History VideoGame / WorldInConflict

* BigDamnHeroes: In the 3rd mission of the American campaign you are defending the town of Pine Valley against a massive Soviet attack. When the Reds are beginning to overrun the Americans, the USS ''Missouri'' appears and starts annihilating the Soviets. You can then use its guns to finish off the rest of the enemy forces.
** In the 3rd Soviet mission, Colonel Orlovsky arrives seconds before American civilians are about to be executed by Malashenko's men in one of the cutscenes.
** In the final mission in the American storyline, [[spoiler:after a hard fight you manage to finally liberate Seattle, thus preventing the Chinese from making landfall here and, most importantly, prevent a strategic thermonuclear strike on said city. Everything looks good when suddenly a large Soviet force appears out of nowhere and starts beating you ''hard''. And they have jammed your communication so you can't call for reinforcements (fortunately, only temporarily). You fight to the last man until eventually, Colonel Wilkins arrives with his tanks and starts kicking Russian on the behind]].

* TanksButNoTanks: [=APC=] edition. The commanders of the US M2 Bradley and Soviet [=BMP=]-2 call their vehicles [=APC=]s. Both vehicles and the [=NATO=] Warrior are infantry fighting vehicles, distinguished from armoured personnel carriers by their heavier armament.

* BigDamnHeroes: In 3rd mission of American campaign you are taking part in defending the Pine Valley town against massive Soviet attack. When finally Reds are starting overrunning you, suddenly, the USS ''Missouri'' appears and starts annihilating the Soviets. And then you can use its guns to finish off the rest of enemy forces.
** In 3rd mission of Soviet campaign, the Colonel Orlovsky arrives seconds before American civilians are about to be executed by Malashenko's mens in one of the cutscenes.
** In the final mission of American storyline, [[spoiler:after a hard fight you manage to finally liberate the Seattle, thus preventing Chinese from making landfall here and, most importantly, prevent a strategic thermonuclear strike on said city. Everything looks good when suddenly ''massive'' Soviet force appears out of nowhere and start beating you ''hard''. And they jamming your communication so you can't call for reinforcements (fortunately, only temporarily). You fight in desperate, all-or-nothing last stand when finally, Colonel Wilkins arrive with his tanks and start chewing Russians from the rear]].

** The cover art for ''Soviet Assault'' shows New York City getting nuked, even though the only nuclear weapons seen on-screen during the story of either game is a single, relatively small scale tactical nuke.

* JustAStupidAccent: Played with. [=NATO=] units are almost all from a different country, and this is reflected in their speech. Most responses to commands are given in a heavily exaggerated accent, likely to allow [[TropesAreNotBad quick identification of units]], but unit chatter is made in that unit's native language, and the voice actors are clearly native speakers. This applies to the Russian units as well; American units mostly have similar accents, however.

''World in Conflict'' is a 2007 [[RealTimeStrategy Real Time Tactics]] game by Creator/MassiveEntertainment. Set during the closing days of the UsefulNotes/ColdWar, the game explores what might have happened had the Warsaw Pact countries decided to start WorldWarIII instead of allowing the gradual collapse of its constituent governments. Best described as Film/RedDawn1984 [[JustForFun/XMeetsY meets]] Videogame/GroundControl, the game eschews traditional [=RTS=] elements in favour of a more tactical approach: no base building occurs, units are air-dropped, and individual armies rarely number more than a dozen units.

* BookEnds: [[spoiler:The original game begins and ends in Seattle. And the expansion pack begins and ends in Lebedjev's limousine.]]

** During the missions that take place in America, the Soviet propaganda shows them occupying ''half of the United States'' by the third mission, even the nearby sections of ''Canada and Mexico''. They also claim the American civilian population is welcoming the invasion as a liberation and are joining the Soviets. In reality they only control the area of Washington State near Seattle and Tacoma, with the furthest they ever get being the Cascade mountain range. And the American civilians are ''extremely'' hostile to the invaders, grabbing any gun or weapon they can get their hands on and fighting back. Romanov even says in the mission briefing that Soviet troops were surprised at the level of resistance, and that ''everywhere'' they went they were greeted with gunfire.

