Editorial

You really do have to question the sanity of some of these games developers.  Here we are, a mere two days from the 91st Armistice Day. A day of remembrance for the tens of thousands of soldiers who perished in the fields of France during the great war. A day of sad reflection on man's inhumanity to man, and the atrocities of war that have occurred ever since and what have Infinity Ward gone and done?

They've released Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 the day beforehand.

Now I suppose that all things being equal, it's just a day after all and most people will have observed their two minutes of silence this morning, being Remembrance Sunday.  But there's a strangely icky feeling to the thought that on the first Armistice day where there will be no soldier left alive who fought in the trenches, that the descendents of that generation will be sitting around their living rooms; eagerly firing round after round of machinegun bullets into terrorists.

It's a fair bet that the thought process involved, was something akin to the following: "Gee you know what would be really cool? If we released the game on the date 11/10/09, like it's a countdown!"

Now quite apart from the fact that to Britons everywhere that means it should have come out last month, it ought to have occurred to someone that there was some significance to the following date.

Along with the fact that it's expected to outsell even the mighty GTA 4 and considering that everyone and their auntie who has £50 to spend will be lining up on Monday night or popping into a shop on Tuesday morning to get their fix of Boys Own SAS fun. It's a given that something that happened nearly a century ago might slide from the popular focus, and the men and women who are somewhere 'over there' might slip from your mind.

So I'd ask that when you all turn on your PC, 360 or PS3 on Tuesday and play on from where you stopped the night before; why not find a quiet place on the map, and just let the controller sit idle for a couple of minutes in silence. Just a thought.

Graeme Strachan