Seven Navy SEALs reprimanded for consulting on Medal of Honor: Warfighter

What was the price of Medal of Honor: Warfighter? £30? (Soon to be a tenner in the Steam Xmas sale?) Well whatever the price, it's cost seven Naval Special Warfare personnel dearly, as they've been punished by the Navy for consulting on the game without permission. For the sake of authenticity - something that, despite the accurately modelled guns, isn't exactly the game's strong point - the seven received "a punitive letter of reprimand and forfeiture of 1/2 month's pay for two months," as confirmed to Polygon by the Department of Defense.

The SEALs, two Senior Chief Special Operators and five Chief Special Operators, are being charged with revealing classified information, misuse of command gear and, as CBS put it , "violating the unwritten code that SEALs are silent warriors who shun the spotlight." Basically, they're ninjas.

CBS also report that the seven are members of the moderately famous Team Six , one of whom was apparently present on the raid that resulted in the death of Osama Bin Laden. It's not clear what they contributed to Warfighter exactly, but it probably wasn't the feature where you can hide behind a wall for a few seconds to regain full health.

While the seven have already faced administrative proceedings, the Department of Defense have confirmed that "an additional NSW [Naval Special Warfare] investigation is ongoing to determine if more personnel may be involved."

Tom Sykes

Tom loves exploring in games, whether it’s going the wrong way in a platformer or burgling an apartment in Deus Ex. His favourite game worlds—Stalker, Dark Souls, Thief—have an atmosphere you could wallop with a blackjack. He enjoys horror, adventure, puzzle games and RPGs, and played the Japanese version of Final Fantasy VIII with a translated script he printed off from the internet. Tom has been writing about free games for PC Gamer since 2012. If he were packing for a desert island, he’d take his giant Columbo boxset and a laptop stuffed with PuzzleScript games.