* RealityEnsues: The Soviets may have seized large parts of Washington State in a surprise attack, but it gradually becomes obvious that for all their guns and tenacity, seizing a country as large and as hostile as the US by conventional means is a fool's errand. Lampshaded by Colonel Orlovsky, who by the time the Americans have launched their offensive to liberate Seattle has given up on any notion of victory, even with the incoming Chinese armada. This is in stark contrast to the Soviet propaganda that insists that the Red Army has encroached half the country, where in reality the Soviets are under constant fire from a rebelling populace and unable to expand their campaign beyond Washington.

* UnitsNotToScale: Averted; every unit is properly scaled in relation to the rest of the game area, which means infantry can be pretty difficult to spot, for good and ill.

* GlassCannon: The Infantry role's units. Their weapons are as effective as any vehicle's [[CripplingOverspecialization against their intended targets]], but without trees or buildings for cover, they tend to die when enemies look at them funny.

* RealityEnsues: The Soviets may have seized large parts of Washington State, but it gradually becomes obvious that for all their guns and tenacity that seizing a country as large and as hostile as the US by conventional means is a fool's errand. Lampshaded by Colonel Orlovsky, who by the time the Americans have launched their offensive to liberate Seattle has given up on any notion of victory, even with the incoming Chinese armada. This is in stark contrast to the Soviet propaganda that insists that the Red Army has encroached half the country, where the Soviets are under constant fire from a rebelling populace and unable to expand their campaign beyond Washington.

* RevengeBeforeReason: Subverted with the already angry Malashenko, who, when he learns his wife was killed by NATO back home, swallows his considerable anger and continues. [[spoiler:DoubleSubverted later as he orders his men to defend Seattle against the American counterattack when it is clear the very notion is completely hopeless, especially since the player knows that the Americans are planning to ''Nuke'' Seattle if they can't take it back.]]

** Just before the U.S. launches the operation to liberate Seattle, they send troops to retake a group of Islands in the Puget Sound to capture Soviet anti-ship missile batteries for use against the Chinese invasion fleet that's heading to Seattle to reinforce the Soviets.

* MajorlyAwesome: [[spoiler:The Player Character in the end. Going from 1st Lieutenant to Captain in a few months is unheard of and would never happen real life.... except for the man who saved the Statue of Liberty, held the line in the Cascade Mountains, and finally pushed the Soviets out of Seattle.]]

* AnAsskickingChristmas: Played straight, and then [[TearJerker painfully subverted]]. Parker and the rest of the U.S. forces successfully drive the Soviets out of the festively-decorated Cascade Falls, only for fresh new Soviet reinforcements to arrive, [[spoiler: necessitating the use of a nuclear strike, and Captain Bannon stays behind to draw the Russians into ground zero. The entire ending cutscene is simply heartwrenching.]]

** In the final mission of American storyline, [[spoiler: after a hard fight you manage to finally liberate the Seattle, thus preventing Chinese from making landfall here and, most importantly, prevent a strategic thermonuclear strike on said city. Everything looks good when suddenly ''massive'' Soviet force appears out of nowhere and start beating you ''hard''. And they jamming your communication so you can't call for reinforcements (fortunately, only temporarily). You fight in desperate, all-or-nothing last stand when finally, Colonel Wilkins arrive with his tanks and start chewing Russians from the rear]].

* DestructiveSaviour: Faithful to real life warfare, saving areas is a messy endeavour. When Webb comments on the state of Seattle, Sawyer admits that the U.S. Army caused as least as much damage as the Soviets. There are some objectives based around avoiding this trope for notable buildings, but [[spoiler: the Nuke on Cascade Falls]] is this in full force. At least most buildings are implied to be deserted by civilians. Most missions end with "Victory!" being plastered over a scene of a town reduced to ruins.

---> '''Sabatier:''' Vous arrogants Americains, vous pensez que vous dirigez le monde comme il vous plais.[[labelnote:*]]You arrogant Americans, think you can run the world as you see fit.[[/labelnote]]
---> '''Sawyer:''' Nous avons une guerre à gagner et je vais faire ce qui me semble nécessaire.[[labelnote:*]]We have a war to win, and I will do what I deem necessary.[[/labelnote]]

---> '''Sawyer:''' Okay. Try not to damage the church, Parker. It's apparently very old and has some cultural value to our allies.
---> '''Sabatier:''' It was built in the twelfth century! Vous n'avez donc aucune culture.[[labelnote:*]]Don't you have any culture...[[/labelnote]]

* HeroicMime: Player characters Parker and (in ''Soviet Assault'') Romanov are never heard to speak in-game; Parker has a bodily presence in certain cutscenes but we never see his face, and Romanov is never seen at all. They are, respectively, white American and Slavic, though. [[spoiler: The intro to the final mission to retake Seattle reveals that the narrator of the U.S. missions (voiced by Alec Baldwin) is, in fact, Parker, though at that point it should be pretty obvious. By the same token, it is implied that the 2nd narrator of the Soviet missions -- the one talking about the realities of the war -- is Romanov.]]

