War simulation = worst game ever?

This week we read an article by Robert Yang where he claims modern shooters such as the Battlefield series give us a distorted view on how war really is. While he makes some fair points in relation to the changing nature of war in the 21st century I couldn't help but notice a few weak points in his argument.

It's been said that "War is 95% boredom, and 5% sheer terror". OK, I admit, I only get to be a warrior online (thank god for that) so I can't actually verify just how accurate that statement is, but looking at a few statistics it's probably close enough for the purposes of this post. In WW2 an RAF crew needed to complete 30 combat missions before their tour was up, however the tour often lasted longer than 12 months. Not to sound disrespectful but that amounts to a couple of missions a month with a whole lot of sitting around inbetween.

Now imagine how a true war simulator might look? Hours of aircraft maintenance? Rifle drill? Imagine a gamer sitting in front of his computer for days on end, guarding his patch and making damn sure Charlie doesn't get the jump on him. In an entire month of playing he's only actually made contact with rival players twice, yet he's racked up an impressive 100+ hours of play in that month. The thing is, games like this exist, ARMA2 being a prime example.

ARMA2 enjoyed some limited success but hardcore military simulations are very much a niche gaming market. I've personally spent up to an hour just watching, waiting for something to happen, not wanting to be the guy that loses concentration and gets his buddies killed. Everything in the game is skewed in favour of realism. If you get shot, you die, there's no health gauge, not even a HUD to speak of. Vehicles were coded after consultation with the people that actually drive/fly them and as far as getting a realistic military experience on your computer you couldn't get much better than ARMA2.

In terms of popularity however ARMA2 barely registered on the radar until 2012 - several years after its release, titles like Battlefield 3 and Modern Warfare 2 have the modern military game market pretty cornered these days. So what made ARMA2 enjoy a sudden surge in popularity (seriously, top selling game on Steam, one million sales in a single weekend kind of popular) ?

A mod, a mod that was free to download and changed this elaborate military simulation into a zombie survival game, DayZ mod. I can't help but wonder if Yang has missed the point about shooter games entirely. Maybe people aren't looking to the gaming industry to recreate the experience of real war, maybe they just want to know what it's like to be Chuck Norris for a few hours.