By Joel Cormode

Hi. I’m Joel Furches, creater and writer of Secrets of the Universe.
What you are about to read is an article written by one of
the few people who I’ve met that both share my name and that I like. Joel and I share more than just a first name. Apparently
we look alike, and have a similar personality. Certainly we share similar interests. By his own admission, people have mistaken
him for me. Anyway, enough of MY talk, listen to this guy… he’s good.

I’ve been thinking about this for some time and have considered putting pen to paper (as it were) for some time as well.

The attraction of Evil is something I first approached from the perspective of gaming. Specifically role-playing games and the
computer equivalent of RPG’s.
I’ve noticed over the course of many years, many games and much pizza, that there is a strong attraction among gamers
towards Evil. In games which make use of an alignment system of some kind, players are often interested in making characters
which fall in the evil category. Likewise in computer RPG’s my gaming friends tell me that they often choose to play characters
which fall into the evil camp as well. Most telling to me is that in computer games such as NeverWinter Nights which track a
player’s actions and assign alignment points accordingly, many of my friends tell me that by the end of the game their characters
are tagged as ‘evil’.
Conversely in most of the RPG’s I have played, the game is set up in such a way that encourages the players to select the good
axis and discourages the choice of the evil axis. This can take the form of a computer game that pits the player against evil foes
and provides good allies or it can be as direct as a Game Master saying to players “no evil characters”.

The question therefore in my mind has been “what is the attraction of evil?” It is a pull which I do not understand. (For the record,
every time I’ve played an alignment tracking game such as NeverWinter Nights I have always ended the game as Lawful Good or
its equivalent.) The attraction of evil is a foreign pull to me. So I’ve investigated this attraction. Sometimes by direct questioning,
sometimes by other less obvious methods.
From direct questioning a few reasons immediately popped out as to why people choose to play evil characters/forces in games.

1. “Evil characters are more interesting to role-play.”
2. “The evil guys have cooler (insert that which is cooler here).”
3. “Its a game, so I can do things which I never would in reality.”
4. “Its a game. Why do you ask dumb questions?”

Okay, that last one isn’t so much a reason as a dodge of the question. But it came up a lot.
The converse was also interesting. The number one reason given for limiting players to good aligned characters was:
“It is more of a challenge for the players if they have to be good”.

Direct questioning did not produce anything more meaningful than what my own fevered imagination had already come up with.  It was time for more subtle methods, which I will not go into here.

The principal conclusion that I came to is this.  Gamers perceive that a Good alignment limits their options, choices, and behaviors.   This limitation is typically seen as a hindrance to doing what the gamer wants to do (ask a D&D player about the perceived  frustrations of playing a 'lawful stupid' paladin).  Evil on the other hand is seen as not placing such limitations on the gamer's in-game behavior and actions.   For that exact same reason Game Masters disallow evil characters.  Running an 'evil' game is much more of a headache than running  a 'good' game. In effect gamers are adhering the idea of 'the will to power' proposed by Nietzsche or the idea written by Machiavelli in "the Prince"  that a ruler must be willing to do the most despicable things in order to succeed.

The principal issue is therefore shown to be that players (and I will extrapolate this outside of gaming to people in general) dislike  having limits placed on their behavior, choices and actions.  Not exactly a revelation from God is it?  Even so it is profound.  Evil  is seen as choosing freedom and Good as choosing self-confinement.   Some will argue that in fact, in those games that allow it, neutral is the best choice for absolute freedom of action.  I do not believe  that neutrality between Good and Evil is possible regardless of what the game writers say.  Therefore neutrality does not enter into  the discussion.

The second conclusion that I came to is that gamers perceive Evil as being more powerful than Good.

This immediately leads me to the next questions.  Is this perception valid?  Is evil more free than good?  Is the dark side really stronger?

I will argue that the opposite is true.  Evil can indeed appear more free and more powerful.  It is the course of action which intends to  produce the most amount of self gratification at the least personal cost.  Gamers are by their nature min/maxers.  This too is a general  human trait. 

That argument will have to wait for another day.  My thoughts are insufficiently marshaled at this time.  I will leave you with this thought  however.  The core of any discipline is self-denial.  Self denial is the antithesis of evil.

Joel

This entry was posted on Friday, April 30th, 2004 at 11:51 pm and is filed under Comics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.