Intellectual Video-Gaming: On Deus Ex, Philosophy, and Democracy

One of the most widely hailed "best game" of all time is the action/adventure/stealth/strategy/RPG known as Deus Ex (it's designer, Warren Spector - who produced the hardcore sci-fi/horror System Shock and the legendary steampunk Thief series - did not categorize Deus Ex into a specific genre, coming to show that it has reached a level of appreciation beyond any mere classification), a VG that I had the pleasure of going through once. The sequel itself, Deus Ex: Invisible War, was quite good as well (and it also came with a quality soundtrack). They both had all the elements of a great game: open-ended situations, pivotal dilemmas to decide on, well-rounded characters that you actually could develop (un)sympathetic emotions towards, occasional side-stories and numerous humor-reliefs, aesthetic sci-fi visuals (so I admit I am a big fan of the sci-fi genre), and - most importantly - a solid storyline that anyone can relate to... well, almost anyone.

But what struck me most in Deus Ex and its sequel, DX: Invisible War, is the depth of its storyline in relation to real-world issues such as politics, the ailments of mankinds, a government by the people, the question of the self, and the future of mankind. While a lot of the elements in the story seem overly fictional and based admittedly on popular conspiracy theories, the questions this game tries to answer are practical and realistic. The hints to such answers appear everywhere in the game, from moments of subtle dialogue to turning points and decision-making scenarios. While a myriad of such hints may be present in the less popular DX:IW sequel (1), I choose to focus this post on the script of the first Deus Ex, namely b/c the endings of the game itself are more consistent with each other in pertaining to a particular question that has already been addressed by DEUSEXGAMING.com, a fansite of the game itself.

Before I get to that, let's enjoy a few excerpts of my favorite dialogue from the game itself (2). Note that I tend to agree with most if not all of the lines presented here. First, a few jarring one-liners from the game's protagonist and player character, JC (Jesus Christ?) Denton, a nano-technologically-modified human being.

"Amazing when you think about it. All the hours I dreamed of working here. All the heroic fantasies when really this place is just a cinderblock bunker with a carpet." (said after his stint with UNATCO ended with him discovering that it is a front for a shadowy organization called MJ-12)

"Some gang-banger, maybe you should think about going back to school."

"Bravery is not a function of firepower."

"Human beings may not be perfect, but a computer program with language synthesis is hardly the answer to the world's problems." (speaking to HELIOS in AREA 51)

"Every war is the result of a difference of opinion. Maybe the biggest questions can only be answered by the greatest of conflicts."

"What good's an honest soldier if he can be ordered to behave like a terrorist?"

Next, Paul Denton, who is JC Denton's older brother and the prototype for the new nanotechnologically-modified UNATCO agent, but defects earlier in the story after discovering the treachery of UNATCO and MJ-12:

"Somehow the notion of unalienable liberty got lost. It's really become a question of what liberties will the state assign to individuals or rather, what liberties we will have the strength to cling to."

Other modified agents include the likes of Gunther Hermann, who is mechanically-augmented and for some reason whose grammar is only slightly better than that of Dubya Jr.:

"I see you, a thief on the roof. My new satellite link has both infrared and the x-ray spectrum. I see your heart beating. I see you are afraid." (said in the French Templar Cathedral when JC is sneaking in from the top to infiltrate the MJ-12 communications network)

"You are a small, prowling mouse... and dumb like a mouse! You keep coming, like you forget about Agent Navarre. I remember Agent Navarre. I remember for everyone." (definitely Dubya material)

"No, I wanted orange! It gave me lemon-lime" (as part of the conspiracy jist in the game, Gunther alleges that the janitors played around with the soda machine to dispense him the wrong drink; you find out about the conspiracy near the end of the game in DX:IW)

Sam Carter is a retired general who serves as UNATCO's armaments specialist:

"Some say concentrated power leads to abuse, but I believe that if an institution has a solid foundation it can survive the narrow aspirations of the people it employs." (I doubt that, though, b/c an institution is as good as the people it employs, and if those people are willing to uphold the principles of the institution)

"Being a soldier isn't just following orders, it's following those orders in the service of a higher cause. When that cause is betrayed, we're not soldiers anymore, just pieces on a chess board dying for the wrong reason."

In JC's trip to Paris, he meets Chad Dumier, the leader of an underground movement known as Silhouette, which have been aided by several Illuminati such as Morgan Everett and Nicolette Duclare. Ironically, in the sequel DX:IW, Dumier turns out to be an Illuminatus himself and uses his power to blame much of his organization's shortcomings on JC Denton. What he says in the game, though, is rather intriguing:

"When government surveillance and intimidation is called "freedom from terrorism" or "liberation from crime", freedom and liberty have become words without meanings."

