Computer and Video Games
- The 1995 graphic adventure game Robot City is largely based around the three laws. The main character, Derec, is stranded in a city built and inhabited by robots with the exception of two humans, one of whom has been murdered. Because of the first law, this leaves Derec as a prime suspect. In order to prove his innocence, he must find the culprit. He often uses the three laws to aid him in his investigation. For example, a robot might not let him into a certain area because it has been ordered not to (it is following the second law). However, if he tells the robot that the real murderer is chasing him then the robot will let him enter; failure to do so would constitute allowing harm to come to a human through inaction (the first law takes priority over the second).
- The video games Mega Man 7 and Mega Man X reference Asimov. In Megaman 7, Mega Man seemingly attempts to break the First Law in order to kill the mad scientist Dr. Wily. When Dr. Wily reminds him of the First Law, in the Japanese original, Mega Man obediently puts down his Buster and is silent; however, in the English version, he claims to be "more than a robot" and again attempts to kill Wily, but is thwarted by another robot, Bass. In Mega Man X, the First Law is mentioned in the opening cutscene. In Mega Man X6, one of the Maverick bosses, Shield Sheldon, was known to have taken his own life for failing in his purpose, which breaks the Third Law, though this is implied to be more out of shame than because of the laws.
- In the role-playing game Paranoia, the robots are guided by a set of similar laws, except the rules stress the importance of The Computer. The laws are enforced by "asimov circuits"; bots whose circuits are malfunctioning (quite an ordinary condition) or removed (often by members of certain factions) are said to have "gone Frankenstein".
- In the Halo video game series, in a video it is stated that human artificial intelligence in certain situations, must obey "Asimov's law of Robotics" where an A.I., directly or indirectly, knowingly cannot let a human come to harm.
- In the game Portal 2, the player is told that all military androids in the game have "been given one copy of the laws of robotics... to share.", and that if they feel an android has infringed on their rights as described in the laws, it should be reported.
- The about:robots page in Firefox states "Robots may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.", the first law of robots.
- The DS game Zero Escape: Virtue's Last Reward explores the implication of the three laws and the morality of the zeroth.
Read more about this topic: The Three Laws Of Robotics In Popular Culture
Famous quotes containing the words video games, computer, video and/or games:
“It is among the ranks of school-age children, those six- to twelve-year-olds who once avidly filled their free moments with childhood play, that the greatest change is evident. In the place of traditional, sometimes ancient childhood games that were still popular a generation ago, in the place of fantasy and make- believe play . . . today’s children have substituted television viewing and, most recently, video games.”
—Marie Winn (20th century)
“What, then, is the basic difference between today’s computer and an intelligent being? It is that the computer can be made to see but not to perceive. What matters here is not that the computer is without consciousness but that thus far it is incapable of the spontaneous grasp of pattern—a capacity essential to perception and intelligence.”
—Rudolf Arnheim (b. 1904)
“It is among the ranks of school-age children, those six- to twelve-year-olds who once avidly filled their free moments with childhood play, that the greatest change is evident. In the place of traditional, sometimes ancient childhood games that were still popular a generation ago, in the place of fantasy and make- believe play . . . today’s children have substituted television viewing and, most recently, video games.”
—Marie Winn (20th century)
“At the age of twelve I was finding the world too small: it appeared to me like a dull, trim back garden, in which only trivial games could be played.”
—Elizabeth Bowen (1899–1973)