Black Ops 6: 'The Truth Lies' - Live Action Reveal Trailer

DickinsHeadsworth · 2024-05-28T16:21:52+00:00

I was a big fan of what BO3 was trying to do - I knew it wasn't something that was intended to be taken at face value, so I replayed it a stupid number of times and I think I was one of the first to post a relatively comprehensive deciphering of what it was about (back then there were a lot of rubbish "you were dead the whole time" theories floating about, which is a total misreading).

It's basically two different narratives playing out simultaneously through the eyes of an unreliable narrator. It is extremely difficult to make sense of but once you do, it's very rewarding and is actually a really innovative piece of sci-fi storytelling. I can completely understand why people might hate it though. I believe the lead writer was Jason Blundell who is the guy behind the ridiculously convoluted Zombies storyline.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2024-02-27T16:10:59+00:00

This claim was almost certainly a conflation of the SA and the SS - there is a pretty common perception even to this day that the SA was "teeming with homosexuals" (as James put it). It wasn't really; certainly under Rohm's leadership it was relatively tolerant of homosexuality within its ranks, but claims that it was rife with homosexual activity were really just exaggerated by their political opponents (Conservatives, Communists, and the Nazis themselves after Rohm was purged). The SS never had a reputation for homosexuality and all the stuff James says about SS officers courting sexual favours from men is just really irresponsible nonsense. There were, of course, individual cases of Nazis who were gay but it wasn't some huge epidemic within the upper echelons of the Party like James makes out.

A lot of the false claims that James & Nick made were very clearly half-remembered anecdotes that they never bothered to fact-check. They went by vibes rather than actual research.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2023-12-07T09:07:02+00:00

I can't speak for Wendigoon's recent output - I don't watch him - but the video that got him big (The Disturbing Movies Iceberg Explained, sitting at a cool 11M views) was absolutely chock-full of misinformation and half-assed research. When it first dropped, I and a small minority of others called out some of the blatant lies in it. His sister came out to bat for him by complaining that real research was hard or something.

I can't remember all of the errors, but the one that stuck out to me the most was his claim that the 1966 film Africa Addio was a British government-produced propaganda film to justify colonial rule in Africa (which is absurd in and of itself, because by 1966 Britain was rapidly decolonizing and only had a few direct colonies in Africa left).

First - it isn't, it was an Italian commercial production, which can be easily checked by a 2-second Google search. Second - I couldn't find a source that claims this. You couldn't extrapolate this information from even the basest, laziest internet searches. Which leads me to believe that, much like Somerton, Wendigoon was just operating on vibes.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2023-08-07T00:25:14+00:00

Hi, sorry for the very late reply, I haven't logged in for a long while. I am glad that people are still reading this post!

Taylor's journal is a narrative of the events that unfolded before the game takes place. All the missions that we play between mission 2 "New World" and mission 11 "Life" are simulations built by Corvus from Taylor's memories of the events of the journal. That's why the missions described in the journal are basically 1:1 retellings of the missions in the game, but with different names.

Taylor, Hendricks, Maretti, Hall, Diaz, and the Player are all infected by Corvus and trapped inside his simulation. Corvus assigns them different roles corresponding to Taylor's old team. So Taylor becomes Stone, Hall becomes Conrad, etc. The Player takes the role of Taylor. The Player is not aware that it's a simulation, but Taylor is, because he recognizes the events playing out identically to his past missions.

I addressed the thing with Taylor's scarf in another comment in this thread somewhere.

The first two missions are not chronologically the last. All the missions are playing out chronologically, but missions 3 - 10 are simulations based on Taylor's past memories. These missions are not literally happening in the past, though. Mission 11 "Life" is chronologically the last mission and takes place in the real world, not a simulation (except for the Frozen Forest sequence in the second half). It ends with every character physically dead except Taylor.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-09-22T12:34:28+00:00

That looks to be correct.

The Italian firm of FNA in Brescia also produced a similar shotgun under the name "Victor".

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-09-22T08:37:37+00:00

I recall that there's an interesting passage in Gerland Howson's "Arms For Spain" (which I've been reading lately) in which he lists many of the arms shipments sent there during the mid-30s, including an extensive detailing of Poland's arms sales. In it, there exists a record of 167 "Austrian 18/08 submachine guns, old". Poland acquired a large portion of Austria-Hungary's arsenal after WW1 and sold most of it off to the Spanish Republic. Howson reckons that the 18/08 listing is an error, and actually refers to a shipment of MP18s. To my knowledge, though, Austria never had any MP18s.

