform, boots and great coat. For example your German helmet offers good protection, but identifies you as a German from afar, whereas the Russian fur hat is warmer and makes you look like a Russian. Who you appear like is important as enemy soldiers and your own scattered allies will fire on those that appear as enemies. Dressing as civilians would have its benefits and restrictions too.

The moral choices would be a lot more grayer/grittier, for example you see a house with Russian civilians in it. You could...

A. Avoid it, but this means you can't get any supplies

B. Threaten them for supplies, but then they'll tell the Russian soldier who will sweep the area.

C. Kill them all, aside from moral ramifications this takes ammunition and risks drawing a lot attention to your position. But if done quietly nets the supplies and no search.

D. Sneak in and steal the stuff, this risks B and C if caught

E. Pretend to be Russian soldiers (if you have the uniforms) and take or barter for it (you'd be able to speak Russian)

With randomly generated content, each time could be different.

A game where there was dozens of uniquely different endings none the good or bad or wrong or right one for your character combined with a randomly generated world would have the best replayability.

 

[JourneyThroughHell]

War of 1812 on the side of the militia.

Which side?
Both sides used militias...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_1812
In contrast to the American militia, the Canadian militia performed well. French Canadians, who found the anti-Catholic stance of most of the United States troublesome, and United Empire Loyalists, who had fought for the Crown during the American Revolutionary War, strongly opposed the American invasion. However, many in Upper Canada were recent settlers from the United States who had no obvious loyalties to the Crown. Nevertheless, while there were some who sympathised with the invaders, the American forces found strong opposition from men loyal to the Empire.

I got to go with Team Canada in this matter.

Wait, there was another 1812 war? Huh. Never heard of that in school.

Then add to the list that other war of 1812 [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_invasion_of_Russia].

 

[C117]

World War 2... from the Axis forces perspective (Germany/Italy/Japan). What made them go so far? Why did they listen to Hitler? What happened to those that opposed the Holocaust? And how did it feel to have TWO of your civilian cities nuked within a matter of days?

 

[CowboyfromHell666]

The inventions of fire and the wheel.
...cmon that'd be pretty interesting.

 

[RIOgreatescapist]

You can find most of major historical events if not all of them in videogames nowadays.

 

[k3v1n]

the Spanish civil war would be make a great game(although they already made a crappy RTS about it)

 

[EatPieYes]

An action/strategy game based on vikings. Killing, raping and pillaging, that's all I've ever wanted.

 

[Guffe]

WW2 is thoroughly played out: there's the Industrial Revolution, the Silk Road, feudal Japan, and my idea: a mixture of steampunk, the old West, and medieval-era Japan.

Red Steel 2

What he said, check out Red Steel 2, it's freaking amazing ninja blade wild west future ass whoopping!! so great game.

 

[IBlackKiteI]

I was thinking the other day, about ten years from now some dev will make a brilliant game with a fully fleshed out world, an excellent plot and moral choices which ACTUALLY WORK.
But I was wondering when and where would this awesome game be set?
Now I cannot think of a more perfect spot for it after reading your post.

Thank you very much,

Spoiler: I elaborated on the idea about a year ago

My game would be a survival fps with pseudo rpg elements (inventory/equipment but no leveling or skills, much in the way of STALKER), about a party of four ordinary German soldiers in the retreat from Moscow. As they are fighting Russians, the Germans can speak (accented) English for the sake of the players.

They would be a squad of the usual stereotypes a cynical (and older) WW1 vetran, a fresh faced boy straight out of hitler youth, maybe a communist sympathizer and yourself, who is a blank slate.

You'd have varying degrees of squad control (including inventory control) to choose from. You wouldn't have to stick with the characters, but they would provide safety in numbers and other advantages (like a watch system while you sleep), but then again they require more food, ammo and draw more attention.

The goal would be to get back to the safety of your own lines by whatever means necessary. You have avoid/fight through Russian soldiers and perhaps in rare encounters German military police that want to hang you for cowardice. Food, water, sleep and protection from winter exposure would all be important things. Food could be found, stolen or scavenged. Food and water also take up weight.

Weapons would be the range available at the time, mainly bolt action rifles, machine pistols and pistols. Guns and ammunition would take up weight, leaving you to decide do whether to take a rifle or mp40 or both and sacrifice the amount of ammo/food and other stuff you can carry. Weapons would be useful in their different ways, rifles more reliable and able to pick off enemies, machine pistols good for close quarters ambush and pistols concealable.

What you wear would also be important, probably reduced to headgear, uniform, boots and great coat. For example your German helmet offers good protection, but identifies you as a German from afar, whereas the Russian fur hat is warmer and makes you look like a Russian. Who you appear like is important as enemy soldiers and your own scattered allies will fire on those that appear as enemies. Dressing as civilians would have its benefits and restrictions too.

The moral choices would be a lot more grayer/grittier, for example you see a house with Russian civilians in it. You could...

A. Avoid it, but this means you can't get any supplies

B. Threaten them for supplies, but then they'll tell the Russian soldier who will sweep the area.

C. Kill them all, aside from moral ramifications this takes ammunition and risks drawing a lot attention to your position. But if done quietly nets the supplies and no search.

D. Sneak in and steal the stuff, this risks B and C if caught

E. Pretend to be Russian soldiers (if you have the uniforms) and take or barter for it (you'd be able to speak Russian)

With randomly generated content, each time could be different.

A game where there was dozens of uniquely different endings none the good or bad or wrong or right one for your character combined with a randomly generated world would have the best replayability.

It sounds really cool.
Im gonna have to go with a spoiler box due to humungo walls of text.

Spoiler: BOX

Sounds awesome, I like how there would be repercussions for both good and bad things, too many games go way to easy on those who go for the good options, like say if you had the objective of getting a key off a guy but he wont give you it unless you go get him some sort of item.
You could just shoot him and take the key, but loads of guys are gonna be after your head for the entirety of the game, but apparently doing his item quest is really easy and avoids having to kill someone and contending with a lot of pissed off people, its sometimes like the developers themselves wanted to steer everyone down the path of Mother Teresa for some reason.

What I mean to say is its way too easy in games with these 'moral choices' to just be the good guy all the time, I've yet to find a game where doing a bad thing is better for the players character themselves than a good thing.
If you put the player in a more realistic environment, such as the one you described where killing someone or not is the difference between life and death then it sort of makes the player have to actually make a hard decision rather than blowing up a town because they want to see a pretty explosion or saving it because they dont feel like killing people, it makes it so there really is no good decision, your no hero or anything, just another part of the world trying to get by.
In a game like that eventually you wont see stealing from starving families as an entirely bad thing, your just doing what you need to do in order to play the game, but done properly could still heavily invest the player emotionally.

Thats why, to me Stalker is the best example of morality in a game I've played so far, even though it doesnt really seem to focus much on it. Theres no cheery little icons saying '+5 Paragon/Renegade points' or whatever, but you can just kill some friendly NPC and take all his stuff, and life goes on.
But if you get into trouble further down the line thats one less guy who could help you in a bad situation, and personally I feel a little guilty when I mow down a team of men who kinda let me to where I needed to be, only to take from their corpses some rifle ammo and a couple of bandages.