[lodge_zero]

Isn't a lot of Broken Sword ripped off from Foucault's Pendulum?

[Dale Baldwin]

What's that?

[fov]

Welcome to the forum.

Could you give some examples of what you mean?

[JHousequake]

Okay, after playing with the Google it appears Foucault's Pendulum is a novel by Umberto Eco.

If a copy (often unread) of The Name of the Rose on the coffee table was a badge of intellectual superiority in 1983, Eco's second novel--also an intellectual blockbuster--should prove more accessible. This complex psychological thriller chronicles the development of a literary joke that plunges its perpetrators into deadly peril. The narrator, Casaubon, an expert on the medieval Knights Templars, and two editors working in a branch of a vanity press publishing house in Milan, are told about a purported coded message revealing a secret plan set in motion by the Knights Templars centuries ago when the society was forced underground. As a lark, the three decide to invent a history of the occult tying a variety of phenomena to the mysterious machinations of the Order. Feeding their inspirations into a computer, they become obsessed with their story, dreaming up links between the Templars and just about every occult manifestation throughout history, and predicting that culmination of the Templars' scheme to take over the world is close at hand. The plan becomes real to them--and eventually to the mysterious They, who want the information the trio has "discovered." Dense, packed with meaning, often startlingly provocative, the novel is a mixture of metaphysical meditation, detective story, computer handbook, introduction to physics and philosophy, historical survey, mathematical puzzle, compendium of religious and cultural mythology, guide to the Torah (Hebrew, rather than Latin contributes to the puzzle here, but is restricted mainly to chapter headings), reference manual to the occult, the hermetic mysteries, the Rosicrucians, the Jesuits, the Freemasons-- ad infinitum . The narrative eventually becomes heavy with the accumulated weight of data and supposition, and overwrought with implication, and its climax may leave readers underwhelmed. Until that point, however, this is an intriguing cerebral exercise in which Eco slyly suggests that intellectual arrogance can come to no good end.

It wouldn't be surprising if it were influenced from this. Many other adventure games take their inspiration/ideas from novels.

[Dale Baldwin]

Templar history, Freemasons etc didn't start from that novel though.

[Eye-Z]

lol @ it being taken from a novel

the knights templars is a part of history around the time of the crusades, the chance it being taken from that novel is slim im suggesting, since hundreds of books have been writen, it could of easily been taken from any recolection of that time and period.

[Jazhara7]

The Crusades, and the Orders of Knights (especially the Templars - they get a lot of publicity) are all too glorified.

There was an exhibition in the Dom (a kind of church) in Mainz, about the Crusades. It was not only from the viewpoint of Christian people of that time - they also included the viewpoints of Islamic people of that time.

If you look at it that way, you realize (if you didn't do so yet) how bloody pointless (and a total waste) those wars were (I knew before, that it was horrible, but the exhibition showed that it was even worse than I had imagined.)

Appropriately, the name of the exhibition was "No war is holy".


One opinion of the Order of the Knights Templar (by someone of that time) was very interesting. They were described as being dirty, stinking, and not tolerating any kind of fun. I think this description was by someone of the Christian side.

-

[Captain Blondebeard]

Originally Posted by Eye-Z

lol @ it being taken from a novel

the knights templars is a part of history around the time of the crusades, the chance it being taken from that novel is slim im suggesting, since hundreds of books have been writen, it could of easily been taken from any recolection of that time and period.

Thank you. Good post.