Let's have a Civil War!

[Imperius]

Hello everyone,
I was just browsing through the interwebs the other day and saw that one of my favourite projects is having a Kickstarter campaign. A game called War of Rights. For those of you that play Mount and Blade you may know about these guys already but I figured it couldn't hurt to get the word out more. So if you like historical games, give them a look it looks like they really put alot of love into their game so far.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1947432146/war-of-rights/description

Hope to see you all on the battlefield.

*Note: I'm not associated with Campfire games I just really want to see this project do well.

 

[DefunctTheory]

Advertising kickstarters is against the ToS, for future reference. Probably have a thread lock inbound.

Edit: On a side note, the game takes place where I live and went to school. Whee!

EDIT EDIT: This is British? That's kinda weird and interesting.

EDIT EDIT EDIT: Denmarkian, sorry.

 

[nomotog_v1legacy]

Neat. I kind of want to see more FPS with old timey weapons.

Well here's a shit storm waiting to happen here, though considering we have WW2 games it's not as playing the "evil" side is new.

It's like the eternal question of historical games. How do you portray real.. well for lack of a better word evil. It gets so so muddy because you have to balance several forms of the truth with your audience's sensitivities.

 

[sky14kemea]

snip

Hi! Advertising on the forums is frowned upon here. If you could add some discussion value into your OP as well I'd appreciate it. (Like asking what people think of the game so far/what kind of similar games people would like to see, etc.)

I'm also on the edge about removing the link, because it's not a personal thing you're advertising... but it is still advertising....

Any way we can compromise and you put the link on your profile, and ask people to go on your profile if they'd like to look?

Edit: Nvm. Got a second opinion and the link shoooould be fine.

 

[DrownedAmmet]

From the kickstarter:

To start off, this is a game focusing on the American Civil War, where bullets flew for the disparate causes of their participants. Those that fought for the rights of their states and purported livelihood clashed with those that fought for the rights of the enslaved...

They should ditch that wishy-washy language and come out and say "Those that fought to keep slaves and those that fought to free them." Have some balls and take a stand! In WW2 games we can slaughter Nazis by the millions and pretend that all of them were evil Jew-killers and deserved it, why can't we do the same for those Confederate assholes?

 

[Silvanus]

Hrmm, I thought we were already having one.


Sorry! Sorry. Couldn't resist. Genuinely don't want to start any arguments on that front. [small]Sorry![/small]

 

[DefunctTheory]

Oh cool, so we can talk about it. Neat!

From the kickstarter:

To start off, this is a game focusing on the American Civil War, where bullets flew for the disparate causes of their participants. Those that fought for the rights of their states and purported livelihood clashed with those that fought for the rights of the enslaved...

They should ditch that wishy-washy language and come out and say "Those that fought to keep slaves and those that fought to free them." Have some balls and take a stand! In WW2 games we can slaughter Nazis by the millions and pretend that all of them were evil Jew-killers and deserved it, why can't we do the same for those Confederate assholes?

That's the first thing I noticed too, and its a bit unsettling. To answer your question though...

1) It's not an American made game. That doesn't of course, means its going to be historically inaccurate, but you can't expect people from another culture or country to have the same perspective as us on any particular subject. The average American, for example, knows about WWII under the same broad strokes as everyone else, but our focus tends to be on the Eastern front and the Pacific War, with things like the Holocaust being prominent but not always up front. If you talk to someone from Israel, they'll probably understand the broad strokes as well as us, but their focus wouldn't be on the same thing, for obvious and good reasons.

2) 'Noble South' is probably in full effect, because people love an underdog.

3) They may just assume that focusing on slavery would piss off a significant portion of the United States.

I'm looking into the game myself, though I can't promise I'll contribute. Its interesting, and I'm always a fan of local history, but this wouldn't be the first Civil War game that kind of sagged a bit in the game play because, let be frank, single shot muskets and rifles are boring as hell.

As for the Civil War itself, well...

