Treatments of race and colonialism in Avatar and Little King’s Story

It might seem odd to compare the highest-grossing movie of all time with a fairly obscure, Japanese developed Wii title, but that's the way my mind works I suppose. I just saw Avatar last week, and have been playing Little King's Story for several months now. I thought that rather than do a traditional review of LKS (which would mostly be me gushing about how it's basically one of the best games ever), I thought I would compare what are really the main issues in both pieces.

Alright, so for those of you who have yet to see Avatar, here's a brief synopsis. This dude has a twin who has died, so the American military asks him to step into his brothers shoes as an "avatar driver." Basically, the US is invading this planet called Pandora to get a certain mineral (called, ridiculously, "unobtainium") and they're using these avatars (which are a combination of human DNA and Na'vi DNA, who are the inhabitants of Pandora) to blend in with the Na'vi and get them to move off of their land. So the dude controls a physical, Na'vi entity with his mind. Anyways, he gets stranded on Pandora, integrates in with "the Natives" and helps them to overcome the Americans. It's Dances with Space Wolves, basically.

Little King's Story's plot puts you in control of a boy who has stumbled upon a mystical crown. When he touches it, all of a sudden he becomes the ruler of this tiny kingdom in the middle of nowhere. He doesn't know why, but his adviser is telling him that he needs to stamp out all opposition in the world and dominate them all, specifically the "filthy" Onii (pictured above). As the game progresses, you conquer more lands, but a creeping doubt sets in – why, exactly, do you have to destroy entire races, especially when they seem to just be defending themselves?

The reason why I thought that these two pieces would be interesting to compare is because, despite its cutesy appearance, Little King's Story contains one of the deepest, most thought-provoking and satirically subversive examinations of colonialism yet seen in videogaming. Avatar, despite recently winning the Golden Globe for Best Picture (and likely the Oscar), is a facile and occasionally racist depiction of colonialism's history.

Consider what Avatar is really saying. It's basically the myth of the noble savage played out in an alien locale, borrowing liberally from the widespread view of First Nations people as stoic warriors, impervious to emotionality (except the women). This view is particularly a problem in American media, as the plight of First Nations people is almost never dealt with in a modern context – they're always placed in the past tense, as if they don't even exist anymore. This can make a discussion of First Nations issues challenging, as most Americans aren't even aware of any issues, or aren't even aware of modern First Nations people. This makes Avatar especially galling, as it borrows from First Nations history without bothering to make that an upfront goal – most audience members are more likely to be wowed by the visuals or the cool blue cat aliens, but few seem to realize the political implications afoot.

SPOILER if you haven't seen the movie: in the end, the Na'vi win. They kick their oppressors out the front door and seemingly live happily ever after (until, of course, an Avatar 2 gets made). But since the movie goes to such great lengths to supposedly be an allegory for the colonialism of First Nations people in North America, ignoring the fact that this didn't actually happen is pretty appalling. It completely ignores the sad legacy left after the first wave of colonialism – residential schools that stripped First Nations people of their language and culture (this has been described as "Canada's Holocaust"), the terrible conditions on reserves, reserves themselves, inner city gang issues, drug issues – these things all relate back to colonialism. And to simply give audiences the happy ending, when there absolutely was no happy ending, basically puts all of these issues even further on the back burner.

Jake Sully, the American avatar driver, ingrains himself into Na'vi culture, and even leads the charge against the American oppressors. This brings up incredibly questionable choices made in regards to race relations, basically saying that the Na'vi were incapable of defending themselves unless they were lead by a white man. Not to mention that Sully essentially appropriates Na'vi culture. Avatar is the world's first instance of blueface.

Little King's Story didn't break any videogaming records – in fact, it's been played by next to no one, apparently. That's a shame, because it has much more to say about race relations and colonialism than Avatar ever did. The important difference is that Little King's Story, while being from the perspective of the oppressors, never loses sight of its political implications – in fact, the way that LKS engages the player's trepidation at committing genocide for the heck of it without beating the player over the head is incredible.

Lest the gamer unintentionally think that the game is really just a game that celebrates colonialism, the game starts with a cinematic that outlines the satirical nature of the game as well as the mindset that the player needs to come in with. (Watch from 0:57 – 1:35)

Class structures are outlined from the very beginning – these are the ideas of being a king and colonizing that a child would have. The game then extrapolates upon those ideas and builds an entire game out of it, positing, what would colonialism look like to a child?

The answer is not so subtly in the game, "not much different from how an adult sees it." You, as the player, are doing what you're told – exterminate the enemy. This is a common goal in strategy videogames, but rarely do your enemies make a crying noise when you kill them; rarely do you finance your colony solely by ripping out crops that your enemies have planted, and also by killing your enemies and taking whatever's on them; rarely does race play such an integral role in understanding the game's ambitions.

You see, if Avatar is a misguidedly liberal film that ends up having a racist message, Little King's Story is a purposefully racist game that ends up having a liberal message. Each of the kingdoms that you invade are stereotypical – all of the enemies look the same (even though your characters all have different names and personalities), and the game even goes as far as to label them as "savages." The Onii even share a resemblance with the Golliwogg. Playing with such blatantly racist imagery could have seriously backfired, but Cing (the developers), were way too smart about their aims with the game: since you're playing as the oppressor, this makes sense – this is how they would see them. You, as the player, always know different, because of the superb characterization in the game. Howser is megalomaniacal and scheming, so you know that the game doesn't want you to take him seriously. There's even religious extremists in your midst, who are intent on spreading the word of God to the "savages."

Because the game is so steeped in satire, it ends up being a brilliant deconstruction of colonialism's myths. As well, because you are actually playing as the Little King, your interactivity highlights elements of colonialism that may not have made as much impact otherwise. It's all extremely tongue in cheek and avoids any sort of proselytizing. That's an impressive feat.

Avatar might have needed an entirely different premise to have anything worth saying. But every element of Little King's Story works towards its goal. Sure, you could complain about controls or the lack of voice work, but that would mean missing out on one of the most incredible looks at colonialism and race yet seen.