Cannibal games

William Latham explains why players get to eat their enemies in his new game, Evolva.

By David Wilson

Oct 28, 1999 | A critic once asked William Latham, a U.K. computer artist famous for weirdly contorted, alien-life-form-like software programs, if he took drugs. Latham replied that his computer -- or, to be precise, his extraordinary program Mutator, which modified computer graphics in accordance with Darwinian genetic theory -- hallucinated for him.

The London Times has called Latham the most innovative artist in cyberspace. A genial 38-year-old with Spock-like sideburns, Latham has exhibited his computer graphics in shows around the globe, winning numerous awards. In 1996, he released a new version of Mutator in the form of his "Organic Art" screensavers, which let individual consumers harness the power of Mutator and personally set evolution in motion. You started with a basic form, such as a cone. A few clicks later, you stared with revulsion or wonder at the mutated, gyrating microbe thing that you had created.

Ten days after Latham made "Organic Art" available on Microsoft's Web site, the screensaver had been downloaded 100,000 times. One magazine compared him to God; a high priestess in the Arizona desert projected "Organic Art" onto the inside of her temple.

But Latham was unsatisfied with creating mere images. His newest application for Mutator is a computer game called Evolva, due to be released in early 2000. Like everything else Latham does, Evolva enacts the process of evolution -- but this time, it is the game warriors themselves who evolve. In the far future, humanity has mastered the art of genetic engineering and created the ultimate Darwinian warrior -- the Genohunter. Whenever a Genohunter kills an enemy, it analyses its DNA, and then mutates, stealing any useful attributes that the victim had: strength, speed, weaponry.

Not every new game on the market makes cannibalism into one of its main selling points. But William Latham is not your everyday game designer. And his game is no ordinary game. Genohunter evolution and adaptation in the face of danger reflects our own changes as a species, and our own changes as individuals over the course of our lives. After playing Evolva, the prospect of going back to a game where the characters stay the same the whole way through is about as unappetizing as talking to a zombie. The gaming industry better take notice.

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