US Army Sniper School in Halo
One of my students at Bard, Andy K----, told me he heard a rumor that the US Army was offering sniper training in Halo 3...I'm not an Xbox Live guy so I did some digging on the internet.
At 405th.com, poster Sean Bradley says that
On the XBL dashboard I've noticed a few little ads of a cross promotion between Halo 3 and the US Army referring to a sweepstakes and Halo 3 Sniper Training video series. I couldn't find the vids located anywhere in the marketplace, just through a clickable ad that occasionally appeared in the dashboard. Last night I accessed the ad, and it took me to a page in the dash that had four videos to download as well as a pic you download to enter the sweepstakes. I DL'ed two of the vids (XBL was running crazy slow so I didn't have time to get them all) and it was really informative.
Bradley says the vids are
1. Know Your Weapon (overview of long range weapon efficiency in H3)
2. Sniper School Beginners Tactics
3. Sniper School Intermediate Tactics
4. Sniper School Advanced Tactics
A Halo blog posts directions for finding the vids on Xbox Live.
You can find the first of them posted to YouTube. Note the "just like in real life" comparisons.
(The most disturbing thing about this video is that the narrator appears to be Canadian. Americans do not pronounce their "t"'s so sharply. Government funded agencies shouldn't be supporting the aggressive Canadian dollar.)
Here's the listing for the US Army Sniper School contest on Xbox's site. This contest is closed, but now there's a US Army Heavy Weapons contest. For both contests, players need to register their gamertag for a chance to win limited edition Halo merch.
Clearly Halo 3 is being targeted by the Army as a primer marketing venue. See:
+ An older Army/Microsoft co-lab: A blogger at Gemaga.com posted Microsoft's press release for the US Army's sponsorship of the first Halo Championship Tournament.
+ Gamepolitics reports back in September 07: "Military Recruiters Snag Underage Players at Halo 3 Launch Bash"
Hey Ed,
I bought your book "From Sun Tzu to XBox" and like it very much. It's such an important topic you wrote about. I'm going to write a german review 'cause I recommend it your work so much. Still working on my Ph.D. about propaganda and group processes in computer games, your book was really helpful.
Together with the documentary "Militainment Inc." it's one of my favorite non-scientific resources!
All the best,
Christian
www.Spieleforschung.de
Posted by: DigitaleWelten | February 10, 2008 at 05:39 PM
Hm i think that the skulls are similar too. The whole game is just so real..
Posted by: michael jones | April 19, 2008 at 12:49 PM
Videogames are coming closer and closer everyday to real life. I wondering what the game industry will look like in 20 years from now....
Posted by: play asia | May 19, 2008 at 02:59 PM
Get paid to play video games. Beta test unreleased video games and earn money. You get to keep the video games for free
Posted by: Number1GamerReview | May 25, 2008 at 12:37 AM
Agreed. The realistic nature of the games today, especially the war games has evolved to a new level.
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Posted by: Chris the Pro Gamer | June 27, 2008 at 01:24 AM
That means that anybody can become a sniper just playing a game like that, I agree the video games are so real these times.
Posted by: Online bingo games | July 09, 2008 at 01:18 PM
That means that anybody can become a sniper just playing a game like that, I agree the video games are so real these times.
Posted by: Online bingo games | July 09, 2008 at 01:19 PM
That means that anybody can become a sniper just playing a game like that, I agree the video games are so real these times.
Posted by: Online bingo games | July 09, 2008 at 01:19 PM
I have been playing Americas Army for some time. Well I have not for the last few months at least.
However it was pretty much the closest game you could get to real life. However it seems that most games have adapted the aspects that once made AA unique.
Posted by: Wanna Copy Games | July 21, 2008 at 09:12 PM
Thanks you for the post, great stuff.
Posted by: Joe Macmitch | July 23, 2008 at 02:14 AM
I live in a country where hunting for the weeks dinner is a way of life. I'm amazed at how much a person can learn from games about shooting. Nothing replaces the tactile learning of actually hunting, but the points of remaining unseen, identifying your target and making sure the shot is clear ring true, even on xbox games.
Posted by: Daniel Broken Xbox Scott | August 05, 2008 at 05:29 AM
The Military running armed tactical games? Wonder how long it will be before they start to use this sort of thing for testing skill level and for recruitment?
Posted by: Barry Bond | August 12, 2008 at 09:57 AM
I hope that isn't true. Xbox Live, collectively, is the cess pool of humanity. So having people like that in the army would doom America.
Posted by: Selling Video Games | August 15, 2008 at 12:16 PM
It's no surprise the military would use a video game to recruit. They have been doing it for years with there own games :)
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I do wonder how useful some games might be to the military, certainly for recruitment purposes. It is easy to assess certain skills from analyzing game play.
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