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Games that let you choose between good & evil
- Thread starter jluedtke
- Start date
ShockingAlberto
Member
Yeah, this is honestly my main complaint about games with these systems. Not only are they always clearly good or evil, you're often basically told which one they are. Mass Effect has good ones on top, bad ones on the bottom, and sometimes they're color coded!EvilMario said:
Speaking of ME, I'm not sure if it's good or evil, exactly. It's more like...ethical or non-ethical. Competing ideas of what "good" is.
There has to be some kind of reward though, even if that reward is as simple as how NPCs or party members or whatever respond to you. If they don't, the game just feels empty. There's no point being given the option to play a character a certain way if the game world doesn't respond to it, and in the end that's the reward and the reason those games are played.Llyranor said:
Story rewards. Not material/powergamey rewards. Ie. The game should certainly *acknowledge* your bravery for going into the burning building, but unless appropriate (eg. you save some noble's kid) you shouldn't really get extra xp/items/gold for it.
Most games basically hand-hold you through the 'good' path. With the kind of material rewards most games give 'good' characters, it'd make more sense for evil chars to pretend to be good.
You didn't beat up that guy? Here's triple the xp you would have gotten otherwise!!
Most games basically hand-hold you through the 'good' path. With the kind of material rewards most games give 'good' characters, it'd make more sense for evil chars to pretend to be good.
You didn't beat up that guy? Here's triple the xp you would have gotten otherwise!!
Princess Skittles
Prince's's 'Skittle's
:lolspeedpop said:
Basically, this is true.
Anyway, the "moral choice" pretty much ALWAYS ends up being this simplistic:
Oooooh, such a moving moral statement, getting to decide to kill innocent video game characters or not. That will make us think and look into ourselves. Basically, it's just another gimmick companies use to get that delicious, coveted M rating these days to pull in all those 12-17 year old male sales.VindicatorZ said:
Not a bad call, especially for the time.Shard said:
It's kind of funny
or sad
In Paper Mario: TTYD you have the option of joining the main villain during the last battle.
In Persona 3: FES toward the end you can choose between being a hero or living peacefully as a coward. The bad ending was kind of cool too IMO.
In Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link if you allow Link to die you can hasten the return of Ganon.
In Persona 3: FES toward the end you can choose between being a hero or living peacefully as a coward. The bad ending was kind of cool too IMO.
In Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link if you allow Link to die you can hasten the return of Ganon.
Ben Pierce
Member
speedpop said:It's all the same shit in the end anyway.
:lol :lol :lol :lol :lol
In a way Civilization has often used a somewhat reasonable "morality" system. Your behavior among other civs is usually going to have an effect and as the game goes on you're going to be forced into conflict with them over a variety of issues and for sometimes realistic reasons (e.g. access to resources, religious differences, border disputes, someone else just being a jerk). If you betray an ally the other civs are generally going to remember that and hold it against you in the future. You get bullied by other civs and can either go to war with them or just suck it up (I don't recall this ever affecting your reputation or causing them to see you as an easy target, but it would be a good idea for the future... giving in makes you look weak, easily victimized, but peaceful while fighting back makes you look stronger, but a possible military threat that might actually lead to future wars or upset other more pacifist civs).
True, it's not the manner that most games tend to use, but there are definitely long-term consequences to your actions and those decisions aren't always the dull, binary choices of being a complete saint and giving the medicine to the villagers and refusing any sort of reward (XP bonus) or selling it to them at an inflated price (more money). So often it's just a matter of either refusing rewards when offered because you're an idiot or just shaking people down because you're a bullying thug.
Frankly, I'm also really sick of games trying to give you dialogue options and having it just be a choice between "normal human conversation" and various levels of "complete dick who just fucks with people for the hell of it". I didn't even find that sort of thing amusing when I was 14 because... well, aside from just not being that sort of asshole myself it doesn't take much to realize that being pointlessly rude to everyone is just going to get you nowhere both in games and reality.
I think the thing that could make this turn around is to give us realistic choices that aren't either good or evil. After all, everyone has different moral views and playing with the middle is where the fun is. How about a quest where, in a world where there is enough established magic and active deities to take personal feelings out of it, you have to make choices regarding a new religion: are they a swindling cult that does some good or are they a legitimate group that sometimes makes questionable choices? This is a realistic issue where there isn't necessarily a single correct point of view and that models, well, pretty much every major real-world religion to one degree or another. It also allows greater narrative flexibility and interesting options for future gameplay that diverge significantly. So long as you never definitively establish either path as having been correct (e.g. obvious cackling plans about deceiving the gullible followers, the god in question shows up and politely asks why you're slaughtering his followers) you'll have a player nagged by the question of whether they did the right thing or not. Even better if you try to work in various moral quandaries (e.g. weak evidence has convinced you that they are a cult, but it's not enough for the authorities... do you plant evidence to get them shut down?) within that so that even if you feel that you did the right thing for the right reasons your path in getting there leaves the question of whether you're really the evil party.
