Latest posts of: Nillo

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We all love Dark Soul's addictive gameplay, the cool bosses and the unforgiving mechanics. But there is something more that keeps us coming back, and has spawned countless discussions on lore: The atmosphere, as in design of the world, backstory, behaviour of NPCs etc. To me, at least, DS seemed like one of these waking dreams (where you're almost awake and only realise you are sleeping because things are subtly, but definitely, off). Some examples of what I mean:

Every NPC behaves as if he has some form of mental damage. "Kekeke", "I am simply crestfallen", "if only I could be so grossly incandescent!", "and so the lass weeps in solitude...". NO-ONE speaks like this. If you combine that with the fake-old English, you pretty much have psycho horror dialogue (think "Jacob's ladder" or similar).
Lordran (and Londo) consist mainly of battlements and spires. Look around at Firelink Shrine. You will see circle-segment battlements stretch out half to the horizon. IN FRONT of the Undead Parish walls. Which are IN FRONT of the Anor Londo walls. Defending against what or whom? Where are the markets? Where are the "normal" houses (except for like ONE place in Undead Burgh)? Before the Undead Curse, did Anor Londo lose like 100 citizens each day to treacherous (and pointless) walkways? There is no rhyme or reason to ANY of the architecture, except that (again dreamlike) it evokes middle-aged themes without ACTUALLY resembling it. It's like somebody turned a castle alive, and told it to mutate.
There is no redemption in the story. No-one is "good", or actually "evil" for that matter. Yes, you could ARGUE that invaders are evil, but are they really? After all, they obey a God/ primordial serpent (Nito/ Kaathe) just as the Sunbros obey Gwyn. Who is arguably not a good character in the story. And is it really "evil" to end Gwyndolin's charade? Better to serve him or the mirage of his sister? Seldom has there been a game with such a lack of "moral compass" to allow you to be "bad guy" or "good guy". In Dark Souls, you just... are. You server some or no masters, you have your own agenda, but nothing you do is inherently "good". This is also exemplified by the game killing off seeminlgy "good" characters with wild abandon. The nice "guv'nor" Pyromancer has to die WHY? Not enough that that chick got stuck in the tombs, she also gets KILLED afterwards? The likely son of Gwyn seeks his own "sun", finds a parasite, goes ape and you have to KILL him after all your history? WTF? It seems that the age-old formula that good behaviour by NPCs is usually rewarded with their life (unless you need drama) is completely inverted. The ruthless and cruel survive (unless you decide to kill them), there is no justice for anyone in the story.

