Grand investment precipitating a sudden withdrawal repeats the "Charlie Wilson's War" effect of 1990, when Afghanistan fell in a moment from spoiled godson to orphan, leaving bankruptcy and chaos behind.
The drama bounces from Texas to Mississippi on the cusp of the civil war, effects a shotgun wedding of 60s spaghetti western with 70s "slavesploitation" and douses the magnolia in arterial blood.
A fog of war effect hides explored areas when the player's characters move away from them.
Her actions in the War Room effected a change in the situation on the battlefield.
A mission to protect life became an intervention in a civil war, or one more war to effect regime change.
As Star Wars effects maestro Dennis Muren put it recently, "special-effects aren't special any more".
The set piece is the enormous "Vietnam II" (1973), Mr. Golub's largest painting, whose cinematic-scale canvas, 40 feet wide, has pieces torn out of the bottom to enhance the heat-of-war effect.
Just as the environment is simultaneously ideal and unstable – prone to forest fires, droughts and earthquakes, yet with perfect clear sunshine – it has a tug-of-war effect on people's affections.
Industry sources partly attributed the soft opening to the "Star Wars" effect.
Essentially this is sort of the Star Wars effect, when you engage to go faster than light and the star field collapses to a point in front of you.
One of the details the team added are post-war effects that continue on the battlefield throughout the game, where dust and smoke continue to roll through the streets, clouding up vision, and junk and debris scattered everywhere.
