Battlefield 3 > Iran Propaganda

Any of you pick up a copy of the new BF3?...

Right off the snap, they are posting facts about Iran's terrorist activity...
Your squad is talking about how "we should be in Iran"...
Iraqi city has insurgents that aren't talking Arabic.. (insinuating Farsi)
Talking about Iran's seismic activity..


More conditioning perhaps?...

(Btw, this is all on the 2nd level.. I'll update you more as I work my way through)

reply to post by CALGARIAN


if it is im just saying i dont want to go to iran afgahn and iraq were crazy enough for me

how's the multiplayer on that...i was thinking about getting it...does it have split screen or is it online mp only?

thats why i dont play these new big production war emulators.. to much propoganda
better off getting a ww2 game or something, i wish medal of honor would re-do some of the wars its done before with new technology..imagine rising sun ps3 style

I did but don't read to much into it they made a game based on the world today so more people would get into it Dice are not prophets.

It's just a game using a location that's in everyone's minds.

I'm waiting for the inevitable threads about Saints Row The Third having air strikes you can call it or the ability to beat someone with an 8 foot purple dildo and claim it's some kind of propaganda regarding a Middle Eastern country or Jewish conspiracy or some other craziness.

reply to post by CALGARIAN



Its just a game..Calm down guy

second line

Originally posted by johnnygamble
how's the multiplayer on that...i was thinking about getting it...does it have split screen or is it online mp only?

While it's not really related to this OP, I will answer...

The multiplayer is very similar to BFBC2. Similar game play and style - better quality graphics, sound, etc. The matchmaking system is terrible. In my experience we have not been able to keep a party together at all and when two party members end up on the same squad it is likely they will not hear one and other over a headset. (same as beta)

If you're not familiar with this type of game or if you prefer run and gun type of games, this likely will not be for you.

On topic: I have not even started the campaign, as I buy these games for the online play (prefer the social aspect of gaming). My roommate who is not at all into geopolitics mentioned the overwhelming Iran propaganda.

There is something to be said about that.

I don't believe the game is a part of the conditioning of people itself, but rather the perception of the developers who created it. Remember, these are normal people who are influenced by the same television/internet/newspaper as anyone else.

I reckon they really stretched the truth when it comes to Iran. So far, Iran has been accused of funding terrorism and stirring up trouble thru rhetoric but never of being hands-on terrorists.

Besides, isn't it a little weird that you spend half the game fighting the PLR but in multiplayer mode, you can't play as them? It's like their pure existence in this game is to be killed by both U.S. forces and Russians. Everyone team up against the Iranians.

Personal opinion: propaganda.

It isn't 'just a game'. It's a 'game' that sells millions of copies worldwide.

Many movies and TV series can have this same premise, but they're usually backed up with a somewhat coherent plot explaining how such an event can happen. Usually they'll go into detail about how agents and provocateurs instigated such a war, and manipulated events, etc. Not in BF3 though.

In the game, it just has you take everything for granted. Iran is bad, bad people live there, we're going to blow up Tehran, are you ready?

EA (Electronic Arts), the publisher, has had a long-running streak of questionable plots and motives, where it just has you take fascism and war for granted. Like, oh, thats just how it's supposed to be. In a sense, all games are like this, because most involve some dystopian world view. The difference with EA games, is that they try to interject this into the real world.

The game was fun, though after I finished, I felt somewhat dirty, because it was kind of a mess.

However, throughout the game, there are instances where a character questions the "motives". Basically marines chattering on about insurgents in Iran;

Marine A: "So what happens if the PLR (Iran insurgents) takes over? Country run by terrorists, that can't be good."

Marine B: "Bro, America was founded by terrorists, for terrorists. What do you think the f**ing Revolutionary War was? History is determined by the motherf** victors."

Marine A: "How did you even get into the marines?"

That made me scratch my head, because this one character went out of his way to compromise the narrative to the entire game, and left me wondering what was going on.

reply to post by SyphonX


It's a first-person-shooter, of course it's going to take war and violence for granted. Art imitates life, that's a standard given of human culture that is in fact universal. Now while I wouldn't call BF3 "art" per-say, it will still imitate and be based upon what is in the public discourse and news now.

Iran being "bad" and America being "good" is what basically is in the mindset of the West to a large degree and something that the player can relate to. The exact same thing occurs in film and print too. People like Tom Clancy have become very wealthy and made their entire careers off of taking countries in the news and making war stories out of them.

