Operation Flashpoint Dev: Games Based On Real War 'Inappropriate'

The creative director for Codemasters' military shooter Operation Flashpoint: Red River recently argued that war games based on real-life conflicts are of questionable taste, considering current world events. "I, personally, don’t want to focus on live conflict. I don’t think it’s appropriate and I don’t think it’s tasteful," said Sion Lenton in an interview with Edge magazine. This year, Electronic Arts removed mention of the "Taliban" in the multiplayer mode for Medal of Honor. Last year, Konami dropped Atomic Games' Six Days in Fallujah after protests of the game's setting within the real-life battle that occurred during the Iraq War. Red River's battlefields don't reflect a live conflict, but the game is set in 2013 Tajikistan, which borders war-torn Afghanistan to the south, and gamers play as U.S. Marines. "At no point did we think that it would be cool to set the game in Helmand or Afghanistan, because there’s a war going on there and there are British soldiers dying," said Lenton. Lenton also said a coworker's nephew was recently killed by an improvised explosive device. The creative director admitted the studio is still making a war game that shows soldiers dying, but said "I guess [the fiction] is us playing safe."