No Russian - How did you play through it? - SPOILERS for Modern Warfare 2

[Gestapo Hunter]

Makarov pointed to me and said "Who made that man a gunner?!"

 

[Velocirapture07]

I only killed the other guys with guns....i guess they were cops.

 

[iFail69]

I started blasting until there was nothing left in my glorious path of destruction.

It's just a game, way to over-react stupid media people!!!!

 

[DoW Lowen]

No need for spoilers, every person and their mum knows about the airport level.

I personally just shot only at the security guards the first time through. Then I remembered I played Prototype earlier that week and shooting innocent civilians is pale in comparison to picking up civilians and throwing them at helicopter blades. And by the time I realized I was shooting pixels everyone was already dead.

 

[Zing]

Slaughtered everything in sight. And reveled in it.

 

[FightThePower]

I gunned them down. Anyone I saw left alive I put them out of their misery with my knife.

Don't you judge me.

 

[Enaksan]

i played my role as an undercover agent and went along with it. It was part of the story, and i believe the loading screen was informing you that you had to maintain your cover. Besides it's just as 'real' as something like 24, in which there is constant 'for the greater good' deaths to be had. I had high hopes that you would maintain a cover and really get into it, earning trust and eventually taking them down from the inside, kinda like Splinter CellA tried. Oh well, guess unavoidable death will have to do....

sorry if you havn't finished that bit yet, don't know how to do these fancy spoiler thingys.

 

[Skeleton Jelly]

I shot and killed as many people as I could. I tried to knife all the people crawling away in pain or trying to carrying dead bodies away. The ones that surrendered, I shot in the balls or clit. I was disappointed by the lack of seniors and babies.

I also wish they would have added executions to it. Some curb stomping, throat slitting, eye gouging action.

I'd also like to say in real life I'm a pacifist. Its a video game, why do you feel right wrong about killing citizens, but not the dogs or the Russian soldiers? They were people (video game people albeit) too. Or the Op For? One mans enemy is another mans freedom fighter. Personally its a video game. I'l kill anything in them.

 

[The_ModeRazor]

Shot some, knoifed some.
But the cops... they were annihilated.
I think it was a pretty stupid level. What's the big deal with killing innocent civilians? You do that in lots of other games. GTA is based around it. In Prototype, you kill thousands more. This level most certainly wasn't very original.

 

[Chipperz]

I killed everything.

It's still a game. Nothing has changed in the last few weeks. I still didn't find it quite as fun as nuking all the innocents in Megaton, but I think it's because that was more cinematic.

I didn't shot at all. I looked around, quite shocked, waiting for someone to ask me why I wasn't shooting. By the time when went down to the ground level I shot at some guy who was crawling away. It was a instinctive reaction from playing too many FPS games but the shot didn't kill him, so I stopped firing.

So you left a little pixelated dude to bleed to death, slowly and painfully, instead of finishing him off quickly and cleanly? Nice, good to know you're a little sadist.

OK, new question, why are people so moral about this? You can't claim that video games don't affect people if you let them affect you - if people can't get over this, then the people who say this kind of stuff encourage violence win.

Maybe it's because developers are trying hard to make their 'games' a little bit more than just 'games'. Yeah, they are pixelated, they are just in a game. But like an ign editor mentioned, it's only a cheap cop-out argument to say that "hey, it's a game, so it's ok if we do something nasty in it".

This scene, was more than just a game. What the writer and game developers obviously aimed for was to make you more determined to go against Makarov and his cronies, but of course, once you find out how shallow of a character Makie was and how the story turned out to be, I just couldn't take that scene seriously anymore.

Well, that's just it, the developers could have intended for it to be a happy family-friendly scene, but it's us, the gamers, who give that scene it's power. The people who didn't opt to skip it and are now triumphantly telling everyone about how they didn't kill anyone in it are the same people who are trying to tell us that gaming makes you violent, because they're acknowledging that their moral code is flimsy enough to not stand up to playing a game.

