The Do’s and Don’ts of Relationships in Gaming

Of all the things that video games have going for it as an art form there is one big piece of subject matter gaming in general hasn’t handled very well: Relationships.  In light of that (and from Thee Brouhaha’s suggestion) I wanted to offer my humble suggestions–my do’s and don’ts of relationships in video games.

Do:

Make it nuanced/complex/believable
Real life relationships are complicated and sometimes messy.  As such it can be difficult to fit them believably into the logical ones and zeros of video games.  Every action in real relationships can have any number of reactions while in a game outcomes are mostly limited to if > then statements.  However, I can see games breaking free of this in the near future.  Bioware’s dynamic conversation system in Mass Effect is a good example of a step in the right direction.

Explore new ground
A major problem in modern games is the overuse and abuse of stereotypes.  If you’re a hero then chances are you’re either a wise-cracking Han Solo type or a muscle headed Marcus Fenix type.  If you’re a woman or a minority then yours chances are even worse.  This is one area that games have been getting a lot better at* but there is still a long ways to go toward developing complexity in character development.

Allow mistakes (but make them fixable)
One of the few guarantees of real life relationships that if you are invested in them at all then you’re likely going to screw them up at one point or another.  It is a given of our human fallibility.  This ability to fall out is something I’d like to see more of in gaming (I hear Dragon Age: Origins has something like this but I haven’t played it so I’m not sure).  At the same time, though, I think it is important that these mistakes be reasonably fixable.  A game is, after all, a game and concessions need to be made in order to not totally screw over the player.

Make platonic possible
It may be assumed that when talking about relationships in games I am mainly talking about romantic relationships.  Indeed, romantic relationships are the most abused in gaming but there is another type of relationship that I simply feel in unfairly underrepresented.  I am referring to platonic friendships.  I believe that game story telling would be well served by exploring this type of relationship in deeper ways.  A fine example of this comes in my old standby Persona 4.

Don’t:

Make it too easy
Unfortunately, the game I praised for better exploring platonic relationships is also one of the biggest offender’s here.  In Persona 4 any female peer that you spend significant time with will, without exception, develop romantic feelings for your character.**  It actually became comical to me after a while.  While a game depiction of a relationship can’t and shouldn’t be as challenging as a real relationship there should be a certain level of challenge involved.  Something won without effort is not going to be perceived as valuable simply because it was easy to get.

Use exploitation and stereotypes
Just as games should work to develop complex and nuanced characters they should also actively avoid the stereotypical and exploitative.  It basically amounts to lazy storytelling.

Make it an achievement
The offender that instantly comes to mind here is the romantic subplot of the original Mass Effect.  Everyone might still remember the unfair flack the game got because of it’s PG-13 sex scene but what I noticed after the smoke cleared was that no one was talking about the sub-story arch but was talking, instead, about whether they laid the human or the alien.  Hiding the relationship story behind a single achievement moment does a great disservice to the story.

Make it too serious
While relationships can be messy, difficult, and confusing they can also be a lot of fun.  I would suggest that unless a game is trying to tell a very specific story it shouldn’t take a relationship story completely serious.  Have fun with it.  Add quirks and friendly jokes.  This will not only help stave off emotional burn out but will also allow the relationship depiction to be more dynamic.

These are just my suggestions.  What are your thoughts?

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*Silent Hill 2 is a good, if dark, example; another is Metal Gear Solid 3.

**To the game’s credit, though, I should note that you can only date one person and all other relationships will become platonic.

 

So proud of Iowans

I am so proud of my fellow Iowans right now.  If you recall, a long while back the Iowa Supreme Court repealed the Iowa ban on same-sex marriage declaring it unconstitutional (which made me proud at the time too).  Well a couple weeks ago I opened up the opinion section of the Des Moines Register and front and center there was an editorial from Bryan English demanding that Iowans be allowed to vote against this decision.  The article was homophobic and bigoted–distorting facts in some cases and telling whole lies in others.  Even worse, it suggested that this was a Christian position.  It made me sad.

Then, the following Sunday I opened up the Register opinion section again and found a flood of  responses to English countering and rebuking his editorial.  According to the editor’s note the Register received many responses to the essay and not a single one of them was in support of English’s views.

Iowans, I am proud of you!

 

A different kind of sexuality in video games

This post was inspired in part by a post found on gamecritics.com called “Man vs. Man: Kanji Tatsumi’s sexuality in Persona 4“.

Recently I began replaying one of my favorite games of all time, Persona 4, and I was reminded that there is one character in the game that I always found particularly compelling and interesting.  That character is Kanji Tatsumi.

