re: When did the German soldiers of WWII realize they were the 'bad guys'?

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Depends on what you're talking about. Political dissent and shirking the normal duties of a soldier were harshly punished. But extensive research has never uncovered any evidence of punishment for refusal to participate in atrocities. Those who were not up to it-and there were some-were simply assigned other duties. The killing squads were manned by willing participants.

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Maybe I was just assuming this for some reason, but I thought there were some records of nazi soldiers who were "made examples of". Either way, I think more and more nazi soldiers questioned Hitler's goals the longer the war went on. But to answer the question the thread is asking, I don't know if there was ever a specific time when something happened to where all of a sudden all of the soldiers realized they were "bad guys".

Some might have thought it from the beginning, some early on in the war, some later on... Some maybe even after the war... And then those who might have never considered themselves a "bad guy".