Controversial video game's goal: to subdue Halychyna and kill western Ukrainians (07/24/05)

Controversial video game's goal: to subdue Halychyna and kill western Ukrainians

by Zenon Zawada
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - It's 2008, and pro-Russian candidate Serhii Hryshkov has won Ukraine's presidential election.

The western oblasts, however, refuse to accept the Hryshkov victory, believing he has sold out to the Russians.

Your job as a Russian Special Forces (Spetsnaz) commander is to storm and subdue the rebelling towns, search and destroy the rebel army bases and take their leaders as prisoners.

"Operatsiya Halychyna," a computer game in which the goal is to kill western Ukrainians while subduing Halychyna in the process, has entered Ukraine's video game market, drawing outrage from political leaders who have called for its removal from store shelves.

"We are deeply convinced that those who modified this game should be found and punished in accordance with international legislation," said Dmytro Svystkov, the assistant director of the press service of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The game is a pirated modification of "Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Desert Siege," a licensed computer game produced by French video-game maker Ubisoft Entertainment and released in 2001. "Operatsiya Halychyna" has been selling for about three weeks at $6 per game.

A Moscow-based company created the game, Yevhenii Mykhaylok told the Ukrayinska Pravda news portal, and they have instructed him not to disclose their identity.

Mr. Mykhaylok is manager of Neogame, which had been selling "Operatsiya Halychyna" through its online catalogue. Sales skyrocketed once the controversy broke, Mr. Mykhaylok told Ukrayinska Pravda.

However, "Operatsiya Halychyna" was no longer available on www.neogame.com.ua by the time this article was published.

Though he declined to name the game's creators, it's quite possible Mr. Mykhaylok won't have much of a choice when government investigators come knocking.

Verkhovna Rada National Deputies Andrii Shkil and Oleh Tiahnybok, both of the Lviv Oblast, have asked that Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) chief Oleksander Turchynov, Procurator General Sviatoslav Piskun and Foreign Affairs Minister Borys Tarasyuk do everything possible to ban the game and bring to justice those responsible for creating it.

"I want the SBU to establish who, the procurator general to bring these people to justice and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to direct a note of protest as to the attempt to inflame Ukrainian-Russian hostilities," Mr. Shkil said.

"Operatsiya Halychyna" has the potential of negatively affecting Ukrainian-Russian relations and igniting international tensions, Mr. Shkil said.

"It's apparent to me that this game, which has come from an unknown source, has an anti-Ukrainian character and an obvious political subtext," Mr. Shkil said.

"Operatsiya Halychyna's" sudden appearance on the Ukrainian marketplace signals that Russian politicians have begun a propaganda war leading up to the March 26 parliamentary elections, Mr. Tiahnybok said.

"This information war has as its goal to call into doubt Ukraine's territorial wholeness and inviolability, and is geared toward dividing Ukraine and degrading Ukrainians' national honor and dignity," Mr. Tiahnybok said.

Its appearance indicates that "pro-Russian forces are trying to take revenge, and the game itself is an attack by these forces on Ukraine's psychology in order to accustom Ukrainians to the idea of the inevitability of Ukraine's occupation," added Mr. Tiahnybok, who also asked that Ukrainian police investigate how the game came onto the market in the first place.

He added that the game is political interference in Ukraine's internal affairs and encroachment on Ukraine's national sovereignty, which Ukrainian authorities should recognize as criminal acts.

Pirated modifications of licensed video games are very common in Ukraine. Often, the scenery and the strategy of a game are unchanged. Instead, authors can modify things such as the game's theme and weaponry.

It was apparent that "Operatsiya Halychyna" was a modification because the creators had neglected to alter the desert scenery, including palm trees that were clearly uncharacteristic of Halychyna's environment.

As part of the game's hatched political scenario, it's not Russia that unilaterally decided to send special forces into Halychyna.

Instead, it's the newly elected Ukrainian government that turns to Russia for help in "restoring Ukraine's territorial wholeness" and establishing control over the unruly Halychany (residents of Halychyna).

President-elect Hryshkov represents the party, Slavic Brotherhood and, upon election, breaks off all talks with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The rebels name themselves the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) and receive military instruction from American instructors at specialized camps.

In addition to www.neogame.com.ua, several other Ukrainian websites were selling "Operatsiya Halychyna."

However, most have pulled the game off their sites because of the controversy.

The www.petrovka.ua site pulled the game after numerous gamers voiced their outrage.

However, "Operatsiya Halychyna" is still widely available at Kyiv's Petrivka market, where software, music and DVDs are widely bought and sold. It also had wide distribution in Russian cities, according to various Ukrainian news reports.

Several clues about the game indicate that Russians created it. Firstly, the creators assume that Ukraine's next presidential elections are in 2008 because they occur every four years in Russia.

However, Ukraine's presidential elections occur every five years and, therefore, 2009 would have been the correct year.

Another hint is that the Ukrainian forces in the game base their defense in Lviv's City Administration building. However, only two Ukrainian cities, Kyiv and Sevastopol, have such buildings, unlike Russia, where every city has an administration building.

The Russian news wire Itar-Tass had reported earlier that the Lviv Oblast State Administration and the Lviv Oblast Rada (council) declared that they want the games banned.

However, the press service directors of both oblast government bodies said neither the administration nor the council had issued such declarations. Instead, it was Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs that called for the government to pull the game off store shelves.

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