Soldiers of the Future

[Stealth]

Soldiers of the Future​

 

[Aree Wongwanlee]

I think it would safe to say that the soldiers of the future would be recruited from the ranks of gamers. Modern warfare requires a lot of skill and knowledge which is already possessed by gamers. So all those children we see playing games today would one day be facing similar consoles and firing real live ammunition as soldiers of the future.

 

[DeltaForce103]

I think it would safe to say that the soldiers of the future would be recruited from the ranks of gamers. Modern warfare requires a lot of skill and knowledge which is already possessed by gamers. So all those children we see playing games today would one day be facing similar consoles and firing real live ammunition as soldiers of the future.

Modern video games oversimplify pretty much everything about combat. It is a simply a case of pointing a rifle at an enemy and pressing the trigger. There is no significant recoil, muzzle flash and deafening sound that you would associate with a real rifle. Not to mention the complete lack of strategy and tactical awareness. There is a large amount of skill involved in certain games, such as Counter Strike, but very little of this is transferable to real life. I used to be a e-sports player so I should know.

 

[Aree Wongwanlee]

Modern video games oversimplify pretty much everything about combat.

Have you seen some of the video footage about how they fly drones to hit targets? Real flesh-and-blood targets. Their consoles are not any much more different from what a gamer faces when he sits in front of his computer. I am not saying that playing games would be the perfect training for soldiers of the future, but it's a good place to start. Warfare of the future will involve more technology and less brawn on the field.

 

[DeltaForce103]

Have you seen some of the video footage about how they fly drones to hit targets? Real flesh-and-blood targets. Their consoles are not any much more different from what a gamer faces when he sits in front of his computer. I am not saying that playing games would be the perfect training for soldiers of the future, but it's a good place to start. Warfare of the future will involve more technology and less brawn on the field.

You can control fighter jets, attack helicopters and humvees in many games. But this doesn't necessarily provide you with the training to operate those vehicles in real life. Controlling a drone in a game would help to familiarise you with the device itself, but I doubt it can do much past that. The philosophy behind most games is to make complex operations simple enough to be fun and easily learnable.

Actual drone pilots have to operate complex controls to keep their drone in the air and oriented towards the target, from thousands of miles away. They are involved in real combat situations where they have to follow procedure and orders. They require tactical skill besides accounting for the uncertainty of the real world. They rely on low resolution feeds from the drones and cope with handicaps like latency. Players using a drone in a video game usually control it with a simple joystick, fly it through a box of limited space and can act with as much recklessness as they choose to.

While I agree that highly realistic VR simulations could be used for training and increasingly are. Recruiting from the "ranks of gamers" would not be a wise decision.

 

[Kamarsun1]

I think it would safe to say that the soldiers of the future would be recruited from the ranks of gamers. Modern warfare requires a lot of skill and knowledge which is already possessed by gamers. So all those children we see playing games today would one day be facing similar consoles and firing real live ammunition as soldiers of the future.

I agree that games like modern warfare are training tools for combat. I also think that soldiers of the future are going to be tech geeks that can sit in front of a computer and push buttons. The future soldiers could be clones for all we know. Lets bring more peace into the picture so we won't need soldiers in the future.

 

[missbishi]

I think it would safe to say that the soldiers of the future would be recruited from the ranks of gamers. Modern warfare requires a lot of skill and knowledge which is already possessed by gamers. So all those children we see playing games today would one day be facing similar consoles and firing real live ammunition as soldiers of the future.

Absolutely true! Like playing COD in real life. In fact, that could form the basis for a great recruitment campaign!

 

[Jakarri Demery]

I would agree also. I've been in the military and played the games as well. The training was always fun and some of it was like playing video games. They have college course that teach you how to fly drones. It's not that hard.

 

[Aree Wongwanlee]

It's not that hard.

I agree. It cannot be any harder than, say, teaching a person to point a gun at a target.

 

[missbishi]

I agree. It cannot be any harder than, say, teaching a person to point a gun at a target.

As long as it's the right person then I agree. I think it's more about character and mentality than actual skills.

 

[downsouth]

Absolutely true! Like playing COD in real life. In fact, that could form the basis for a great recruitment campaign!

Is it like COD in real life ? Wow that would be awesome !

 

[jade870]

This might be off subject but with all the technology we have today don’t you think it would be better if we could have like bots that we control from home. That way we wouldn’t have to lost any of our loved ones, with all that our government knows about technology I really think we could come up with something. I mean there has been movies made about this stuff so I think if we can think it up we could make it happen. Even if our men had some kind of suits to help protect them I think it would make a big differences.

 

[TatsuKaji]

I think it would safe to say that the soldiers of the future would be recruited from the ranks of gamers. Modern warfare requires a lot of skill and knowledge which is already possessed by gamers. So all those children we see playing games today would one day be facing similar consoles and firing real live ammunition as soldiers of the future.

I think the Army already attempted that with America's Army. I remember when that game came out, I got contacted by the Army soooo many times that it was on the side of being spammed, kind of ridiculous.

 

[TatsuKaji]

You can control fighter jets, attack helicopters and humvees in many games. But this doesn't necessarily provide you with the training to operate those vehicles in real life. Controlling a drone in a game would help to familiarise you with the device itself, but I doubt it can do much past that. The philosophy behind most games is to make complex operations simple enough to be fun and easily learnable.

Actual drone pilots have to operate complex controls to keep their drone in the air and oriented towards the target, from thousands of miles away. They are involved in real combat situations where they have to follow procedure and orders. They require tactical skill besides accounting for the uncertainty of the real world. They rely on low resolution feeds from the drones and cope with handicaps like latency. Players using a drone in a video game usually control it with a simple joystick, fly it through a box of limited space and can act with as much recklessness as they choose to.

While I agree that highly realistic VR simulations could be used for training and increasingly are. Recruiting from the "ranks of gamers" would not be a wise decision.

Actually that's not really true, if you have a accurate reproduction of that type of vehicle you can easily control it through game knowledge. People use programs like Microsoft Flight simulator to train and learn how to become actual commercial pilots. Granted you won't find a lot of accurate reproduction of military related craft because that information may or may not be available but you do have heavy simulator games like DCS which can require you to go through actual check list and properly toggling whatever switches to even start an aircraft or tank.

 

[DeltaForce103]

Actually that's not really true, if you have a accurate reproduction of that type of vehicle you can easily control it through game knowledge. People use programs like Microsoft Flight simulator to train and learn how to become actual commercial pilots. Granted you won't find a lot of accurate reproduction of military related craft because that information may or may not be available but you do have heavy simulator games like DCS which can require you to go through actual check list and properly toggling whatever switches to even start an aircraft or tank.

Microsoft Flight Simulator, as implied in its title, is a simulator program. If you notice the last paragraph in my post, I did account for the existence of such programs. Where I disagree is that I don't see them as mainstream video games, in the same vein of Call Of Duty or Battlefield.

There's a difference in the philosophy used to make them, simulators are designed to be as realistic as possible and appeal to a niche audience with specialized knowledge and involve a steep learning curve, while arcade games that sell in the hundreds of millions are designed to be pick-up-and-play and fun. While they may be presented through the same medium, they are too different to be grouped together.

I don't know, I think earning a tank medal in Battlefield or Planetside would give you knowledge of how tanks work, but not anymore than watching a video on them and nowhere near reading a book on their design and use in warfare. And even then, that would only be theoretical knowledge.