Wired makes the case for more torture in games
If you weren’t sick of this debate already, here’s more.
So this, really, is the problem with World of Warcraft‘s torture sequence. It does not model any consequences. You torture the sorcerer, but nothing particularly comes of it. You just move on to the next quest.
This would be lame in a TV show, but is arguably even lamer in a videogame, because it’s not too hard to imagine all sorts of repercussions that would have been dramatically fascinating while actually enhancing the gameplay.
For example, Lich King maker Blizzard Entertainment could have made the Art of Persuasion quest optional ā but endowed it with some unusually lucrative loot or experience. That would have made it a genuine moral quandary: Should you do a superbad thing for a really desirable result?
— “Why We Need More Torture in Videogames“, Clive Thompson in Wired
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My take on this debacle (?) is that it’s dodging around the issue of authorial endorsement. If I make a movie which portrays torture as a justifiable means to an end, that doesn’t necessarily mean that I personally approve of torture (though I’m sure you’d be hard-pressed to convince many viewers otherwise). With games, this goes a step further; not only do you have to distinguish the game’s content from its creators’ personal views, but you also have to distinguish an avatar’s behavior from its player’s personal views — the player being a secondary author of the game.
Naturally, one can argue that positive portrayal creates endorsement independently of authorial intent, but even unintended endorsement is only as powerful as the audience allows. People can engage in a creative work, accepting its premises temporarily, without any permanent effect; those who can’t do so need to address some mental health issues. To that end, Thompson’s opinion on the torture quest will probably be misunderstood. It’s only a moral quandary in terms of role-playing — “Should my character condone torture?”
Unless Thompson himself actually believes that avatar actions always directly reflect player beliefs, which I really hope isn’t the case.
Cyanix, that’s a pretty good point. People go nuts in games; I would never try to get to level 80 in real life, spend all my time poking walls to find secret doors, so on and so on, but I have definitely done those things in games, because I play to win.
Despite the best efforts of a game designer to produce a moral narrative (if X then Y, etc.), there are definitely going to be players who want the numerically superior ending, whatever that takes. From there, you have the gradual normalization of torture.
PS – Raph, I didn’t comment in the last torture thread because I thought you were serious when you said you were anxious to close the topic š
(I know, I know, I made some assumptions about what choices lead to which endings, also, I spelled Cryanix’s name wrong.)
Despite all that has happened since 9/11, it still amazes me how easy the veneer of civilization and morality disappears from our society once you scratch the surface. As a society, we have agreed upon the idea that mistreating other is a bad thing. We have enacted laws and international treaties to codify this idea. And yet, at the slightest opportunity, we discard this notion and do whatever we feel like. Torture happens in real life, conducted by the “good guys”, and they do this because they can get away with it. And why can they get away with it?
Because torture, as it seems, is considered to be no big deal by parts of the general public. Otherwise, there would not be any discussion about the quest.
There is a place for torture in games, and movies, and so on. As a means of distinguishing the “good guys” from the “bad guys”. Bad guys mistreat people, good guys do not, and our media – tv and movies and, now more than ever, games – should not only support than notion, they should educate our children and youngsters towards this ideal. Judging from the discussion, it is very necessary.
There is moral ambiguity about killing people. For example, there is the concept of self-defense, or the defense of others. That’s why a soldier is not necessarily a murderer – he basically has a choice of killing the other guy, or be killed himself. It’s quite a complex issue. The “World of Warcraft has killing, so torture is okay too” argument just doesn’t have any merit.
However, there is no moral ambiguity in torture. There may be a question of where “torture” ends, and where simple “mistreatment” begins (a street mugging, for example, while a crime in itself, is certainly not torture), but there is no question, EVER, that torture is inhumane – “evil”, if you will. There is no doubt that using the poker to extract information from the NPC in WoW is a depiction of torture.
The problem with Thompson’s idea of making the quest a moral dilemma is, what he’s saying is already in the game. You torture the prisoner, you get to proceed in the quest line and you get gold and XP and good reputation. If you don’t torture, nothing happens – you do not get to proceed, nothing (and it can be a penalty, even, as you’ll lack faction reputation, xp, and maybe the quest count necessary for the Tundra quest achievement). It should be the other way around – if you agree to torture the NPC, you should lose faction reputation and be penalized in other ways.
A moral dilemma could only arise if not torturing the prisoner has noticeable negative effects, not only for the character/player, but for others. “If I torture this guy, I can prevent the destruction of the city, and thousands of deaths – but torture is evil. Do I dare to walk that path?”
World of Warcraft does not support such consequences, as it is a static world (and a virtual one at that). You could of course penalize the player character in some form for not torturing, but then you’ll go even further down the wrong road. Not only would you depict torture as okay, you’d actively encourage it. No, that would not be acceptable.
