The review actually addresses this dissonance. You can't kill civilians in Valhalla, but you burn down their livelihood.

Huh. Sounds like the game does a lot of jumping through hoops in trying to make Vikings the good guys without actually changing what they did.

My original point: you would never see a game journo pining for the "realism" of murdering Muslims or Jews.

No they definitely wouldn't. And they'd condemn any game that even let you do either of those things.

The review actually addresses this dissonance. You can't kill civilians in Valhalla, but you burn down their livelihood.

Huh. Sounds like the game does a lot of jumping through hoops in trying to make Vikings the good guys without actually changing what they did.

My original point: you would never see a game journo pining for the "realism" of murdering Muslims or Jews.

No they definitely wouldn't. And they'd comdemn any game that even let you do either of those things.