Day of Deceit
A couple of days ago I was watching a YouTube video showing upcoming shooters. Overall, nothing really caught my eye. The “new” ones I’d seen before and I hadn’t found them interesting to begin with, and the others were remasters. But one game… One game most DEFINITELY caught my attention. Days of War. Now you may be pondering why this one game had caught me hook, line and sinker while the other games hadn’t even managed a blip on my radar. There’s a very, VERY good reason for that. You see, I was a Day of Defeat: Source player for a very long time. I loved that game and played it until the majority of servers died and the only ones left had so many rules enforced that admin abuse was the norm. I’ll probably mention that later for the laugh.
No-one in the YouTube comments even mentioned the fact that Days of War’s gameplay and trailer were both blatantly shot in the map dod_donner. So I looked into it. I watched the greenlight video and it showed the developers themselves saying they were heavily inspired by the WWII games of past and based their blueprint for their game off of them. Heh… Yep. But I couldn’t find if they’d actually got permission from Valve. Considering maps are considered intellectual property, I’d hope so. Although it took the map from Day Of Defeat, the game itself played differently. The players moved FAR too fast, it was missing the recoil system where you’d fight the mouse for control of your weapon as it dragged the screen upwards, the MP44 was insanely accurate even when set to automatic (if you can even swap at all) and didn’t lose any fire rate for fine aiming.
So it wasn’t a clone. But it was obviously still trying to appeal to Day of Defeat players (not doing too well, are we?) considering there hasn’t been a raw, old-fashioned, multiplayer WWII shooter in forever. Honestly, it was more of a kick to the balls to me. Just reminding me how much I missed it while not actually resembling it. Though it’s their game and I have no right to tell them how to make it, they clearly want it to be its own thing, I’m just baffled as to why Day of Defeat gets dragged into the confusion. Especially when you take into consideration that while I was researching I realised they had a competitor… And even MORE confusingly, they had Valve’s blessing to essentially make the spiritual successor to Day of Defeat: Source.
It’s a standalone mod for Insurgency. Therefore immediately playing differently to Day of Defeat. Days of War leans more on the arcade side while Day of Infamy leans more on the side of simulation. The pace for both of these “successors” is not the one they claim to be influenced by. I’ve watched footage of both and neither impressed me. They both talk a lot of the elements Day of Defeat provided, yet of what I’ve seen Days of War is fast-paced, twitch-shooting and throwing caution to the wind, while Day of Infamy is a lot of lying on your stomach, being bored, standing up after two minutes, being shot from a mile away and repeating the pattern. Both stray too far from what I remember falling in love with, it was the best of both worlds.
It’s like both games have an arm and are pulling me in separate directions and I’m just calmly indifferent in the middle. I should be thrilled at the concept of two developers taking a crack at rebooting one of my favourite multiplayer shooters ever, but both only meet me halfway. It really is bizarre to me. Both games are probably equally good at their own thing, but neither are what I was hoping for. It’s been over a decade since Day of Defeat: Source came out, and without as much as a peep from Valve about a sequel, I commend the developers for trying to bring that class-based, twitch shooting yet still tactical WWII magic back. But for me, that wait is still going and that clock is still very much ticking.
Right, the stupid admin abuse story… Let’s go! My friend, Crimson, while in spawn, shot a guy who was shooting into spawn. Both of these actions were considered offenses. Yet only Crimson was banned permanently. The other guy got off scot-free due to the admin’s blind eye, presumably a friend of his. I later shot from spawn instinctively as an enemy popped up from beneath me. Before I could even finish writing “sorry” in the chat, I’d already been banned permanently as well. Because, naturally, of all the potential enemies, the one whose brain got blown out the back of their head with a (if I say so myself) beautiful M1 Garand twitch shot, was an ADMIN.
The best part is that the server had a three strikes system. But I suppose that’s just a facade, considering both Crimson and I were both banned on the first offense, and saw multiple offenses committed by the admins themselves that they were never punished for. My, my, what a coincidence. These ranged from spawn shooting, to intentionally teamkilling, repeatedly laughing as he did so knowing we were powerless to fight back. (My, sir, what a large epeen you have.) But don’t worry guys, the other admin told him to stop after about two minutes in the most unenthusiastic voice I’ve ever heard in my life. Give that man a raise, what a quality admin. Bravo, sir!
I don’t think Crimson, or I, have ever been happier to have been banned from a server. Stupid rules anyway. You can’t shoot out of or into spawn, but you’re allowed to lay prone and shoot people the moment they touch the floor after they drop OUT of spawn.
…Because that’s, SO, much different than regular spawn camping!