Bin Laden Might Have Trained Terrorists With a Video Game

The SEAL team that killed Osama bin Laden recovered video game-related books from the Al Qaeda leader's bunker, according to documents released Wednesday by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. But was bin Laden just a gaming enthusiast or was he using the material to train terrorists?

Among the items recovered was Delta Force Extreme 2 Videogame Guide and a Game Spot Videogame Guide. The first guide is likely the downloadable manual for Delta Force: Xtreme 2, a first-person shooter by NovaLogic. But GameSpot is one of the biggest English-language video game websites (and is under the same CBS Entertainment umbrella as GameFAQs and, ironically, Giant Bomb), so without further detail, it's unclear which GameSpot guide was recovered.

The news appears to have been first noticed by Brian Fung of The Washington Post, who speculated that Al Qaeda played the game for entertainment. But when you look closer at the game series and the developer behind it, it seems more likely that Delta Force: Xtreme 2 was used for training, and not just because it's a military shooter.

Delta Force: Xtreme 2 is a mediocre-to-poor PC shooter released in 2009 to generally bad reviews. However, both its series and its developer have a legacy of niche quality. The series began in 1998 with the first Delta Force game; it was similar to the original Rainbow Six game, a squad-based, tactical shooter that required planning to achieve objectives. Missions were complex, and you had to outfit your squad properly for each one.

Developer NovaLogic primarily made military games, including the Comance helicopter simulator series, the F-22 jet simulator series, and the Joint Operations online military shooter series. In fact, the company branched off with NovaLogic Systems, Inc. in 1999 to produce tactical simulators for the United States military. NovaLogic hasn't produced a game since 2009, but it was deep in the military video game field for over a decade.

Unlike the modern Call of Duty games, which have had military advisors for technical accuracy but focus mostly on large set pieces and are almost entirely cover-and-corridor shooters outside of multiplayer mode, the Delta Force series has mostly focused on more open level design and mission structures. They're largely more tactical games that require scenario planning to succeed. It's a structure that, in concept, makes Delta Force: Xtreme 2 a candidate as a military training tool. From NovaLogic's publishing history and the Delta Force series structure, it's very likely that Osama bin Laden used the game documentation and the game itself to help train Al Qaeda fighters.

This doesn't mean the game was actually effective in training terrorists. Video games are generally fictional and almost always unrealistic, and even a tactical shooter made by a company that focuses on military realism can't be expected to accurately prepare someone for combat. The value they might offer in abstract tactical preparation is based on generally unrealistic artificial intelligence that causes enemies to behave either stupidly or unrealistically skilled. Even if Al Qaeda relied on multiplayer mode for training, specific tactics and behaviors can't be consistently predicted, and the game itself wouldn't offer more support than, say, playing with paintball guns.

Of course, other documents released include the Grappler's Guide to Sports Nutrition, the Guinness Book of World records Children's Edition 2008, instructions on silkscreening, and a suicide prevention manual. So the presence of the Delta Force and Game Spot guides could just be a mere coincidence in a rather unexpected book collection.