By Jim Rossignol on June 9th, 2011 at 7:05 pm.
I’ve posted a gallery of screenshots from the recently-announced Brothers In Arms Furious 4, below. I suspect you might want to take a look after the surprising CG announcement trailer from earlier in the week. The gallery shows chainsaws, blood, jetpacks, lightning powers, mohawks, and blood.
All this images can be clicked for full size.
09/06/2011 at 19:07 X_kot says:
Aaah, the staring eyes! They haunt me!
09/06/2011 at 19:08 Lusit says:
I am so incredibly angry.
09/06/2011 at 19:08 Soender says:
Mindless slaughter of German troops in Tarantino style grotesque reverse racism. No thanks.
And stop calling it Brothers in Arms. Stoopit.
09/06/2011 at 19:26 X_kot says:
Perhaps if they used one of these anagrams of Brothers in Arms?
Sombre Tarnish
Ransom Rebirth
Storm Her Brains
10/06/2011 at 00:37 Stevostin says:
Actually, the fact it’s labelled “Inglorious basterds” also pisses me off. The film is actually quite subtil, with a lot of tensions scene that are nothing like Pulp Fiction – and are actually quite the opposite of what’s in that trailer. It was marketed that way, sure, but the film itself is really something else.
10/06/2011 at 03:35 poop says:
yeah i think a really good inglorious basterds game would be an alpha protocol esque tense guns and conversations game, gearbox are like my friend who was really pumped for inglorious basterds who hated it after he saw it because it wasnt nonstop action
10/06/2011 at 07:01 dadioflex says:
I hated it because of the violence and the idea that it’s okay to act inhumanely towards those who are inhumane. That interrogation scene at the start with the German officer (who was stand-out brilliant right through, unlike most of the rest of the cast who couldn’t have wrestled the coat from a caricature’s shadow) set a superb opening tone for a film that ended up as Troma with a better budget. Compare the stylized mutilation and slaughter of a Kill Bill with the lingering torture going on in IB – it felt cheap.
Still, it’d be a boring old place if we all liked the same things. I do like an awful lot of what Tarantino has done but mostly for the talky bits.
10/06/2011 at 09:51 lurkalisk says:
It’s as though Inglourious Basterds made everyone forget about the decades of similar movies that came before it (including Inglorious Bastards). This aversion is really quite strange. The whole, “rag-tag team of often humorous misfits go off and wreak havoc”, thing is hardly trademarked by Tarantino. Not to mention that anyone who’s seen a Tarantino movie would realise nothing about this game so far screams Inglourious Basterds, unless you consider the mere idea of irregular American troops in a semi-comical situation to be something uniquely Trartino-ish. So, chainsaws, blood, jetpacks, lightning powers, mohawks, and blood? Sounds great. I don’t give a damn if the super tactical tactics of the old games aren’t present, I can still play those. Besides, it’s not as though yet another super grim WWII shooter about serious men being sad and serious during a sad, bleak, serious situation would be welcome, at least as my opinion is concerned.
Also, reverse racism? There is no such thing. Racism isn’t one way, and the majority race within the US is the very same as that which populated the Wehrmacht.
09/06/2011 at 19:09 Janek says:
:(
09/06/2011 at 19:12 dingbat91 says:
seriously Gearbox, ubisoft. if you want to make this game. thats great, go ahead! show the world the vision you want…
but this is not brothers in arms. this is not the motivating, powerful story and tactical action that defines the series. and a “rebranding” usually at least keeps some of it’s roots and it’s origin… this is just a desecration of a much loved series. taking all of it’s work, all of it’s motivation and dumping it in the bin. just to use a popular brand name to try and help move a new game.
make furious 4. and make it what you imagine it to be. just sell it on it’s own merit, not destroy a loved series just to help bump it’s sales.
09/06/2011 at 21:02 Gnarf says:
Oh, but you forget about the WWII setting. It makes sense to use the name of the one other game set in WWII. It can be kind of hard to get that across, you know, that, yes, this is actually a videogame with a WWII setting. If it wasn’t called Brothers in Arms I would get stuck trying to comprehend how WWII videogames could possibly exist.
09/06/2011 at 19:13 Icarus says:
“I suspect you might want to take a look”
Nnnnnnnnnot really, no…
09/06/2011 at 19:14 Napalm Sushi says:
Holy shit.
09/06/2011 at 19:15 sonofsanta says:
Er…
09/06/2011 at 19:58 Arclight says:
Indeed.
