An Image of Mystery: The Increasing Presence of ... - Masonic Gamer

The world of the video gamer and the world of the Freemason appear to be in
parity statistically, so why is there a marked increase in the presence of
Freemasonry in video games? While the use of our fraternity has been overt
in some of the more popular video games in recent years ? the Assassin?s
Creed series is a good example of that ? a much more discrete and almost
invisible presence has appeared in video games in recent years, placing the
fraternity in plain sight while at the same time presenting so subtle a
presence that it is usually noticed only by the initiated. The question of
why Freemasonry has suddenly become a more common sight in video games has
a very complex answer ? and that answer may surprise you?

In 2010 the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) released some
interesting statistics about their industry, among which was that U.S.
computer and video game software sales grew a massive 22.9% in 2008 to
$11.7 billion. Those numbers may not seem all that significant when you
reflect upon the fact that, as entertainment, both PC and console-based
gaming is a well-accepted form of leisure activity, but when you consider
that in 2004 Americans spent $7.3 billion buying 248 million video games,
the increase of $4.4 billion in just four years is astounding. Sales
figures for 2011 suggest that the increase is steady, but the experts who
analyze that sort of data are convinced that the improving popularity of
gaming has more to do with it being considered more socially acceptable
today than it was at the start of this decade, with more adults gaming
today than ever before.

Their research revealed that 68% of American households play computer or
video games, and that the average game player is 35 years old and has been
playing games for around 12 years. Forty percent of all game players are
women, and women over the age of 18 represent a significantly greater
portion of the game-playing population (34%) than boys age 17 or younger
(18%). The average age of the most frequent game purchaser in any given
household is 39 years old, while a whopping 84% of all games sold in 2008
were rated ?E? for Everyone, ?T? for Teen, or ?E10+? for Everyone 10+
putting to rest the notion that adult gamers are more interested in games
that are rated ?M? for Mature.

Finally in 2009 it turns out that 25% of gamers in America were over the
age of 50 (an increase of 9% compared to the same figures for 1999), with
the fastest-growing segments of the gamer population being gamers aged 14
to 20, and aged 55 to 70. It seems that the baby-boomer generation is
discovering video games with a passion, and when we examine the subject
matter for many of the AAA titles that have been released lately, that
makes perfect sense as game worlds are increasingly focusing upon familiar
time periods spanning from the 1950?s forward.

A Masonic Gaming Population

The statistics presented above neatly match an informal survey that I
conducted among my Masonic brothers, who are embracing gaming in a
statistically matching manner as far as age is concerned, but also exhibit
a trend towards sharing their gaming activities, with around 90% of the
two-dozen Masonic gamers that I quizzed indicating that they regularly play
their games with a family member (their spouse and grandchildren vied for
first place, while younger Masons stated that they played games with their
spouse or children) and, increasingly, with their lodge brothers.

First-Person Shooters are the most popular genre according to the gamers I
sampled, though RPG and Action-Adventure games were also popular. The
Masonic gamers indicate that the most common genres that their spouses
played independently were Puzzle and Action-Adventure games, while they
were more likely to play co-op RPG rather than multi-player shooters when
they gamed together.

These numbers are statistically significant, despite the fact that
traditionally the age range of Masons in North America trends upward; those
statistics prove what has long been suspected, that gaming is not the
exclusive realm of children ? if it ever was ? and the fact that adults
can actually afford to game, being able to purchase gaming systems and
games, and have the leisure time to play their games, certainly contributes
to that demographic change.

Traditionally it is thought that current members age while new members tend
to be a bit older when they join ? and that may be a national average and
trend, but it is also an evolving statistic as well, because we are seeing
the average age for new brothers dropping thanks to wider and more intense
promotion of The Craft via the web and to a smaller extent via the Ben
Franklin TV commercials and sponsorship on PBS.

In the years following World War II there was a huge bump in membership,
and that segment of our population is now aging out of lodges, with many
grand lodges fearing that with the fading of that ?greatest generation?
overall we will see a drop in member numbers.? ?Fortunately this issue was
recognized years ago, and steps are being taken to address it ? the
previously mentioned TV ads and the Ask a Mason website created by the
Grand Lodge of Massachusetts that has moved from a regional to a national
footing are prime examples ? and these efforts along with other
initiatives appear to be slowly succeeding in the goal to expand the
fraternity to a new generation of younger Masons.

