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" Video-game executives know it as well as their Hollywood brethren: Casting our enemy as the villain can be as lucrative as a Halliburton contract in an oil-rich war zone (and a hell of a lot more fun). Here, a declassified report on the new wave of anti-terror games. \u2014CHRIS KAYE Shadow Ops: Red Mercury (XBox). Briefing: A classic military shoot-&amp;#039;em-up, with terrorists who all look like Yakov Smirnoff wearing Hawaiian shirts. Oh, wait, that&amp;#039;s camouflage. Okay, so the wardrobe does not quite reek of authenticity, but the developers do have an ear for detail: They recorded the actual sound of each weapon discharging, including the malignant tinkle of falling shell casings. Objective: To find and seize the Red Mercury, which is small enough to fit in a briefcase and robust enough to create a nuclear explosion. Yet another case for casual Fridays. Locations: Chechnya, Congo, Syria, Paris. Fun alert: ELEVATED.  Splinter Cell Pandora Tomorrow (XBox, PlayStation 2, PC, GameCube). Briefing: Inspired casting has Dennis Haysbert, 24&amp;#039;s fictional president, supplying the voice of your boss in this sequel to the now-classic original. If this franchise continues to innovate, it will be the Donkey Kong of the next decade. Only, you know, terrifying. Objective: This Pandora&amp;#039;s box holds a strain of super-smallpox, so there&amp;#039;s definitely more sneaking than shooting. But, hey, when you&amp;#039;re hunting a biological contagion, it&amp;#039;s best to holster the weapon. Locations: Indonesia, Israel, LAX, France. (Seeing a pattern here?) Fun alert: SEVERE.  Target: Terror (the arcade). Briefing: Old-school designer Eugene Jarvis (Robotron, Defender) aims to get kids carrying quarters again with this arcade-only two-person shooter. Refreshingly, the action isn&amp;#039;t set in a military or espionage framework. Disturbingly, it is based on the capital A, capital E type of Actual Events: 9/11. Objective: Stop the enemy from destroying the Golden Gate Bridge, seizing the Los Alamos nuclear-test facility, and, finally, from flying a hijacked plane into the White House. Piece of cake. Locations: San Francisco, New Mexico, and (gulp) inside the plane. Fun alert: HIGH. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/a2524/esq1004-joystick-jihad/>