09/06/2011 at 19:17 Vague-rant says:
Wasn’t there a time Brother’s in Arms prided itself on a well researched story and World War 2 authenticity? Or am I getting confused with another franchise?
09/06/2011 at 19:23 PIGSquad says:
No, I’m pretty sure you’re right. I remember watching developer commentaries for the original game “Road to Hill 30″, and the developers were talking about how all the missions in the game were based on historical accounts of small battles during the war (in this case they were talking about the level “Objective XYZ”).
It would be an understatement to say that this game is departing from the series’ previous focus on realism
09/06/2011 at 19:33 somini says:
Incidentally I’m starting to play the original trilogy and I must say I’m sad that they are taking the franchise this way. :(
09/06/2011 at 19:19 JFS says:
This is what’s wrong with modern videogaming.
09/06/2011 at 19:21 Eukatheude says:
Games have always been over the top like that. Wolfenstein anyone? There’s much worse stuff.
09/06/2011 at 20:00 Arclight says:
Think the point is more that they’re raping an established and respected franchise.
09/06/2011 at 20:56 wengart says:
The thing is, if this were a Wolfenstein game or whatever the over the top violence wouldn’t bother me. But with the heading of Brothers in Arms it suddenly becomes quite distasteful and a little bit appalling. The earlier BiA games trained me to think of them as attempts to seriously show the cost/horrors of war, and I can’t divorce the lessons of those games from the name.
09/06/2011 at 23:31 JFS says:
Absolutely. I mean, there’s over the top, which is fine, and then there’s over the top, which is more like “err…”. And then there’s over the top (ab-)using a franchise that has nothing to do with such stuff.
09/06/2011 at 19:19 Daiv says:
And The Sims 4 will be a murder simulator.
09/06/2011 at 19:24 Teddy Leach says:
You mean the rest of the series isn’t?
… I think I may have been playing them wrong.
09/06/2011 at 19:20 Eukatheude says:
First pic: “Equalizer is OP”
09/06/2011 at 19:38 BooleanBob says:
I love this site.
09/06/2011 at 19:41 Teddy Leach says:
The site loves you, Bob. The site is benevolent. The site is your friend. Happiness is mandatory.
09/06/2011 at 19:43 BooleanBob says:
Mmm. Hivemind love…
09/06/2011 at 19:48 Teddy Leach says:
I am sorry, citizen, but this Hivemind entry is currently placed at Security Clearance YELLOW. Reading any of the words contained within this page without appropriate security clearance is considered treason. Please proceed directly to your nearest available Termination Booth. Have a nice daycycle!
09/06/2011 at 20:01 timmyvos says:
All hail Friend Computer!
09/06/2011 at 20:18 Raiyan 1.0 says:
Resistance is futile, you shall be assimilated.
Friendship is magic.
09/06/2011 at 19:23 Okami says:
God. I hate this industry so much…
09/06/2011 at 19:24 Teddy Leach says:
First there was XCOM, now there is this. Shall we start placing bets on what the next one will be?
09/06/2011 at 19:28 Dana says:
That doesnt mean these games wont be fun to play.
09/06/2011 at 19:29 banski83 says:
The new Syndicate game.
09/06/2011 at 20:55 woodsey says:
“That doesnt mean these games wont be fun to play.”
That’s not really the point though.
(And this is coming from someone who doesn’t give a crap about XCOM or Brothers in Arms.)
09/06/2011 at 22:33 cairbre says:
It’s almost fun waiting to what horror the spring on us next.
10/06/2011 at 00:37 frenz0rz says:
Grim Fandango 2. As an FPS.
You heard it here first.
13/06/2011 at 09:56 d32 says:
There was Fallout 3 before XCom… :(
09/06/2011 at 19:27 Stick says:
Stealth Scott Pilgrim reference? Nice.
10/06/2011 at 13:13 KillahMate says:
What are you talking about? I just clicked the article because I was a little BiA curious.
09/06/2011 at 19:28 Kamikaze-X says:
Even going with ‘Brothers In Arms: Through the Eyes of the German You’ve Been Killing’ would be less offensive to me than this ABSOLUTELY TERRIBLY thought out idea.
BiA was one of my favourite series of all time, with earned in blood being up there for me as one of the best FPS/Tactical Shooters in terms of gameplay AND story.
Screw you Ubisoft, Screw you, Gearbox.