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, the underlying theme of Persona 4’s story is what happens when people are forced to confront the parts of themselves that they had alway denied (and seeing it physically personified before them).  For Kanji this lead to facing the personification of his sexual doubt:

I found it compelling not only because Kanji had to struggle to come to terms with his inner feelings but that the game also suggested that it was the societal assumptions about masculine and feminine traits that made it such a difficult shadow to face.  This shadow was not only the way Kanji view the self he was denying but also how he believed society viewed him. Thus why he felt it had to be hidden.

If you’ve been reading here a while you’ll remember that I recently wrote advocating a Christian acceptance of homosexuality.  In that post I suggested that homosexuals are one of the most oppressed people groups in our society today and that our forcing homosexual people to remain closeted is not only wrong but dangerous.  I think this game may suggest a similar message.

Video games these days are often accused of being hyper-sexualized and juvenile so it is very encouraging to see an example of my art-form of choice  that can approach something as complex as sexuality is such a thoughtful and candid way.  Perhaps we will see more like this in the future.

 

Calming

Authors Don Miller and Karen Zacharias are helping to stem my anger at Pat Robertson:

Regardless, Robertson’s comments further divide people of faith from, well, people of faith. I don’t want to debate the theological ramifications of Robertson’s statements, I only want to point out some perspectives that ease my anger, and instead, cause me to pity him. I consider this a more mature response than I would have had a few years ago. Here are a few perspectives that, hopefully, will keep you from throwing a stapler through a wall.

- Don Miller at Relevant Magazine

Like most television evangelists, Robertson preaches the “Law of Reciprocity” – give money to God and he’s going to give it back to you ten times over.  Embedded in this theology, however, is the misguided belief that material goodies come our way because we’ve been faithful to God. And if bad things are happening? Then, we need to straighten up, fly right and return to God.

What Robertson has done in the name of Jesus is deplorable. But perhaps even more troubling is the insidious ways in which all of us continue to buy into this notion that God loves Americans best and that we are the people who honor him most, which is why we are so rich, so beautiful, so smart and so immune to the sorts of disasters decimating other “pagan” people.

- Karen Zacharias at Burnside Writers Collective

I’m still upset about it but I’ve gained a bit more perspective now.

 

Blog Spotlight #2

It is time for number two in my blog spotlight series.  Today I’d like to introduce you to Susan (or Susie as she recently became).  Susan’s blog, “A Slice of My Life”, is exactly what it sounds like.  It is simply stories from the lives of Susan and her family. From stories of impending empty-nesting to stories of odd things that happen early in the morning this blog manages to be both touching and hilarious.

Visit Susan here and say Hi while you’re over there.

 

Angry

Pat Robertson (and people in a similar position) makes me angry.  He makes me fighting angry.  He makes me angry because it seems like no matter how hard I work to try and change the way Christianity is preconceived and represent it faithfully little stupid comments can instantly tear all that work down.  It makes me feel like I’m trying to turn back the tide with a bucket.

If you haven’t heard I am referring Robertson’s recent comments concerning the tragedy in Haiti.  Burnside Writers Collective said it better than I can:

I do not want to share the name “Christian” with someone who sins so recklessly and flagrantly against thousands of suffering people on national television.

It’s time for moderate to liberal Evangelicals get angry out loud. We are called to love, but we are also called to justice. We are called to discernment. I am tired of people telling me not to be judgmental when I decry the presence of evil in the Body of Christ. Just once, I’d like to toss the disclaimer about this being my opinion and respecting everyone’s perspective, etc. That’s usually appropriate, but not this time.

Can we get angry together now?

 

Blog Spotlight #1

I have not had a whole lot to say on here lately but at the same time I didn’t want to let the blog fall into disuse like I have in the past.  With that in mind I decided to finally get around to doing a series I had had in mind for some time now.

I would like to take some time to introduce you to other bloggers that I think are the cream of the crop and you should check out.  Today I’d like to introduce you to Thee Brouhaha.

Thee Brouhaha is written by someone who, like me, is a lover of storytelling.  On his blog he goes in depth in exploring and critiquing storytelling and design in everything from movies to anime to video games.  With humor and intelligence, Thee Brouhaha is a top notch blog.

 

Merry Christmas (for real this time)

Merry Christmas to all.  I really do still love this holiday.

 

The Meaning of Christmas (not really).

Merry Christmas to you and yours from someone who had to work retail this month.

 

“We come late; late, we come”

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.  When the Spirit of truth comes, that Spirit will guide you into all the truth.  For the Spirit will not speak independently but will speak whatever the Spirit hears and will declare to you the things that are to come.  This Spirit will glorify me by taking what is mine and declaring it to you.  All that God has is mine.  For this reason I said that the Spirit will take what is mine and declare it to you.”

- John 16:12-15

Anyone who has been around here for a while will know that I have become a rather outspoken advocate for the civil rights of homosexuals.  It is something I have become increasingly passionate about over the years but until recently I have remained undecided on the actual morality of homosexuality.

