Some of the most powerful scenes in the Iliad are the Aristeia setpieces in Books V, VIII, XVI and XXI. In these sequences a lone character, divinely inspired, rampages across the battlefield killing everyone who gets in his way. It is precisely such sequences that form the battle system—in many ways the core of the gaming experience—in a modern RPG. Through an examination of the Homeric assumptions of RPG universes, and a consideration of the ways in which some players ‘break the game’ by playing self-consciously pacifist characters, I hope to shed light on the aesthetics of slaughter and the enduring cultural significance of the aristocratic warrior hero.

Although this is just the muse of an idea, I really like it. A paper like this could be very interesting.

Nakano arcade with fighting game tournaments.

“Darkness will destroy you” is not an especially complicated theme to convey. The entire sequence also seems inescapably taken from The Empire Strikes Back, so I don’t want to oversell the cleverness on display here. But what makes the sequence worth discussing is that most of it is conveyed through gameplay, even in this very simplified system. Your battle decisions on a strategic level also make sense thematically. Mike, he knows his games.