09/06/2011 at 19:38 Tretiak says:
When will we have a game from the German perspective? Someone buy Sven Hassel’s books rights!
09/06/2011 at 19:41 Teddy Leach says:
Brothers in Arms: Auschwitz Guard.
Brothers in Arms: You Are Hitler.
Brothers in Arms: Gestapo.
But no, I would like a game from the German perspective (preferably one more realistic than Necrovision).
10/06/2011 at 00:49 pepper says:
Brothers in Arms : Normandy beach bunker disco party
09/06/2011 at 19:38 SirKicksalot says:
They’re still brothers in arms, technically.
09/06/2011 at 19:46 Navagon says:
Team in Fortress more like.
09/06/2011 at 19:51 StreetCleaner says:
Looks like CliffyB just crapped on a schnitzel.
09/06/2011 at 19:57 Moleman says:
Eh, it’s such a departure from the previous that the only rational response is confusion, followed by mild worry that you’ve had a stroke or something, but I’m struck by the fact that, if you’d asked my opinion of the Brothers in Arms games a week ago, the phrase “far less thoughtful and poignant than they think they are” would come up. Honestly, Gearbox making a Borderlands-style comedy game containing no laughs is fitting, because the previous Brothers in Arms games were games that wanted to be emotionally affecting, but completely botched it with such boilerplate war-film cliche that it wrapped around to actually kind of funny.
Although, if we have to get “Inglorious Basterds: The Game,” can it have twenty minutes of awkward small talk in a basement tavern with RPG style conversation trees before we get to the shooting? (Order 3 beers with index, middle, ring finger/Order with thumb, index, middle finger/Use gun on Man) Can someone mail that one to Bioware or Obsidian, actually?
09/06/2011 at 20:22 Eukatheude says:
I’ll stand for this. Hopefully Bioware won’t insert any useless romance subquests.
09/06/2011 at 20:31 Moleman says:
See, you’re not thinking about this on the right level- the idea is to have “use gun on man” always be a conversation option.
Even during the romance sidequests.
09/06/2011 at 20:01 Jake says:
So it looks quite like Borderlands – the 4 player co-op and the UI anyway – and it has a Nazi carnivale with jetpack Nazis. I think it sounds really promising, even if the CGI trailer was really tasteless and tacky.
I didn’t play the other Brother in Arms games though so the name doesn’t offend me. And I love Borderlands so much.
09/06/2011 at 21:45 Keymonk says:
I’m with you there.
09/06/2011 at 22:40 pth says:
I agree, looks like it could be a lot of fun. I look forward to seeing more about it.
09/06/2011 at 23:14 Jake says:
Cool, one more and we’ve got a team! Bagsy not the guy with the cattle prod.
09/06/2011 at 20:17 Bhazor says:
God, this is worse than what happened to X-Com in terms of fan betrayal.
At least Xcom was made by a new team at least you can say they don’t understand the original they just got the license for. But here the original makers are just giving a big screw you to the fans of the originals and to a lesser extent to the veterans who helped make the original. Would love to see what the real Matt Baker says next time him and Randy meet.
09/06/2011 at 20:19 Cheese says:
I swore when I saw the image. I swore a lot.
What does this even have to do with brothers in arms?
09/06/2011 at 20:23 Comrade Communist says:
Well, at least this game is going to be bad all over…
09/06/2011 at 20:28 I LIKE FOOD says:
Ah glorifying torture and over violence against German soldiers.. how tasteless to say the least.
09/06/2011 at 20:30 Comrade Communist says:
By the way, there are some Veritbird-like helicopters and german soldiers using jetpacks on the screenshots… Shouldn’t it be just called Wolfenstein: Furious 4?
09/06/2011 at 20:31 Saldek says:
It’s probably a bit early to ask this, but I do wonder if the game will offer same-sex relationships …
(kind of hard to keep a straight face there)
09/06/2011 at 20:43 Gigs says:
I spent a few seconds contemplating whether a Bi-furious person was somebody who hated both sexes, or was just extra violent towards lovers. A strangely appropriate name for this game. Then I re-read the title to notice it was BIA Furious.
When I was growing up, elevators had wooden steps. Yessir, they had character back in those days.
09/06/2011 at 20:43 Nick says:
Well, that looks bad.
09/06/2011 at 20:51 Antsy says:
They should go the whole hog, make it a platoon of timetravelling stereotypical 70′s pimps.
