by RadiumEyes, HSM guest contributor

Magic’s a tricky business in fiction.

From Harry Potter to Sailor Moon, mystical powers have a “good versus evil” dichotomy wherein the heroic figures triumph over the more sinister forces lurking in the darkness. The menacing side has a literal darkness about them, and one can usually spot the antagonist by their demeanor and clothing. It’s a classic formula; take the original Star Wars trilogy as an example. You knew Emperor Palpatine was villainous by his looks and sinister laugh, but once you saw him in action, there was no doubt about where he stood on the moral spectrum. He’s manipulative, cruel and sadistic; he coerces Darth Vader through the dark side of the Force, but that is ultimately his downfall, as Darth Vader found his light again and sacrificed himself so that his son may live.

This applies to games as well, but there’s an experience I would love to see for a Home game – an RPG where the distinctions between the “good” and “evil” sides aren’t clear. In fact, what if a game toyed with you, and an NPC that offered you a chance to become a fantasy hero didn’t reveal its true intentions until late in the game? By that, I mean he’s not simply playing you for a fool – he actually has no real sense of morality at all, and doesn’t understand the value humans place on their souls.

What would you do if confronted with such a being? Would you defy him? Would you become dedicated to your work anyway, knowing he’s not trustworthy?

That basic premise underscores the story of Puella Magi Madoka Magica, the tale of several magical girls who accept spurious contracts from a mysterious creature who separates their physical bodies from their souls once the contract is agreed upon. The idea of “good versus evil” becomes more intense when you realize that Kyubey, the being behind the contracts, essentially forces the magical girl protagonists to fight witches. With their souls sealed in delicate seed-like cases known as Soul Gems, the girls are at Kyubey’s mercy – if they show hesitation, he can apply pressure to their Soul Gems, which harms them greatly.

Would you like to become a magical girl?

Compounding this is the fact that a Soul Gem can become a Grief Seed, transforming the girl attached to it into a witch, if the girl experiences enough despair. That sense of danger looms over the cast, and Madoka (the central figure) must decide what to do with her own powers, knowing that at any moment she can transform into the very being she’s fighting against.

Home could benefit from a game like that, if on a smaller scale. The one RPG present on Home, Mercia: Fractured Realms, provides users with a standard (and very nice) fantasy romp where you encounter various beasties that you must fight in order to achieve goals and level up. Mercia shows that Home can handle a pretty complex world, offering dungeons and quests for players to bide their time with; it’s based on a classic formula, one familiar to fans of Dungeons and Dragons and the Final Fantasy series, with you against hordes of monstrous creatures that seemingly have no other desire than to oppose you.

Along with other multiplayer outings such as No Man’s Land and the much lauded Xi alternate reality game, Mercia shows the depth of the gaming experience on Home; games offer a social atmosphere where people can have fun and socialize while playing either with or against each other. But how would a game constructed around the concepts shown in Madoka Magica fare? The anime shows a rather gloomy outlook – magical girls can become corrupted, and they must be careful as a result. Because of this, a game based on that set-up will be quite different from the games currently available on Home.

It’s no longer a simple “good versus evil” dynamic – it’s a fight for survival and redemption.

Let me elaborate on that last point a little more. In Madoka Magica, the magical girls can give in to their despair and become practically mad; one of the girls, Sayaka, demonstrates this very well in one episode when she thrashes a witch with reckless abandon, laughing all the while; she’s descending into despair, realizing that her soul and body are now separate. For her, fighting the witches becomes a war of attrition; she’s not emotionally ready to accept her powers and responsibilities, and eventually she becomes a witch herself. Becoming a witch is a terrible fate – witches feed on negativity, and normally cannot be seen. They inhabit a world of psychedelic dreams which they control; only magical girls can see them, as a Grief Seed symbol indicates their presence. If one becomes a witch, then you leave your world behind for one of your own design; you’re now part of the larger world of the witches, who can control humans in frightening ways.

A game based on this concept would be a strange sight, indeed; players would have to be careful not to become corrupted, or else they become the “bad guy” themselves. Of course, Madoka Magica shows a world surrounded by moral dilemmas; magical girls entered into contracts because Kyubey promised he would give them something in return, but he deigns to mention the terrible cost that could result from it. Translating such a system onto Home would mean making an entirely different storyline, but the core theme (a world where negativity and hope clash endlessly for dominance) would make for a very nice jumping-off point.

Players of the Bioshock series would be familiar with a similar theme – the first two games focus on a society that’s turned into a living nightmare, with ghoulish-faced citizens working for themselves and Little Sisters draining the Adam from the deceased. Rapture became a cautionary tale of one man’s vision going horribly wrong, and now the city is overrun with anarchy; the second game presents a possible savior in Sophia Lamb, but she’s no better at handling the city than Andrew Ryan.

For a Home game based on the concepts seen in Madoka Magica, think of what would happen if Andrew Ryan recruited people to be “heroes,” only to have their souls trapped outside of their bodies; he would be a veritable Mephistopheles as seen in Dr. Faustus, who wants to toy with people.

Speaking of Dr. Faustus, his work informs Madoka Magica; quotes from that work appear in the show, indicating a devilish ploy on Kyubey’s part. For a Home game to take after the show, it may be best to make the contract-maker more of a self-interested individual, someone who has gone mad and fancies himself a chess master who thinks he can control others by keeping their souls and bodies separate. The player would have the option of opposing him, showing him that people are not inherently horrible beings – the world has kindness in it, and not succumbing to the chess master’s whims will show him that humans cannot be thus controlled.

For me, a game based on an indifferent contract-maker and magic-wielding individuals would be best handled by ensuring that the world’s darker elements can be contained and redeemed. Witches in Madoka Magica appear beyond redemption, but a Home game with similar precepts can allow people to bring much-needed hope back into the lives of these “corrupted” individuals. They’re in despair, and fighting them doesn’t mean they should be destroyed; like Bioshock, people can become good again, with the aid of someone willing to give them a chance.

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