WW2 games – the best World War II shooters, strategy games and beyond

We’ve put together a list of different perspectives on the conflict across game genres.

Video games and World War II. An odd couple — one an entertainment medium, the other one of the most harrowing periods in world history — but one that endures. The conflict is unique in that its fictionalization began as it was still taking place. The movies of the early 1940s portrayed heroic deeds in a war that didn’t bear much resemblance to the horrific reality, and as the 20th century continued, so did the tradition of World War II in a fictionalized setting.

When we play games set during WW2, you could argue we’re actually revisiting the silver-screen version, albeit in interactive form. Nearly every shooter seems to tip its hat to Saving Private Ryan, Band of Brothers or Enemy at the Gates along its way to the credits screen.

What we’ve assembled below is a list of different perspectives on the conflict as we’ve seen it in movies and TV in the intervening decades. Perspectives that place you in the boots of an infantryman, a general, or more often than not, an incredibly tough supersoldier capable of turning the tide — if not wrapping the whole thing up — —singlehandedly.