On May 23, 2018 EA & DICE revealed the latest installment of Battlefield V, long rumored to be based on the long-desired return to World War II the game’s setting was indeed confirmed to take place within that era. However in what seems to be another day for EA, controversy reared it’s ugly head as players looking forward to the next entry took note of some very head scratching scenes within the two minute and thirty-five second trailer which can be seen below. And honestly the complaints are fair and it feels like people covering the topic are either not understanding the core issues of the complaints or are flat out choosing to ignore them:

Of course the go to to dismiss these complaints is to claim foul play from the so-called “women haters crowd” and unfortunately there is indeed a decent portion of that group who just throws the “SJW” term around anytime something involves women & diverse characters getting large roles in titles such as this, but I’m not addressing them, for obvious reasons. I’m talking about the side who wants a (mostly) historically accurate WWII game within the basic confines of a video game’s design. The trailer which currently has more dislikes (277K) than likes (263K) showcases some very sound reasoning behind why the historical accuracy crowd are upset.

The first issue and it’s not just that this is a woman.

1. A Female With A Prosthetic Arm Is On The Frontlines:

Again pointing back to the post above, yes there are idiots who are simply complaining due to the fact that the trailer heavily featured a woman in combat and the fact that she saved the male player character’s life at the end of it. But that’s not really the point (or main concern) of those who don’t care about that. The issue is this woman is disabled with a prosthetic arm and is in combat on the frontlines. Women who were involved with aiding WWII, while having combat training just like the men, didn’t actually go into combat in most cases. There were female soldiers from the Russian and French side of combat, however, but if anyone (male or female)  had a prosthetic or some kind of major injury they were sent home not continuing the fight. If the woman featured in the trailer was portrayed as French or Russian, I honestly don’t think there’d be much if any problems. Also I should point out that this woman is British, so yeah.

2. An African-American Is Also In Combat On The Frontlines:

If I was a WWII buff looking for a historically accurate game from a high quality developer and you had told me that one featured an African-American solider on the frontlines, as an African-American myself, I’d be confused. Yes there were thousands of male and female African-Americans who registered for World War II, but according to reports only about 25% of those men were actually in combat.

3. The Trailer Features Katanas…

I mean, do I really have to go into details with this one? Is there also playable Ninjas and Samurai? Actually that sounds kind of awesome.

4. Body Paint:

Yes the trailer for a World War II game features soldiers with body paint.

WWII is looking a little bit creative.

5. Uniforms For Soldiers Don’t Look Very Unified:

The uniforms don’t look anything like what actual soldiers would wear during the time period represented. They’re way too colorful and they even look way too personalized for a WWII soldier.

The Real Problem?:

Certain media outlets are flat out choosing to ignore the historical accuracy crowd in great detail and are just going for the “it’s only because you hate women” crap because it’s safer I guess?  The fact of the matter is if you actually bother to read all of the complaints buried underneath the misogyny there’s grounds for an actual discussion as to why this group is concerned. This very large group of people (regardless of what some people claim yes this group is very large) have been asking for a WWII Battlefield game for years and it wasn’t just because they wanted to revisit the second World War, it was because they wanted to see what a historically accurate World War II game could look like with modern gaming technology. It feels like EA just kind of jumped the gun a bit and chose to go with the WWII setting while ignoring other requests.

I think I should be clear in saying that I myself am not on either side of this battle, but at the very least I understand both sides, and I want gaming media to understand the real issues with this as well. Most of the complaints have nothing to do with misogyny and it shouldn’t be viewed as such just because a few morons have chosen to be that way. I’m also not saying the game looks bad or anything of the sort because of the inaccuracies, it looks great and outside of this, mechanic & play wise it looks like one of the best EA games in a long time. But, don’t just write off the opposite side of this argument in favor of generalizing them with a bunch of idiots. The majority don’t care about a woman being on the frontlines just because, it goes much deeper than that among other inaccuracy issues with the game.