I’m Internet friends with 3 Germans who play World of Tanks. For two of them, it’s just another pew-pew game, they don’t care about using German or non-German tanks, or shooting at German tanks (though they will bitch about Soviet bias. But that’s 50% of the people who play WoT, as I understand it. The other half has OP Russian tanks :D). I don’t think the idea that maybe their grandfather got blown up in a tank very much like the one they just set on fire ever hit, or bothered, them.
The third is strangely bipolar about it. On the one hand he’s **very **anti-Nazi, hates what Hitler and his cronies did to his country and will tear the few genuine neo-nazi fucks who play the game a virulent new one. On the other hand, he restricts himself to playing German tanks and sometimes brags that had Germany been given a “fair war” they’d have beaten everyone because Germany is awesome rah-rah.
As for froggy me, I played out the invasion of France as the Nazis quite a few times in various grognardy war games. It’s just a game.
The only time I got bothered by war games was in the early 90s, when games based on the Gulf War came out and the war itself was still very fresh in my memory - it was a “real” war with real dead people. The idea of making a game out of it, and so soon, did seem tasteless and disrespectful.
By comparison, conceptually WW2 is a black & white, film grain war that existed in history books, you know ? I mean, I know both my gramps did some not-spoken-of things during it and millions of people died, but to my born-in-81 self, it’s just a piece of The Past and holds about as much tangible reality and impact on my life bubble as the Hundred Years’ War.