Before you start designing your morality system maybe you should read up on other media that deals with these sorts of issues. The Wire, for example, would be an excellent place to crib ideas from as it frequently deals with exactly this sort of behavior.
True, it's not the manner that most games tend to use, but there are definitely long-term consequences to your actions and those decisions aren't always the dull, binary choices of being a complete saint and giving the medicine to the villagers and refusing any sort of reward (XP bonus) or selling it to them at an inflated price (more money). So often it's just a matter of either refusing rewards when offered because you're an idiot or just shaking people down because you're a bullying thug.
Frankly, I'm also really sick of games trying to give you dialogue options and having it just be a choice between "normal human conversation" and various levels of "complete dick who just fucks with people for the hell of it". I didn't even find that sort of thing amusing when I was 14 because... well, aside from just not being that sort of asshole myself it doesn't take much to realize that being pointlessly rude to everyone is just going to get you nowhere both in games and reality.
I think the thing that could make this turn around is to give us realistic choices that aren't either good or evil. After all, everyone has different moral views and playing with the middle is where the fun is. How about a quest where, in a world where there is enough established magic and active deities to take personal feelings out of it, you have to make choices regarding a new religion: are they a swindling cult that does some good or are they a legitimate group that sometimes makes questionable choices? This is a realistic issue where there isn't necessarily a single correct point of view and that models, well, pretty much every major real-world religion to one degree or another. It also allows greater narrative flexibility and interesting options for future gameplay that diverge significantly. So long as you never definitively establish either path as having been correct (e.g. obvious cackling plans about deceiving the gullible followers, the god in question shows up and politely asks why you're slaughtering his followers) you'll have a player nagged by the question of whether they did the right thing or not. Even better if you try to work in various moral quandaries (e.g. weak evidence has convinced you that they are a cult, but it's not enough for the authorities... do you plant evidence to get them shut down?) within that so that even if you feel that you did the right thing for the right reasons your path in getting there leaves the question of whether you're really the evil party.
Before you start designing your morality system maybe you should read up on other media that deals with these sorts of issues. The Wire, for example, would be an excellent place to crib ideas from as it frequently deals with exactly this sort of behavior.
I have to agree that games do go too far rewarding those who take the 'good' path. And I'm speaking as one of those who can't play evil. They may be fictional people, but I still can't hurt them.
Honestly, Fable 2 is the last game that I think really did a (somewhat) nice job punishing those who want to play good. I was somewhat impressed when, after you
I think games should make the evil path be the easy path, at least in the short term. Good players should have to work to be good. The reward should be how you feel, not what you get.
Really, KOTOR kind of had it right in the power system. However, they didn't take it far enough. If you're playing good, it shouldn't have simply cost more force points to use lightning. You flat-out shouldn't have had access to it. Lock it off for those tilting towards good, make it expensive for grey, and give it to evil.
If you had a whole range of powers that are locked off depending on your alignment, it would give a real heft to your choices. Plus, since grey jedi would have had access to all powers (albeit for crazy amounts of force points), it would reward those who want to play the middle as well.
Admittedly, even that system is still guilty of min/maxing, but I think it would work a little better.
Honestly, Fable 2 is the last game that I think really did a (somewhat) nice job punishing those who want to play good. I was somewhat impressed when, after you
choose to be aged to spare an innocent, you never recover, nor gain an extra reward (as far as I remember). Of course, all the aging seemed to do is make your eyes glow so it wasn't perfect, but it was a step on the right direction.
I think games should make the evil path be the easy path, at least in the short term. Good players should have to work to be good. The reward should be how you feel, not what you get.
Really, KOTOR kind of had it right in the power system. However, they didn't take it far enough. If you're playing good, it shouldn't have simply cost more force points to use lightning. You flat-out shouldn't have had access to it. Lock it off for those tilting towards good, make it expensive for grey, and give it to evil.
If you had a whole range of powers that are locked off depending on your alignment, it would give a real heft to your choices. Plus, since grey jedi would have had access to all powers (albeit for crazy amounts of force points), it would reward those who want to play the middle as well.
