RPGs as indoctrination

This week I reviewed The Fifth World, which is a neo-tribal roleplaying game set after the collapse of our unsustainable civilization. The game is rife with neo-tribalist philosophy and writings and, from what I can gather, is really an attempt to familiarize and indoctrinate readers into eco-anarchist/neo-tribal ideology.

The setting itself is actually right up my alley - I love post-apocalyptic settings, and I’m fascinated by humankind’s prehistory (or, rather I’m fascinated by what we don’t know about it). However, the very overt and heavy emphasis on the eco-anarchist philosophy that inspired the game is very off-putting for me. It’s preachy and it overwhelms what could very cool stuff. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind basing the game off of the scenarios that this movement predicts; it just shouldn’t be such an overt attempt at convincing the reader that they are correct in the real world.

Because of the potential stigma associated with RPGs (which is something I very rarely, if ever, invoke - I’m not big on the idea that gamers need “advocacy”, we’re not an oppressed minority), I think it’s a poor idea for any game designer to try to use the game as a vehicle to indoctrinate into an ideology. It winds up coming off as heavy handed and stifles the creative spirit of what a roleplaying game is supposed to be. It’s really just a step worse than designers that insist their game only be played one way - except in this case, the idea is the game and your life should be played that way. There has always been some amount of authorial prejudice creeping into games - Paul Jaquay’s views on good, evil and homosexuality being very evident in the Central Casting books spring to mind. But let’s leave the proselytizing out of the RPGs and let them just be fun.