History VideoGame / ValiantHearts

* PetTheDog: Quite frequently, as Walt gets a pat on the head whenever the player takes something from him.

** Potentially coincidental: The first-aid dog's name is Walt. WaltDisney was a Red Cross ambulance driver in France immediately following the war.

* YouHaveFailedMe: In the last level, the AxCrazy French Officer who keeps urging you and your comrades to walk into the line of fire will actually stab you to death with his sword if you try retreating.

* ArtisticLicenseHistory: Despite being fairly historically accurate, there's more than a few licenses taken that are beyond simple RuleOfCool, such as tanks appearing before their historical debut (and shooting down airplanes to boot). For instance, what appears to be a translation error in the in-game narration and material states casualties as deaths; i.e. 600,000 dead at Verdun, as opposed to 600,000 dead, wounded, and captured, the actual historical number. Oddly, this makes the already infamously bloody WorldWarI seem even more gruesome than it actually was.[[note]]The causalities at Verdun are still not confirmed to this day. There's a varieties of reasons for this including ill and wounded soldiers being counted towards causalities, but the battle lasted for so long that these men would be back in the trenches before the end (inevitably some would be wounded or get ill again, being counted twice or more). Other reasons include, causalities mistakenly being brought up on other parts of French's Western front (Churchill's mistake, many historians quoted his statistic). Conservative estimates of causalities were as low as 596,000 with the worst case being 976,000. However, the reports of deaths is more consistent being in the 299,000 to 305,000 range. Still not a small number by any means.[[/note]]

* BitterSweetEnding: [[spoiler:Anna manages to survive, and saves Karl. He goes back to life with his family, and lives a happy life. Unfortunately, Emile is executed for "murdering" his commanding officer, when in reality he killed him to prevent more people dying due to his [[GeneralRipper insanity]]. Not to mention that the War's aftermath would set the stage for the [[WorldWarII sequel]].]]

* AmericaSavesTheDay: America doesn't show up until the later stages of the war, so very downplayed. More or less played straight with Freddie, who is a major {{Badass}}.

* BadassBeard/BadassMustache: '''[[UpToEleven Everyone male.]]''' Even the extras have some form of facial hair. The only exception is Karl. [[RuleOfSymbolism Probably symbolizing his youth and innocence or something.]]

* PoliticallyCorrectHistory: Save for a brief moment at the beginning, Freddie gets surprisingly little discrimination for his black skin in the game itself, though [[AllThereInTheManual it's mentioned in his background]] that he and Catrin fled to France in the first place to escape a MalignedMixedMarriage in US.

* AnachronismStew: For some reason, the Germans keep their pickelhauben long after they should have switched to Stahlhelms even though the French eventually abandon their bright dress uniforms for more practical grey-blue uniforms and the Adrian helmet.

''Valiant Hearts: The Great War'' is a side-scrolling 2D adventure/puzzle game developed by Ubisoft Montpellier and published by Creator/{{Ubisoft}}, set during the Great War; otherwise known as WorldWarI. The story tells the tale of a number of people who are involved in the war, and their points of view: A drafted German soldier, his French father-in-law, a Belgian nurse, a rescue dog, an American soldier, and more. Valiant Hearts tells of the impact of the war, and how it tore apart lives, and formed blood brothers on the smoke-filled battlefields of Western Europe. It also makes the point that the moral dimensions of the Great War's Western Front were ones of degree, rather than the absolutes on the Great War's other fronts or those so infamously imposed by Nazi Germany and its [[TheHolocaust genocidal programmes]] in the Second World War. [[note]] Yes, this is a gross oversimplification on the Great War side given the Ottomans' genocidal programmes and the Hindenburg-Ludendorff Junta's plans for postwar ethnic cleansing to make Baltic States into ethnically pure German-only territories. And yes, it is also a gross oversimplification on the Second World War side given that none of the Allies fought - or made any physical efforts - to save other countries' people from oppression or extermination (of course, claiming otherwise made it almost ridiculously easy to secure the moral high ground in the propaganda war). By definition, generalizing leaves out important details [[/note]]

* SettingAsCharacter: Unusually for the trope, not a place, but an event. War is portrayed here as a machine with an insatiable appetite, almost seeming like an EldritchAbomination that destroys all.

* OnlyOneName: We only learn the last name of one playable character - [[spoiler:Emile Chaillon.]]

* HeroOfAnotherStory: The game goes out of its way to portray the often overlooked colonial forces that were sent into the war, such as [[IndiansWithIglas Indians]], [[NepaliWithNastyKnives Gurkhas]], and [[CanuckswithChinooks Canadians]] fighting for the British Empire and Algerians and the French Foreign Legion fighting for France.

* TwoFistedTales: deconstructs this by placing it in the real-world context of World War 1. The early game focuses on the RagtagBunchOfMisfits tracking down a [[AristocratsAreEvil Diabolical German Baron]] who has kidnapped TheChick's ReluctantMadScientist father and used his genius to engineer devastating super-weapons in the name of German Imperialism. However, even once the apparent BigBad is defeated, the War itself continues on and the game shifts focus to the GrayAndGreyMorality of the situation and the extreme personal toll of the war on the protagonists.

* InferredHolocaust: The part in which Anna is traversing Belgium shows the Germans gassing the city (a CIVILIAN POPULATION) and involves Anna having to save several civilians from certain doom ... and this actually downplays the German Atrocities in Belgium. There's a reason historians refer to the events as "The Rape of Belgium".

