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The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > Let Us Playeth The Killzone Trilogy - The Tragedy Of Rico, Moor Of Vekta
 
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destitute
May 1, 2002
It's about how hard you get hit and keep moving forward.
Nap Ghost

Blind Sally posted:



Okay, here's some actual interesting subtext. The ISA Lancers all have the ace of spades painted on them. Depending on who you ask, the ace of spades might have different connotations, but it generally seems to be known as the "death card". However, it's also considered the most valuable card in many card games, making it potentially really lucky. If I'm not mistaken, a number of airborne units in WWI wore the icon as a good luck charm.

Contrariwise, it had a much more sinister role in the Vietnam War. American soldiers believed that Vietnamese superstition led to them viewing the ace of spades as terribly unlucky. I don't believe that's true, but that's unimportant--the Americans believed it so strongly that having the card boosted their morale. Bicycle even shipped over crates of cards containing only the ace of spades for the soldiers to use. They would place the cards on the bodies or in the mouths of dead North Vietnamese and Viet Cong soldiers. There are images on the internet, but they're pretty grim so look at your own risk. If you've ever watched Apocalypse Now, Robert Duvall's character partakes in this tradition after capturing the beachhead.


Actually this looks a lot like the Special Operations Command emblem:


Special Forces are often referred to as the "Tip of the Spear", the spear in question being those that show up all over national iconography to represent strength of arms or military might; the first element to fight in a location is often Special Forces troops of one sort or another, and SOCOM's Tier One Operators are often the first to show up. I think it has less to do with being a death card and more to do with representing a SF unit -- some countries have only one type of Special Forces unit, which is essentially a Rapid Reaction Force. Those tanks, which look like Light Armored Vehicles with a seriously upgraded primary weapon system, would be a decent choice for rapid armored response in a metropolitan area; some SWAT units actually have LAVs. It might be a lot more thought than was actually put into it, but I could see the spear emblem being used to help reinforce that these are ISA RRF special forces tanks.

That brings up an interesting correlation -- the Helghast troops all look heavily armored and the ISA troops appear to be wearing some much more basic ballistic vests, whereas the descriptions for the vehicles and space assets describe the reverse; Helghast vehicles are lightly armored and smaller than their ISA counterparts. Very unlike the German armored corps during WWII. I assume that Helghast forces will be promptly torn to shreds once ISA mounts a coordinated counterattack, or do they have a more significantly armored main battle tank?

* # ¿ May 12, 2014 06:29
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# ¿ May 22, 2024 11:56
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The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > Let Us Playeth The Killzone Trilogy - The Tragedy Of Rico, Moor Of Vekta