I guess this week has been a Russian week. So, I'm sitting here listening to Echelon's Song while working on my spaceship, the JSS Yuri Gagari, and I've just collected all of Fatum's info on Russia from alt.War... and I had a thought:

Anybody know any video games where you play Soviets? Not Russians, but dyed-in-the-wool Soviets? I remember playing Close Combat: The Russian Front and loving it - especially having to use shitty anti-aircraft guns to try and kill Nazi tanks, because they were the only thing laying around Raseiniai that had sufficient bore to punch through the German Panther II's. But games where you can play Soviets - that aren't FPSes in multiplayer - are few and far between.

If there are any wargames or whatnot out there set during the Great Patriotic War or - even better - the Russian Civil War - that'd make me so happy. Anybody know of any?

Men at war, a WW2 RTS game,

and World In Conflict, an alternate history RTS are the only two that come to mind.

there is also Stalin Vs Martians...

I love World in Conflict so much. No, seriously, it's just an *awesomely* made game, and despite the somewhat odd premise, I've always found the story to be very believable...

I'll check out Men Of War - I've been seeing the occasional ad on steam, but I assumed it was just a Company of Heroes type game where you play Americans doing the whole Omaha beach shit...

nope. IIRC the greater part of the missions take place on the eastern front.

there is a few in france and North africa. can't recall any in Italy.

Not our universe, and not a FPS or any such, but the Red Alert series of Command and Conquer. Tim Curry is in one and that made me very glad.

World in Conflict is awesome, indeed. An excellent, and badly needed, change of pace from World War II.

as a student of game and human interface design, WiC is FANTASTIC. they have a continuous chat/voip connection during the loading screen, which allows you to strategize with your teammates while you wait for everyone to load the game.

the reason for its unpopularity is balance issues, IMHO. infantry is way too squishy. i will let wikipedia explain the rest:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Front:_Turning_Point
I still fondly remember this game as being fucking hard.
Also, you can actually play the germans and not be nazi.

Soviet Superweapons:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lk97LBiWAcU...feature=related
Allied Superweapons:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGxvxlt1-BM...feature=related
German Superweapons:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cCJcKWvKco...feature=related
E3 2006 Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCqlXg-_TaQ

In this RTS, you can control Pillboxes and Anti Tank Cannon Turrets in FPS mode.
The game actually was successfull enough to spawn a spin-off/2nd part FPS game named Turning Point: Fall of Liberty.

That's a shame. I've never tried the multiplayer, but MLRS units in the campaign were a blast to use. So often artillery in RTS games has its range severely cut down in order to not be unbalancing. The on-field artillery in WiC are just about the only artillery units I've seen in a game that actually felt like artillery.

In a couple of the Call of Duty games you're a Russian soldier during WWII.

In Metro 2033 you play a Russian, an although it's post-apocalyptic so no soviet, there are a few levels where a ww2 stalin-style soviet faction fights against Nazi faction. It's pretty cool.

Don't forget the old adventure game, KGB.

By "Cool" you mean "Pain in the hoop", right? So many valuable bullets lost because I can't do stealth missions...

Men Of War is an excellent tactical game. It's set in WW2 but you still play the Soviets.
KGB is great too, even though it's quite difficult (and the kind of game that punishes you near the end for something you did (or didn't do) at the beginning).