Unsatisfied with this indecision I plunged myself into digging up the truth of the matter and this is the conclusion I have come to:  Homosexuality is neither wrong nor immoral.  Instead it is natural and should not only be accepted within the Christian community but even celebrated.  Let me elaborate how I came to this conclusion.

The biggest issue that had to be tackled was finding out exactly what the Bible had to say about homosexuality.  I found that it actually said surprisingly little.  Throughout the Bible there are seven references to homosexual behavior, four in the Old Testament and Three in the New Testament.

The most common references come in Genesis 19 in the story of the destruction of Sodom.  In this story the men of Sodom demand that Lot bring out the two messengers that had come to him so that they could have their way with them.  In the ancient world it was common practice for male rape to occur as a way of humiliating the victim and demonstrating the power of conquering men.  Rape then, just as it does today, has little to do with sexuality and everything to do with exerting power.

Furthermore, the Bible never gives homosexual behavior as a reason for Sodom’s destruction.  Instead we are told that their sin was of pride, gluttony, oppression and complacency.  This is what the prophet Ezekiel said: “This was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy. They were haughty and did abominable things before me” (16:49-50).  Why, if the Bible takes so little note of Sodom’s supposed homosexual practices, do we obsess over it so much?

The second set of texts in the Old Testament mentioning homosexual behavior is found in Lev. 18:22 and 20:13.  These are where the term ‘abomination’ is used in conjunction with homosexual behavior.  It is important to note, though, that the word ‘abomination’ here is not a moral or ethical term.  Instead it is a term that is used to describe a breach of purity law.  Likewise, other ‘abominations’ in Leviticus were eating pork, misusing incense, and sex during menstruation.  In other words, this is among the purity code that not even the most fundamental of Christians recognize as applicable today and was effectively discontinued with the coming of Christ (see Paul’s letter to the Galatians).  If we are to use this to condemn homosexuality then we become either become ‘selective literalist’ or we wish to bind ourselves once again to the whole of Old Testament law.

What we are left with, then, are the three references in the New Testament which all occur in the Pauline letters (the Gospels are utterly silent on the issue).  Two of these passages (1 Cor. 6:9-10 and 1 Tim. 1:9-10) mention “Sodomites” and “the lawless and disobedient”.  However, strong evidence suggests that these are a reference to pederasty—the sexual or economic exploitation of children—and not to homosexuality.  That leaves us with Romans 1:26-27 as the main point of discussion.  The passage reads as follows:

“For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions.  Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another.  Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error.”

The main thrust of Paul’s argument here is that these people were acting in an unnatural manner.  In other words, Paul believed these people to be heterosexuals who were “giving up” their natural sexuality for unnatural.  Paul would have believed every person to be inherently straight and would have had no concept of homosexual orientation.  For Paul these people were rebelling against there own natures.

Over the last several decades much time has been devoted to discovering why homosexuals are homosexuals.  By and large evidence has shown that homosexuality is a predetermined trait that has little to nothing to do with upbringing or environment.  Homosexual traits have been found to occur more commonly in close relations of homosexuals (suggesting a genetic cause), the percentage of the population with homosexual traits has stayed consistent over the years (debunking the notion of gay recruiting), and the traits can’t be unlearned (as many failed ‘ex-gay’ programs can attest).  As we grow to understand more about sexual orientation we are finding that heterosexuality is not the only orientation that nature provides us with.  While the majority is naturally heterosexual there is a minority who are just as naturally homosexual.

While the Bible says precious little about sexual orientation there is one thing that is repeated continually throughout the whole of Scripture and is beyond any dispute of interpretation.  I speak of the Biblical mandate that every Christian has to care for and defend the poor, the oppressed, and the ‘least of these’.  In our world today there are few groups more oppressed than the homosexual community.  What is worse is that for years the church has not only allowed this oppression but led it.  Our sin is the same as Sodom’s.

I have come to realize that this is not simply an issue of morality.  It is an issue of life and death importance.  In our society we see that homosexuals are not only ostracized, segregated, mocked, and despised but sometimes even murdered or driven to depression and suicide simply because of the way they were made.  Much like with slavery and the civil rights movement the Church is late in fulfilling her duty but late is better than never.  As Eugene Carson Blake once said, “We come late; late, we come.”

As with many issues, I can’t claim to have all the answers but the stakes are too high to sit on the sidelines anymore.  For when I am wrong, may the Lord forgive me but for now I will echo the words of Bishop Paul Egertson: “Each of us will place our own bet and take responsibility for the outcome. . . We would rather err on the side of helping hurting people than on the side of hurting helpless people.  Lord, have mercy upon us!”