09/06/2011 at 20:52 EiZei says:
This announcement officially marks the return of the pre-MoH era when serious WW2 games outside grognard products were surprisingly rare. One major gaming magazine here infamously complained about the lack of WW2 shooters back then..
09/06/2011 at 20:54 Òscar says:
The thing is that this doesn’t even look anything like ww2
09/06/2011 at 21:06 Eukatheude says:
I would have never noticed.
09/06/2011 at 21:03 Eukatheude says:
I would have never noticed. EDIT: REPLY FAIL!
09/06/2011 at 21:05 Navagon says:
If they dropped the BiA branding then this would be improved dramatically to the point of being an inconsequential, bad game.
09/06/2011 at 21:54 oceanclub says:
My flabber would be less ghasted if Gabe Newell announced that Half Life 3 is to be a yaoi hentai dating simulator.
P.
09/06/2011 at 21:55 etho says:
Don’t really care that this is Brothers In Arms branded. I have almost no experience with the series, as I am not particularly excited about realistic war sims.
I have substantially more experience with another of Gearboxes games, Borderlands, which was goofy, gory, actiony and over-the-top. I love the hell out of the game. I think it has stayed in my list of regularly played (I pick it up once or twice a week. I usually play the console version! Gasp!) games longer than any other single game. So given that, I will definitely give this one a go.
I love this site and it’s commenter community, but sometimes, people get really butthurt over really minor things.
09/06/2011 at 22:15 Unaco says:
A lot of harsh feelings over a name.
09/06/2011 at 22:19 Vinraith says:
Rather like a “cherry cordial” that’s actually filled with rancid mayonnaise. Names matter, they create expectations and when those expectations are not met, or are willfully subverted, people get pissed off. The price of a little name recognition, in this case, is a horde of BiA fans that want Gearbox burnt at the stake. I find I don’t have any problem with that.
09/06/2011 at 23:11 etho says:
I would say it is more like the difference between a cherry cordial and a cherry cordial flavored milkshake. It takes aspects of the original and changes them up and switches them around and adds some new stuff. They are intended to be two very different experiences, and may not necessarily appeal to the same consumers, but ultimately there is still a common thread.
Ugh. It just drives me crazy. The two biggest causes of Angry Internet Man syndrome seem to be “Games are all the same! Where’s the variety?!” and “OMG THEY HAVE CHANGED ASPECTS OF A GAME FRANCHISE I ENJOY BURN THEM ALL!”
I’ll tell you what, I don’t mind living in a world where different games in a series are different games. Even if it means I don’t love all the games in a given series equally (for example, I was bored to tears with the earlier BiA games) I’m just happy that it means that creative people are trying new things.
09/06/2011 at 23:13 Jake says:
Does it have to be rancid mayonnaise? I mean, sure it is mislabeled and you have a right to be upset if you were a long time fan of cherry drinks (I’m not), but it might turn out to be quite nice Borderlands-flavoured mayonnaise.
I wonder if there is any reason why they don’t just drop the Brothers in Arms prefix now that they have seen the backlash.
10/06/2011 at 00:39 Vinraith says:
@etho
But they aren’t “trying new things,” they’re just cashing in by churning out the same tired crap everyone else is churning out these days. The BiA games WERE something different, this isn’t.
@Unaco
I wonder if there is any reason why they don’t just drop the Brothers in Arms prefix now that they have seen the backlash.
As I said when this was first announced, I can’t fathom what they were thinking putting it on there to begin with. Any name recognition it buys them is name recognition for a slow, thoughtful, tactical shooter. How does that do them any good for a game like this?
Shit, it would have made more sense to call it Borderlands: 1944 or something.
10/06/2011 at 06:10 wengart says:
I wouldn’t have a problem if this were a departure from what BiA has been, but in this case they demolished the god damn house and built a new one.
Look at the new X-Com game, or the Ghost Recon Advance Warfighter games. You can see plenty of similarities between them and their older iterations. How many similarities to you see between the old BiA games and Furious 4?
I mean name recognition is supposed to draw people who are interested in the series in, but this just targets an entirely new audience. Like Vinraith said it would have made much more sense to say “from the makers of Borderlands” or something.
09/06/2011 at 22:47 Guiscard says:
So we’ve got a mix of Call of Duty, Serious Sam, Duke Nukem Forever, Inglorious Bastards, Borderlands and Doom. No thanks Gearbox. Let me know when you intend to do Brothers in Arms 4 properly. Or better yet, let someone who hasn’t had stupidity take over their studio develop that.