The quest line could be salvaged – give a greater reward for not torturing, and add a penalty for torturing. Both ways should be effective in solving the quest line. The torture option could be easier than the non-torture option. That way, the player can decide between the easier but evil option, or the morally correct option, which may be less convenient (morally correct choices often are), but which gets positive reinforcement in the end (the greater reward, no penalty).
@Cyranix: Only a subset of players in the game role-play, and of those not all role-play to that extent to make quest decisions based on player character. And in addition to that, you don’t really have a choice beyond “decline quest”, which is, quite frankly, not a meaningful RP option. So the quest must be fixed in an non-RP context as well.
As an aside… I wish we would stop calling them “computer role playing games”, because they are generally not role-playing games anymore than Colossal Cave was.
Raph:
Sanford Levinson published a collection of essays not too long ago simply titled, Torture: A Collection. The contributors to the book include folks such as Ariel Dorfman, who experienced torture firsthand during Pinochet’s reign, and Elaine Scarry, who wrote the book The Body in Pain that Levinson considers the premier argument that torture is evil.
If Dorfman, McCain, and others who have suffered through torture can openly discuss the topic, how can you justify your “squeamishness” (for lack of a less offensive and more appropriate word) about having this discussion? Using phrases like “sick of this debate” doesn’t give me the impression that you’re giving the subject a fair treatment or the attention that such an important topic deserves. Levinson asks, “Why should one take valuable time and expend equally valuable intellectual and emotional energy thinking about torture?” He concludes that torture really is an important and serious topic, that “sweeping condemnation” of torture worldwide makes the case for asking “why?” Why is torture so universally condemned? Levinson continues, arguing that to avoid discussion because torture is “both ugly and evil, and ‘that is all you know and all you need to know'” is tantamount to treating torture as though torture does not exist.
You know I don’t believe that games are art, but I know you do. If you consider yourself a writer, an artist, is it not your role to explore the human condition, for better or worse, through your medium? In the prologue to A Theory of Fun, you write, “And there I was—making games rather than contributing to society. I told him that I did contribute. Games aren’t just a diversion; they’re something valuable and important.” To close your eyes and look away, to admit that your medium is incapable of exploring one of the most sensitive and impactful subjects in human history, seems awfully out-of-character for you—you, who has earned a reputation as not just a game designer but a philosopher, a thinker.
While you’ve communicated that you’d rather not be involved in this debate, the fact that you’ve posted about torture three times in the past week or so indicates that you at least recognize that torture in video games is not trivial. Perhaps now is time to move past the stomach aches into more heady realms?
I kinda took that as being ‘tongue-in-cheek’, myself. I also acknowledge that even the most passionate (maybe even especially the most passionate) of thinkers on deep issues like this can find their emotional tanks empty rather quickly once it picks up steam. Then (for some of us), once we’ve emptied it all out, we go through the long reflection, adjustment of ideas to encompass points of view we were exposed to in the exchange (or creation of nuanced ‘exceptions’, etc). At some point, at least for myself, I have to disengage from the discussion or I’ll simply start into repeating the core principles of my position/understanding.
My issue with this is the often-missed purpose to torture. Those who believe that this activity is intended to produce reliable intelligence are misguided at best. Torture does not return reliable intelligence often enough to warrant the resources invested in it. Torture is a tool for affirming and justifying actions taken retroactively. Torture produces cooperative witnesses to confirm fallacious justifications with incredible success, but is useless for little beyond that. Straingely, it has more in common with blackmail, extortion, and bribery than murder or assault. That torture often produces false intelligence is, in fact, an intended feature! Its victims will confirm the existence of the boogey-men that are, in turn, declared the justification for both the torture itself and possibly other broad agendas. It produces tools for manipulation of public opinion, not intelligence for ‘making the world a safer place’.
I don’t think multiple posts on the same topic can be considered squeamishness. My comments had more to do with frustration over the “it’s just a game” school of responses. Moreover, as you yourself point out, I have written on similar topics plenty in the past — with a fairly consistent take on matters, too, I think.
So I wouldn’t say that I don’t want to be involved in the debate — I think I have been plenty involved, and it is just feeling a tad fruitless. š
@Morgan,
I think Raph meant “sick as in “tired,” not “sick” as in “sick to your stomach”.
Ferum:
In the previous post, Raph wrote at the bottom:
It’s an internet debate, Raph. Everyone’s getting involved. How many people are really reading every thread of discussion? These things never resolve within a year, about 10 months after everyone’s forgotten the discussion and come to their own conclusion.
For myself, I haven’t seen anything interesting in the debate whatsoever, other than some nice perspectives on torture I normally wouldn’t have bothered reading. I like Kerri’s depiction, for instance: how’s that for a game? Increase the morale of your inquisitorial guard by torturing the infidels. Sounds like… Evil Genius! Maniacal cackling comes prepackaged.