You people of the South don't know what you are doing. This country will be drenched in blood, and God only knows how it will end. It is all folly, madness, a crime against civilization! You people speak so lightly of war; you don't know what you're talking about. War is a terrible thing! You mistake, too, the people of the North. They are a peaceable people but an earnest people, and they will fight, too. They are not going to let this country be destroyed without a mighty effort to save it ? Besides, where are your men and appliances of war to contend against them? The North can make a steam engine, locomotive, or railway car; hardly a yard of cloth or pair of shoes can you make. You are rushing into war with one of the most powerful, ingeniously mechanical, and determined people on Earth ? right at your doors. You are bound to fail. Only in your spirit and determination are you prepared for war. In all else you are totally unprepared, with a bad cause to start with. At first you will make headway, but as your limited resources begin to fail, shut out from the markets of Europe as you will be, your cause will begin to wane. If your people will but stop and think, they must see in the end that you will surely fail.

 

[pookie101]

it looks spectacular and a 1:1 representation of the areas? wow to say the least

that said it lost me at multiplayer game

 

[Ambient_Malice]

CryEngine is love. CryEngine is life.

that said it lost me at multiplayer game

Agreed, sadly.

 

[Recusant]

From the kickstarter:

To start off, this is a game focusing on the American Civil War, where bullets flew for the disparate causes of their participants. Those that fought for the rights of their states and purported livelihood clashed with those that fought for the rights of the enslaved...

They should ditch that wishy-washy language and come out and say "Those that fought to keep slaves and those that fought to free them." Have some balls and take a stand! In WW2 games we can slaughter Nazis by the millions and pretend that all of them were evil Jew-killers and deserved it, why can't we do the same for those Confederate assholes?

Because most of them weren't assholes. I'm disappointed to see the revisionism on display here (no faction that held that any newly admitted state should have no voice in deciding whether it'd be slaveholding or free can claim the "state's rights" argument; those fighting for the rights of their states and those fighting to for the rights of the enslaved were on the same side), but painting a more realistic picture is asking for political trouble- though only if it's done on a grander scale. For the average Confederate soldier, this wasn't about fighting to keep slavery enshrined as an economic principle, but fighting to repel an invasion. You'd have a better moral case painting the US soldiers as the "evil side" in Vietnam than you would the CS soldiers in the Civil War.

This isn't a slavekeeping simulator, folks. It's a war-based first person shooter.

 

[DrownedAmmet]

From the kickstarter:

To start off, this is a game focusing on the American Civil War, where bullets flew for the disparate causes of their participants. Those that fought for the rights of their states and purported livelihood clashed with those that fought for the rights of the enslaved...

They should ditch that wishy-washy language and come out and say "Those that fought to keep slaves and those that fought to free them." Have some balls and take a stand! In WW2 games we can slaughter Nazis by the millions and pretend that all of them were evil Jew-killers and deserved it, why can't we do the same for those Confederate assholes?

Because most of them weren't assholes. I'm disappointed to see the revisionism on display here (no faction that held that any newly admitted state should have no voice in deciding whether it'd be slaveholding or free can claim the "state's rights" argument; those fighting for the rights of their states and those fighting to for the rights of the enslaved were on the same side), but painting a more realistic picture is asking for political trouble- though only if it's done on a grander scale. For the average Confederate soldier, this wasn't about fighting to keep slavery enshrined as an economic principle, but fighting to repel an invasion. You'd have a better moral case painting the US soldiers as the "evil side" in Vietnam than you would the CS soldiers in the Civil War.

This isn't a slavekeeping simulator, folks. It's a war-based first person shooter.

I agree, and since it is focusing on the battles, it's probably not going to have much of an impact since they are focusing on recreate the battles and the area, which if it is 1:1 scale will be amazing.

But since when does the average soldier get to decide what the war is about? I hate to keep bringing up WWII, but the average German soldier probably wasn't fighting for racial supremacy. Yet the Allies are seen as ending the holocaust, but the Union isn't acknowledged for winning the war that ended slavery in the US.

But yeah, the Civil War is a very complicated thing. There were instances of the South being against state's rights when the Fugitive Slave law was federal law but states didn't want to send captured slaves back to the south. Nothing is ever black and white, I just think they are going too far in not acknowledging slavery in talking about the Civil War

 

[Therumancer]

Well, I don't think it's close to the first American Civil War game to be made, and at the very least it might help some people gain perspective on the conflict which was about a lot of things, not just slavery. It's not like we haven't seen confederate and former confederate heroes in media before such as Clint Eastwood in "The Outlaw Josey Wales" and the more recent TV series "Hell On Wheels". While some might not have caught onto it, there were some Civil War analogies involved in "Firefly" with the so called "Brown Coats" being veterans of that universes equivalent of the confederacy with the war being fought on very similar principles except for the slavery (and let's be honest the ACW would have happened even if slavery wasn't an issue).

