It is interesting to see how many video games deal with stories that are mythological or legendary in nature, as opposed to creating a realistic, complex plot in the same way that a novel or a film might.

If we look at video games as diverse as Patapon, God of War, Age of Mythology, Grim Fandango, Age of Conan, Final Fantasy, and Viking: Battle for Asgard we can see obvious mythological aspects. However, even the less obvious games set themselves up in a mythological framework, as opposed to a plot-driven framework.

There is no easy way to define a ‘myth’ in opposition to a ‘story’ or a ‘plot’, since all these words overlap to an extent. For the sake of this article, we will say that a myth we’ll use the OED definition:

A traditional story, typically involving supernatural beings or forces or creatures, which embodies and provides an explanation, aetiology, or justification for something such as the early history of a society, a religious belief or ritual, or a natural phenomenon

What is the link between myth and video game? Well, firstly, myths deal with large themes, tend to make use of symbolism and metaphor above realism and character, and have greater room for implausibility. Central characters in video games tend to be larger than life, but faceless. Someone like Link, for example, travels through time and space, deals with large scale ‘Evil with a capital E’ and works with powerful beings such as the Princess and the Ocean King. But he never says a word for himself. We never get a true feeling for him as a personality or an individual. We never experience the day-to-day minutiae of his life.

In addition, ethics within myths and games are often questionable. A hero can kill several thousand people, guards, creatures or monsters on the path of his quest, and it is of no consequence. If the ‘Evil’ sets fire to a village or razes a forest to the ground, however, it becomes yet another reason to exact revenge or restore the status quo.

Despite being implausible in terms of plot, myths usually carry the sense of a greater ‘truth’ within them. This is driven by the concern with overarching themes of creation, destruction, social order and ritual. If we look at some of the many modern-day shooters around, we find terrorists and anarchic elements as the enemy, and the army or the elite hit troops of the government as the player. It doesn’t take an English professor to follow that thread back to the current social structure. These types of shooters assume a certain reality, and reinforce it in exactly the same way myths were used to shore up ideas about human sacrifice and religious rituals.

However, along side being the medium for authority, myths also carry the seeds of anarchy and the notion of revolution. If we take something like the Final Fantasy series, we see common themes of corrupt powers and powerful individuals that overthrow them. In Final Fantasy 7 you play a terrorist, combating a corrupt, capitalist, resource hungry government. As time passes, the government is revealed to have doomed the world to destruction, thanks to their immoral science. You can’t miss the metaphors in Final Fantasy 7, since they more or less sledgehammer you with screaming planets and green swirly lifestreams.

Video games aren’t realistic, as I argued before. They are carnivalesque, post-modern, and very aware of themselves as a medium. They contain near seamless integration of multiple realities - the reality of the story, the reality of the game play, and the reality of the player. The game can switch from an explicit tutorial (”Press O to run”) to story-driven cut-scene to interactive game play. They mirror myths, in the sense that myths contains ‘tutorials’ on being a good or worthy person, or performing a certain ritual correctly, whilst simultaneously contain creation/destruction stories, and can be modified at will by both the storyteller and the audience (assuming an oral tradition, as opposed to a written one).

Because video games are primarily a visual medium, the symbolism becomes encoded both in the story and in the graphics. This opens up a further space for exploration and for dissonance. A poorly executed game has conflicting visual symbols and story symbols. A well-executed game is tightly structured, and the visuals and story compliment each other.

‘Ripping off’ myth is not the same thing as creating a mythological game. We can name our races after ancient Nordic gods all we like, but that doesn’t mean we get any kind of symbolism or metaphorical depth, unless we use those legends to reinforce our races and their characteristics. Using Shiva and Odin as summons in Final Fantasy is not where the Final Fantasy myths stem from. The summons in Final Fantasy games are nearly always interchangeable, doing certain amounts of elemental damage. Midgar, on the other hand, is a mythological city with plenty of interesting parallels to be drawn between the old Midgard and the iconic video game city.

All myths butcher and build upon each other, being modified to fit changing circumstances, and affected by translations, different storytellers, and different perspectives.

Video games are about other worlds, other races, other ways of being and seeing. They provide escapism into larger than life heroes and villains, they allows us to process cultural questions and traumas by placing them within a symbolic, dreamlike world. They utilize many of the methods of that rituals use to create an ‘out-of-body’ receptive state, including music, narrative, and interaction. Patapon is a cute game, but it also hooks into a very primitive human need for rhythm, which is also a human need for patterns. And video games are all about patterns.

The typical audience for video games affects the type of myths on offer. In the past we have had a lot of ‘coming of age’ stories, in which our hero evolves from a nobody into a Hero. In many ways, the tasks set were fiendishly difficult, and defeating them marked acceptance by peers. As the audience has grown up and diversified, we find plenty of different myths coming up. You can make an argument that Fl0w is a very beautiful visual creation myth about evolution.

Because myths work on a symbolic, near sub-conscious level, we remain fairly unaware of their cumulative effect on us. I don’t buy the simplistic “Violent video games make us violent” argument, but to argue that video games have no effect on how we think is ludicrous - especially as they become many people’s primary choice of media. Myths have always shaped the way we view and interact with the world, and video games are no different - but they work in a much more subtle fashion than most of the anti-game critics would have you believe.