Michael Chui:
That phrase is just as bad as “it’s just a game.” We could be sending e-mails back and forth, or *gasp* letters by snail mail. The fact that we’re using the web to communicate is not relevant to the quality of the discussion. People use that phrase to excuse uncritical thinking on their part or others’ parts. Shifting blame to technology makes people feel good.
But I think you meant something else…
This is the song that never ends. It just goes on and on, my friend. R. Bartle started singing it, not knowing what it was, and we’ll continue singing it forever just because.
In general, though, I’ve never heard the phrase used to “refute” any kind of argument. It’s a pejorative description. I’ve had plenty of internet debates that reach an agreeable resolution (more often in one-to-one exchanges than forums, blogs, or even cross-site debates), but it’s not common. People usually just get tired and let it drop, which is what happens in realtime, colocated face-to-face, too.
But when was the last time a flash mob developed over a vaguely intellectual question like, “Is torture in games bad?” in real life, anyways? 1700?
The nature of the internet is that you can’t put down a debate once it gathers momentum. Years from now, you’re still going to have gamer conspiracy theorists muttering that Richard is out to get them. (And I’m being non-specific to dodge Google searches in the future; how paranoid is that?) Someone build a game to teach them not to do that; consider it a challenge.
What I find a bit hyprocritical in the torture design of that WOW quest ( at least what I understood about it from what I read) is that it kinda reverses the real life situation and “washes” bad conscience in regard to torture. In real life, the torture “need” of the democratic society had been “outsourced” by societies in which torture is “legal”. In the game however, you are in the role of the outsource service. You aren’t the one in “need” for torture. You do it for a profit. The victim doesn’t matter really. You don’t even care if it’s guilty or not. It’s business.
To come to Thompsons point: Is this really “good” torture design? Is it really an attempt to meaningfully cover the subject of torture and make us face it as a moral problem? I think in this WoW case, my answer is no. I don’t think this setting really contributes to question torture. To me, it seems like it helps to play down the way in which torture has been used in the “war against terrorism”? I somehow feel that in the context of guantanamo and abu ghraib it just says: “Look, we’ve hired some guys to do the dirty job for us, and heh, you see now, it’s not as dirty as you thought, it just hurts a bit, but is soon forgotten. And the sorcerer is an ass anyway, do you really worry about him? So just take the money and do it.”
Now I hope that this is just the first node of an act which hasn’t been fully played out yet. But if left like this, I think it only normalizes torture.
My question is: Do you think that this approach to the torture problem is the result of “torture as a selling point”?
It seems to me (though he can surely correct me if I’m wrong) that article echoes Bartle’s objection to the quest; torture in a game is fine as long as it’s given proper weight. As it stands, however, it draws too much attention to itself as something that doesn’t fit quite right.
Has anyone else noticed that by putting in a torture quest WOW freely receives millions of dollars worth of advertising?
Brookston>Has anyone else noticed that by putting in a torture quest WOW freely receives millions of dollars worth of advertising?
By that logic, the rape quest can’t be far behind…
Richard
“Torture does not return reliable intelligence often enough to warrant the resources invested in it.”
Are you guys all CIA torture experts or something? I hear many of you repeat this theme. How do you know it’s true? I have an idea why many of you say this but I just thought I’d put the question to you – without answering it. Maybe you should question your sources?
Does that mean I think torture is good? Hell no. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t work. I’m not saying it works though either. Just that you should figure out why you are treating certain statements as fact.
Sanz:
You can find many quotes by experts — you know, the experts who are trained in interrogation by the intelligence community — in articles published by the New York Times, AP, Time, etc., over the last couple of decades. You can also find several books on the subject, too. We’re not talking out of our asses here.
I have a friend or two trained in interrogating prisoners by the U.S. Army. Their basic response to this debate echoed that exact claim, with many elaborations on how they would prefer to extract information and how they’d make an interesting sub-game out of it.
Michael Chui:
…and both the U.S. Army Field Manual and the HUMINT Collector Operations Field Manual, which overrides the former, state:
“Experience indicates that the use of force is not necessary to gain the cooperation of sources for interrogation. Therefore, the use of force is a poor technique, as it yields unreliable results, may damage subsequent collection efforts, and can induce the source to say whatever he thinks the interrogator wants to hear.”
Other field manuals for armed services around the world probably state something similar, but I haven’t taken the time to see if those manuals are declassified.
A quick search with Google for keywords “torture ineffective” brought up a video on YouTube of an interview with William Colby, who was Director of Central Intelligence during the 1970s, who also discusses the ineffectiveness of torture.