Not something I'll argue about, I simply think it's quite doable as a product and it's not likely to raise all that many eyebrows except maybe among some millennials since it's a period that doesn't get much treatment. That said I have no real interest in multiplayer, so I'm not sure if I'll be interested in this project.

 

[Crazy Zaul]

Looks like it could be good for the people that like that kinda thing, but also looks like $70000 would be nowhere neat enough to make it.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

Well here's a shit storm waiting to happen here, though considering we have WW2 games it's not as playing the "evil" side is new.

To be fair, the South wasn't the bad guys in totality, and the North weren't the benevolent saviors they've been made out to be in pop culture. And a lot of the men fighting were torn in half emotionally because some of the people on the other side were family. The whole thing was a messy affair and I'd never once attribute a "good/evil" binary to that conflict. I'm not condoning the South, but I'm not willing to paint them with the same brush people use to describe the Nazis. It was not a clear good guys/bad guys war, it was a lot of tensions arising from inequalities of many people, and yes slavery, but really it was about money.
Its not clear cut and done right, a game could explore the themes involved in that conflict rather than just binary painting each side as good/evil.
Just sayin'. It was a horrible black mark on the US IMO, and even if something good came out of it, there was a lot of bad shit also surrounding it and neither side could be put in a positive light overall.

 

[Recusant]

From the kickstarter:

To start off, this is a game focusing on the American Civil War, where bullets flew for the disparate causes of their participants. Those that fought for the rights of their states and purported livelihood clashed with those that fought for the rights of the enslaved...

They should ditch that wishy-washy language and come out and say "Those that fought to keep slaves and those that fought to free them." Have some balls and take a stand! In WW2 games we can slaughter Nazis by the millions and pretend that all of them were evil Jew-killers and deserved it, why can't we do the same for those Confederate assholes?

Because most of them weren't assholes. I'm disappointed to see the revisionism on display here (no faction that held that any newly admitted state should have no voice in deciding whether it'd be slaveholding or free can claim the "state's rights" argument; those fighting for the rights of their states and those fighting to for the rights of the enslaved were on the same side), but painting a more realistic picture is asking for political trouble- though only if it's done on a grander scale. For the average Confederate soldier, this wasn't about fighting to keep slavery enshrined as an economic principle, but fighting to repel an invasion. You'd have a better moral case painting the US soldiers as the "evil side" in Vietnam than you would the CS soldiers in the Civil War.

This isn't a slavekeeping simulator, folks. It's a war-based first person shooter.

I agree, and since it is focusing on the battles, it's probably not going to have much of an impact since they are focusing on recreate the battles and the area, which if it is 1:1 scale will be amazing.

But since when does the average soldier get to decide what the war is about? I hate to keep bringing up WWII, but the average German soldier probably wasn't fighting for racial supremacy. Yet the Allies are seen as ending the holocaust, but the Union isn't acknowledged for winning the war that ended slavery in the US.

But yeah, the Civil War is a very complicated thing. There were instances of the South being against state's rights when the Fugitive Slave law was federal law but states didn't want to send captured slaves back to the south. Nothing is ever black and white, I just think they are going too far in not acknowledging slavery in talking about the Civil War

When has the Union not been acknowledged for winning the war? I'm not saying the South wasn't on the wrong side of history here, just that, like so many others over the centuries, it was a rich man's war and a poor man's fight; conscription means soldier didn't equal ideologue, and it's unfair to demonize the typical Confederate for the action of his political overlords.

And I wonder why you think a game in this setting has an obligation to bring up slavery. From what the Kickstarter showed, it's about the battles- and just the battles. Would you have games about fighting the first World War have backgrounds explaining that every non-Italian political leader was a rampaging doofus?

 

[Skatologist]

I like this very much, mostly because a lot of war games not taking place in 20th century or present/near future tend to be only be strategy games. I'm seeing stuff online saying how it just can't be done right, but here's hoping Campfire can change that. Hopefully it might lead to more games exploring the time period and centering games around it. I'm still waiting for my stealth game for the Underground Railroad god damn it!

Also something to note: In the video, when they were showing off customization, I just had to notice that they didn't change that customizable model at all. No different hairstyles, heights, weights, arm lengths, or anything else. Just outfit and facial hair. Don't now why, but I actually kind of found that funny for some odd reason.