In the long, long, illustrious list of bad decisions made by Wargaming for the North American market, this one is without doubt not only the most desperate, but in the top 3 of “What the absolute fuck are they thinking?!” decisions they’ve made over the last few years.
Sabaton, for those of you who do not know (which we are well aware is nearly ALL of you) is a Swedish Heavy Metal band.
You read that right. A heavy metal band. From Sweden. That you’ve never heard of. Neither have we. Here they are:
And here they are singing for Wargaming:
FAIR WARNING: WE HIGHLY RECOMMEND HAVING SOME LED ZEPPELIN, PINK FLOYD, ROLLING STONES…SHIT, EVEN BARRY MANILOW WOULD BE A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION, AT THE READY TO RECOVER FROM THIS ABSOLUTE SHIT ONCE YOU SUBJECT YOUR EARS TO IT!
Well, that band you’ve never heard of, playing music you don’t listen to, that is so bad you had rather shove knitting needles into your ear drums and gouge your eyes out rather than ever be subjected to it again, is now being featured in the game that many of you no longer play. Why are we not surprised?
It the realm of low budget gimmick moves, this one actually tops the very poor decision of bringing Steven Seagal in for a World of Warships promo.
Now THAT was a very bad move. I mean, the last time the guy had a movie worth a shit was 1992…7 years before Wargaming was even founded…18 years before World of Tanks…23 years before World of Warships, the game he was featured in. That the game features warships is, at best, academic.
Since then, Steven Seagal has had a career best summed up as “an old fat guy with mediocre martial arts skills and very bad acting talent paying people to publish his D movies”.
So, yeah. That was a fucking stupid move on Wargaming’s part.
But this one is actually worse. Why? Well, it’s one thing to bring in an old American has-been to market to Americans. I mean, some of us bought into it for no other reason than the memory of Steven at his best. (Not that his best was that good, but you know what we mean.)
So although a pretty bad decision the vast majority of us saw as laughable, at least with an open mind one could see the merit in giving it a go.
But Sabaton? Fucking seriously? Since none of us here had ever heard of them at all until now, we each were tasked with finding out what and who they are and what people in their area thought about them. We asked only one question: “What do you think of Sabaton?”
Here are just some of the results:
Who?
Who?
Who?
Fucking who?
Who’s that?
Never heard of them.
Can’t voice a opinon when I never heard of them.
That was the VAST majority of responses we received and was a list so long that if laid out flat would extend to the horizon, so we’ll spare posting the hundreds of other comments along those same lines. Here are some of the responses from the very few people we came across in the States that actually knew who they were:
I’d rather drag my balls through miles of glass and listen to your mother fart through a walkie talkie than listen to Sabaton.
I stand with you. Powermetal is shit. I was at this music recently festival and everyone who was going to see Sabaton looked like a fucking sperg.
In the list of top 5 worst bands of all time Sabaton is 2nd only to Nickleback.
I saw them as a leadoff for Iron Maiden a while back. They were fucking awful. People were booing the shit out of them and throwing things on stage so they got yanked off early. I don’t think IM kept them around after that.
They are to metal what ‘Attack of the Killer Tomatoes’ is to fine cinema.
And my personal favorite:
If I had the choice of being mercilessly kicked in the balls non stop while watching you screw my wife – or listening to Sabaton, I’d brace myself and tell my wife she’s going to have to take one for the team.
And then this one was brought to us from Kottongamer’s Twitch Feed:
“The tank costs more than the average ticket to see them in concert, let that one sink in.”
So, yeah. Not a good decision on Wargaming’s part. Again.
But why are we surprised? They pulled the plug on us years ago when they found out we weren’t stupid fucking sheep that don’t realize when we’re being treated like the red-headed stepchild.
LMAO! Ohhhhhh my. That was funny. Thanks for the pick-me-up. I needed it!
Another cheap shameless display and trying to separate people from their money $ A band like this desperately needing a lift, from a game looking for anyone who would fall all over themselves to help Wargaming siphon every last dime out of their poor player base.
We’re the 10 cent whores of Wargaming and it’s nickle night.
There are several threads by people on the main WoT forum over this saying in many cases the same thing.
NOBODY from the U.S. knows who the fuck they are or cares.
Circon did a video recently of this thing and you can add this comment to the list because it’s gold: “The tank costs more than the average ticket to see them in concert, let that one sink in.” Honestly I have heard of them but only through the rather poor taste in music the subscribers have to Kottongamers’s Twitch feed which includes gems such as ICP and whatever godawful garbage they call hip hop in this day and age.
Amendment to my previous post, the comment was made in the stream chat.
Now THAT’S some funny shit right there! Consider it added. Thanks!
Hilarious. I thought that WG couldnt get any worse. This takes the cake.
@Thing1
Sabaton was also at gamescom, all I will say is when I saw the first 3 minutes, I started bashing my head on the table
I think that’s their objective: to make you bang your head. 😉
Their playing is simply horrible. The vocals are even worse if that’s at all possible.
The last time I heard a band that bad I was 26 and was at a battle of the bands competition at the Music Farm in Charleston, SC. I can’t recall the name of the guys, but they went on right before we did. We had to cut our set short because it took 20 minutes to clean the stage from all the things people had thrown at them.
It was that bad.
(We were runners up. Not a bad night.)
I’m surprised nobody brought up the irony of Swedes driving a British tank shooting German tanks. This from a country that was playing fiddle to both Axis and Allies and did nothing to help little Finland against the Soviet maw.
As for Wargaming, they’re busy throwing crap at the wall to see what will stick instead of fixing basic problems that would have solved everything years ago. If anything, it’s reaffirmed my affection for Blizzard and it’s gem after shining gem library and an army of devs that fix problems fast as a NASCAR pit team.
That they even put the Swedes in the fucking game tells you just how far ’round the bend those stupid, shit-for-brains idiots have gone.
Yeah – Italy doesn’t have enough to warrant a tank tree, but the fucking pussy Swedes and Czechs that never fired a fucking shot in anger and threw their fucking hands up the instant anybody looked at them sideways do.
Bullshit of the highest order right there. It’s fucking disgraceful.
I know Sabaton. Heck, I’ve listened to some of their tracks. But the last bit, damn. Yeah, I’d rather save my money for a concert in our country (if ever they make a concert on our country) than buy a virtual tank on a game I won’t play after some years.