Crusader Kings 3 will finally let us play as the pope in the By God Alone expansion, launching on September 30. The power! The pageantry! The blood boys! Wait, what?
OK, so history has given us a lot of weird pope stories. One of them relates to the declining health of Pope Innocent VIII. As the story goes, in 1492 three boys were hired to bring the pope back to health with their blood. All of their blood. It went badly. All three boys died, of course, and so did the pope.
This was long before physicians understood the circulatory system, or even knew it existed, and some versions of the tale have Innocent VIII literally drinking from the lads. It's apocryphal. Obvious nonsense, and likely propaganda. But the story has gone from a tall tale full of inconsistencies to the first example of blood transfusion. It's not true, but it is compelling.
One of the reasons for that is the modern trend of wealthy psychopaths hiring blood boys to claw back their youth. The idea that the rich and powerful, the Silicon Valley execs, are literally feeding on us.
Inappropriate due to realism, not due to atrocity.
Jesse Henning, Paradox PR manager
As The Guardian put it in 2024, "What history can teach us is that finding a miracle cure for ageing has long been one of humankind’s most cherished dreams. And wealthy, white men have often been at the forefront of this quest—despite the dubiousness of the effectiveness or safety of anti-ageing treatments."
Now, Paradox games can get pretty weird. You can, for instance, eat the pope. And with the By God Alone expansion allowing you to play as the pope, you could theoretically turn him into a cannibal. Justice at last. But blood boys? Nope, that's not on the cards.
A trio of Paradox devs were asked, and while they did have to check—implying that it's not outside the realm of possibility—this is not a feature in By God Alone. But there's a practical reason. "Innocent VIII is at/past the end of the CK3 timeline, so they wouldn't be appropriate anyway," Paradox says.
"Inappropriate due to realism," joked Paradox PR manager Jesse Henning, who had to ask the devs this absurd question on my behalf, "not due to atrocity."
Maybe Europa Universalis 5 will add the feature.
More papal weirdos
Pope Julius II
Jules was an utter bastard, but I've gotta give it to him, his nickname, 'The Battle Pope' is badass. I mean, c'mon, who wouldn't want to be known by that moniker? He personally led soldiers into battle, but he seemed to like sex as much as war, and may have been riddled with syphilis. Which might explain why he had such a terrible temper.
Pope Benedict IX
The original Young Pope, he was pope three times, sold his title to his godfather and was described by a successor as "a pope was so vile, so foul, so execrable, that I shudder to think of it".
Pope Sergius III
This lad allegedly murdered his two predecessors, had an illegitimate son who also became pope, and was accused of running a "pornocracy". What a legend.
