I think it is disingenuous to claim that most of he games deconstructing player agency within the narrative are attempting to insult the players or that they are somehow bad stories to tell. Bioshock, specifically, deconstructs many things beyond just player acceptance of violence in narrative. Jack is sympathetic in regard to the actions he takes and it is central to the discourse of the individual v. group that is core to the games plot. I think suggesting it is a case of mocking the player for being complicit totally skips over almost all the games value.

That might be true. I have no problem admitting that I probably missed a lot of the nuance in that game's story. That game was boring as hell from a gameplay perspective, so I tuned out pretty quickly (but still somehow finished the game).

I can at least accept that Bioshock doesn't really talk down to you like I think Spec Ops does.

I think it is disingenuous to claim that most of he games deconstructing player agency within the narrative are attempting to insult the players or that they are somehow bad stories to tell. Bioshock, specifically, deconstructs many things beyond just player acceptance of violence in narrative. Jack is sympathetic in regard to the actions he takes and it is central to the discourse of the individual v. group that is core to the games plot. I think suggesting it is a case of mocking the player for being complicit totally skips over almost all the games value.

The game is questioning this rule. Why do you want to play a game about war? Why are you willing to do whatever is necessary to keep the linear story moving? If you saw a large crowd of unarmed people, why did you do it? You should have turned the game off.

Well, there's the obvious answer of "I'm not a psychopath, but I've been told all my life that war is hell, and games about war are as close as I can come to seeing what that really means without actually participating."

It's sort of like sniffing the carton of milk someone has just handed you and told you is sour. You KNOW you're not going to like what's coming next, but you sort of want to see how bad it really is.

Then on the flip, you are now experiencing the hell of having to make amoral decisions in a war zone, decisions real military personnel face all the time.

You forgot Metal Gear Solid 2.

Truth. Also 3. Also Revengeance! A very well written game.

Nah, 3 could have easily been done in a film.

Rly tho? Advancing the clock to kill The End? The Sorrow's ghost river and taking the revive pill? Pulling the trigger yourself at the end? Those aren't very filmic.

Those are all kind of… gimicks. They don't really have anything to do with the story itself.

You forgot Metal Gear Solid 2.

Truth. Also 3. Also Revengeance! A very well written game.

Nah, 3 could have easily been done in a film.

Rly tho? Advancing the clock to kill The End? The Sorrow's ghost river and taking the revive pill? Pulling the trigger yourself at the end? Those aren't very filmic.

Well, there's the obvious answer of "I'm not a psychopath, but I've been told all my life that war is hell, and games about war are as close as I can come to seeing what that really means without actually participating."

This is obviously wrong. War games are super fun. If war is Hell, then games aren't very close to that. I've never played Spec Ops the Line, but the 'twist' seems ridiculous on face value if the game itself is actually fun.

Spec Ops asks you why you're playing a game about war.

Because games about war are awesome.

You forgot Metal Gear Solid 2.

Truth. Also 3. Also Revengeance! A very well written game.

Nah, 3 could have easily been done in a film.

The game is questioning this rule. Why do you want to play a game about war? Why are you willing to do whatever is necessary to keep the linear story moving? If you saw a large crowd of unarmed people, why did you do it? You should have turned the game off.

Well, there's the obvious answer of "I'm not a psychopath, but I've been told all my life that war is hell, and games about war are as close as I can come to seeing what that really means without actually participating."

It's sort of like sniffing the carton of milk someone has just handed you and told you is sour. You KNOW you're not going to like what's coming next, but you sort of want to see how bad it really is.

The game is questioning this rule. Why do you want to play a game about war? Why are you willing to do whatever is necessary to keep the linear story moving? If you saw a large crowd of unarmed people, why did you do it? You should have turned the game off.

That's what bothers me. That's just not a compelling message or story for me. Why didn't I turn the game off? Because I paid sixty dollars for the fucking thing, and everyone else apparently loves it, so I'll slog through it.

I guess I just don't like the real-world side of it. Here, pay us $60 for this so we can tell you bad you are for playing the fucking thing.

You forgot Metal Gear Solid 2.

Truth. Also 3. Also Revengeance! A very well written game.

Reread what I said about it. You have no agency because you have chosen to enter a devastated wartorn city and involve yourself in the local conflicts (i.e. you have chosen to play a war game). Some situations - like war - cannot be resolved with your moral agency intact. The only purely Right choice is to never enter the situation.

Okay, sure. That means the only right act is to not play the game, defeating the purpose of a video game. I get what it's angling for, it just doesn't work in the context of what a video game is. Of course I'm going to do what you tell me to do, that's sort of how video games work. There's an understood rule where I buy into whatever the game is selling to move it along and see what's happening--throwing that back in my face and saying, "look how bad you were, you shouldn't have done that" isn't exactly compelling. The thing is, I don't even think what they were trying to do was bad--it was just executed poorly, in that it's predictable. Again, the white phosphorous scene really stands out. When I (the player) can clearly see the big crowd of people are unarmed and not shooting at me, but the game forces me to kill them anyway, all sense of illusion is gone, and I immediately know what the game is trying to do. That completely kills the impact of the entire rest of the game for me.

I don't disagree, I think it's mean-spirited and wouldn't replay it.

But I don't think it is self-defeating. It's a successful story that can only be told as a video game. You say it yourself:

"There's an understood rule where I buy into whatever the game is selling to move it along and see what's happening--throwing that back in my face and saying, "look how bad you were, you shouldn't have done that" isn't exactly compelling."

The game is questioning this rule. Why do you want to play a game about war? Why are you willing to do whatever is necessary to keep the linear story moving? If you saw a large crowd of unarmed people, why did you do it? You should have turned the game off.

It's a video game take on Funny Games, and just as that movie depends on being a movie (the villain literally rewinds the movie with a remote control to prevent his victims from beating him), Spec Ops asks you why you're playing a game about war. It is necessary that it be predictable, because if you couldn't predict what was coming, you would not have the choice to turn away and refuse to cooperate.

Once you have chosen to invade Iraq, you cannot protest that the situation forced you to do hideous things. You chose to enter a hideous situation. This is Spec Ops' central comment, and it can only be made effectively in a game.