Game News Company of Heroes 2 gets Metacritic bombed by upset Russians

[Burning Bridges]

Seems like the Germans were using a lot of captured T-34 and didn't think it was crap.

http://www.achtungpanzer.com/panzerkampfwagen-t-34r-soviet-t-34-in-german-service.htm

T-34/76 was held in high regard and also elite units such as Panzergrenadier Division "Grossdeutschland" (Panzer Regiment "Grossdeutschland") used some captured examples as late as 1945.

When in March of 1943, SS Panzer Corps recaptured Kharkov, some 50 various models of T-34/76 tank were captured. All of those were being repaired in a local tractor (tank) factory that was overrun and designated as SS Panzerwerk (SS Tank Workshop).

Modifications were necessary to bring the Panzerkampfwagen T-34 to "German standards".

Shortly after they were repaired along with being modified to German standards, repainted and marked with German markings. Modifications included installation of commander’s cupola (from damaged Panzerkampfwagen III and IV tanks), Schuerzen (armor skirts) and other equipment such as Notek light, storage boxes, tools, radio equipment and antenna.

SS Hauptscharfuehrer Emil Seibold from 3rd SS Panzer Battalion scored some 69 kills during his career including those on his Panzerkampfwagen T-34 747(r) in July and August of 1943, during the Battle of Kursk Salient.

 

[Burning Bridges]

The Daimler Benz Panther. A never realized design that looks like a shameless copy of the T-34.

http://www.wargamer.com/Hosted/Panzer/panther.htm

 

[Grinolf]

And the characteristic shit performance with armoured units charging in blindly from march with disastrous consequences made its combat début in the Soviet-Japanese conflict of 1938-1939.

You mean that Soviet-Japanese conflict of 1938-1939, where Soviet Union defeated superior Japan forces and pushed them into the war with USA? Yes, mentioning that war totaly support your point abut poorly trained and poorly equiped Red Army. You even could end there.

The red army was permanently in the middle of modernization since the beginning of 30s with soviet industry shitting out tons of poorly designed tanks. Also, it doesn't explain anything, because shit training and coordination was already visible in manoeuvres of 1935 where and generally, there was a tendency to manufacture mountains of hardware without ensuring that there's adequately trained army to use it.

Didn't mean anything? I want to write about army beign unable to fight full scale war, when it undergoing such serious change, but it is too obvious thing to write. And you can't ignore something like that, only because it conflict with the world that you created for yourself.
And I belive, that I give you enough reason for USSR perfomance in 41-42s, so you can stop create your own.

And purging capable officers should fall under decimation of intelligentsia, shouldn't it?

No, it falls under Stalin retardness and paranoia. Purge 1937 considered unique situation for SU and before it USSR had 17 years history.

Functional tanks have stuff like internal communication system, gearbox that doesn't require two hands or help of a second person to switch a gear, decent observation devices and stuff like that.

Functional tanks are effective at fulfiling missions. And t-34 was ideal for situation USSR find itself in WW2. That why it so famous.

How about another random example:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matvei_Bronstein

Let's look. He been properly educated and working and making contributions under 37. Then stalin happened to him. Yes it also totaly support your point about uneducated SU citizens before WW2.

Also, some technological/scientific progress doesn't prove that Soviet Union was a sane or well organized place and that it wouldn't do much better without the Bolshevik insanity.

It done much better job at industrialization and education it's population, than Russian Empire in 19-20 centures.

Or competent industrial cadre.

Like Pavel Sukhoi?

 

[Pegultagol]

I perused through this thread and enjoyed the discussions on the aspects of Soviet participation in WWII. It is a debate of an issue so complex and wide ranging that cuts through cultural understanding and sensitivities to even abridge a part of it into a narrative, fit for a game no less, would be a daunting task that no amount of effort will serve to please everyone. Perhaps CoH2 should have been drawn up as a series of carefully collected campaign missions than trying to introduce a character to pin any personal stake and navigate through standard tropes devoid of necessary nuances and at least some understatement. Or they could have easily introduced what amounts to be an archetype rather than an excuse for a living, feeling character, and upon that foundation of what constitutes an ideal Russian character (a very nebulous concept I concede) skew perspectives here and there to suit the issue of fallibility and culpability but at the same time suggest the underlying theme of struggles of the Russian common folk. I mean 'Company of Heroes' the title itself is dripping with romanticized view of the conflict.