So why does DS have this unique feel and take on the genre? Because the authors of the game are not Christian (in the cultural sense, not talking about faith here).
"WHAT" I hear you say, dear reader, "does RELIGION have to do with this?". Well, everything really, at least if we're talking about the genre of fantasy (which DS arguably belongs to). First let's take a step back and look at the history of modern fantasy, using two examples: LOTR, and Michael Moorcock's "Elric of Melnibone" / eternal champion (kudos if you know the last). We will additionally look at one contemporary game that is in many ways the polar opposite of DS, namely "Skyrim".
LOTR, as is quite apparent, is a highly Christian text (to the point of retelling a version of the Christian creation myth in the Simarillion, including fallen angels, fallible mortals, sin, and redemption). There is never a shred of doubt who the "good" and who the "bad" guys are, and though some characters are "gray" (like Gollum) on the whole we know whom to root for. This isn't even necessarily Tolkien rooting for Christianity, it is just a feature of most European literature up to some point- even if it tackled tricky (earthly) morale, the dichotomy (notice the word) between light and dark, good and evil, righteous and depraved can be found in most works (compare e.g. Goethe's "Faust" which, while being modern in the way that it treats its characters' sensibilities, is framed by a bet between God and Satan). Whether we acknowledge it or not, this way of thinking is so deeply ingrained in our culture that films which let the "bad" guy win are usually quite a hard sell (unless the guy isn't really "bad", see Leon the Professional or even Captain Malcolm Reynolds). Western audiences essentially like morality tales.
"Hold on", you will say, "what about the D&D alignment bit (lawful vs. chaotic, good vs. evil)?". And you would be right, since the whole point of the alignment system is to avoid "morality-tale" type of stories, by letting chaos fight order (first done by the remarkable Michael Moorcock with his deliberate anti-hero Elric- who is weak, ugly, cowardish, only looking for his own gain, and as a recurring theme sacrificing everyone he loves to his soul-devouring sword). Yet as so often when you try to rebel against something long-ingrained, you can see the original in the caricature, and so Elric is so over-the-top despicable that the intent becomes quite clear. Additionally, Moorcock's successors were not as radical: Gary Gygax DID introduce chaos vs. order, but DID keep good vs. evil (giving you nine possible alignments), which is arguably a mix between the rigidly Christian LOTR and the rigidly anti-Christian Elric.
A good example for this mix would be the game "Skyrim": Yes, there is a great deal of ambiguity (rebels vs. imperials), but NO-ONE doubts that that one dragon is an asshole, that some Daedra are more good than others (Kyne vs. Molag Baal) etc. So the most contemporary tack of fantasy is this mixture (to a degree you find the same mix of ambiguity vs. straight-up morality tale in e.g. "Game of Thrones").
Enter FROM software, and its Japanese developers. Japan, apart from some attempts by the Portugese, has never been christianized, and historically prevailing ideologies were a version of Confucianism (obedience to lord, village and family, in that order) and Shinto (Japanese ghost world, compare e.g. ghosts from "The Ring" or "The Grudge"- unstoppable, amoral killing machines that actually SUCCEED.). Neither system has any hints of "divine justice" or "divine moral" (you would not expect the lord you serve to be of high moral integrity, as the "god king" doctrine in Europe implied)- you WOULD obey a cruel order, because obedience is most important. On the other hand, you couldn't care less about people's sexual activities, because there is no divine taboo on that, either. It follows that in many tales, it is not the "morally good" heroes that end up winning, but those heroes that display courage and initiative (satisfying a desire not for justice to win, but for someone to break free from the bonds of servitude and do as they please- compare to Kung Fu heroes in China, which fulfil the same function). It also follows that the "support characters" are not neatly stackable into "good" vs "evil", but are just that- characters, with their own agendas, and their own fate.
Now imagine coming from Japan in your youth (as the author of DS did at one point), and travelling to Europe, and seeing all these castles and battlements, and then seeing your first Christian cathedral (which, arguably, are among the most beautiful and awe-inspiring structures ever built), and then letting your fantasy run wild and populating these long-empty places with heroes of your imagination. Dark Souls is the result:
On one hand, "faith" plays a huge role in the game, but not as a morality concept- it is merely a tit-for-tat with a (very human) god, as faith gives you direct power, and serving your god's selfish needs is immediately and materially rewarded. This is much more akin to Shinto (where you would appeal to ancestors for help, or where you might be the plaything of powerful spirits) than of monotheism- yet they still designed everything in DS to invoke a WESTERN style church (including the over-the-top "pardoner", but also the architecture, the clothes, the poses people assume). And then consider the DS creation myth- again, superficially it reads like the usual good vs. evil plot, but not so: Dragons aren't evil in DS, they just represent stasis (vs. fire, which represents change). DS merely tells of ages ending and new ages starting, but no judgement is passed here whether Gwyn and his followers were moral to destroy the dragons. Add to this the very very Japanese NPCs (as in, they generally fill their assigned role with a few exceptions, but still grumble/ are sarcastic about their lot while being utterly fatalistic in accepting that they cannot change it- hence the dark humour), and you begin to understand that DS is, essentially, Western (Christian) Fantasy Fanfiction from a Japanese perspective. It LOOKS like a Western fantasy product, it PLAYS like it, but it ISN'T Western fantasy (hence the eery feeling). All the parts are there, but due to the different cultural background, the authors really do not understand the Western Christian good-vs-evil paradigm sufficiently to turn out a Skyrim-esque Dark Souls.
In fact, playing Dark Souls as a European is probably very, very close to watching "The Last Samurai" as a Japanese. It has the looks, it TRIES to get at Japanese mentality, but it's just not quite there.
In a way, having read much fantasy I believe DS is a beautiful compliment to the genre, and it usually takes someone from the outside looking in to what you're doing for you to truly understand yourself through that outside perspective- much of what makes "Western" fantasy really only occured to me when I was trying to put a finger on why the DS world feels so, well, odd.
If I had any wish, then it would be that someone absolutely prevents FROM from reading this statement, or traveling to Europe again, or in fact doing ANYTHING to rob the creators of their wonderful and quirky view of fantasy- I feel that by being entirely oblivious to the whole Christian angle, this game achieves what Michael Moorcock set out to do with his "Elric"- convincing post-Christian fantasy in a beautiful, surreal, and forever mysterious world.
TL;DR: DS is Western-Christian Fantasy fanfiction from a Japanese Shinto perspective. ...Oh just read the text.