Chwistek

Philip Chwistek
David Maxson
CAS 137H
16 October 2015
The Anti-War Message: Guernica and This War of Mine
Video games are replacing Hollywood blockbusters. Most notably, the gaming industrys
financial colossus, Grand Theft Auto V, generated 800 million dollars within 24 hours
(Goldfarb). With such heavy-hitting games dominating the market, it is fairly rare for a lowbudget independent Polish production, such as This War of Mine, to reach the Top Sellers
chart on Steam (an online video game retailer). What makes This War of Mine even more
remarkable, however, is its ability to simultaneously appeal to a desensitized audience and
deliver an antiwar message: the fact that over 90% of casualties in modern war are civilians
(Patterns in Conflict). Similarly motivated by the large amount of collateral damage brought
by war, Pablo Picasso, in 1937, composed Guernica, a massive, 290 square foot painting that
illustrated the indiscriminate bombings precipitated on the town of Guernica during the Spanish
Civil War. Although completely different mediums, Guernica and This War of Mine both
employ emotional appeals that are intended to depict the horrors of war and to lessen the
growing impersonal nature of military conflicts.
Guernica, a work of art, is evidently defined by its visuals. Picassos use of cubism
creates a jagged and grotesque image that is intended to evoke feelings of helplessness and
disorientation. At the center of the painting is a wounded, screaming horse that seems to defy
all logic. The painting also features a severed head, a mother holding onto her babys limp
ragdoll body, and a woman trying to stop the bleeding from her injured leg (Piecing).

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Picassos use of cubism only adds to the viewers dismay as it makes the figures seem contorted,
with their limbs sprawled across the painting. Guernicas black and white color scheme also
contributes a certain kind of lifelessness to the painting. This lifelessness, combined with
Guernicas size, envelopes the audience in the chaos depicted by the painting.
This War of Mine, although a different kind of immersive experience, relies on a very
Guernica-like color palette. The grey colors not only illustrate the physical debris and ash that
are associated with war, but also establishes the games sorrowful tone. When the player does
encounter a flicker of red, usually in the form of fire or a burnt-out neon sign, the change in color
only amplifies the feelings of dystopia and loneliness that the user may experience. This
technique has been seen in many other forms of media. For example, in Schlinders List, Steven
Spielberg places a little girl in a red coat in the middle of an otherwise black and white Jewish
ghetto. This War of Mine also has player-controlled characters emit a lighter shade of grey. This
not only serves a practical purpose of helping the player identify who is under his control, but
also serves as a subtle reminder that the player is a potential source of moral good in a world
overtaken by chaos and destruction. While the games color palette helps establish the games
atmosphere, This War of Mines primary source of immersion, and rhetoric, occurs in its
gameplay.
The players attempt at ensuring the survival of his civilians can be broken down into two
parts: implicit and explicit decisions. Explicit decisions involve the player clicking yes or
no. These user prompts appear when the player is faced with a random event, such as two
young boys knocking on the groups door. Implicit decisions involve the decisions that the
player makes regarding resource allocation. To gather resources, the player must scavenge.
Scavenging involves looting abandoned buildings, stealing, and even murder. The player must

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then ration out food, water, and medicine, as well as craft new items with the remaining
resources. The combat and crafting systems are what first draw video game enthusiasts to play
This War of Mine. However, instead of being rewarded for committing crimes such as theft and
assault, the player is reprimanded. After the player commands a character to do something that is
understood as immoral, the character will spend the following days in a depressed state. He or
she will begin to make comments about going to hell, not having the right to live, etc. These
comments are intended to arouse guilt in the player. Exposing characters to violence also greatly
increases the chance of characters becoming wounded. Once characters are wounded, they
experience a very slow but fairly certain decline towards death (it is very difficult to save a
severely wounded character) forcing the player to watch his characters suffer as a result of his
choices.
To win the game, players must have at least one of their civilians survive twenty days.
Each day is more difficult than the last, and This War of Mine is infamous in the gaming
community for being incredibly challenging. The games difficulty exists to convince the player
that surviving war as a civilian is more than challenging, and that real war is nothing like sci-fi
battlefields swarmed by re-spawning super soldiers. With every day survived, users discover
more backstory pertaining to each character in the game. Players discover that their characters
have families, desires, and careers. This form of storytelling greatly humanizes civilians trapped
in warzones, and proves to the audience that refugees are more than statistics in a newspaper.
When players reach endgame, either by surviving the necessary twenty days, or by having all
their characters die off, the critical decisions the player made are summarized on a scrollingcredits screen. Even after the game has ended, the player is reminded of whom he stole from,
whom he murdered, whom he helped, and which characters under his control did not survive. In

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a final goodbye, players are left with memories they can be proud of and others that make them
reconsider their own morals and beliefs towards war.
Guernica and This War of Mine both immerse the audience in order to maximize the
efficacy of their emotional appeals. Guernicas sheer size demands attention and engulfs the
viewers field of vision. This War of Mine, a video game, by definition is required to be
interactive. However, Guernica and This War of Mine appeal to two completely different
audiences. Guernica is an internationally renown painting created by an internationally renown
artist. A copy of Guernica hanged outside the United Nations Security Council from 1985 to
2009, serving as a reminder of the devastating and chaotic impact of waron civilian life and
communities (Shabi). The UNs recognition of Guernica only verifies its universality, and the
paintings cubic style and lack of era-specific objects only verifies its timelessness. This War of
Mine, on the other hand, requires a fairly up-to-date computer, purchase, and hours of dedication.
It therefore reaches a relatively minute amount of people. Although This War of Mines
penetration into culture is fairly shallow, it has been able carry the same antiwar message as
Guernica on a much smaller but more personal level. The game carries an Overwhelmingly
Positive ranking on Steam with over 12,000 reviews, and was selected to be a one of TIMEs
2014 games of the year. It has elicited customer reviews describing the game as emotionally
crushingsuccessfully self-reflecting and the war game we needed (This War of Mine).
Picasso, in 1937, had realized that the recent innovations in weaponry had only increased
the scale of war. Civilians were becoming more vulnerable to collateral damage as artillery fire
and air raids integrated into military strategy. Since then, the problems Picasso had recognized
have continued to grow. Not only are more civilians dying in war, but war has also become an
impersonal and distant occurrence. Technology has minimized the amount of contact necessary

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to wage war, and often times, can make it seem like the warring country is completely at peace.
Drones have replaced bombers, and This War of Mine is the contemporary Guernica-n response:
another attempt at bringing voice to the people caught in the crossfire.

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Works Cited
Goldfarb, Andrew. GTA 5 Makes $800 Million in One Day. IGN. Ziff Davis, 18 September
2013. Web. 14 October 2015.
Patterns in conflict: Civilians are now the target. Unicef. United Nations, n.d. Web. 14 October
2015.
Piecing together Guernica. BBC Magazine. BBC, 7 April 2009. Web. 15 October 2015.
Shabi, K. Guernica Meaning: Analysis & Interpretation of Painting by Pablo Picasso.
Legomenon Online Literary Journal. 31 July 2013. Web. 15 October 2015.
This War of Mine. Steam. Valve, 2015. Web. 15 October 2015.
This War of Mine War Child Charity DLC. Steam. Valve, 2015. Web. 15 October 2015.