Gamespot has posted the first screenshots of the upcoming Civilization IV: Warlords expansion. Apparently, Joseph Stalin [right, taken outside of a Moscow Starbucks] will be one of the new leaders.

Granted, they haven't denied that he's in it... but where's Hitler? It seems to us that if you're going to include one of the 20th century's most inhuman mass murderers, you might as well go the whole hog and include Hitler. Hitler's scarcely more distasteful than Stalin — in fact, Hitler killed less people than Stalin.

We know, 2K Games: you've got the profitable German market to consider, where Hitler references are, as they might say, verboten. Still, do what all other game manufacturers do when they run afoul of German anti-Nazi censorship laws: replace Hitler with a robot for the German release. We recommend the sensuous German robot Maria from the 1927 Fritz Lang film, Metropolis.

Civ IV: Warlord Screenshots [Gamespot]

Contact information for this author is not available.