Jarhyn
Wizard
- Joined
- Mar 29, 2010
- Messages
- 14,857
- Gender
- Androgyne; they/them
- Basic Beliefs
- Natural Philosophy, Game Theoretic Ethicist
So, again I can use an example from my stupid little god game. It does, strangely, feature a couple sorts of sacred sites. Some are just in there to act as nucleation points for !!fun!!.Frankly, I don't understand the intent of OP's question.
I was pondering whether the adulation/worship/defense of sacred sites (or vessels or shards or whatever) represent a plot hole in stories of god(dess)(es) who are purported to be
!!fun!! Is a euphemism for things going sideways and terrible.
The second kind of holy site is... Disturbingly like the kind you describe.
This sort of "holy site" is really "a limited play area", a limited area in which the player can interact with the game universe in a direct way. Note that I could define or operate on any position or entity in the game using a memory editor/debugger, but that's like trying to type on a computer by rhythmically bridging traces on the motherboard by hand with a loose wire. Why do that when there's a limited, but useful interface for doing what you want in a less brain-numbing way?
I don't really think it's a plot hole so much as a trait only of worlds which, of all the things that create worlds, are most likely to be created by "a shitheel child going on a fucked up tear".
We can observe that humans can just as easily pretend such mechanisms exist as "real" without them being real at all, a function of humans thinking about games.