When the subject of Freemasonry appearing in games cropped up in
conversations with Masonic gamers online and in person over the course of
the last 18-months a number of theories have presented, including the
attractive (though difficult to prove) supposition that more of the men who
design and create video games are Masons, while a narrower group supports
the notion that the appearance of Freemasonry in video games ? as a symbol
? may have more to do with the public perceptions of the fraternity as a
host for secrets. The idea that including Freemasonry in a video game as an
image and symbol appears to be logical on its face, but the trend towards
downplaying its appearance and the subtlety that has been trending lately
contradicts that hypothesis.

No matter what view you take on the issue, it is clear that more games are
including Freemasonry either as an integral part of their story, or more
frequently, as part of the game world, than ever before. In fact the
presence of Freemasonry and its symbols in modern video games is so
prolific that the rabid and very active anti-mason community online has
seized upon it as one of their newest causes for exposing the evils of
Freemasonry, blaming the Masons for the insertion of their organization
into the pop-culture landscape of video games!

Freemasonry in Modern Video Games

The increasing presence of Freemasonry in modern AAA video games both as
part of the primary focus for plot and story, and as part of the game
world, has caused gamers to sit up and take notice, compelling many to
research the fraternity in order to better understand it, leading to open
discussion of the fraternity on game-related online chat boards, and
leading to more than a few gamers actually joining their local lodges as a
result, having liked what they learned in the process.

Freemasonry as a subject of video games has had a much more limited
presence, and understanding why that is can be as easy as taking a look at
the game Freemasons ? check out the video on YouTube (
http://youtu.be/dFYR4HE7lsg <http://youtu.be/dFYR4HE7lsg> ) ? but then
that makes sense, because the average lodge meeting is not exactly the sort
of ?play? that makes for an exciting action-adventure game?

The following brief list of video games ? many of which will certainly be
familiar to you ? presents a cross-section of the genuine and implied
presence that Freemasonry has had in video games over the course of the
past decade:

Assassin?s Creed Series
The Assassin?s Creed series is a historical fantasy and science fiction
game solidly placed within the RPG / Third-Person Action-Adventure genres,
and consists of a growing number of titles that continue to tell the story
that was originally set out in the first game in the series, Assassin?s
Creed.

The game includes a very wide retelling of Templar legends and the hidden
symbols that are often associated with that order, and while there is no
direct reference to Freemasonry in the game, whenever the subject of
Masonry in a video game comes up, this series is always mentioned as a
prime example because despite the lack of specific Masonic content, it
seems to neatly package the idea that it has a Masonic connection without
ever actually presenting one.

BioShock Series
Hailed as one of the most riveting games in the survival-horror / FPS
genres in the past decade, the games present an idealized view of the sort
of utopian visions that were popular from the 1920?s all the way through
the 1960?s, so you might not think it would be a game in which Masonic
symbolism would be present ? but from the moment that the player climbs
out of the bathysphere and looks up at the ceiling and its large and
in-your-face Square and Compass, to the odd glimpse of other Masonic
symbols on buildings throughout its massive underwater city, clearly it is.

At least part of the justification for including Masonic symbols in the
game comes down to the (mistaken) belief that they serve as an obvious
pop-culture reference to the 1950?s.? The idea in this respect seems to be
that Freemasonry is essentially bound to that decade, and considering the
large number of buildings that were erected in the decade following World
War II that makes a certain sense.? A sampling of cinema from the era
depicts the presence of apron-wearing Freemasons armed with trowels
whenever a building is being dedicated or its cornerstone is being placed,
so it is understandable that a game developer might make that connection.

To be fair there were a lot of buildings constructed in the post-war era so
naturally the Square and Compass seems to be connected, but the truth is
that our symbol can be found on dedication blocks dating all the way back
to the years following the American Revolution.

A more troubling point however is that including the most Masonic of
Masonic symbols in a game like BioShock, which is literally built around a
conspiracy, probably does not help the fact that Freemasonry is catnip for
conspiracy theorists, but there you have it.

