Morality Bites
Not that I would recommend Dante’s Inferno (2010, Visceral / EA, Ps3 / 360) as a perfect vehicle for profound moral introspection. One has to dig for adult theme past layers of excessive gore, gaudy art direction, and arena after arena of button-porn grind. But then maybe that’s the point – I can’t be the only person who finds the grind of real life a distraction from higher contemplation, and were I dwelling in the nine layers of hell I might deem myself too busy with the business of eternal pain to navel-gave more than perhaps once a century.
But Dante does encounter moral choice in the form of regular encounters with classical figures, in hell, and one is invited to either punish or absolve them for their sins. Complete with a three-line précis of their plight, one must decide. How they might feel about having a wandering Christian warrior decide their eternal fate is unclear – perhaps when in hell one is inclined to take one’s chances with any passing warriors eager to mete out justice.
When I make it to hell I’ll be able to empathize so much more easily.
The first one you meet is Pontius Pilate, as if a token ‘easy decision’ to break the player in at the start. Choose to punish one of these figures and you stick a sword through their brain – I think that fits the description. Choose to absolve them and one is thrown into a rhythm-action mini-game in which sins have to be saved through carefully-timed button presses – a gameplay experience synonymous with the pits of hell. Perhaps priests should be introducing Parappa the Rapper to the confessional – 4 ‘Hail Mary’s and 3 run-throughs of the Onion Dojo.
A fascinating pair of these moral choices gave me pause for thought. Francesca da Polenta and Paolo Malatesta – the names mean nothing to me, but in-game they are presented as damned souls, along with an opportunity to absolve or punish them as adulterers. On absolving both I was surprised to hear the ping of achievement – 20 gamer points for absolving both characters.
So for absolving these people EA and Visceral will award me extra credit. Fair enough, and looking at the background of these characters they seem to be a couple that were treated with sympathy in the original Divine Comedy – perhaps Visceral’s encouragement for us to act kindly upon them is a tribute to Dante’s own presentation of them.
But I’m struck by the fact that had I looked at the achievement list beforehand, as many gamers undoubtedly do, I would have been inclined to absolve these characters regardless of my inclinations. Sod morality, we’re talking about a higher calling here – the gamerscore. And thus we uncover perhaps the real theme of dante’s inferno, at least this release – the moral corruption of a generation of gamers, for whom the hypnotic nature of gaming credits outweigh the forces of simple morality.
I jest. At least I think I do.
A quick glance through the achievement list. Apparently I will encounter a Brunetto Latini (who he?) later in my journey, and 10 gamer points are on offer if I absolve them. Note that no points are on offer for punishment – a politically expedient decision by EA / Visceral? But nevertheless a deal with the devil is on offer 10 point a for a soul. I’m actually excited about it – I hope that their crimes are utterly abhorrent. What will I do?
What would be great is to be given the option to absolve Hitler of his sins. With 100 gamer points on offer. Would everyone absolve the man who gave us the second world war and the final solution? For 100 points I might have my arm twisted, no matter what my moral inclination might actually be.
What will also be exciting is if I, Dante, am offered the chance to absolve or punish my own soul. It would be an embodiment of the entire theme of the story in one gameplay choice. For all it’s failings, this sort of choice would be the ultimate moment in a game that takes it’s adult themes and classic story quite seriously. Calling it a ‘God of War clone’, as I have in the past, is actually fundamentally narrow-minded and simply lazy.
Yes, i grant, the moral choices on offer here are too simplistic. We need to somehow get beyond either/or dilemmas. Fallout 3 was very good at this, allowing complex and ambivalent grey areas in which to operate. But while we get there I’ll take some shorthand moral dilemmas in my games, because they are an experience i just don’t think any other medium can even get close to.
You play a game, and you have to live with yourself afterwards. It lasts much longer than the time it takes to switch off the TV, close the book, or walk out of the cinema into the daylight. Because you’ve left something of yourself in there. In the hell we call the gamespace. I think it’s a fairly powerful platform for our expression of ourselves.
At the same time, some button-mash hack and slash may help me forget what I’ve done to those poor souls.