"Culture by definition a shared territory of meaning, inspires conflicts far more destructive than any other dispute over territory on the Earth's surface."

Morpheus, an AI construct reputed for being the game's "most poignant element", says at one point that

"The human being created civilization not because of willingness but of a need to be assimilated into higher orders of structure and meaning."

Let's skip the one-liners and go for excerpts of dialogue. This one is between JC Denton and a bartender named Isaac in the "Lucky Money Club" in Hong Kong's Wan Chai district. The district itself exists, but I doubt that the club - with a phony name like that - does, though:

JC Denton: "You said 'outside influences.' What does China fear?"
Isaac: "China is the last sovereign country in the world. Authoritarian but willing - unlike U.N.-governed countries - to give its people the freedom to do what they want.
JC Denton: "As long as they don’t break the law."
Isaac: "Listen to me. This is real freedom, freedom to own property, make a profit, make your life. The West, so afraid of strong government, now has no government. Only financial power."
JC Denton: "Our governments have limited power by design."
Isaac: "Rhetoric--and you believe it! Don’t you know where those slogans come from?"
JC Denton: "I give up."
Isaac: "Well-paid researchers - how do you say it? - 'think tanks,' funded by big businesses. What is that? A 'think tank'?"
JC Denton: "Hardly as sinister as a dictator, like China’s Premier."
Isaac: "It’s privately-funded propaganda. The Trilateral Commission in the United States for instance."
JC Denton: "The separation of powers acknowledges the petty ambitions of individuals; that’s its strength."
Isaac: "A system organized around the weakest qualities of individuals will produce these same qualities in its leaders."
JC Denton: "Perhaps certain qualities are an inseparable part of human nature.
Isaac: "The mark of the educated man is the suppression of these qualities in favor of better ones. The same is true of civilization."

Similar sentiments are echoed in this dialogue between JC Denton and Morpheus, except in relation to the value of religion in terms of politics in the past and the present:

Morpheus: "Human beings feel pleasure when they are watched. I have recorded their smiles as I tell them who they are."
JC Denton: "Some people just don't understand the dangers of indiscriminate surveillance."
Morpheus: "The need to be observed and understood was once satisfied by God. Now we can implement the same functionality with data-mining algorithms."
JC Denton: "Electronic surveillance hardly inspires reverence. Perhaps fear and obedience, but not reverence."
Morpheus: "God and the gods were apparitions of observation, judgment and punishment. Other sentiments towards them were secondary."
JC Denton: "No one will ever worship a software entity peering at them through a camera."
Morpheus: "The human organism always worships. First, it was the gods, then it was fame (the observation and judgment of others), next it will be self-aware systems you have built to realize truly omnipresent observation and judgment."
JC Denton: "You underestimate humankind's love of freedom."
Morpheus: "The individual desires judgment. Without that desire, the cohesion of groups is impossible, and so is civilization."

Next comes a rather crude exchange between JC Denton and a rival, Walton Simons, who himself is also nano-augmented:

Walton Simons: "You take another step forward and here I am again, like your own reflection in a hall of mirrors."
JC Denton: "That makes me one ugly son of a bitch. How'd my face get all marked up with bioelectrics?"

And finally... for a few giggles...

JC Denton: "How are the drinks here?"
Renault: "Great if you like rat piss."
JC Denton: "Never tried it."

There's more in the game, but this is just to give you an impression of the game's dialogue itself. And that's just scratching the surface, to be honest.

Anyways, let's move on to the more important stuff. Deus Ex is not your typical run-of-the-mill Orwellian nightmare come to life in 32-bit color and Unreal Engine game graphics. Many of the issues dealt with in Deus Ex 1 are more close to home, and are exhibited in the competing political philosophies that have sprung out in the past 3 centuries. At the forefront is the issue of democracy, a government of/for/by the people, vs. authoritarianism, allotting power to a select few. The abovementioned quotes are rather telling. Human nature, it seems, is driven by ambition and greed, all resulting from a survivalist psyche that we're ingrained with. Education and civilization, in as Freudian a manner as possible, seem to suppress these traits "in favor of better ones": humanistic ideals and striving for the "general will" or the common good of all peoples in a society. Qualities such as these are what lead to the establishment of civilization in the first place. Depending on the society and its people, a government of a particular type will be established. Eventually, shifts in power will allow for ambitious individuals to supercede authority and impose their will on the average Joe. This statement is most telling in the ending where JC Denton fuses with the Helios AI, a program incapable of ambition and greed. According to a particular writer at DeusExGaming.com (why do you remain anonymous?),

Bob Page’s plan was to merge with Helios and use the AI’s direct access to global communications networks to rule the entire world on his own. Helios has also decided that the world needs a human/AI absolute dictator, but he has determined that Page is unworthy to complete the merge. He has chosen you instead. Helios’s ability to control almost all automated systems in the world and his lack of human ambition, combined with your understanding of human needs and desires, creates a perfect leader for the world.

