The player takes the role of Dean Shepard, a young African American who joins the Marines out of school and is sent to fight in Vietnam. Vietnam is the first war where Americans of all colours fought alongside each other as putative equals, and the game portrays some of the tensions surrounding this new state of affairs. As the war progresses, volunteer soldiers like Dean were supplemented by draftees, some of whom were reluctant to go to war on Vietnam - Dean's younger brother among them. The conflicts between black and white and military and non-military cultures adds drama to the overall storyline.