Binary Moral Systems in Video Games – Are You Good or Evil?

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38 thoughts on “Binary Moral Systems in Video Games – Are You Good or Evil?”

  2. I normally do the good side for the same reason. You normally get rewarded instantly for being good. The bad guy I find normally gives you good things but after more work

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  5. Games are usually designed to reward the good guy. Unless it's marketed as having very clear support for starting with the bad buy, it's better to learn the game options by playing first as the good guy and seeing if it will reward you in depth for replaying as a bad guy.

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  7. Baldur's Gate 2. Being evil means that you will sort your team in a different way, because the good characters will be angry if you force them to do evil stuff. In the worst case they will abandon you or even turn against you. So in that game being good or evil defines your team, changing your style of play.

    Among evil characters there are less to choose but the ones there are, are more specialized and more powerful than their good counterparts. Yet less versatile.

    And how npc that could have helped you are instead going against you when you are evil is great. The motivation is not to act, but to act out of greed. What do you prefer? Save the forest to get friendship and a new character that you will probably ignore forever… or MURDER THE FOREST AND EVERYONE INSIDE to get a fortune and a powerful magic item? Uhh? What do you prefer, help the man who saved you by fighting an almost invincible dragon and rescuing his daughter, or siding with the dragon, killing the girl and stealing everything from the poor man?

    In Baldur's gate 2, being evil makes the game easier in a first sight, since you skip some very hard battles, it looks like the easy way, and that's how it is in reality. However, in the long run you have less allies, and people going against you for reveng or to get a reward for your head. It can happen in very bad moments, making the game more unpredictable and challenging.

    Really loved the system in Baldur's gate 2. Mass effect tried something similar but very watered. The influence is obvious there.

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  9. I really enjoy the new system, guys. I think it will improve the engagement a lot, the conversations are much more focused. I had my doubts but right now, it looks great.

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  14. I dont like this good or evil shitty systems in game. There is no good and no evil. You can do good and have bad motivation and you can do evil but aiming for good. I dont want the game tell me with some shitty bar that im either "good" or "evil" because some developer decided that the decision i made was either "good or not". I want to see everything in the consequences. I will be deciding if the consequences are either good or bad. I dont want to constantly think while making a decision "omg omg which one is the "good" option". I do what i want and live with the consequences.

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  15. I like playing high honour in RDR2 and RDO, as much as I love how the single player treats a high honour Arthur, the fact you can dig yourself out of low honour playthrough just before the end of the game by greeting people is a huge oversight.

    I know it's pretty pointless in the online mode. But it's just something I do naturally and with my own principles, I suppose. IE I don't see the fun or point in murdering a NPC unless if I really think they deserve it or if I was in a particularly bad mood in that moment. Plus, the criminal free roam missions are more tedious to do anyway.

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  17. Both the Infamous series and at least the first Dragon Age did it pretty well to.
    With Infamous it was more obvious because you had to choose which path you wanted to go down from the start as it affected your abilities and the main story beats.

    However with Dragon Age the rewards or consequences were more immediate eg: Do i give back a unique sword i ahem "acquired" to a struggling girl and her young brother whom just lost their parents?  
    Do i compensate them fairly?
    Pay them more than it's worth?  
    Or do i simply take it?

    The moral choice system has always made games more replayable… Even if SOME games (which i won't mention) 'miss the mark by having the final choice at the end rendering previous actions meaningless!!

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  19. The best morality systems in games are the ones that offer a wider range of choices to the player rather than focussing on black or white moral choices. The shades of grey in between are always far more interesting. Shout out to some of the quests in The Witcher series and Fallout 3 as games that offer more interesting and varied decisions for the player.

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  20. I believe the honour system in RDR2 is a fourth wall breaking type of thing. When committing a crime, while there is no one around, your protagonist knows you doing the evil deeds. The redemption arc is as much as a life lesson for the protag as for the player. Everybody a gangsta until death comes knocking on your door. Then you'll understand that a good relationship with other good people is more important in this life than being self-centered or the material stuff.