In the end, it is just a game, but the effect of somewhat optimistic view would have suit more without this much outrage. I have only seen a few videos of the gameplay but perhaps I should hold judgement until after I play it, which will be a long time in coming.

 

[Murk]

This thread is awesome.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

I totally forgot about it!

Now if I was making "American Internment Camp Manager", my options would be (from the information in those articles you linked):
- Require them to surrender hand cameras, short-wave radio receiving sets and radio transmitters.
- Make them register at their local post office.
- Exclude them from designated military areas.
- Force them to move their home to another suburb by creating exclusion zones.
- Freeze their assets, so that they can't relocate from the exclusion zones.
- Create "Assembly" and "Relocation Centers" and demand they report to them.
- Impose a curfew.
- Give them 'the intolerable stigma of being branded as enemy aliens'.
- Oh and when it was all over, there'd be no option for you to apologise for what you did!

It'd be a really, boring game.

You or your familiy should apply for an internship in such a concentration camp relocation center, then you would not believe such bullshit

Also:

:patriot:

My family would've likely survived and received compensation after a Government review. Oh yeah, they also weren't forced onto "collective farms" for "the good of the nation" and worked to death.

In 1988, Congress passed and President Ronald Reagan signed legislation that apologized for the internment on behalf of the U.S. government. The legislation said that government actions were based on "race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership".[12] The U.S. government eventually disbursed more than $1.6 billion in reparations to Japanese Americans who had been interned and their heirs.[13]

Now, how many people survived the Russian Gulags and received an apology and compensation after a Government review?

No really, I'd like to know. Alternatively, please tell me how many interned civilians were "worked to death" in American internment camps.

Let's do a comparison of numbers. Total people interned and total people who died in camps in America vs Russia:

In 1931–32 archives indicate the Gulag had approximately 200,000 prisoners in the camp​

Let's go one further and compare it to the total number of people in Nazi concentration camps:

Used to hold and torture political opponents and union organizers, the camps held around 45,000 prisoners by 1933​

So, which nation used camps more effectively and relied on them more heavily? I tried to look into those figures as a percentage of population but had trouble finding numbers for the Soviet Union:

After the First All-Union Census of the Soviet Union of 1926, the next census was planned to be held in 1933.[2] On March 15, 1932 the formal commission on census organization, chaired by V. V. Osinsky was created by the Statistical Commission (Tsentral'noye Upravleniye Narodno-Khozyaystvennogo Uchyota, TsUNKhU) of Gosplan. On 22 April 1932 Sovnarkom adopted the decision On Conducting the all-Union Census in December 1933. On 15 April 1933 Sovnarkom moved the date for the census to the beginning of 1935. On 23 June 1934 Sovnarkom further delayed the census to January 1936. On 15 June 1935 the census date was moved to December 1936. Finally the census was conducted on January 6, 1937.
[...]
The Soviet Census held on January 6, 1937 was the most controversial of the censuses taken within the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The census results were destroyed and its organizers were sent to the Gulag as saboteurs because the census showed much lower population figures than anticipated.​

You just don't find stories like that for Germany, America or the United Kingdom. And yet you wonder why this stuff comes up for Russia?

And Russia had Gulags, so of course they get mentioned. Nobody else had Gulags. Germany didn't have Gulags. The British didn't have Gulags. The Russians though? Gulags.

Ok, this can't be real. DU cannot be really so :patriot:

Gulag:

Up until WWII, the Gulag system expanded dramatically to create a Soviet “camp economy”. Right before the war, forced labor provided 46.5% of the nations nickel, 76% of its tin, 40% of its cobalt, 40.5% of its chrome-iron ore, 60% of its gold, and 25.3% of its timber​

Not even the Nazi's used Auschwitz so effectively. Russian Gulags were running for much longer and on a far larger scale than any other country. That's my point.

