Another Molyneaux interview - Religion in Games

[heruamon]

This subject is so touchy, and will get you LOTS of airtime on Foxynews in a heartbeat...and not in a nice way.  I can't wait for Fable 3, and to see how this is implemented ino the game.  If you're overthrowing the ruler, can you then impose social changes as well, such as religion?  I really hope they provide a strategic aspect to the game to build your empire...so instead of a rpg, you're in a life simulator!

http://www.gamespy.com/articles/106/1066775p1.html

GameSpy: Irrational Games' Ken Levine recently suggested to us that religion is the proverbial "third rail" of game design, and that it's an area where the payback for the risk of offending someone is too small. Do you agree?

Peter Molyneux: Religion is one of those things where -- if you're specific about it, and you start referencing real religions around the world -- you're going to get yourself into a mountain of trouble. There cannot be a hotter potato than that hot potato. You have to be very, very careful. The thing that has fascinated me is not about religion as such -- this god or that god or this structure or that structure -- it's the human need for belief; what belief as a cultural force has done, and what it does do. I find that fascinating. And you can deal with that without offending anybody. It's a much more generic thing.

But I think if you get specific -- if I talk about Christianity or Hindu or Taoism or whatever religion it is -- you're going to offend someone. You'll either offend someone through your ignorance, or you will offend someone through your irreverence.

It's one of those issues where you just avoid it completely. I think that's true of games of all cultures. There are some examples of games that have specific religious points in them -- we still look to things like the Spanish Inquisition in our dramas, but I still think it's something to be avoided.

What's so interesting, especially in today's world -- and this is a purely philosophical point -- is that belief is much more diversified into different areas of our lives. Up until 50 years ago, belief was very focused on religion and religious structure wherever you were in the world. Now, belief is much more diversified into different areas of life. Some people would turn around and say "Hey, the whole structure of capitalism is based on belief, and actually, the whole of the credit crunch and the recession is actually because of a failure of that belief." I think human beings desperately crave and need belief in something; that's a very interesting mechanic in itself. The converse of that, of course, is that if you are the focus of belief -- I know its ridiculous, but if you look at how we all feel about Tiger Woods now, and how we feel about [President Barack] Obama now, we had this cultural belief where there was nothing they could do wrong. That's a very interesting emotional change in state, how fragile that belief structure is. I think that's a very interesting thing to explore, especially when you're trying to make a player feel powerful, but responsible.

In Fable III, the whole premise is really that you are going to overthrow this tyrannical ruler, and you are going to become king. And you have to get people to believe in you and follow you. I'm not saying that's religion, but there's that same need for belief, and that same need to be believed in. That's my fascination with it.

There is a political correctness that has crept into entertainment, where we are hypersensitive about offending people, and about saying the wrong thing. There's a reservation in today's world about offending anybody. Of course, especially with the war on terror -- the Taliban, everything to do with the Middle East. It makes [everyone] hypersensitive. While the world is in this state -- and who knows if it's a transient state -- [only] a very brave person who would go out there and specifically do something that has religious overtones or is in any way judgmental. You think about Monty Python -- they were doing some quite hard stuff; they hammered religion. A lot of their irreverence was specifically about the formal nature of religion. But in today's world, [that's] unthinkable, really.