Aesthetics of World at War.

Truly wonderful

Its crazy how my memories and perceptions as a child, made the game far more violent than it was.

For when I shot an enemy in the knee with either a pistol or submachine gun, their knees would bend and twist, as the projectile tore through, causing the combatant to drop their weapon, crawl into a fetal position, clutch their knee with both hands and scream.

Shooting someone in the eye, would add this massive hole where their eye once was, as their lifeless body crashed into the floor. No scream, moan or gasp, the combatant was instantly a corpse.

When a limb was torn off by either a shotgun, machine gun or grenade, the combatant would make this terrifying scream, before they fell to ground and started sobbing.

The M2 Flamethrower was a brush of death, that paints the environment in flames, leaving only scorched earth, sand, concrete and steel.

Any incendiary weapon was an instrument of cruelty. As Molotovs and Flamethrowers would burn away the clothes, hair and eyes of a combatant, causing them to scream non-stop. Eventually the screaming would cease and the combatant would become a hideous corpse, robbed of their very Humanity.

I had nightmares to say the least.

One detail I always loved was the reload animation for the BAR in Call of Duty 3. You can see the characters' hands trembling, and his hand slips off the magazine while trying to eject it. It was the first time I'd ever seen something like that.

I always liked the darkness and grit of Brothers in Arms.

Your final message of your grandfather passing and his memories he had carried with him fading away, and how you wish you couldve stayed and heard more to retain them, drove me to make the decision to fly out to see my own this very winter break. I need to hear these memories and feel his humanity before he inevitably passes as we all do. Never think your videos dont have impact, as your writing and storytelling always will. The importance of these videos to convey thoughts are very well shown, just as important as the memories that we all carry do. So thank you for this.

best COD

What happened to the thumbnail?

It seems like somebody took patton's actual blood and guts speech and went way way way too far.

I think this will always be my favorite CoD and favorite WWII shooter, I have so much respect for what it did. It's soundtrack is my favorite part, it's absolutely incredible and unique and I really dig the eerie vibes it gives

if i had kids id legitimately make them play through this game, everyone should have their eyes open to capabilities and nature of man

We will never experience this era of COD ever again. Thanks to everyone who fueled the sterile, souless, politically correct, creatively bankrupt, scum sucking sheckle chasing dip sh*ts wanting to make war games a commodified rotting s*it sack to make a quick buck off of fa*g*ts and grifters. F*****g garbage these days. And f**k the **w bags fueling censorship. Free Palestine and most importantly free your fuc*ing selves.

Bit of a miss that I didn't see this video 2 years ago when WaW was my favourite (and last that I liked) Call of Duty entry.

To talk about the worldbuilding in the last 2 Soviet missions, I do think it's a neat and often missed detail how German soldiers are stylized in this game. On one hand it would be very difficult to narratively tow the line on their motivations in a Soviet campaign either way, especially without stepping into some form of apologetics, but there is another problem which is that the winners of WW2 largely failed (or never intended in the first place) to process WW2 or pick appart nazism as an ideology. That's the same reason why most WW2 games that cover all of the war strictly end with the summer 1945, and never then move on to either depict the year following WW2 or what happened around the world beyond the front lines in the last year.

"It's not that you shouldn't fight them even more. Its not that they don't deserve death when standing to protect such vile visions of the future. But when they scream in agony, they speak the most human of languages."

💯💯💯

"But on a certain level WW2 was a clash of ideologies that asserted to be the final solution to the everlasting problem of the human future and ,what more, humanity's destiny itself.

But the Nazi ideology had defined the groups of people that deserve or have the right to live and this ultimately made it a fight for the human as a unit of society. The carrier of prosperity and happiness promised by the ideology."

Another masterful passage in this video.

"Carnage and slaughterhouse seem too specific, and don't possess the implicational scale. Tragedy is too poetic, with its desperate reliance on catharsis.

Darkness is truly the most concrete and vaguest term at the same time to describe this horror. The extent of the savagery. The scale of its madness. The very light of hell."

One of many masterful and profound passages in this video.

I'm not a COD fan, but I'm just coming here to say that this video is an absolutely fantastic look at the nature of brutality in WW2.

It really resonated with some of my own thoughts when reading about such a dark chapter in humanity's history.

Imagine how disturbing a re master (If done properly) of this game would be.

Beautifully done video 🫡

I've revisited the older CoD games recently and today I've finished World at War
Throughout the campaign, all I could think back to was this video and how much I appreciate it and the game even more for it
Suffice to say, I had to give it a rewatch

I still love this video. A while back I was listening to a podcast, and they brought up this video and I nearly jumped up and down with excitement

This video is awesome man. Awesome analysis.

