Fate, Cruelty, and Resistance: Valkyrie Profile Lenneth, Part 2
Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth has a key consistent theme of fate running through the game. The game is placed on a tight thread of time, the humans feel resigned to their fates given the prevalence of slavery, and the gods feel justified to recruit for their war against the Vanir as they feel they have to win. Fatalism is not questioned in Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth and I think the lack of questioning leads to extreme cruelty.
To read the previous post in this series, please click here.
Responsibility as a burden is often tied to rituals deemed necessary to prevent chaos from entering the world.
Duty and Responsibility
The easiest way to see an example of people feeling bound by fate is the experience of Nanami as a Shrine Maiden in Hai-Lan. She feels the burden of needing to complete the Shrine Ritual, where she has to risk her life to calm the spirit of the island to inherit the power needed to lead the island. This ritual can only be done by a direct descendant which Nanami is not. However, she still feels pressured to complete this ritual as the biological daughter died. A belief in fate is measured by the importance of doing certain rituals in order to prevent chaos from interfering with life. Namely, if Nanami doesn’t do this ritual, there will be no one to protect the island from evil spirits. In life, most religions and states have specific rituals to build narratives which highlight the in-members as people/circumstances which are representative of order and goodness and out-members, people/circumstances represented as chaos.
Powerful leaders often try to force their image of fate, despite the cost to everyone else.
Fate and Leadership
The villagers in Hai-Lan also have to deal with military leadership who are guided by a Songstress named Shiho. Military leaders want to gain more land and expand the power of their state. Shiho sings to inspire soldiers in battle. The villagers are angry because they do not want Shiho signing their sons to death. When Hai-Lan loses a battle against a rival faction, Shiho is captured and killed by enemy forces because of her power leading to the death of the enemy faction. The only people who benefitted from Shiho’s song are the military and political leaders of Hai-Lan. Shiho is unaware of how much suffering her song causes and has a breakdown when she realizes the effects of her actions. The villagers lose their children in a world of continuous war and they do not receive the benefits of spoils from constant war. Leadership often will say war is fated or necessary because the leaders benefit from expansion. Fate is not just existential, it can also be dictated by leaders who share their own vision of fate and what is necessary.
Focal points are a key problem when overemphasized
Fate and Idols
Fate is also highlighted by placing too much emphasis in either wealth, status, or a particular deity. Jayle’s question about Magnus is in response to Magnus’ erratic behavior and his focus on causing destruction. Jayle wants revenge against the harm Magnus has caused her family and for the surrounding community, Gerabellum. Valkyrie Profile has a grounding where people struggle to find meaning and how to respond to people who have found too much meaning. Magnus has found meaning in a devil-god to use as a combat. Resisting against people who have idolized anything and who hold positions of power is a life-long struggle.
Conclusion
A belief in fate is problematic because fate always favors a minority group of people and enable them to cause harm to the majority. Narrow obsessions with status and power cause people to become insensitive to others who do not agree with their vision. Valkyrie Profile is a struggle against the burdens leaders have placed on others. Even Valkyrie’s task is a burden placed on her by the gods which affect the humans she recruits. Fate causes unnecessary burdens without any standard of proof, as seen in the three examples given above. Fate might make people feel better but it has no grounding in reality and I think Valkyrie Profile is a great example of how the burdens of fate are in truth, deeply problematic. One final thought: I have not beaten hard mode in Valkyrie Profile. There will be more to come when I go back to play hard mode someday. Next week, we will do a character profile from Octopath Traveler and I’m recruiting for more podcast guests for our Pixelated Plato Podcast.
