A Promise Unforgotten- A Franchise Matures

We cap off a month of Disgaea by looking at the fourth, but not the last game in the series, Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten.

Image taken from gamefaqs.com, by user leonia19.

Absence of Justice- A Franchise Leaps Forward, Stumbles a Bit

The year was 2008, and though the Playstation 2 was still selling, the fact of the matter was that the Playstation 3 was on the market, and it was hungry for new games. For the first time in over a decade, Nintendo was taking a commanding lead in the Console Wars with their Wii, and Microsoft's Xbox 360 was selling strong, but was losing ground thanks to the many hardware problems that had been plaguing the console, most notably the Red Ring of Death. Still, this was a new age for console gaming, where new features that were previously the exclusive realm of PC gaming were suddenly becoming the norm for all games: downloadable content, online play, online socialization, and the ability to upload information to the internet. NIS released their latest game with all these features in mind, and that game was Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice.

Image taken from gamefaqs.com

Cursed Memories- A Franchise Grows

The year was 2006. Though the next generation of gaming was just around the corner, the PS2 was still dominating the gaming scene. The JRPG, though far from dead, was no longer the critical darling it once was, with games like GTA: San Andreas, Halo 2, and God of War proving that the JRPG was not the only genre that could tell cinematic stories. Still, Nippon Ichi Software, riding high on the success of their game Disgaea, were releasing several Strategy games that combined in depth combat with a story told humorously. Games like Makai Kingdom and Phantom Brave were giving the company a good reputation among gamers, showing that Disgaea 1 was no flash in the pan. Still, a sequel was inevitable, and three years after the original, Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories was released.

Image taken from Gamefaqs.com

The Hour of Darkness- A Franchise is Born (Part 1)

The year was 2003. The Playstation 2 was the biggest seller in the world, Nintendo was going through it's toughest time yet, and the XBox was catching up to the PS2 with a plethora of games, including a little game called Halo. The PS2, however, was still reigning supreme, and as far as RPG's were concerned, it was home to some of the best games in the genre, including the latest Final Fantasies. On that year, a little gaming company called Nippon Ichi Software, or NIS, was releasing a new game that used 2D sprites. This game company was, until that year, known in Japan as the makers of a cutesy series of SRPG's called Marl Kingdom. Outside of Japan, they were nobodies. That all changed with the release of a little game called Disgaea: The Hour of Darkness, hereby referred to as Disgaea 1.

Image taken from the game's Wikipedia page.

Spoilers Abound!!!

Announcement- December will be a Month of Disgaea

Just like last year, this December, every Saturday or Sunday I'll be uploading a blog entry analyzing the Disgaea series. For those of you who don't know, Disgaea is a Strategy Role Playing Game series, somewhat under the radar in comparison to, say, the Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest series of games.

Why am I doing this? Well, mostly, because I am a Disgaea fanboy. I admit it, and I am not ashamed of it. I am a Disgaea fanboy, through and through. In fact, I could go a step further and say I'm a NIS fanboy. So yeah, I am going to be analyzing a series of video games most people have never even heard of. Such is my sad but fulfilling life. Anyway, here's the schedule:

December 6-7: Disgaea 1
December 13-14: Disgaea 2
December 20-21: Disgaea 3
December 27-28: Disgaea 4

For the record, I'll be using the original PS2-PS3 releases of the games as my basis for analysis, for the simple reason that they are the ones I've played. I am aware there have been re-releases, but since I've not played them, I cannot comment on them.

I hope you'll be joining me on this analysis!

The Disgaea metaphor

Every now and then you come across a game that hides a deep, meaningful message beneath layers of a gaming element that would make it easy for someone who looks only at a surface level to miss it. Today, I want to briefly talk about a game that talks about what it means to be a good person. That game is Disgaea.

The game is, on the surface, about this guy, called Laharl. He's a demon, and he's 1313 years old. His father, King Krichevskoy, has died, leaving Laharl to assume the position of Overlord. Laharl himself is, in one word, an ass. He's arrogant, he's rude, he's loud, he's obnoxious, and he has the emotional maturity of an 11 year old boy.

Pictured: Laharl. You just know that, if the artist were allowed to draw him that way, this kid would be flipping you the bird.