As others have said, it's just a game mate, relax. If you think that this little game, sure it will sell well but only a small portion of society overall will own or play it, is propaganda to get the West to attack Iran, take a look at history and see what real hawk propaganda was during the Cold War.

Saying this game is propaganda to get everyone to attack Iran is like saying Forza 4 is trying to brainwash everyone into liking Ferrari despite them being crappy cars, it's all just laughable.

Originally posted by ProjectJimmy
Iran being "bad" and America being "good" is what basically is in the mindset of the West to a large degree and something that the player can relate to.

Hence, the propaganda, get it?

Art imitates life? Maybe, but we're talking about war, not life. In order for the west to fully swallow a campaign against Iran, then it needs to start with stuff like this. It's been like this for a while, but this game goes to show you how callous people are in regards to propaganda and the warpath.

As others have said, it's just a game mate, relax. If you think that this little game, sure it will sell well but only a small portion of society overall will own or play it, is propaganda to get the West to attack Iran, take a look at history and see what real hawk propaganda was during the Cold War.

I am relaxed. I'm merely stating the obvious. Even non-gamers (as shown in this thread) will see this game and say, "Wow, what a ultra right-wing fascist propaganda piece."

You're also right about "Tom Clancy" etc, and "real propaganda" during the Cold War. But get this, we never went to war, in spite of the mass paranoia. Miracle. You want to know what the difference is with the Cold War propaganda campaigns and the current schemes? We are at war right now, and war with Iran or other countries is a very real possibility. We have virtually surrounded Iran with troops via Iraq and Afghanistan, not to mention the "black wars" with drone attacks and contractors in other countries in the region. Nothing cold about this war, mate.

Saying this game is propaganda to get everyone to attack Iran is like saying Forza 4 is trying to brainwash everyone into liking Ferrari despite them being crappy cars, it's all just laughable.

It isn't laughable. BF3 is just one of many hit pieces on the west's war propaganda to-do list. If it art imitates life, then it imitates life too well. I like BF3, it's a fun game, but I consider the loose-writing and flimsy plot to be very irresponsible in this climate. You can laugh at it all you want, but there are a lot of people holding their breath on this one. Stuff like this only continues to desensitize and 'soft kill' the public's view on more war.

reply to post by SyphonX


What?

You're playing a soldier on the ground with orders to stop terrorists.

What next, threads accusing Super Mario games of being elitist propaganda against reptilians who try to kidnap Mushroom Kingdom royalty?

The game is designed for it's target audience. Mainly those in the US, Canada and the UK.

If you make a game with a storyline that involves killing Americans, it will never hit shelves. It will be deemed too controversial and canned.

Iran is just the badguy of the week. Other games have used Japan, Nazi Germany, Russia, North Korea, China, Iraq, Afghanistan, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, Mexico, A variety of post-soviet countries, a few central and south american countries, and a couple African countries to fill this role.

Using Iran is no more propaganda than any of the others.

reply to post by allenidaho


In case you haven't noticed, there's a very 'minor' difference in the aforementioned wars: they *all* belong to the past.

If you were talking about the Persian Gulf War (1990), then you'd be right, as I even remember playing such related games on commodore 64 back in the nineties afterwards.

But, we are talking about the *present* Iran and we see that Battlefield 3™ clearly, portrays us Persians (Iranians) as terrorists, who are helping their neighbor terrorists against the good American anti-terrorist forces.

So let me express my apologies for killing the buzz (for you), but we are not terrorists, and that's not a very nice way to portray a present-day country.

reply to post by Jahangir


You are wrong. Russia, North Korea, China, Iraq, Afghanistan and a few other countries have been used as the villains in games set in either the present day or near future.

Besides, Iran's public image is none of my concern. It's none of your concern. It's just their concern. And I don't see that public image changing any time soon.

A Window into World War III - EA's Battlefield 3 Announces US Invasion of Iran and War with Russia

From the ghosts of Tom Clancey's 2001 release of Ghost Recon, with its single player campaign plot involving the exact, prophetic, Georgian invasion of South Ossetia with Nato backing that later occured in 2008, comes the latest, greatest, First Person Shooter Video Game from EA: Battlefield 3. Battlefield 3 features the latest gaming engine, Frostbite 2. It looks real. but what is so interesting to me about this game is that not one reviewer chose to comment on the plot of the Single Player Campaign, with most of them preferring instead to devote the majority of the substance of their reviews to praising how wonderfull it is to blow each other up in such great detail in multiplayer and co-op mode. Not even the prestigious site Gamespot.com's Video Review host Chris Watters could be bothered to tell you what armies you are representing in multiplayer or co-op mode during his 5 minute commentary.