 

[Murk]

Huh, guess we should switch all our stupid nazi based circle-jerking to soviet based circle-jerking.

spacemoose was clearly ahead of us all.

 

[communard]

Speak for yourself, I've always jerked off to the Gulag. USSR stronk, number 1 librul tearmaker since 1917.

 

[baturinsky]

http://www.smartasset.com/blog/news/the-economics-of-the-american-prison-system/

The American prison system is massive. So massive that its estimated turnover of $74 billion eclipses the GDP of 133 nations. What is perhaps most unsettling about this fun fact is that it is the American taxpayer who foots the bill, and is increasingly padding the pockets of publicly traded corporations like Corrections Corporation of America and GEO Group. Combined both companies generated over $2.53 billion in revenue in 2012, and represent more than half of the private prison business. So what exactly makes the business of incarcerating Americans so lucrative?

 

[Burning Bridges]

Let's go one further and compare it to the total number of people in Nazi concentration camps:

Used to hold and torture political opponents and union organizers, the camps held around 45,000 prisoners by 1933​

So, which nation used camps more effectively and relied on them more heavily? I tried to look into those figures as a percentage of population but had trouble finding numbers for the Soviet Union:

"By 1933", are you kidding? 1933 was the year the Nazis took power did you know that? This is the full text from your link:

The first Nazi concentration camps were hastily erected in Germany in February 1933 immediately after Hitler became Chancellor and his NSDAP was given control over the police through Reich Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick and Prussian Acting Interior Minister Hermann Göring.[1] Used to hold and torture political opponents and union organizers, the camps held around 45,000 prisoners by 1933 and were greatly expanded after the Reichstag fire of that year.

In 1988, Congress passed and President Ronald Reagan signed legislation that apologized for the internment on behalf of the U.S. government. The legislation said that government actions were based on "race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership".[12] The U.S. government eventually disbursed more than $1.6 billion in reparations to Japanese Americans who had been interned and their heirs.

You're right. Putting whole families of american citizens to camps in the desert, ceasing their property without trial, etc was totally no problem because they got an apology and financial recompensation by 1988, 40+ years after the war.

What's your point? That the Gulags were worse than the KZ's? That's pure trolling. And defending american detention policy is just as pointless, the US government paid relatively large sums in the 1980s which proves that there was a serious breach of law. They just weren't ready to deal with it as long as the people responsible were still alive.

 

[Burning Bridges]

http://www.smartasset.com/blog/news/the-economics-of-the-american-prison-system/

The American prison system is massive. So massive that its estimated turnover of $74 billion eclipses the GDP of 133 nations. What is perhaps most unsettling about this fun fact is that it is the American taxpayer who foots the bill, and is increasingly padding the pockets of publicly traded corporations like Corrections Corporation of America and GEO Group. Combined both companies generated over $2.53 billion in revenue in 2012, and represent more than half of the private prison business. So what exactly makes the business of incarcerating Americans so lucrative?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate

Incarceration rate, prisoners per 100,000 population

1 United States 716
2 Seychelles 709
3 Saint Kitts and Nevis 701
4 U.S. Virgin Islands 539
5 Cuba 510
6 Rwanda 492
..
90 Saudi Arabia 162
..
124 China 121
..
130 Lebanon 118
..
137 Iraq 110
..
152 Haiti 95
..
209 Pakistan 39
..

 

[DarkUnderlord]

Let's go one further and compare it to the total number of people in Nazi concentration camps:

Used to hold and torture political opponents and union organizers, the camps held around 45,000 prisoners by 1933​

So, which nation used camps more effectively and relied on them more heavily? I tried to look into those figures as a percentage of population but had trouble finding numbers for the Soviet Union:

"By 1933", are you kidding? 1933 was the year the Nazis took power did you know that?

Yeap. Well before the Nazi's took power in Germany, the Russians had the whole Gulag thing in full swing. It's no wonder Russia has a reputation for it - which is the point here.