EDIT: random minor point of interest: on their forums, BiA and this Furious 4 crap are kept separate. There may still be a glimmer of hope for a proper BiA continuation.
http://forums.gearboxsoftware.com/
10/06/2011 at 01:21 shaydeeadi says:
Rather conveniently in an interview I read with on kotaku about this said that they were planning on still continuing BiA properly and they just couldn’t think of a decent concept for a serious one that was engaging. So they went mad and made a co-op nazi-em-up.
All the butthurt in these comments is insane, you guys act like they besmirched your sister!
09/06/2011 at 23:10 magnus says:
It’s odd but the negative comments only make me want this game more.
09/06/2011 at 23:13 etho says:
Me too! I hadn’t paid much attention, but all these weirdos getting their knickers in a twist over a stinkin’ makes me want to give Gearbox money just for pissing them off.
09/06/2011 at 23:18 brulleks says:
Wait – the colour, the carnival-esque bunting and canvas. Does BIA actually stand for Bioshock Infinite Again?
09/06/2011 at 23:27 The_Great_Skratsby says:
*watch the trailer to IB and make a game derived from it*
09/06/2011 at 23:43 Gpig says:
Brothers in Arms 4 is worse than World War 2, itself a shitty sequel.
09/06/2011 at 23:46 Gpig says:
Randy Pitchford doesn’t care about German people.
09/06/2011 at 23:54 wodin says:
I thought they had announced this wasn’t going to happen and was a test bed? I’m confused.
10/06/2011 at 03:18 john_silence says:
This test bed is HAPPENING, baby. Yeah it is.
Damn it’s late. I’d better happen myself some test bed too.
/snores experimentally/
10/06/2011 at 00:21 Synesthesia says:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/8a/Problem.png
10/06/2011 at 01:45 john_silence says:
On the one hand: to mindlessly riff off Inglourious Basterds like that, with macho teenager humour in lieu of narrative flair? Come on, that’s just sad, and casts shame on the entire medium.
On the other hand: Brothers in Arms going less lachrymal? YES please. I’d happily forget about Baker, Mason, Leggett and the rest. In fact I pretty much have already – although I finished Hell’s Highway not three months ago. I mean, I know one’s a redhead, another one feels for his men but oddly ends up a lone wolf half the time, one’s got glasses and they got broken when he threw a tantrum at a tank. But man I’d love to see the series going some place less ponderous – especially as long as Gearbox can’t edit their cutscenes properly.
10/06/2011 at 02:33 ZenArcade says:
Wow.
Brothers in Arms was never a particularly great game (it was merely “okay”, it was a decent waste of time I suppose) but this takes the piss a bit. This is what I hate about the industry. For all the things I love about my favourite hobby, stuff like this makes me realize that people sometimes are really only out to make money and that’s that. Although, on the bright side it makes me rather glad we have a healthy indie scene on the PC which more than compensates for depressingly stupid and cynically patronizing “re-branding” tactics like this.
tldr; Yay video games! Boo publishers.
10/06/2011 at 08:06 explosiveface says:
I’d LOVE to meet the person who thought it’d be a good idea to use put ‘Brothers in Arms’ in the title.
10/06/2011 at 11:02 RogB says:
How utterly tasteless. im sure the 12 year olds will love it.
10/06/2011 at 11:28 blainestereo says:
But but but it’s not a headshot when you do it with a pickaxe, is it? IS IT?
10/06/2011 at 14:20 Robin says:
It’s stupid, it’s tasteless, but if it hastens the demise of Ubisoft (or at least their descent into only making motion controlled shovelware, leaving real games alone) I’m all for it.
10/06/2011 at 15:22 Thunderkor says:
This game wouldn’t be getting a third of the hate it’s getting if they had not tacked on the Brothers In Arms name. it was a really poor decision to use that name for something so dramatically different in tone.
I just hope if at any point there are drivable vehicles in the game, Gearbox doesn’t do that stupid “drive with the mouse” bullcrap they always do.
11/06/2011 at 13:15 RegisteredUser says:
I love violence.
Don’t call it BIA – only associated with snore and bore here – and release it as a full-fledged gorefest without limits to the arsenal, Make it over the top, keyboard and mouse optimized and with anytime saves, and you would have one happy fan here.