For some reason CoD World at War is the only Call of Duty game I distinctly remember playing in my youth, and I always remembered it as a great game, much greater then any other CoD games. For whatever reason it managed to grab me far stronger than anything I've played back then. Your video was a spark that ignited my interest in replaying it, which was building up for some time now. But not only that, actual esthetics analysis made me realize why I liked it back then, and how much I truly didn't understand when playing it. Truly, I cannot remember any shooter that managed to encapsulate the horror of war, and I presume it is the only one that even tried.
The whole length of this video I was being pulled deeper and deeper into a realization of those horrors, it pulled up every aspect of it, and gave me time and help to examine it in close detail, and the more I examined, the more details I saw, the more I wanted to cry as if I was watching an endless conveyor belt of people feeding into the bottomless hellfire pit, with air resonating with screams and flame humming and crackling, and I could do nothing but witness it. It culminated when Lacrimosa started playing, which truly fits this picture of unending agony contrasting with a cold disinterest of the machine.
Concluding, I am truly thankful for this experience, it was worth every second of the time I spent on it. Keep on creating.

Where is the part where you talk about the bandages on ther german's faces in downfall?

My favorite cod game and best campaign imo

Hey man, I think your analysis is quite complete for the most part but I think you missed one part that was so common of COD's aesthetic for the early WW2 games they'd produced - the Wehrmacht dialogues. Those screams after sighting enemy soldiers, sledging them while throwing grenades, desperately calling for medics and cries of horror after spotting enemy tanks/Panzerschrecks/artilleries. I played these when I was like 10 and some of these dialogues are etched right into my brain.

Since the start of this year, I've been learning German. And one of dialogues, which goes like -- 'Ich hab' einen! Ich hab' einen' keeps playing in my head. It simply means 'I got one (enemy). I got one' but the way it is said, really gives you an insight into the psyche of a typical drafted adolescent Wehrmacht soldier, who started his life out on possibly the biggest horror, but is now reassured after successfully killing an enemy.

Gotta be honest, i've always thought the upper executives obligated the developers to include a character like Chernov, because the campaign glorified the soviets way too much. It's not that war gives you a free pass for cruelty, it's simply that you fight FUCKING NAZIS, nazis that killed 20 something millions soviets. It's not as grey when you consider that, and Chernov is just a little bitch that wasn't intended to be in the game. That's my opinion.

amazing analysis

To me, one of the greatest and most immersive design choices WaW made was to not include in game cutscenes. All cutscenes in the game are made in between missions in the load screen.

There are so many little things that happen in game that the player could miss if they arent looking at them. They arent cut scenes, and they arent triggered events. They happen whether you are witnessing them or not.

It gives the player the feeling that the war is going on all around them, whether you are actively participating or not. Its so simple and yet such an incredible detail that needs to be brought back.

Nowadays, nearly every important event in a game HAS to be a cutscene. It just destroys immersion and pace. Such a shame that this has become the industry norm

I swear I heart shoot and gloop every time you said shoot and loot

video is simply a masterpiece from beginning to end, thank you.

One of the best cod campaigns, and one of the heaviest Platinums I ever got.

Excellent video and narration

A uniquely deep, insightful, philosophic and even hypnotizing video. And to me your best. I've watched it a few times already. You are so great with words. To me what comes to mind with the aesthetics of WaW is the style of all those beautiful intro's. The Kandinsky like shapes they use around flashy words in those dynamic and heavy stylized scenes of the Berlin intros. And the news headline or wargame like visuals of the pacific openings. I like them a lot and to me they are about the most iconic part of WaW. Black Ops had is superb own take on this, making you feel brainwashed yourself.

You have put into words what I have so often thought about. I especially love your point in which you talk about the destruction of the head- the face- and what it means on a human level.

God bless you, sir. Thank you for making this.

Absolutely incredible video. Especially touching as I'm getting to an age where being a part of the reality of war isn't glorious and instead makes me question my actions. Those questions inspired me to pursue the medical field and at least be a healer if I'm going to be involved with the military. Funny how a video game can carry so much weight haha

I agree with most of what's said, but the part about the soundtrack? I feel the heavier tracks are fitting of the brutality, symbolic of the war machine grinding on.

take a shot every time he says intimate

An interesting note during the mock trial. The Russian who does the execution is an officer, while the man trying to stop him is just rank and file. It's a moment of defiance against a superior that that man knew could get him shot

this is literally one of the best video essays I've ever seen. Incredibly thought provoking, you wouldn't expect something like this to come out of a franchise like COD.

I never really knew any of mine. Three of 'em, barely could understand them.

Lovely work.

Yes. Great game. That shows WAR for what it truly is. Nothing but misery, death and suffering.
We really do need a psychological horror game based on an experience of a soldier. It's a crime that it isn't a thing yet