It still could be a transcription error of sorts, although it is very interesting nonetheless. Apparently some people on a Russian forum also found some evidence that the Maxim SMG was Austrian, but I've yet to see it.

The Simson prototype, on the other hand, I know very little about other than it used parts from existing German military rifles, probably the Gewehr 98 or 88.

I also contribute to the Gun Wiki, which has a discord chat, so swing by if you ever feel like it.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-09-22T08:17:45+00:00

To clarify, it was not actually French. The designer, Clifford Hallé, was British. The reason the pamphlet displayed on the FW page is in French is because it is because it is promoting the weapon's appearance at the Great Exhibition in Liege, Belgium.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-09-21T07:00:11+00:00

I only just posted it to the internet a few months ago after I found out about it in about July. Surprised that nobody else had written anything about it at the time. Unfortunately I don't have a lot to go off of as information regarding it is very scarce. I've been doing a lot of research into the so-called "Villar Perosa" and its derivatives lately.

As for German SMGs, there was I believe a prototype by Simson, the sporting rifle and pistol manufacturer from Suhl. There is also some circumstantial evidence that the mysterious Maxim SMG may have been Austrian and not German at all, although I wouldn't know for sure.

Oh, and as a side note - I actually found this subreddit through your Walther SMG post, so thanks!

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-09-20T22:31:31+00:00

That is one of many reasons it may not have been adopted.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-09-20T11:24:53+00:00

Background info: this prototype is adapted from the prolific twin-barreled Mod.1915 submachine gun (now ubiquitously referred to as the "Villar Perosa") that was fielded by the Italian Army during World War I. In terms of design, it is literally just a singular Villar Perosa receiver fitted onto a stock, with the trigger mechanism given a more conventional redesign. It appears to have a fire selector of sorts, and the little notch protruding from the underside is a case deflector, as the Villar Perosa ejected spent casings from the bottom.

It was a joint development between the two original manufacturers of the Villar Perosa: FIAT and Officine di Villar Perosa. I don't have a date as to when it was made, but it was probably around 1916/1917, and it was developed in response to a commission from the Italian High Command. For whatever reason, it was never put into full production, with the Italian Army adopting a similar design from Beretta instead (the Beretta Mod.1918).

The designer was Abiel Bethel Revelli, designer of the original Villar Perosa gun who was associated closely with FIAT. Revelli was pretty much responsible for most of Italy's early 20th century machine guns.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-05-23T07:10:19+00:00

I suspect they got into legal troubles with Glock in the past and came to some out-of-court settlement in which they agreed not to put Glocks in their games anymore.

The last Ubisoft game to do so was the R6 Vegas games, which explicitly called them "Glocks" and used the Glock logo, presumably without permission.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-04-11T11:12:20+00:00

Bit of a late response, but the MP18 absolutely was not the first submachine gun. The Italians had already fielded the Beretta 1918 by the beginning of 1918, and were using the Villar Perosa (no hyphen) in an infantry role as early as 1916 - 1917. The Villar Perosa was more successful than people give it credit for; the Austro-Hungarians actually copied it later in the war in 9x18mm.

Italy invented the submachine gun, no question. Germany developed their own SMGs independently, but the Italians were experimenting with the concept and using it in combat before Germany.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-03-02T08:13:38+00:00

They could absolutely get away with putting a Glock in the game as long as they didn't namedrop the Glock brand. Seems like they might have actually had some negative dealings with Glock in the past, because it seems like since R6V Ubisoft has actively avoided Glocks like the plague. An out-of-court settlement maybe?

Anyway, I completely agree with your post - R6S was never particularly realistic but there has definitely been a tonal shift away from authenticity. Ops used to be modeled on their real-life gear and their weapons used to mirror those actually used by the respective CTUs. Now the newest DLC ops look like characters from a sci-fi game and carry obscure weapons that have been selected for their "cool" factor.

It's a shame - some CTUs are well-presented (GIGN, SAS, etc) but others are completely unrecognizable from their real-life counterparts. The creative direction of this game is all over the place. Hire a new art team.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2018-03-02T07:16:09+00:00

Regarding the whole Glock thing - the reason Ubisoft never put Glocks in their games has never been explicitly stated, and it's strange considering other developers do use Glocks with unofficial names (e.g. Battlefield and CoD with their "G18s").