Deus Ex Series
Another game that intentionally blurs the line between the Illuminati and
Freemasonry, Deus Ex presents the player with a primary objective to
complete a series of missions (?tests?) whose overall purpose is to vet
them for joining the Illuminati. The underlying function of that secret
worldwide organization in the game is to restore its control of a secret
world government to rule.

By including Masonic symbols and instantly recognizable Masonic themes ?
at one point a character in the game asks for help ?for the Widow?s Son? ?
the developers manage to imply a direct relationship between the fantasy of
the Illuminati and the reality of World Freemasonry.

Final Fantasy Series
It should be emphasized that while the Final Fantasy games, as a series,
share a common set of themes, objects, and ideas, each major number in the
series represents a completely different and unique game, game world, and
story. The inclusion of a number of Masonic symbols in the background in
the world of Final Fantasy X, and in Final Fantasy XII and XIII should be
thought of as more of a recognition of the universal power and identity of
those symbols than any actual intent to communicate the ideas that the
symbols represent.

In Final Fantasy X during a visit to a religious temple the characters are
instructed to make a gesture in prayer that is very obviously an
interpretation of a Masonic Sign. The inclusion of that gesture is very
consistent with the tradition in Japanese games to borrow freely from both
religion and cultural organizations like Freemasonry when it appeals to the
developer, but the games do not include any sort of plot or subplot that
relates to The Craft. The mere presence of the symbols though, appears to
be enough to generate speculation that the game has underlying Masonic
meaning, so much so that some newspapers in France referred to FFX as ?the
Masonic video game? when they reviewed it.

LA Noire
Perhaps one of the best police-procedural, police-RPG, mystery and
action-adventure games of the past decade, LA Noire is celebrated as a
highly accurate look back in time to the Los Angeles of the 1940?s and
1950?s, placing the player in the role of a flawed but ultimately
good-hearted police officer whose entire career, from Rookie beat cop to
Detective is experienced in playing the game.

In addition to encountering several characters who wear Masonic rings,
overheard conversations in which Masonic phrases are spoken, and a
masonic-themed sign, one of the most iconic images in the game appears
during one of its many cinematic Cut Scenes, showing the well-illuminated
Los Angeles Masonic Temple as viewed from the air, in a panoramic sweeping
scene.? Later in the game the player actually has a lengthy mission that
involves scaling the Temple using scaffolding and natural elements of its
construction, and upon reaching the top obtains an excellent view of the
hand-tiled rooftop with its arches, Egyptian motif, and the all-seeing eye.

The use of Masonic symbolism in LA Noire is benign in the sense that the
game does not take advantage of the many stereotypes and conspiracy
theories that it easily could have as that would have neatly aligned with
its plot, which is something we can probably be thankful for, but in the
same breath it should be emphasized that LA Noire is one of the games that
generated the most discussion of Freemasonry for any individual game on its
own chat boards.? How cool is that?

World of Warcraft
One of the best-known and most successful Massive, Multi-Player, Online
Role-Playing Games (MMORPG) of all time, World of Warcraft is probably not
the first fantasy world you might think of when thinking of Freemasonry,
and yet in that orc-slaying world of swords and sorcery and half-naked
dancing elves can be found a coveted bit of bling for the players to own
and wear: The Masons Fraternity Ring!

Masons Fraternity Ring
Power: Binds when picked up
Equipped on: Finger
Stats: +12 Agility / +5 Stamina
Item Level: 49
Equip: Increases your hit rating by 5 (0.04% @ L85).
Sell Price: 70 Silver 92 Copper

It should be emphasized that World of Warcraft is not about nor does it
feature Freemasonry, and the presence of that ring in the game is something
of a mystery.

The games listed above represent a tiny fraction of the thousands of games
that were published in the last decade, and were picked because their
popularity with gamers makes it very likely that the reader has played most
? if not all ? of them, and so can relate to them as examples of this
trend. There are easily hundreds of other games that we could point to,
like Mafia II, the Fallout Series, and even the Elder Scrolls games, but
these examples get the job done.

