Our mind are conditioned in such a manner that “Progress” word becomes synonymous to something positive and appreciable. We’ll take it as positive improvement over something without considering any context or background. A little wordplay of the blog title is nothing but to emphasize the fact that there may be different angle or context to everything which we completely missed out due to our closed perspective and hence take it as offense or against nature. Why so much ranting on simple wordplay, you may ask.

Here’s the reason: EA has pulled out the release of its super massive, highly anticipated (by Gamers like me), finale to the Dragon Age universe, final chapter of the trilogy; Dragon Age: Inquisition from India. Reason being presence of gay character and potential story arc where main protagonist can have homosexual relationships. Self-realized reason by EA is not want to be on the other side of future lawsuit because of these portrayals.

Before dissecting EA’s clear conscience, I would really like to make note here in general logical terms regarding to social conventions prevailing in India. From dubious censor rules to ever degenerating public mindset, India is nowhere progressing in terms of acceptance of individuality or expression of art. In fact considering the ancient “Kamasutra” legacy of India, we are progressing backwards (and hence the title). I would like to see social setup where same-sex partners don’t draw a single glance (forget about scornful looks) and be treated as routine or usual. Education won’t work here as I have seen educated people with extreme prejudices and closed minds. This is something else, this is to understand that there may be some other context/perspective from where we never try to analyze the notions. A view beyond our pre-configured, conditioned mind.

Talking about another view, I also need to tackle other side of this rejection also. Not everything wrong with India here it seems. If you rifle through bit of Google search pages and bit of deduction, you realized EA also thinking something else and may be all this “Gay” affair is nothing but safety switch. Already EA has released previous to installments of Dragon Age along with super hit Mass Effect series where you can pursue same-sex romances. Also I am surprised to see positive involvement from India in Gay Pride parade this year. Even I am pretty much sure that not a single Gamer who wants to romp through new Dragon age RPG really care about homo-sexuality (Even they will be happy that Games getting serious on depiction of such sensitive issues nowadays). Even Rockstar is regularly releasing GTA titles in India containing nudity and all. Problem here with EA is the popularity and demand with deep RPGs. I read that EA along with Bathesda (Whose absolutely brilliant Fallout 3 and New Vegas never released in India due to two-headed cow called “Brahmins”) ship only very limited copies to India when it comes to RPG. Potential market is very low here. And considering the fact that EA, Ubisoft, Bathesda, Rockstar are big names now in gaming giants they don’t want to take risk by releasing “law-suite prone” title whose sales are not promising enough to justify the risk of release. They are happy to leave marginal profit rather than spending more money on lawsuit.

This social commentary mixed economic “play” article has two improvement on concluding side. Indian mentality has to claw out to that unreachable edge of garbage dike, at the bottom of which it has managed to settle down after these many years (and still sinking in). At the same time, Gaming needs to be considered as art covering broader age-span which can have serious adult content not appropriate for children (and hence no to be indulged by children, same as Movie and other media). We cannot punish the media just because negligence of audience causing them to hurt their own sensibilities.

PS: EA has stopped all kind of distribution for Dragon Age: Inquisition i.e. physical as well as digital also in India. So either you can import via other country (buy from Amazon US-UK) or try some other digital distribution sites. You know the drill. (I will most probably import).