 In Disgaea, the world is divided into three parts: There's the human world, the world of demons named the Netherworld, and the world of angels named Celestia. Laharl was the prince of the Netherworld, and spends the first half of the game becoming its ruler. However, there is a complication: the ruler of the angels, the Seraph, has sent an assassin to do away with Laharl. And her name is Flonne.

Not Pictured: A competent assassin.

Flonne, however, eventually learns that Laharl is incapable of love and compassion. Feeling that such a thing is impossible, she joins Laharl, to observe if he truly is incapable of such things. Because of her continuous belief in love, Laharl and his vassal, Etna, give the little angel the title of Love Freak. 

In spite of the abuse that Laharl and Etna send her way, Flonne stays, determined to see if Laharl truly is incapable of love. When she loses her special angel pendant, which allows her to stay in the Netherworld, she begs Laharl to help her. He does, though only through the promise of a reward.

Flonne is someone who believes in love and kindness. She believes everyone is capable of good, and that no one is truly irredeemably evil. Throughout the game, her faith is rewarded: She sees demons, whom she had been taught knew nothing of mercy or love, commit acts that could only be fueled by such emotions. She sees Laharl spare a demon's life, because the demon had a son who begged for his father to be spared. She witnesses Laharl cry for his departed mother. She sees Laharl put his subjects before himself, albeit slightly begrudgingly, when he rounded up the zombies that were collected by a child of his realm, which had managed to escape. Flonne, in time, learns that in spite of how he's a demon, Laharl is, deep down, good. In fact, no. Flonne learns that someone being a demon, a human, or an angel is not what determines if they are good. All are capable of love.

And in time, she learns the true nature of her mission: She was to become the bridge between the Netherworld and Celestia, to bring peace between these once bitter enemies. But, there are those in Celestia who would oppose such a thing.

                           Pictured: Vulcanus. An Angel of God, and an asshole.

Vulcanus, who does not know of the Seraph's true plan, and would oppose it if he did, sets out to murder Laharl himself. Unlike Laharl, Vulcanus is truly evil. Among his plans, he manipulates the human world into attacking the Netherworld, costing an untold amount of casualties, just to kill Laharl. He is the one who stole Flonne's pendant, endangering her life, just to be rid of her. And the worst of all, he makes pacts with several demons, forbidden by angel law, just to destroy Laharl.

Vulcanus reminds me too much of people that claim themselves to be good by virtue of being religious. There are a lot of people in this world, none of whom I will name, that believe themselves to be paragons of virtue just because they read this holy text, or they pray at that church. In fact, that's who Vulcanus is: he's every religious hypocrite in the world, rolled up into an arrangement of two dimensional sprites. He's everyone who has ever held up their nose to the poor as they strutted down to church. He's every church goes who has ever gone to a diner and left no tip to the waiter. He's every pastor, every priest that has ever preached the word of God only to throw out someone from his parish by virtue of not wearing decent clothing. He's every deacon that has ever preached against homosexuality, only to go to Vegas to buy a male hooker. He's every Rabbi that has eaten pork, every Imam that has ever spat at a beggar.

Flonne, on the other hand, is like every authentically religious person in the world. She practices what she preaches, and she is not afraid of standing firm in her beliefs. But, she does not rub it in the faces of those who are different from her. Flonne believes in love, and that is what she shows the world. She shows everyone love, patience, and understanding. She stands by Laharl and Etna through thick and thin, expecting nothing in return every time she helps them. The one time Flonne stands up to Laharl is when she demands that he treat her with respect, to at least remember her name, which in time, he does.

Laharl himself is an impetuous being, but deep down, there is good. He thought himself incapable of love, but deep down, he loved his mother. Deep down, Laharl cares about more than himself. He cares about his Netherworld, about his vassals, about Etna, and Flonne.

That's what the game is about, when you get down to it. The game asks "what makes a person good?" And the game provides an unambiguous answer. The game sides with Flonne, 100%. Love is what makes someone good. Nothing else. Vulcanus himself, who is more than worthy of punishment, is shown mercy by Flonne herself, when she, at the end of the game, becomes his teacher.

What makes someone good? It's how you treat everyone else. It's not what you associate yourself with, it's how you treat other people. Being part of a religion does not make you a good person. If you want to be good, you need to do good. And when you get down to it, every religion in the world tells you how to do precisely that. Give to the poor, feed the hungry, comfort the weeping. In short: love thy neighbor, as you love yourself.