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From Sun Tzu to Xbox: War and Video Games
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List Price:
$16.95
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$11.53
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Manufacturer: PublicAffairs
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 793.920285
EAN: 9781560256816
Format: Illustrated
ISBN: 1560256818
Label: PublicAffairs
Manufacturer: PublicAffairs
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 400
Publication Date: 2006-05-30
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Studio: PublicAffairs
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Editorial Reviews:
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Part of an industry that now earns more yearly than the Hollywood box office, video games have entered the forefront of the militarization of popular culture. How did this once-innocent pastime become a key player in America’s entry into global warfare? And is this blurring of reality changing the way we think about war? Stretching from 3000 BC to today, this book investigates how military cultures and the evolution of games have been closely linked, from video gaming’s ancestors like chess and go, to the popularization of the 19th century Kriegspiel, to the development of computers for use during World War II and the invention of video games by Defense Department-funded scientists. Readers will discover how war fantasies played out from the early arcade years to the rise of online gaming, how the military began working with companies like Nintendo, Atari and Microsoft to produce training devices, and how today’s generals hope to sell recruitment to a new generation of joystick warriors.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Engrossing, well-researched.
Comment: Mr. Halter's richly informative and highly entertaining exploration of the complex relationship between war and gaming technology sucks you in and doesn't let go until the very last page. War buffs and game enthusiasts alike will find themselves engrossed in this book, but even those of us who approach it with far more limited knowledge will be delighted by the journey into the workings of our own country's war machine.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Interesting perspective on society and war
Comment: I picked up Halter's book almost by accident. Although I'm a military historian and wargamer I've never been interested in the video game genre. I was just about to put the book back on the shelf when I realized the book isn't really about video games per se but about how computer wargames have been shaped by war and how computer wargames fit into our culture.
Halter argues that from the beginning of the computer age, when primarily military money was used to fund computer research and development, to the present there has been an almost symbiotic relationship between computer games and war. One, in turn, fed the other as experience in war led to more realistic computer games which allowed computer wargames (or simulations, if you prefer) to increase the realism of training. At the same time the knowledge created by the military-industrial complex (to which Halter adds academia) spilled into the entertainment industry. This in turn developed more realistic animation and interactive capabilities that went back into the military's training simulation programs.
The book is easy to read, as you'd expect from a journalist, and certainly causes you to think a bit differently about the development of the computer and the entertainment industry as it relates to wargames. The only (small) issues I had was that its focus on the military aspect of computer R&D does not allow a consideration of NASA's impact on computer development. The other issue was that, as a journalist and not an academic, it is not well foot-noted or sourced so you can't go to the sources to verify or validate the information he uses to support his argument.
Having said that, Halter certainly presents an interesting and thought-provoking argument and commentary on the relationship between society and the military as it's connected via computer wargames. I wouldn't want to use it as a source for an academic paper, but it certainly presents a thesis that makes for interesting reading.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great Book about a subject that had to be written about
Comment: As a professional in the Modeling and Simulation field I see this book as a great analysis of the mistaken belief that because you can play video games you can fight a war and take on complex social problems. Video games are made for entertainment to satisfy the need for humans to play. If you put the psychology of real human beings into video games, you will not have fun game. Mr. Halter's book give great insight into the problems that have to be overcome to create a "realistic" environment for the training of future soldiers, and what we have so far are not even close. The day we can have a kid walk from the video arcade to a M1 Abrams tank and fight effectively we will have reached our goal. . .but, is that where we want to be?
Customer Rating:
Summary: An eye-opening history
Comment: This is a clear-headed and fascinating account of the many complex links between war and video games, some of which I knew something about (America's Army for example) and others I'd never heard about (like the Institute for Creative Technology at the USC, where the Army develops videogames for training). Halter approaches the subject matter with a wry but even-handed manner, and he makes clear that he's an avid game player himself, unlike many political journalists who have taken on similar subjects. He begins in ancient civilizations, runs us through the ways games were used in Victorian times for strategy, and reveals how military needs funded the early hacker culture where video games were invented. About half the book is about the post-9/11 era, however, and the part I knew least about is his final chapter dealing with games about war made by activists and artists. All in all it is a thoroughly entertaining read, and a sharp analysis of the way in which the experience of real war and conflict have seeped into our popular culture for reasons that aren't always obvious.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A free, biased opinion of a culture that he does not understand
Comment: I had bought this book in the hopes that it would explore some of the fascinating and complex links in out society between war and games, espically in video games. I was greatly disappointed in the content of this book. Mr. Halter seems to imply throughout the book that the "Video Game Generation" simply will not amount to much due to time spent during the formative years playing vidoe games. He touches little on the complex social networks that have arisen on the internet and over such services as XBOX live, and merely seems to repeat his belife that the United States Army is manipulating an entire generation through it's sponsorship of a video game. In more than a few instances in this book, he seems to imply the tech savy youth of today are bound for failure due to their passion for and lifelong interaction with, video games. This book ends up being more like a manifesto against video games than it does an objective analysis of conflict and it's presence in our society through the guise of video games. I do not recomend it as either an assessment of the video game generation, nor of the interactions and connections between society and conflict. In fact, I don't reccomend it at all.
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