The ultimate message of Deus Ex is that “government by the people” is impossible. The final irony of the game is that you, after working so hard to return freedom to a world of shadow governments, are forced to determine the fate of the world alone. Whatever choice you make, you must choose whether to throw the world into a new dark age, allow the Illuminati to rule in the shadows, or rule the world alone as a computerized Platonic philosopher king.

The game uses a dramatic story of conspiracies to make a statement that can be verified by real-world history. Strong leaders like Pericles were very influential in Athens even though it was the world’s first direct democracy. The Roman Republic was designed to ensure the aristocracy’s power over the lower classes. Even in the United States, the modern world’s bastion of freedom and equality, politicians are often more interested in serving giant corporations than in representing the people. There is always somebody will to do anything to for power, whether that somebody is just a greedy politician or the leader of a vast conspiracy of world domination.(3)

The central dictum of Deus Ex is that human nature, being inescapable, will cloud the judgements of any one ruler, and that a perfect democracy is impossible to attain. History itself attests to this particular notion: even those that which we call "democracies" have been led by individuals who frequently abuse their power in some form or other.

But what about no government at all? Consider what the Morpheus AI said to JC: that the human being will always worship and desire judgement. Assuming that to be the case, governments will eventually be re-established even after their demise. Another ending in Deus Ex involves destroying all communications, leading to massive collapse of businesses and beaureaucracies that rely on them to maintain power relations. According to the same author,

All forms of communication-phone, television, radio, internet, postal, etc.-are computer-based. Because all computer networks have been centralized in Area 51, all long distance communications in the world are shut down indefinitely when Area 51 is destroyed. The bloated bureaucracies and corporations that rely on communication to sustain their stranglehold on the world topple soon after loss of communication. Society as a whole soon collapses, and the once great nations of the world split into small communities of survivors. Humanity will enter a new age similar to the centuries immediately after the fall of the Roman Empire. The almost complete collapse of modern civilization will likely result in a significant decrease in population and the adoption of a subsistence lifestyle by most of the survivors. While areas of the world whose people are used to dictators and despots will probably continue under similar governments after the initial anarchy of the collapse, other areas will go through much more significant changes.

Many areas will probably revert to feudalism as strong leaders rise out of the chaos to seize the wealth and resources left behind by the old society and conquer whatever land they can protect against other leaders. They will take control of those people who are too poor and weak to become leaders. The middle class will disappear, and the aristocratic and serf classes will reestablish themselves in their ancient positions of master and slave.

Not all areas will necessarily revert to a feudalistic mentality. Most people in the Roman world didn't have the benefit of an American-style democracy. Even the Roman republic, while it lasted, was nothing like the modern concept of representative democracy. Voting in ancient Rome was heavily stacked in favor of the aristocrats, and the aristocracy thwarted the few political reformers who attempted to give political power to the plebian class. It's possible that people who have been exposed to modern democracy will choose to form small democratic states instead of feudalistic kingdoms. Whether they become Athenian direct democracies or Roman republics, these citizen-run states will be base off which civilization is eventually reformed.

The western world will go through an accelerated version of the development of modern civilization. Humanity already has the benefit of knowing how the middle ages turned out, and it won't be long before democracy spreads again. Global communications will be a reality in a generation or two at the most. After all, people already have the knowledge and resources to set up long distance communication networks, and they only need ambitious people to step forward and organize them to the job done. Because most people were never really aware of your reasons for destroying the monolithic governments, nobody will prevent them from rebuilding. Within a few hundred years, civilization will progress from the dark ages to its modern form just before its collapse. You will have set human societal development back several hundred years for nothing.(4)

Given that human nature will supposedly never change, unless people realize that such blind technological advancement and ambitious capitalist pursuits may cloud or stagnate social progress in terms of civilization, all Denton would have done is regressed time for nothing, as it will all repeat itself later on. This is due to the capacity of human beings being able to recognize their own state of evolution and progress outside such natural bounds. Now, if only they knew how to work for the betterment of this world if not just for themselves...

To me, Deus Ex is a reminder of the force that is human ambition, a force that dominates the economical and social spheres of this global community, and its potential dangers. It also serves to highlight chilling prospects for a future Earth, and how many people today die for the sake of the greedy desires of an autocratic few. Silly conspiracies aside, I think Deus Ex is an eye-opening video game that gives people the drive if not the capacity to think towards embetterring the world within the bounds of the realities of human nature, as well as the drive towards a better political solution or away from politics, which itself is the embodiment of the ambitions of a particular individual (group) at the expense of the common man. So I recommend you give it a try...

...if you can stand the outdated graphics, that is.

Salaam, from Saracen