This is an archive of the former website of the Maoist Internationalist Movement, which was run by the now defunct Maoist Internationalist Party - Amerika. The MIM now consists of many independent cells, many of which have their own indendendent organs both online and off. MIM(Prisons) serves these documents as a service to and reference for the anti-imperialist movement worldwide.

Maoist Internationalist Movement

"Medieval Lords: Build, Defend, Expand"
Monte Cristo Multimedia
2005

Like "Knights of Honor," "Medieval Lords" ("ML") may have the effect of spreading militarism and snippets of "Doom"-like pornography. We'd rank it in the bottom half of strategy games for this reason, but ahead of the vast majority of TV or Xbox/Nintendo-style entertainment. Despite its reactionary impact, "ML" is put together in such a way that it is easy for Marxists to discuss and draw out some interesting topics.

Forces of production

Although social classes are almost non-existent in "Medieval Lords," there are still many aspects of the game that we can talk about. According to Marx, the "forces of production," including technology are the base of a structure he called the mode of production.

There are some nice demonstrations of the importance of the forces of production in "ML." When the ruler has pleased the citizens enough that they pay taxes sufficiently (by moving in from other places), the ruler can pay for a carpenter, a blacksmith, a stone mason, a mechanic, an architect and an engineer. Each of these skilled laborers makes possible a range of advances in production and the rest of society. This is the same idea as in Marxism about the role and influence of the forces of production.

The other part of the mode of production is called the relations of production. "ML" does not really have relations of production evident or playing an active role. So we do not really see class struggle.

Applied-side knowledge production

As in other video games, the makers of "ML" found it very important to include military struggle. The class struggle and how it advances is unimportant to "ML;" however, "ML" does show one more kind of struggle in this game that starts in the year 1000. What we like is how science in "ML" arises from production, on the applied side. We did not build a university in our version of the game.

The idea of knowledge arising from production and struggle is actually a difficult concept for many of MIM's opponents. Marx referred to "mechanical materialists," people overly influenced by Galileo and Newton to the point where they treated everything as a matter of dropping a rock off a building to witness its accelaration and velocity. "Mechanical materialists" are thus guilty of copying overly much Newtonian mechanics and then fitting everything into that straight-jacket. "Mechanical materialists" also do not see struggle anymore than they see struggle when the moon orbits the Earth or the Earth the sun. For mechanical materialists, the struggle of species to survive is outside the realm of possibility as a scientific matter. Politically, mechanical materialism is popular with the petty-bourgeoisie, which finds justification for its attitude paralyzed between the great classes of proletariat and capitalist class.

Basing themselves on Galileo and Newton, there are those on the whole passive side of pseudo-Marxism including social-democrats, Mensheviks and the Menshevik of long duration Trotsky. They fail to see that while we can draw many scientific conclusions about species, those species are and were in struggle. So not every science can be a matter of observing a rock falling off a building, where it is obvious the rock does not struggle.

The pseudo-Marxists have raised up the productive forces to being a "theory of productive forces," whereby the activity of things (objects or implements in production) can add infinitely to economic production, the production of value. Politically the theory of productive forces is popular, because it justifies the existence and greater pay of the petty-bourgeoisie and it does so in such a way as to make wealth production unproblematic, devoid of struggle. The increase of wealth in the world is seen by many as a passive occurrence as natural as a cliff or the sun rising.

Pseudo-Marxists spouting conscious or unconscious "theory of the productive forces" as Marx and Mao referred to it, are a constant source of distortion in the international communist movement. If we follow their theories, there is no reason to see that capitalism would ever have an economic crisis. Just automatically and passively the productive forces add to value according to the pseudo-Marxists. In contrast, we Marxists hold that the means of production come from labor if they add to value at all. These means of production degrade and then have to be repaired or remade, so we can talk about them as depreciating in labor terms. The pseudo-Marxists find some kind of magic in how the means of production contribute value. Marx held that objects do not add new sources of value.

So it is "ML" could be construed to be in line with a lot of pseudo-Marxism. Even there, though there is no class struggle, there is a "stop activity" button on each building. If the player touches it, the workers are still there but do nothing. The building then deteriorates and society goes backward, regardless of the advanced objects or implements in that building. In teaching the labor theory of value in a game, we could hardly do better than to add a "stop activity" button on a building.

Politically, we will find that most mechanical materialists line up with the powers-that-be. Just as in this game, most of the imperialist country so-called Left is working full-time backing their imperialist powers and supporting military conflicts, either consciously as in the case of Democrats or unconsciously in the case of some followers of revisionism. What is missing is the struggle of classes influencing labor, output and economic crisis.

Productive sector

Although "ML" misses out on class struggle, "ML" does model the difference between the productive sector and unproductive sector in the economy. From the beginning of the game, there is a chance the player may have too many military units and not enough farms. The military units will then starve and then the economy will rebalance itself if the player does not lose in the meantime. The player must quickly plant enough farms and have enough tax paying and working citizens to support a military. That much is in the game.

Marx built a model of this same phenomenon into his whole theory of the economy. Military units are examples of the "unproductive sector." Every economy requires a certain minimum to operate and that minimum includes what Marx called value for the capitalist economy. Value is another word for labor, but many activities do not count as productive labor. Today if the world had too many military units, Hooters waitresses, office workers and cosmetic specialists for cars, the economy would go into a tailspin. For many countries that is in fact occurring, but in the imperialist countries the severity of the crisis is put off because of an appropriation of international labor: farm work gets done by other nationalities.

In fact, despite the advances in the means of production in "ML" which translate into better production and greater happiness of the citizens, it is possible to have an economic crisis in late stages of the game because of the difference between the productive sector and unproductive sector. In my simulation, I reached the very advanced "mechanic" stage of the forces of production, but that's when I had my biggest economic crisis, because I had advanced too far without the food and citizens to back me up. I made an ultraleft mistake. As a result my entire military had to quit and I went into the deepest deficit in the game, one that seemed insurmountable. That means I tried to advance before I was ready. Luckily I had saved the game and could start again from just before advancing to the mechanic stage.

Pornography

"ML" is three-dimensional (3D). The 3D scenes are reminiscent of another game called "Doom" and somewhat more realistically painted. While "Doom" is famous as a pointless game of endless gore with only an occasional justification such as hunting Nazis, "ML" is much more sparing but pointed in its use of gore. People go to the gallows and a soldier chops off someone's head in the victory scene. For the most part, this is the kind of thing that makes the game a negative influence.

On the other hand, the pornography is so conscious that it may backfire especially in reference to cultures that are no longer our own. The ruler can build a stake, and once built, people burn there all the time during the game. At the same time, the public feels more secure and its entertainment rating also increases. Both the higher polls for security and entertainment translate into higher taxes for the ruler. MIM would have to say that the game-maker got that exactly right.

Now some sick people of 2006 will find the burnings at the stake entertaining too. Many will passively accept it. Yet others will find it repulsive if only out of preference for the pornography of our times. For those young people who find their own age's pornography superior, because it possibly involves less coercion, there is a chance that "ML" will introduce a theory of pornography for the first time. We see that entertainment structures are set up by the rulers by conscious design and that they contribute to tax revenues and political stability. Why it is that the public finds this sort of public suffering entertaining is not explained in "ML," but the fact that it is a choice to produce that pornography that benefits the rulers is obvious and down to an algebraic formula.

By itself, "ML" has a mostly negative impact, but with a little effort we can turn a bad thing into a good thing.


Go To Amazon.com to Buy This CD