* ItsAWonderfulFailure: If you fail the last mission in the vanilla game, [[spoiler:the Pentagon will authorize a nuke to destroy Seattle to prevent the Chinese invasion.]] That's not the trope, though. [[spoiler: The Soviets will see the Americans' willingness to use nukes, so they'll launch a nuclear strike of their own. The rest is history.]]

* MajorlyAwesome: [[spoiler: The Player Character in the end. Going from 1st Lieutenant to Captain in a few months is unheard and would never be down in real life.... except for the man who saved the Statue of Liberty, held the line in the Cascade Mountains, and finally pushed the Soviets out of Seattle.]]

** ThoseTwoGuys whose B-Plot is about the (then) new CD player and how they can't get batteries for it in warzones. [[spoiler: The final scene is the two of them finally listening to it in liberated Seattle.]]

--> '''Port Authority Officer:''' [''Dodging a gunship's minigun with his car''] 11-99! [[note]] Officer needs Help. Extreme Emergency. [[/note]] Repeat, 11-99 emergency! They have gunships! I repeat, gunships! We need help immediately, America is under attack!

* RedemptionEqualsDeath: [[spoiler: Bannon chooses stay behind at Cascade Falls to lure the Russians into the blast radius of the nuke.]]
* RevengeBeforeReason: Subverted with the already angry Malashenko, who, when he learns his wife was killed by NATO back home, swallows his considerable anger and continues. [[spoiler:DoubleSubverted later as he orders his men to defend Seattle against the American counterattack when it is clear the very notion is completely hopeless, especially since the player knows that the Americans are planning to ''Nuke'' Seattle if they can't take it back. ]]

* RunningGag: Mike's has a state-of-the-art portable CD player (it's 1989), but can't find any batteries for it.

* YouAreInCommandNow: Happens to Bannon in the open cinematic of the first mission.
--> (Bannon is driving a Humvee through the increasingly debris filled streets of Seattle while on the Radio) "This is Captain Bannon! I'm trying to reach the Major!" *Beat* "What!? Well who's in command then? *Beat* "What do you mean 'I Am'?!"

%% ZeroContextExample entries are not allowed on wiki pages. All such entries have been commented out. Add context to the entries before uncommenting them.

An ExpansionPack was released in 2009, titled ''Soviet Assault''. The expansion added six new missions interwoven into the existing campaign that covered the Soviet side of the story, as well as four multiplayer maps which were later released for free. The expansion pack was not well-received, as it did not have any new gameplay features at all. %%was it poorly received by players as well as press?

* [[spoiler:ChineseWithChopperSupport]]: [[spoiler:China enters the war on the Soviet side,]] forcing the Americans to take back Seattle before [[spoiler:a Chinese amphibious assault can be mounted.]]

* StormingTheBeaches: The Soviets use disguised cargo ships to sneak their troops past the U.S. Navy and storm Seattle harbor, beginning their invasion of the United States.
** The Soviets also invade southern France by way of amphibious assault.
** The player gets to take part in a couple of his own during the New York and Puget Sound missions, as both involve retaking enemy held islands.

%% How?

''World in Conflict'' is a 2007 [[RealTimeStrategy Real Time Tactics]] game by Creator/MassiveEntertainment. Set during the closing days of the UsefulNotes/ColdWar, the game explores what might have happened had the Warsaw Pact countries decided to start WorldWarIII instead of allowing the gradual collapse of its constituent governments. Best described as Film/RedDawn1984 [[XMeetsY meets]] Videogame/GroundControl, the game eschews traditional [=RTS=] elements in favour of a more tactical approach: no base building occurs, units are air-dropped, and individual armies rarely number more than a dozen units.