Released on several platforms a few days before the WWI centennial (June 27th, 2014), with an [=iOS=] version following a few months later. Of note is the fact that this is another game that uses the [[VisualEffectsOfAwesome Ubiart engine]], such as some previous Ubisoft games, VideoGame/RaymanOrigins and ChildOfLight.

* AnachronismStew: For some reason, the Germans keep their pickelhauben long after they should have swtiched to Stahlelms even though the French eventually abandon their bright dress uniforms for more practical grey-blue uniforms and the Adrian helmet.

* ArmchairMilitary: Averted, which is surprising given just how popular and pervasive the portrayal of 'Working-Clas Lions led by Upper-Class Donkeys' became in the mid-late 1950s and arguably remains to this day. [[note]] Which makes the contrast with scholarship all the more striking, since by the early 1980s it was more-or-less accepted that the British Army's leaders had been brilliant men confronted with novel and extremely difficult problems. Just ''how'' difficult these problems were was not appreciated until the 1990s. There are good reasons why infantry, artillery, engineer, airpower, and logistical techniques can be neatly sorted into 'Pre-WWI' and 'Post-WWI' periods [[/note]] All the generals shown are {{Frontline General}}s. That being said, they're still heartless {{General Ripper}}s who barely care for their men at all.

* DangerousDeserter: Averted. When Emile is first arrested for desertion, he is pardoned because of bravery in a previous battle and returned to the front easily. When Karl deserts during the middle of a battle [[spoiler: to rescue his wife and son from chlorine gas attacks]], he faces NO repercussions of any kind (legal or otherwise). Justified in both cases in that The Great War had such high casualties that neither side could afford to be choosey.

* InferredHolocaust: The part in which Anna is traversing Belgium shows the Germans gassing the city (a CIVILIAN POPULATION) and involves Anna having to save several civilians from certian doom ... and this actually downplays the German Atrocities in Belgium. There's a reason historians refer to the events as "The Rape of Belgium".

* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MP8q5F6dFqQ#t=119 If this e3 trailer]] is anything to consider, the dog greatly wishes he could [[TrueCompanions write his 5 dearest friends to wish them well]], [[TearJerker but as he is just a dog...]]

* PoliticallyCorrectHistory: Save for a brief moment at the beginning, Freddie gets surprisingly discrimination for his black skin the game itself, though [[AllThereInTheManual it's mentioned in his background]] that he and Catrin fled to France in the first place to escape a MalignedMixedMarriage in US.

** ALighterShadeOfGrey: However, only the Germans are shown using chemical weapons or bombing civilian population centers. [[spoiler: The German Army kills Freddie's wife during a bombing run and kidnaps Anna's father to force him to develop weapons.]]

* DirtyCoward: The French Officer in the last mission. He ruthlessly orders his men into machine-gun fire, while himself remaining in the rear and therefore safe from any and all harm. He is the only officer [[spoiler: other than Baron von Dolf]] to do this; every other officer shown lead the charge and faced the same dangers as all his men. [[spoiler: This makes it a KarmicDeath when Emile finally brains him with a shovel]].

* YourApprovalFillsMeWithShame: After blowing up the German tunnels (and the German soldier who saved his life in the process) in Vauquois, Emile refuses to be decorated for the heavy losses he helped inflict on the Germans and actually ''burns the medals he got''.

''Valiant Hearts: The Great War'' is a side-scrolling 2D adventure/puzzle game developed by Ubisoft Montpellier and published by Creator/{{Ubisoft}}, set during the Great War; otherwise known as WorldWarI. The story tells the tale of a number of people who are involved in the war, and their points of view: A drafted German soldier, his French father-in-law, a Belgian nurse, a rescue dog, an American soldier, and more. Valiant Hearts tells of the impact of the war, and how it tore apart lives, and formed blood brothers on the smoke-filled battlefields of Western Europe. It also makes the point that the moral dimensions of the Great War were ones of degree, rather than the absolutes imposed by Nazi Germany and its [[TheHolocaust genocidal programmes]]. [[note]] Yes, this is a gross oversimplification on the Great War side given the Ottomans' genocidal programmes and the Hindenburg-Ludendorff Junta's plans for postwar ethnic cleansing to make Baltic States into ethnically pure German-only territories. And yes, it is also a gross oversimplification on the Second World War side given that none of the Allies fought - or made any physical efforts - to save other countries' people from oppression or extermination (of course, claiming otherwise made it almost ridiculously easy to secure the moral high ground in the propaganda war). By definition, generalizing leaves out important details [[/note]]

''Valiant Hearts: The Great War'' is a side-scrolling 2D adventure/puzzle game developed by Ubisoft Montpellier and published by Creator/{{Ubisoft}}, set during the Great War; otherwise known as WorldWarI. The story tells the tale of a number of people who are involved in the war, and their points of view: A drafted German soldier, his French father-in-law, a Belgian nurse, a rescue dog, an American soldier, and more. Valiant Hearts tells of the impact of the war, and how it tore apart lives, and formed blood brothers on the smoke-filled battlefields of Western Europe. It also makes the point that the moral dimensions of the Great War were ones of degree, rather than the absolutes imposed by Nazi Germany and its [[TheHolocaust genocidal programmes]]. [[note]] Yes, this is a gross oversimplification on the Great War side given the plans for territorial conquest and ethnic cleansing by the Hindenburg-Ludendorff Junta which ruled Germany in 1917-18. And yes, it is also a gross oversimplification on the Second World War side given that none of the Allies fought - or made any efforts - to save other countries' people from oppression or extermination. By definition, generalizing leaves out important details [[/note]]