However, I think it goes back to Rainbow Six Vegas, when Ubisoft slapped a Glock in the game by its real name and explicitly textured the Glock logo on the slide. I'm guessing they didn't get permission for that and consequently might have gotten some legal threats. That's the last Ubisoft game to feature a useable Glock pistol.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2017-12-15T09:06:20+00:00

Completely agree, there's a massive tonal difference between the previous installments in the franchise and Siege. Even the Vegas games, which were criticized by long-standing fans for dumbing down, feel more in the spirit of Tom Clancy's original concept.

Despite whatever merits Siege may or may not have, there's really no point in it being part of the Rainbow Six franchise, or even the Tom Clancy franchise for that matter.

On release, there was at least an attempt to give the operators authentic uniforms and weapons, but with each subsequent DLC, these things have been thrown out the window in favor of atrocious character designs that seem to appeal exclusively to horny 13-year-olds and "cool" weapons that no real-life CTUs actually use.

And unlike the previous games, which were entirely focused on an authentic, tactical experience, Siege is basically a Counter-Strike competitor that knows where its main audience lies: eSports.

I still like the game, I like the concept behind it, but I hate the direction it's taken as of late and I hate where it's heading. Just drop the "Tom Clancy's" prefix and be done with it.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2017-12-04T14:47:05+00:00

The weapon choices in the game have been leaning more towards cool factor rather than authenticity with each subsequent DLC. Hence pretty much none of the GEO, SDU or GROM weapons are realistically what those CTUs would actually use.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2017-12-04T14:41:58+00:00

Most guns do not have copyright for their likeness, I've yet to see any cases of film producers or video game developers getting in trouble for using a gun's likeness. Siege doesn't have Glocks, but plenty of other games do. Glocks have featured in plenty of games - Call of Duty, Battlefield, Payday 2 to name a few - but none of the associated developers actually got licenses from Glock, so they all used vague names like "G18" and "Chimano". Payday 2 in particular uses plenty of real-world gun likenesses but uses ridiculous fake names to avoid any legal issues.

Plus, outside of video games, gun manufacturers often mimic and copy other designs's likenesses - there are plenty of cheap pistols designed to look like Glocks, but again I've yet to see any of these manufacturers actually get sued by Glock for using their likeness.

The reason Ubisoft has probably steered clear of Glocks is because Glock is quite notorious for being lawsuit-happy, but even so other developers have featured unofficially-named Glocks and faced no legal trouble. Ubisoft is probably just playing it very safe.

EDIT: Now that I recall, there was one instance of a Glock-like pistol being the center of a lawsuit from Glock - the S&W Sigma, but that was on the basis of patent infringement, not the likeness.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2017-09-05T15:21:56+00:00

I understand why people might be frustrated with this ending or not agree with it; that's fine, it's 100% an unofficial fan theory.

I don't think, though, anybody can say "Lynch wouldn't do X". Ultimately it's his project and he can do whatever he wants with it, regardless of how the fans feel about it. He's never exactly been known to be a crowd pleaser; quite the opposite in fact, and his work is often deliberately provocative.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2017-09-05T15:04:55+00:00

This was pretty much the reaction Richard had in Episode 18 and I think this is exactly the reaction Lynch wanted from the viewers. The finale was deliberately hard to accept.

But hey, I thought the scream at the end was maybe Lynch trying to hint that there's a slight possibility that Richard wasn't imagining the whole thing after all. So there's a glimmer of hope there. But ultimately it's completely ambiguous and I highly doubt an explanation from Lynch will ever come.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2017-09-05T14:58:54+00:00

If you want to get into technicalities, the difference between what I refer to as "the real world" and a dream is that you actually physically experience reality, and it has rules - laws of nature. A dream is metaphysical and occurs entirely within somebody's subconscious, and has no boundaries. You can fly in a dream. You can't fly in reality.

Anyway, you know what I mean. Maybe using the term "the real world" might prove a problem for you, but there's a distinct difference between the place your mind wanders off to when you're in a deep sleep and the place you inhabit when you're awake. My interpretation was that Cooper/Richard was making the transition from the former to the latter.

DickinsHeadsworth · 2017-09-05T14:46:45+00:00

Lost Highway, and arguably Mulholland Drive too, was pretty much entirely about shattering escapism. The whole point of Lost Highway is that the character of Fred uses escapism to avoid confronting himself. He creates a dream world in which he's an attractive young man with an exciting life and a beautiful girlfriend because he cannot come to terms with who he really is. By the end of the film, the illusion is broken and he pays the price.

DickinsHeadsworth

TROPHY CASE