And no, you can pull those filthy minds out of the gutter. For once there is no dirty double meaning attached here.

What I’m talking about is making something targeted for a younger audience accessible to adults, and possibly the only example I know where it’s not merely done right, it’s done brilliantly.

I’ve spent a lot of time playing the family friendly MMORPG Pirate 101 by Kings Isle, and in the last couple of weeks I’ve been playing in the beta of new content for the game. I’m not a paid shill – I spend way too much of my hard-earned income on the game for that. Just a fan who appreciates the way the game has been put together, and who can see how much care the game makers have gone to when building a functional plot (check), interesting characters (check), worlds with a feeling of depth behind them (check), and all the usual things you’d expect from any good piece of storytelling. Add to this that the game is targeted primarily towards the middle-school level but has a dedicated adult fan base, and you can tell they’re doing something right.

Their primary tools are layering everything and using references. Shamelessly using references, I might add. I couldn’t count the references I’ve recognized, and I guarantee that I’ve missed a whole lot. At the young player level, there’s a quest-driven adventure in which the player-character is a “pirate” (although mercenary privateer is probably closer to the mark, and there’s precious little actual piracy going on) being hunted by the nefarious Armada (magically driven clockwork soldiers who are also remarkably creepy for the age range this game targets – and have curious resonances with at least one totalitarian system) and trying to beat the Armada to the greatest treasure in the game universe – a treasure held in the legendary realm of El Dorado (also known as Shangri-La) whose nature is curiously undefined.

The starting world is known as Skull Island and bears a strong resemblance to the Caribbean Sea in the Pirate Age. From there the core plot twists through multiple levels of  betrayal, being used by various more powerful entities to further their goals, and gradually learning more about the game universe and your character’s history. In addition, your character gains companions (aka crew members) along the way, and the core companions have an extensive history of their own, with quests which reveal more about them. Mixed in with this there’s a ton of subtle and not so subtle layering: the universe is full of anthropomorphic animals (humans are in the minority in most places), with each major group of animals corresponding to a cultural grouping. There are Monquistan monkeys, Marleybonian dogs, cats, and foxes, Valencian unicorns, crabs, and guinea pigs, Aquilonian eagles, Cool Ranch’s bird ranchers and buffalo tribes, and Moo Shu’s cows, goats, pigs (including ninja pigs), and sheep. Humans… I’m not sure where they come from! As you progress through the game, you get Monquistans mocking your oversized awkwardness, a Marleybonian suffering a horrible curse where he becomes a human at night and when cured is so thankful he’s no longer a monster, the Cool Ranch buffalos call the ranchers “claw feet”, and so on. A big part of the game involves seeing – and being on the wrong side of – bad behavior from all sides.

For the adults, there are references to Cthulhu appearing semi-regularly. There’s an impressive Godfather pastiche involving the Frogfather – who is, you guessed it, a frog. And yes, he is in charge of most of the illegal activities around, and no, you don’t want to disappoint him. The Marleybonians are very Victorian British, and include characters like Mycroft Bones (whose brother Sherlock Bones appears in the sister game Wizard 101) in charge of the special branch, Mr Gilbert (the sensible one) and Mr Sullivan (who keeps bursting into song with snippets from the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas). They’re having problems with the foxes which very strongly parallel the relationship between England and Ireland (yes, the foxes are Irish. Which in the game is Albion). At one point I found my character and crew re-enacting Dickens’ Christmas Carol.

In Moo Shu there are not only oodles of references to samurai era Japan, many of the characters are named for Asian food. Egg Foo Yung is a major NPC, and General Tso is one of the world villains. I nearly sprayed my keyboard in the middle of a dungeon battle when the key to winning the battle was to get close enough to General Tso’s pet chicken to threaten it. And that’s before the cow jokes. They worship the holy Moodha there. And have samoorai. And cowbuki theater. And… You get the idea. Then there’s the bad puns, which are everywhere.

For parents, playing the game with their preteen and teenage kids there’s a gold mine for history lessons (the quest to acquire a conundrum machine has strong parallels with the WW2 Enigma Machine), ethics, and honestly just about everything else. The more I play the game the more impressed I am.

Here endeth the unpaid commercial, brought to you by a fried writer whose main form of de-stressing activity is sinking enemy ships and killing enemy critters in the game.