As opposed to the weird perspective of individuals caught in a fetishized, choreographed, simulated war which only exists in the realm of video games, which really just tries to milk contention towards NPCs in a video game?

Don't get me wrong now, the whole thing is weird, but for military-based games, it makes sense to be a soldier/aggressor, there's good guys and bad guys, missions, urgency, decisions to make, action and all that jazz, you're a soldier. Or a super-soldier, typically.

The whole nature of being caught in a conflict as a civilian, however, is that you're subject to the whims, upon threat of death and violence and rape, by so many things outside of your control, so what exactly do you do with the controller? You don't really get to have any agency other than "try not to die or have a number of horrible things happen to you." Like, unless you literally just randomly die or get picked up and accused of being a traitor and tortured/killed, it wouldn't really be accurate.

Since they are, in fact, NPC's in relation to the soldiers in a traditional shoot-em-up, I can safely assume that they'll participate in whatever behavior and activities that best suit the game, instead of what would best suit some clairvoyance into the reality of being a citizen in a warzone.

The absolutist position that "videogames don't promote violence" was simply political contrarianism from the time of Jack Thompson, and it's blatantly false if you consider videogames to have any artistic value at all.

Definitely not an absolutist, by any means, but I am curious as to how that may make someone of that opinion feel.

I would love to see video games propelled to statuses where they are more recognized as art, but I've just seen too few examples of them living up to their ability to transmit a message or concept better. Probably just due to my limited experience, though. I haven't sat down and played one in several years now, but post-modern video games sound tight.

Honestly, I'd just have to wait and see what they produce, but it just seems ripe for taking someone's terrifying account of living in a warzone, ramp up what they've been through to make it playable or engaging enough to sell, thereby removing the actual terror of living in a war zone, a lot of which is due to how little control you retain over your life and the lives of your loved ones around you.