Learning Through Video Games: The Talos Principle and the Garden of Eden (Spoilers)

So I played through the Talos Principle last year and loved it. In part because of the puzzles but also the tone and atmosphere was so engaging. But what stuck with me after finishing it was the story. I grew up in a Protestant Christian family and for my whole childhood attended a non-denomination church. Obviously as a kid your perspective on the world is skewed. What I was taught by my family and at my church created my reality and I assumed everyone else's reality was just the same. I remember when I first went to school and being surprised when people would say that they weren't Christians. Because, at that time, everyone I knew was Christian. I couldn't even conceptualize what that meant. Then my teens happened and they hit me like a brick wall. I hated everyone and everything and the church was just another group to rebel against. I remember being mad when I went to church and they tried to talk to us about the value of Christian music. "They were just trying to make me like them!" In actuality, they had good intentions. They wanted kids to hear as many positive messages as possible to lift their spirits because teenage life is rough and the best way they knew how to do it was to get us to listen to what they considered to be positive music we might like. But it didn't matter because I was an angsty teenager and everyone else sucked!

But as I got older I relaxed a bit and spent less time getting mad at other people and more time trying to figure out what I actually believed. I had still called myself a Christian but didn't know why. I went back to church and thought the messages were positive but I still couldn't put my finger on why I identified with the religion. I think part of the problem was that the Biblical stories I was raised with were told in very black and white terms. When we were taught about Noah's Ark, we focused on the fun stuff. How crazy would it be to have all those animals on that boat? How big would that boat have to be? Wouldn't it have been neat to see it in person! We didn't focus on the genocide angle. We didn't discuss the intentions of God to bring forth that incredible flood. We just took it as it was and moved on.

That's where the Talos Principle comes in.

The Talos Principle is a retelling of the Garden of Eden. Basically. In it you solve puzzles in a picturesque world to further a narrative. The narrative being 'solve puzzles so that you might be given the opportunity to solve more puzzles.' The only catch is that you can't climb a tower. You are tempted by a computer program to fight against the design of this world and do something different. In the end, you are given a choice; climb the tower or exit through two large double doors that had been closed up to that point. If you enter the doors the character dies as a faithful servant to the God of that world and the program, the Garden of Eden, continues on for the next character. If you climb the tower, the program is destroyed and the character exits out into the real world.

What it brought up in me was this idea that I would have loathed living in the Garden of Eden. Yes, it was picturesque. Yes, it was perfect. But I wouldn't have had complete freedom of choice. Christianity, at least, has struggled with the problem of pre-destined fate and freedom of choice for a long time. St. Augustine philosophized the nature of free will a long, long, long time ago. I was taught as a child that God hadn't wanted us to be automatons. We weren't to blindly follow. Rather, we were to use our 'free will' to decide for ourselves, with our heart, soul, and mind, if we were to be Christians. But the conflict is in that I was also taught that the Garden of Eden was perfect and we as a species had messed up when we had fallen prey to temptation. Had we only not done so we wouldn't have ever suffered. But how can we both have freedom of choice but also glorify a reality where choice was limited?

Truth be told, I had cleared up my own personal issues with religion before playing this game and I'm not going to share that. Mostly because it isn't germane to this blog. What is is that this game would have the capacity to bring up this line of thinking in me. That it would even flirt with these concepts is an amazing feat. And it shows the odd ways in which games can teach you more than just better hand/eye coordination.

@jasonr86: Interesting blog, thanks! It sounds like we both come from a background of lapsed faith. I started the first little bits of this game a while back but didn't get too far into it; it seems like there's some depth to it, so I'll try to give it another whirl sometime soon!

I still find it crazy that this game came from the people that made Serious Sam.

As someone who entered this site with the username Believer and now doesn't have any faith in religion, I can sympathize. I do still think about religion and God a lot, so I should probably install this game and play it at some point.

Thanks guys for reading. And just for clarification I don't mean this blog to belittle religions out there. Believe what you would like to believe. In fact, in my work as a mental health therapist, I've utilize religious leaders from all types of religions as allies. And most of the food banks I send people to are run by churches.

Rather, I wanted to give my honest reaction to what this game presented to me and to point out how videos games can offer more than we might realize at face value.

Whats funny, is the way the religious aspects of this game where handled didn't give me pause. I never once stopped to think about it until the game was over. I enjoyed this game. But the second I hit a religious audio log in The Witness, I stopped playing. And have no intention of ever playing it again.

@sterling:

I felt the same way with the Witness. I think the problem with that game was that it presented the player with others' opinions. The Talos Principle provides the player with a situation and environmental storytelling that allowed the player to form their own opinion. The Witness' quotes made me think about philosophy I suppose but I spent more of that time feeling like I was being preached at. I didn't feel involved in the process. I felt like a student at a lecture.

I loved this game so much. It nailed the feeling of being raised in a sheltered community and then slowly coming to terms with how radically different the outside world can think and feel. You're a sentient robot being told what to do from God immediately. But as you progress, you learn more and more about what God doesn't want you to know.

I'm in the same boat, I've figured out how I feel about any of it long ago and the game isn't really going to change that for anyone I'd imagine. But it does remind you to consider things you may have buried.

Interesting blog. I agree with you on the concept of paradise thing. Why would anyone want to be a slave and do nothing but worship your leader, literally for all eternity. It's as Christopher Hitchens put it, a "celestial North Korea, except at least you can fucking die and get out of North Korea".

The Talos Principle is a great game. One of my absolute favorites over the last 5 years. It's a shame it didn't get the recognition it deserved.

Thanks for this great blog!

I only just finished Talos a couple of weeks ago, and it instantly has become one of my favorite games in recent memory. The way that game mixed philosophy and religion into its narrative in an engaging, thought-provoking, yet non-preachy manner was impressive. Having grown up in a Christian household and now not being terribly religious, I can certainly sympathize where you're coming from btw with your views.

The Talos Principle definitely entered my list of favorite games when I played it. Not because of the religious undertones (never been religious myself), but because of the way it made me think. The atmosphere in that game is just great - I loved all the emails and random story bits on the computers. And those audio logs from that lady really managed to hit me - they made me imagine how I'd feel and what I'd think in her situation. What would I do? And the last message on the tower actually made me cry for this fictional woman who I only knew through some recorded voice lines.

And aside from all that, I love puzzle games and the puzzles were very entertaining. I still mean to play through the game again, to refresh my memory, so I can play through the DLC as well.

I did enjoy The Witness a whole bunch - I loved hearing those quotations being read by good voice actors. But because that game didn't really have a plot as far as I'm concerned, I enjoyed Talos way more.

@cav829: @dunchad:

Thanks for reading and commenting guys.

Thanks for writing about your experiences, I hope more people will get to experience this game and the brilliant writing within it

@oueddy:

Thanks dude.

Great read.

Thanks for writing! I picked up The Talos Principle during a steam sale months and months ago. It had been languishing unplayed in my library for a long time until recently, when I suddenly became obsessed with it. On a purely mechanical level it helps to clear my mind so I don't spend hours stressing over my current (crazy) workload, but it has so much more going on. The text conversations are so well fleshed out, and the back and forth philosophical questioning has given me pause on multiple occasions. I just completed it about an hour ago, and I still want more - I'll be diving back in to find all those damned stars!