Admittedly, even that system is still guilty of min/maxing, but I think it would work a little better.
What was that game that had a laughably bad choice. I think it was Everquest Legends of Norrath or something like that where they were like "choose between good and evil! Your choices affect the outcome of the game!" They were right. It was one choice. Made in the first five minutes. That's it.
Really nearly all the games with these kind of choices fail because the choices are like,
A. Help the lady cross the street.
or
B. Kill her puppy and force her to drink the blood from the dog's skull.
I'd like to see a little bit more nuanced choices to make.
Really nearly all the games with these kind of choices fail because the choices are like,
A. Help the lady cross the street.
or
B. Kill her puppy and force her to drink the blood from the dog's skull.
I'd like to see a little bit more nuanced choices to make.
Yeah, sometimes it's so arbitrary and obvious..
Been playing Mass Effect recently, and suffers from this very thing..Being good is related to choosing the good answers (Yeah, I love you, Of course I'll help you)..and being bad is choosing the obvious ones too (Fuck you, Go rot in hell, etc..)
A problem with Fable games (even when I love them) is that you can go from evil to good and the world perse doesn't change or is affected by it..or just anything..Like I did...You can go on a rampage, kill absolutely everyone, be this dark skinned guy with glowing green eyes and horns...then go around killing just bad guys and donating money to the light temple..and there I was good and everyone forgot I destroyed every house and killed every person in there.
I wouldn't mind if they forced me to continue playing the game with the actual choices I made..meaning if I chose to kill everyone, then accept that fate and continue playing a game with dead people all around, destroyed houses, etc. If anything, that would make the game more challenging since killing everyone = no sellers = no items to buy..or heck just no story progress..
Been playing Mass Effect recently, and suffers from this very thing..Being good is related to choosing the good answers (Yeah, I love you, Of course I'll help you)..and being bad is choosing the obvious ones too (Fuck you, Go rot in hell, etc..)
A problem with Fable games (even when I love them) is that you can go from evil to good and the world perse doesn't change or is affected by it..or just anything..Like I did...You can go on a rampage, kill absolutely everyone, be this dark skinned guy with glowing green eyes and horns...then go around killing just bad guys and donating money to the light temple..and there I was good and everyone forgot I destroyed every house and killed every person in there.
I wouldn't mind if they forced me to continue playing the game with the actual choices I made..meaning if I chose to kill everyone, then accept that fate and continue playing a game with dead people all around, destroyed houses, etc. If anything, that would make the game more challenging since killing everyone = no sellers = no items to buy..or heck just no story progress..
Spirit of Jazz
Banned
Patryn said:
I think Fable 2's master stroke was not that it offered choice, but took choice away from the player
Reaver taking out Lucian if you gave the bastred time to reel off his generic evil villain speech really shocked me
I think the only really interesting devs focusing on morality right now are Obsidion, but it's pretty fucking obvious that would be the case given Planescape: Torment is a master-class in narrative choice. Hopefully Alpha Protocol will offer something deep, will be a success, and encourage writers to actually look beyond this dull, unrealistic, insignificant binary choice of absolute good and evil.
Patryn said:
I disagree. I mean, I see where you're coming from, but it still enforces too much in the way of some people's real-world views. You're saying that "good" is to be self-sacrificing for the benefit of others not only without reward, but actual punishment and that the player should desire to do this.
I think ambiguity is the best approach. Not only do you avoid judging the player personally and getting into real-world arguments of morality, but you have greater ability to introduce nuance and personal feeling. It's not an ego-trip of self-righteousness because you dutifully went out of your way to suffer for others so you can feel superior at the end because you not only did it the hard way, but along the "good" path so much as a place of dilemmas where you never know if what you did was really correct even from your own point of view. Where you're put into situations that cause you to be willing to bend or break your own code of behavior not because you want the personal benefit, but because you think it might be the only way to do the right thing.
I have no problem being the evil person in games. In fact, that's usually the first one I do. What pisses me off in these games is that when there is a sequel, you very rarely play as the person you were the first time, and even if you do, the good side is always fucking Canon. LAME!
guggnichso
Banned
The game with the best implementation of moral player choices so far was The Witcher imho.
Although it didn't make you choose between good or evil, but between various shades of dark grey
I totally LOVED the game, it's story and characters. My favorite RPG so far!
Although it didn't make you choose between good or evil, but between various shades of dark grey
I totally LOVED the game, it's story and characters. My favorite RPG so far!