I guess the Nazi's took notes from their Eastern neighbours.

After World War II the number of inmates in prison camps and colonies, again, rose sharply, reaching approximately 2.5 million people by the early 1950s (about 1.7 million of whom were in camps)
[...]
Officially the Gulag was liquidated by the MVD order No 020 of 25 January 1960​

So while the Americans were releasing their interned civilians, Russia was ramping their program up. And again, you wonder why Russia has a reputation for Gulags?

You're right. Putting whole families of american citizens to camps in the desert, ceasing their property without trial, etc was totally no problem because they got an apology and financial recompensation by 1988, 40+ years after the war.

Yes and how much compensation have those in the Gulag's received? 65+ years later.

No really, how much? Can you tell me the exact figure in compensation paid out by the USSR / Russian Government?

Oh and a link to their apology too would be nice. I mean, they have admitted that it was wrong, right?

What's your point? That the Gulags were worse than the KZ's? That's pure trolling. And defending american detention policy is just as pointless, the US government paid relatively large sums in the 1980s which proves that there was a serious breach of law. They just weren't ready to deal with it as long as the people responsible were still alive.

That's the difference between America and Russia though. America admits the mistakes it made and tries to do something about it back in 1980. Meanwhile, Russia celebrates them, even today - in a camp that's still open.

Sergei Yerofeyev, the deputy head of a veterans' group for prison guards, told guests at the concert that the Usolksy camp had been founded in "troubled years" but its managers had "displayed courage" to make sure it "got on in its feet and successfully fulfilled its production and social tasks".​

Meanwhile, in America... 25 years ago...

the internment was "wrong," and a "national mistake" which "shall never again be repeated".​

 

[baturinsky]

I guess the Nazi's took notes from their Eastern neighbours.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_Civil_War_prison_camps

America admits the mistakes it made and tries to do something about it back in 1980.

In 1956 Nikita Khrushchev, then in the position of General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, denounced Stalinism in his notable speech On the Personality Cult and its Consequences. Afterward, the government accompanied release of political prisoners with rehabilitation, allowing them to return home and reclaim their lives.

Meanwhile, in America... 25 years ago...

the internment was "wrong," and a "national mistake" which "shall never again be repeated".​

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisoner_abuse

 

[Burning Bridges]

What are you trying to prove DU? Do you think CoH 2 must not be a sensationalist piece of shit because Bolshevism was a dictatorship? Do you think every moron can take history out of context and exaggerate it 100-fold, because the state in case was "evil"? Because who fucking cares what is was really like? I don't get the connection between a country which had GULAGs and political prosecution, and the idiotic scenes in the game. The Soviet Union shown in the game is pure fiction.
There were no shootings on a daily base. Neither was there a Nazi Germany in which every house had a gas chamber and a stack of dead Jews in front. Or an Australia in which everyone was a petty criminal and rapist because it is genetic. You may also have missed that the Russians are a bit torn on the issue, on the one hand they know full well that Stalinism was no picnic, on the other hand they don't like their people depicted as idiots who constantly commited irrational acts.

 

[Burning Bridges]

I guess the Nazi's took notes from their Eastern neighbours.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_Civil_War_prison_camps

I think that's too far fetched and no one really "invented" detention camps. The Czar sent people to Siberia, and the Soviets did the same, there is a continuation. A long time before that the British King sent people to Australia and among them were in fact Dark Underlord's great-great grand parents. The Brits put people into camps in the Boer War, etc and the Americans during the two World Wars.

 

[Mastermind]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_torture_and_prisoner_abuse

Retarded. That wasn't US policy, just people acting on their own. It's like saying Austria has prison camps because of this guy:

 

[Hamster]

Oh no, our glorious leader is indeed a :patriot:

 

[baturinsky]

DU, can you please make your point without using what you think are historical facts? I think it will be more clear this way.

 

[communard]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Boer_War#Concentration_camps_.281900.E2.80.931902.29

Hitler was a big fan of the British Empire.