    It's not like in RDR1 where you had a different honour system, which was based on fame. You saw your fame level in a progression bar. In RDR1 you're supposed to redeem yourself as an honourable family man and the word of your good deeds becomes publicly known. Whereas in RDR2 you're (Arthur) an outlaw who does his crimes or demeanours in the hidden, and then redeems himself going from bad to good. So they had to come up with that kind of honour system now present in RDR2.

    Ok boah? Now, where's my muneh?
    Oh also, do yourself a favour and play it in first person.

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  22. I seem to remember after playing a particularly evil character in one of the Baldurs gate or spin offs (some D+D based RPG)that I got a response along the lines of a presence so dark has entered the realm even Bhaal shudders I'd basically killed everything and everyone that had crossed my path for the entire game. Making what ever Evil deity it was fear my presence felt really good.

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  24. I played both in Infamous 1-2 and Mass Effect trilogy playthroughs. While in RDR2 seems like an illusion of choices you make through the game (like entire Mass Effect trilogy turned into color choices, but instead you choose ending you prefer by saying hi to everyone in Saint Denis or shoot every innocent person you find).

    To be honest, Infamous 2 gave me real feeling how pathetic scumbag you are when you're playing evil (especially during Zeke scene) and in Mass Effect 1-2 as well, while games such RDR2 was completely minor (regardless of choices, Arthur is guilty person from beginning to the end. From beating the sick man to robbing and killing hundreds of people doesn't justify him being good person. He confirms that to every naive person that claims to say he's good man when in fact he isn't).

    With playing good person, i'd say Mass Effect 1-3 was really good with it and enjoyed it.

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  28. I like systems, where some of the decisions have repercussions much later on in the game or where your decisions are bad for one party or the other. E.g. When you pick-pocket all (or at least the majority of) the Dalish in Dragon Age Origins sometime later you're ambushed by some very angry Dalish elves (while you are fast traveling the world map), same is with pick-pocketing the Denerim marketplace. Or let's take TW3. You can follow the witches' bidding and slay the monster in the tree, then Anna will survive her servitude to the witches. She will be traumatized but her husband will comfort her and both will live. Which is good, but the children of the orphanage will be slaughtered and eaten by the witches. Or you can free the Ghost in the tree, who in return saves the children from the witches and brings them to Maranella's school in Novigrad. But the ghost will also kill the villagers in Downwarren. And the furious witches hex Anna into a water hag. She will regain her free will (if Geralt can lift the curse) and talk to Tamara and Philip, but in the end, she dies and Philip commits suicide. Which is the lesser evil? (Or you can be the total scumbag and free the ghost before you get the quest by the witches – then the ghost will not save the children because she's already gone, and Anna and Philip will die anyway).
    I dislike rigid Paragon/Renegade systems as they are implemented in ME1-3, DA2, DAI, Risen 1-3, and Elex. You have to play as a pinnacle of one type in order to get the bonuses, abilities, or whatever the game grants you when you reach a certain level (or to save Wrex from being killed on Virmire). That robs the player of their agency. And it takes me out of the immersion.
    On the other hand, I like playing a "good" character. My worst playthru of DAO was one, where I did all the "bad" decisions (helping the werewolves to kill the elves, killing Wynne and siding with Cullen and the templars, killing Connor, ruining the sacred ashes, making Loghain a Grey Warden at the Landsmeet, just because I wanted to unlock certain specializations and see what the game had to offer. It was enlightening, but I will never do it again. Afterward, I had the urge to puke and shower for a couple of hours,

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  35. If there's loot/reward difference tied to it – it isn't really a choice. There should be a symmetry to it to remove skewed motivation – if you lose out in one quest because you're evil, you should gain more for an evil choice in the next. Otherwise, you do that, which gets you more rewards, and not that, which you want or would enjoy. At least this is how it is for me. Besides, renegade wasn't exactly evil. It was a version without npc coddling.

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