The multiplayer mode storyline has the Pacific Asian Coalition led by Russia invading Europe in France and battling NATO with American troops on the ground in France. In other words WW III. This article will focus on the storyline of the Single Player Campaign. The story is told in a disconnected, non-intuitive way, revolving around the protagonist's flashbacks that he recounts as he is interrogated by Homeland Security. In fact the two DHS interrogator characters actively and forcefully push the protagonist and in so doing you the player to constantly reinforce your casual dismissal of the plot.

The story features US Marine Sgt Blackburn, the protagonist, and has you the player live through his quest to capture an Iranian PLR agent named Solomon who has 2 Russian suitcase nukes that he plans to detonate in Paris and New York City. As the story unfolds, US Marines conduct small scale black ops incursions into Iranian cities in order to secure strategic intel objectives. One of these missions involves your in-game character and it consists of a force of 50,000 US Marines invading Tehran, Iran without provocation to look for suspected Russian double agent/terror mastermind Solomon. You get to be the navigator/gunner in an F-18 airstrike on Tehran's main airport. This mission allows you to discover that Solomon acquired 3 suitcase nukes. One of them is still there, and you see maps for Paris and New York City. Next thing you know Paris gets nuked. Yes you read that correctly. The suitcase nuke goes off in Paris and kills 80,000.

In response a full scale invasion of Iran is launched, and in the next mission you participate as a tank gunner in a full scale tank battalion assault into Iran as part of a multi-pronged air, land, and sea operation. Meanwhile Sgt Blackburn is desperately trying to catch up with PLR leader Solomon before he detonates the third suitcase nuke in New York City. The war escalates in Iran as US Marines engage Russian Paratroopers dropping out of Russian heavy troop transports all over Iran by the tens of thousands and backed by Russian Migs in the air and tanks on the ground in full scale war. In the end Sgt Blackburn stops New York City from getting nuked, but not before you the player are forced to shoot a fellow Marine dead or the proverbial "millions will die" scenario will happen and the door is left wide open for future Downloadable Content to weave more tales of world destruction behind a foreground of very realistic fire and brimstone.

What adds to the eerieness factor in this campaign is the way they use their disconnected, flashback method of story telling blended with the establishment view that the Homeland Security characters promote from start to finish to totally marginalise, minimise and in fact dismiss the fact that the story line is about war with Russia in Iran with nukes going off all over the West.

Below are links to the main game site and youtube clips of some of the scenes I described earlier.

I strongly recommend that you look at each link, and while you watch those video clips, think about the fact that this blockbuster, number one game was released Oct 25, 2011, while Israel is openly green lighted to strike Iran, and we are massing troops in Kuwait after conquering Libya, and major figures in our government have said that we are preparing for a major military offensive in the near and middle east, to include Iran, Syria, and Pakistan in November.

For those of you that don't play PC or Gaming Console (XBox) games you probably don't realise that movies are obsolete. In the same way that the internet made non-interactive TV obsolete, computer games have made non-interactive movies obsolete because in a computer game you don't just watch, you are the protaganist in the movie. And many of todays games have plots that are determined by your actions withing the game. The point being that in the same way that movies promote mass mind control and show glimpses of the future, games accomplish the same but to exponential proportions. There are entire virtual worlds built to tell you what they are about to do, and you can go inside and actually be there. (See Fallout or Rage and especially Deus Ex, the original [Deus Ex is actually an anti Illuminati game showing the future with good intentions])

The way that this game (Battlefield 3) generates cognitive dissonance by turning the plot line into a picasso to distract the player from the actual plot content, i.e. the invasion of Iran and nuking of Paris, not to mention the beginning of open hostilities with Russia, will produce millions of young males with an affinity for war whose memories will blend Iran with Iraq and therefore they will eventually come to believe we have always been at war with Iran, and they will think its fun. In fact if you play the game, or just watch the mission video clips, you will see how they casually present each new major invasion of Iran and escalation of the conflict, and they are major escalations, headed straight for total global war, as if it was just routine and had always been happening. The plot never addresses a beginning of hostilities. In fact it implies that we have been fighting on the ground in Iran since as far back as you can remember. But they use all the authority of the top game in its genre with the latest, cutting edge engine. backed by the military industrial complex, to bestow upon their version of history, present and future not only the appearance of legitimacy, but the a-moral high ground. lol

