Gaming
doesn’t normally make the front pages of the Mumbai Mirror. In fact, in the Indian media, the
existence of serious gaming is rarely acknowledged at all, and this is
something I am rather grateful for. After all, if the quality of movie
reviewing is anything to go by, I would hate to read anything by them on Skyrim or GTA.
But the few
paragraphs in the Mirror today were not about gaming. They were
about that fundamental right that India seems to be forgetting it has in rather
a hurry – the freedom of speech.
EA, one of
the biggest, if not the biggest game distributor in the
world, chose to not release it’s marquee game of the season, Dragon Age:
Inquisition in India, due to
fears (an euphemism, obviously, for arm-twisting by officialdom) of falling
afoul of India’s obscenity laws.
But what
exactly about the game is it that EA fears would offend India’s notoriously
thin-skinned sensibilities? Apparently, the existence of a gay character in the
game is what’s to blame.
Ah, India
and it’s sensibilities. Gays don’t really exist in "Indian culture", you know. Our
so-called ‘culture’ is somehow simultaneously the best in the world, the
oldest, the holiest, the vibrant-est (and all those other superlatives that my
vocabulary falls short of adding here), and also the most prone to destruction
by things we say, read, wear and do.
And so
there won’t be any legal way for me, and such other gamers as exist in India,
to play the much-anticipated follow-up to Dragon Age: Origins and Dragon Age II.
The first
of these was, quite simply, brilliant. DA:O managed to take a clichéd story and
tell it so well that we fell in love with medieval RPG’s all over again. Witty, self-deprecating Alistair and acerbic, arrogant Morrigan, maternal but fiesty Wynne and stranger-in-a-strange land Sten, even the OTT bi-sexuals Zevran and
Leliana were strongly-written, each with a personality well beyond
just being the support cast for the player character. And the player character
– well, the ‘Origins’ in the title was there for a reason, allowing you to
choose from six possible origin stories to make the whole game your own
personal redemption arc. It had the lost prince, the Kingdom at war, the Big
Bad, in short, all the stereotypes, and mixed them into a stew that made for a
game that swept awards across the board and was a commercial monster success.
Dragon Age
II suffered
from one shortcoming – it was the successor to Dragon Age: Origins. The developers dared to do
something different – DA:2 did things differently – the graphics
were not just better, they were different, the
storyline was very different, with a pre-defined character known as Hawke…and
not all the things they did differently were good. But they still got their
characters right. Varric the story-teller dwarf, Isabella the promiscuous pirate,
Merill the sweet abomination, Ser Aveline the gender-stereotype-busting Knight,
Anders the bisexual militant – the game still did a great job of making their
characters believable, relatable characters. It had a braver story too,
eschewing a conventional good vs evil narrative to make Hawke essentially a
pragmatist, forced to choose sides between factions and fated to see the
consequences of his/her (you get to choose whether you play a male or female
version) choices pan out, often tragically. I’ve said before that DA:2 suffered from not being it’s
predecessor, and perhaps that’s part of the reason it didn’t win as many awards
as DA:O, but it still did
well commercially and was reviewed positively.
Both games
did a brilliant job of showing the underlying politics behind the combat, the
ideologies behind the battles. The scene is set superbly for the expected third
and final installment of the series as well – the game that we are fated not to
see on these shores, and why – because it has one gay character? If Zevran and Leliana
were fine, if Anders passed muster, what’s the deal here? However much we
rationalize it, it's going to come down to a Government that thinks it's people
are incapable of rational thought, or fears what will happen if they do become
capable of it.
Oh, I
suppose there’s an argument to be made that there is no explicit ban on the
game, and that this is a simple case of the distributer not wanting to end up
in the situation
faced by the publishers of Wendy Doniger’s books.
The thing
is, why should such a fear hang over companies at all? A game is a
discretionary purchase, something that we can choose to buy or not buy. If the
existence of a homosexual character offends you, don’t buy the bloody game.
After all
it’s not someone’s “Mann ki Baat” being forced down your throat whether you
like it or not.
Real life's moved on, you know. Games are art, Homosexuality is a reality and not a crime (whatever the ancient men in wigs sitting at Tilak Marg, New Delhi have to say about it). And it's high time we realised that a 'development agenda' cannot be pursued at the cost of becoming a nanny state.
As for me,
I’d appreciate anyone helping me out with using a VPN so I can buy the game
legally on Steam or something.
 |
| When in doubt, ask yourself - "What would Morrigan do?" |
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me
- Martin Niemoller
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me
- Martin Niemoller
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