 

[Burning Bridges]

I have no problem with the depiction of a Red Army in which the soldier feared his officers more than the enemy. This is a Prussian concept ("Der preußische Soldat muss seine Offiziere mehr fürchten als den Feind." Friedrich of Prussia). Soviet military thinking was strongly influenced by Prussian tradition.

I have a problem with the depiction of purely irrational acts in the game. There is nothing irrational about drastic methods to maximize discipline that were practiced in the Red Army. The methods were inhumane when impossible things were expected, but if the performance of soldiers and officers was satisfactory, there was also no reason to punish them. The game lives in a world of pure fiction when it does not recognize that Soviet soldiers were not only punished but also rewarded, based on their performance. Just look at these WW2 veterans, they can hardly walk with all the metal on their uniforms. And even if they look somewhat old, and the ideology they fought for has failed, they also seem proud of their performance in the war.

Now Stalin's speech - November 7, 1941. If you can cut out the propaganda and bullshit this captures the national mood at the critical point of the war. First priority is the defense of the Soviet Union, not irrational terror, or waging war against the own population. Strengthening, not weakening of the manpower and morale. Stalin had understood the situation, when he talks about a long term strategy that relies on the advantages in resources and manpower, the foreign support, and the need to maintain morale. He demands a feeling of national solidarity, based on Soviet and Russian tradition when he evokes the military heroes of the revolution and the czarist past. This is a step back from "soviet terror" (which as I understand was introduced to maintain discipline and obedience during the revolution and civil war, Czeka units, Gulags etc).

Soviet terror was still practiced in WW2 but Stalin had also given in to his officers demands to reduce the interference of Politkomissars to a minimum, and re-installed the more competent officers (like Shukov or Koniev). So even if one disagrees with the system and the methods, the general policy makes total sense, and explains why the country eventually won the war and emerged as a superpower.

 

[Whisper]

I totally forgot about it!

Let's go one further and compare it to the total number of people in Nazi concentration camps:
Used to hold and torture political opponents and union organizers, the camps held around 45,000 prisoners by 1933

Whole sentence reads:
Used to hold and torture political opponents and union organizers, the camps held around 45,000 prisoners by 1933 and were greatly expanded after the Reichstag fire of that year.

 

[baturinsky]

This pretty much sums it:

 

[Hamster]

Hmm...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties#endnote_Japanhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties#endnote_Japan

World War II casualties

Japan
Army:
against US 485,717
against Australia 199,511
Navy: 1941–45 414,879

VS

U.S. Combat Dead by Theater of war:
Asia–Pacific 108,504

The Australian War Memorial[reports 39,761 military deaths.

I wonder if the Japs have to endure same shit as we do?

 

[commie]

One other thing is also the hoary old '10-100 Soviets killed for every Aryan' crap and that the Soviets has limitless supplies of men. Of course the Soviets took massive losses in 1941-42 but German casualties even during the 'happy time' were hardly tiny. 200,000 dead just by the end of 1941 which is about 3/5ths of the total casualties the Germans suffered against the Western Allies throughout the entire war. By then the Germans had occupied much of the populated areas of the Soviet Union and so from a pure manpower perspective, the Germans and their allies had not many fewer recruits to choose from than the Soviets.

Yes of course the Soviets employed human wave attacks, but that was partly due to the doctrine of the Soviet Army which emphasised a concentrated crushing of a sector of enemy and the pouring through en masse. It was also partly due to Stalin's often irrational timelines which forced commanders to dispense with finesse and just plow through. What is rarely mentioned is that although the initial attack may result in a lopsided casualty count against the Soviets, when they actually did breakthrough and force the Germans to rout, they often slaughtered them redressing the casualty ratio somewhat. Operation Bagration and the advance into Romania really show what the Soviets could do when their tactics work well, annihilating the Germans with few casualties.

 

[commie]

Yeah, because god forbid we show anything that does not fit the patriotic bullshit that gets peddled as history in Russia. Rapes? What rapes?

I've seen quite a few Dutch films about their heroic resistance to the Nazis when in fact they mostly were gleeful collaborators. Better stop talking Trash.