When a gamer finds themselves playing an epic title that they very much
enjoy, and they also happen to be a Mason, stumbling upon a familiar
symbol, or overhearing a pair if NPC?s standing at the bar in a game
talking about looking forward to Tuesday?s lodge meeting can be a very
pleasant piece of serendipity ? a figurative bit of fairy floss in an
otherwise deep and heavy plot, and for us an added bonus.? Still you cannot
help but wonder what non-Masons make of it?

When you add up all of the images, words, and ideas, the reality of the
presence of Masonic symbols in modern video games really starts to feel as
pervasive and evident as worst of the conspiracy theorists suggest ?
though minus the evil intentions of course ? and oddly enough it almost
validates the notion that Freemasonry really is a powerful worldwide
organization? At least it is in video games.

The Video Game Subculture Invades Masonry

Any brother who has attended more than one Blue Lodge is aware that a
certain subculture exists within the fraternity in the form of home lodge
identity, as each individual lodge has its own character ? and to one
degree or another its own characters ? and the notion that a lodge
community might be influenced by other subcultures is not that far-fetched.

In an online posting to the We Fly Spitfires gaming blog (
blog.weflyspitfires.com <http://blog.weflyspitfires.com> ) in a post that
begins with a comment about the introduction of video game related Belt
Loops and Academic Pins to the Cub Scout program, writer ?Gordon? goes on
to speculate that it is high time that Freemasonry adapted to the 21st
Century and began to embrace what the games, Internet, and the Web can do
for it, going so far as to suggest that it replace rituals with video game
tournaments!

?Although much of Freemasonry is about history and remembering the past,
young folk find the all of the rituals and services to be outdated and
inefficient.? Instead, let?s have video game tournaments which can be used
to determine the rank of each member!? FPS or beat-em-ups would be perfect
for this, and I can almost hear the chants of ?two men enter, one man
leaves? echoing throughout the halls,? he writes, observing that ?The idea
of degrees (ranks of Freemasonry) is so pass? now and hard to follow. A
much simpler solution would (be) for each Mason to have a level awarded,
and increased when they win tournaments.? Fellow Masons could chime ?ding?
whenever someone levels up.?

Clearly these suggestions are more tongue-in-cheek humor than they are
sincere suggestions for change, but when you consider that this sort of
outlook and humor today is a fairly well-accepted presence in the Masonic
community ? whereas twenty years ago it would have easily earned the
brother offering it some nasty stares ? says a lot about how other
subcultures have influenced The Craft.

While this is still in the hypothesis stage, I have a theory about the
video game subculture and why it is so visibly impacting what we can fairly
consider to be traditional subcultures ? like Freemasonry ? and it neatly
fits into the new gaming reality, with the past ten years being crucial to
the entire formula. The first point is that it is fair to say that the
growing acceptance of video games as an acceptable social activity is a
very significant factor that has everything to do with why our symbols are
appearing in video games.

Bear in mind that ten years ago the vast majority of video games were
created to be played by a single player, in the privacy of their home, and
lacked even the most basic of network access or services.? Since 2001 that
situation has reversed, with the vast majority of games being built for
social play, with multi-player support, and Internet connectivity being the
norm, and that goes a long way towards explaining the appearance of social
ideas ? like Freemasonry ? in modern video games.

In simple terms, the developers are striving towards not just relevancy in
the worlds that they create (though that is of critical importance), but
they are also seeking symbols and ideas that will be familiar to most
gamers and that have inherent values to them that do not require lengthy
explanations. The process of selecting those symbols and building them into
the world that you are creating, as a video game developer, is important ?
especially when you mean to create a certain vibe, or ?feeling? for your
game.

Like it or not, the symbols of Freemasonry have come to represent power,
control, and secrecy, and the fact that we neither seek to control their
use, or complain when those symbols are misused means that they can easily
be co-opted in video games for the purposes that they are being used for.
Far from being a negative trend, the appearance in modern video games of
Masonic symbols is in fact an opportunity for the Masonic community and its
gamers, because it naturally opens the door for dialogue on the subject
with our gaming partners, and provides every Mason with an opportunity to
share.

C.M. Boots-Faubert is a freelance writer who lives on Cape Cod. You can
reach him at chris@boots-faubert.com

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