(WARNING: The following post contains
spoilers pertaining to the game Dishonored and
its DLC episodes.)
There comes a moment at the end of the
game Dishonored—or, more
accurately, at the end of the DLC episode The Witches of
Brigmore—when the player
uncovers a nefarious plot involving a powerful witch named Delilah
and her attempt to usurp the imperial throne. By way of some arcane
ritual, Delilah has discovered a way to transform any painted canvas
into a kind of magical portal, allowing her to possess the physical
form of its real-life subject—in this case, the young Empress Emily
Kaldwin. By assuming control of the empress (think of it as a
bloodless coup in which no one, save for the members of her loyal
coven, will ever be the wiser of it ever occurring) she will direct
the fate of the empire.
The added
significance of this event has to do with the fact that Emily's
mother, the former Empress Jessamine Kaldwin, has recently died at
the hands of the deadly assassin known as Daud—who also happens to
be the player character for this particular episode. Thus, by saving
the daughter from a fate perhaps as grim as death, Daud has a chance
to find a measure of redemption for murdering the mother.
At first I was kind
of impressed by the game's mysterious turn of events. It seemed like
both a clever and unexpected way in which to expand upon the story of
the main game (in which the player assumes the role of an entirely
different character), delving further into the saga of Dunwall—a
place where even the lowliest members of society may be scheming and
conspiring to "reign in hell," so to speak.
Then, after I gave
the whole thing slightly more thought, I realized it was also kind of
preposterous.
First of all, how
the hell does something like that actually work? I'm talking about a
magic ritual that lets you turn an ordinary painting into your very
own John Malkovich possession tunnel. Does the painting have to be
any good for the ritual to work? What happens to the consciousness of
the possessed victim? Is the soul of the victim essentially banished
or does it coexist with the usurper, helpless to enact its own will
at the hands of their new puppet master? What happens to the
possessor when the targeted victim dies?
I
could generate an endless list of questions and it wouldn't really
matter, because these aren't the sorts of questions the game intends
to answer. This magic ritual exists not so much for the
purpose of metaphorical insight—nor to be explored in any matter of
depth as a hypothetical reality. It exists primarily because the game
says it does, because it makes for an exciting, high-stakes finale.
If it comes off as brilliant writing, it's because its brilliance
lies in the fact that it so deftly obscures its own imaginative
effortlessness. You forget the writer is literally
making up whatever flimsy rules they can think of in order to wrap up
some neat little plot. It's the same type of storytelling that makes
an episode of Dr. Who so
mindlessly enjoyable. The fictionalized universe becomes a
never-ending Mary Poppins bag full of narrative tricks and
pseudo-scientific non-explanations for the way things work.
Then I had another
thought. Despite all of this, isn't it nevertheless interesting how
the player already mimics what the character Delilah is attempting to
do? Consider a few of the written passages from the game, including
this brief excerpt from one of Delilah's hand-written notes:
"Once young Emily assumes the throne I'll already be looking out of those brown eyes."
And here's this
partial entry from Delilah's journal:
"Now that the painting is finished, I will sit in young Emily's skin and wear her face like a mummer's mask. Havelock and his lickspittles will put the child on the throne, but it is ME they will be crowning. Delilah."
In a
sense, isn't this the same kind of virtual immersion the player is
intended to feel by the very act of playing Dishonored—or
any other number of first-person perspective games? Only instead of
an enchanted painting to make this immersion possible, we have a
computer simulation. Instead of inhabiting the flesh of the targeted
individual and peering directly through their eye sockets, we rely on
the mediation of a game controller and television monitor. It's not
really Corvo (the protagonist of the main game) or Daud wandering
through the fictional city of Dunwall. It's us—or at least some
hybrid creation of us and the simulated other. Whether Corvo dons his
mechanical mask or not, whether he's mingling with a bunch of
aristocrats at a masquerade ball or sharing drinks with his fellow
co-conspirators at The Hounds Pit Pub, this is perhaps the greatest
trick and conspiracy of all.
At any rate, this is about where my train of thought hits a dead end.