So in short, if you want to know what the beginning of World War III will look like, those video links below are your oracle into the future. And the oracle of the military industrial complex produced video game has always been right so far. I had a foreboding feeling as I anticipated the release of this game, and when I saw the plot, I was not pleased. I can't imagine how all the Iranians must feel about the West as they watch millions of us gleefully pretend to blow their ancient capital city to rubble in Frostbite 2 3D. Could you imagine a Chinese game where the goal is to conquer as much American territory as possible, and capture as many slaves as you can catch in the process? Think it won't happen? lol Think again.

Release Date: Oct 25, 2011

Battlefield 3 Official Website:
www.battlefield.com...
"Better Engine: Frostbite 2
BF3's new technology allows you to experience superior animation, unparalleled lighting and special effects, epic scale and incredible sound design."

Gamespot Review Page:
www.gamespot.com...
"Americans and Russians collide. Our Battlefield 3 Walkthrough gets you ready for the fight with info about online multiplayer, kits and equipment, and unlockable goodies."

Video Review (Chris Watters downplays the single player campaign plot while promoting the online killing mode saying "that reason is all you need" to buy his game):
www.gamespot.com...

Single Player Campaign

12 Missions in all

Mission 4 - Go Hunting
Bomb Tehran, and take out the Tehran Airport in Iran with airstrikes and Iranian bogies in air combat over Iranian capital (before Paris gets nuked)
www.youtube.com...

Mission 5 - Operation Guillotine
You are part of a 50,000 strong US Marine force that invades Tehran, Iran with armor support and air superiority in order to attempt to capture Solomon. During this mission you don't catch Solomon but you find a suitcase built to house 3 suitcase nukes and two are missing (before Paris gets nuked)
www.youtube.com...

Mission 6 - Comrades
Nuke in Paris (last minute of video)
www.youtube.com...

Mission 7 - Thunder Run
Follow up interrogation, 80,000 Parisians dead, tank invasion of Iran
www.youtube.com...

Mission 10 - A Rock And A Hard Place
US Marines engaging Russian infantry in Iran
www.youtube.com...

Mission 11 - Kaffarov
Scene where they make the player shoot a fellow Marine dead or the proverbial "millions will die" scenario will happen (at 11 minutes and 45 seconds)
www.youtube.com...

In the end New York is spared the detonation of the suitcase nuke. But the war with Russia and Iran is on, with a lot more Downloadable Content waiting in the wings.

Watch each mission of the game here (mission numbers on this youtube playlist do not correspond exactly with actual mission numbers in the game):
www.youtube.com...

reply to post by SyphonX


first of all Iran is not a bad country and the people there mostly like americans its full of culture and a underground clubbing and entertainment community i lived in iran most of my life and whenever iranians come here to the US they call themselves persians cuz they are afraid americans are gonna treat them bad and im not gonna lie most americans find Iranina persian girls very attractive and end up feeling bad about iran bashing.
Second i hate the goverment of iran though as an Iranian they are more deadly to us then anyone else Iran is no danger to the US the US just needs a big enemy
third of i love this game the story line is cool anyway tehran does look like that in real life and the iranian soldiers look bad ass i love the gameplay and props to EA the story line was made by an Iranian american also

reply to post by allenidaho


May I have a reference to some of these games? As you again seem to miss the point: Iraq and Afghanistan are *currently* in war, Iran is not.

The war in the game doesn't occur decades ago (like Russia or Nazi Germany) but in a very present day and time.

And also, Persia's public image may be none of your concern, but it's of utmost concern to me, as I'm living my life and I wouldn't like to be seen a terrorist, just because some stupid game story writer thought it's a good idea to picture me as such.

Don't get me wrong, I have no sympathy or affiliation with the Iran's Government whatsoever, and I hate the bastards as much as everyone else. But if you've ever lived in Iran, you would've seen the clear line that there's between People, and the Government of Iran (the radical Islamists).

The latter may be less than 2% of the population, and we're talking about ≈75 millions individuals here.

reply to post by Jahangir


I agree, they got the city (Tehran) very well. I enjoyed a lot just wandering around and couldn't really concentrate on the game in those missions.