This gives ammunition for the anti-games crowd. If adults can't handle something this tame, then how are kids meant to handle it? What happens when something actually bad comes along? Even worse, how are video games as a medium meant to grow when adults aren't mature enough to read the two options to skip the scene with possible offensive content? I wouldn't be surprised if many people complaining about this are the same people who also complain that too many games are "Space Marines Vs the Aliens for kids", which is a mixed message if ever I saw it - we want games to grow up, but we don't want them tackling real issues? We want proper story lines, but we don't want to have to see it, and if we do have to see it, we certainly don't want to play it? We hate games that feel too similar, but we condemn anything that tries anything different?

I think "No Russian" was a great step forward for gaming. The first time that terrorism has been shown properly in games, and a very personal look at the effects of terrorists on everyday people which you can't get with films or books. While the rest of the game didn't suit the jarring change of style from Bourne/Bond style super-thriller to sudden gritty terrorist attack, back to super thriller, the actual level shows exactly what gaming can achieve as a medium. Also, it's a very, very undenyable display of gaming as an adult form of entertainment. It's hard to say that gaming is just "for kids" with a level displaying the very direct consequences of a terrorist attack on the market, and selling so well.

I would urge everyone that feels they have the moral high ground by playing the level and not killing anyone to go back and actually play the level to see what the fuss is about - it's a completely different experience between playing it and just watching it.

 

[MrSnugglesworth]

The same way I played the entire game.

Maximum ammunition, minimum subtlety

Ha.


Me to >.>

 

[wonkey20]

I killed everyone.. Even the guys that were crawling away..

 

[deathstar2Razor]

Actually, I thought hey, I got to earn their trust. So as soon as the elevator doors opened up I started shooting and...

Mission Failed. You killed a civilian!

Then I noticed that even though I own an imported version, I have to set the language to anything BUT German.

 

[Jharry5]

I thought it wasn't going to affect me, so I started shooting. Then something very strange happened. I stopped and saw mountains of innocent civilians either dead or dying, some trying to crawl away, drag other people away. I was pretty sickened by it, truth be told.
So I didn't fire a shot unless they tried to shoot me (so the airport guards got it). The only other time I shot at a civilian was to mercy kill them.

I think a level that can evoke such a reaction is one that's incredibly well done. I commend them for that. It was meant to create such a response, and it did in me (although, looking at some of the other responses, it seems like I'm in a minority...)

 

[Nieroshai]

I stood back for a minute, begrudgingly decided to get into my double agent role, and maniacally hosed down the crowd. Second time through? The terrorists didn't even have anything to shoot at!

 

[jboking]

No Russian was possibly the most boring level ever. There wasn't much shock for me. I mean, come on, I just got done playing God of War, I've done worse than kill some innocence as a means to an end. Not only that, but when the police finally did show up I didn't die once, because their resistance was pathetic. No Russian was crap because there was no serious opposition. Enemy of my enemy, now that was a good level(I have some lover for cliffhanger too).

 

[Gigano]

I held that trigger down like there was no tomorrow, and took down everyone. There is no ethical questions in unleashing a hail of pixels on other pixels, and most of us have already done the same in various GTA games.

 

[Cid Silverwing]

I GUNNED DOWN EVERYONE I SAW!!!

not because I loved blood shed but because the objective was to earn the badguys trust and I thought if I didnt I would fail the mission.

Too bad, because you get a bullet planted right in your face after the mission anyway.

This is one of the world's most pointless missions ever. Not that I played it, and even if I had that moneymilkfest I would sooner skip the mission.

 

[era81]

Killed every mo'fucker that got in my way including a couple of fellow terrorist.

 

[chronobreak]

OK, new question, why are people so moral about this? You can't claim that video games don't affect people if you let them affect you - if people can't get over this, then the people who say this kind of stuff encourage violence win.

Who said video games don't affect people? They can evoke as much emotion as a movie or a great album. You would be belittling the developers point if you just have the attitude that they are a bunch of pixels. If that's your attitude, why even play games, if you don't want to appreciate the scenarios and at least try to use your imagination and become immersed in the experience?

I mean shit, would you pop in Silent Hill and just turn your mind off and play it, because it's just pixels anyways, or would you take the time to appreciate things like th sounds and atmosphere of the town? Maybe I'm just a different breed of gamer.

Oh, and cue the internet tough guys pretty soon with this question. "Dude I ttly Naded like 150 people where were the babies though I wanted to chop them up hopefully there's babys in MW3"