Moral Choices In Video Games, And Choice Systems In General

[Seil]

Now, when I talk about moral choice systems, I'm not talking about games like Infamous. I'm talking about Little Sisters in Bioshock, the Silent Hill V mercy-killings, all that jazz.

But let's start from the beginning - I was playing Dragon Age: Origins and was pleasantly surprised how my actions would affect my team mates opinion of me, and how they wouldn't hesitate to stop me if I, say, defiled the remains of a long dead religious icon. I like that - in some of the games I've played, there's been very little change when I make a choice in game, and to have party members dislike me for trying to help such and such when we're fighting a war against evil demon things is neat.

But there's really no hard choices. Nothing that offends one's morality. I'm on record as saying I dislike Silent Hill V - and I still do - but there's a point where you've got the option of leaving your mother on a stretching rack or kill her out of mercy. Hell, look at Heavy Rain - you've got the bit from the trailer (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMUfUpvFOFg) where you have to hurt yourself for the sake of a loved one.

Now, SHV was like Saw: The Video Game even before Saw was a video game. But Bioshock, with the Little Sisters wasn't a big problem for gamers - most people I know who took the Harvester option weren't too perturbed by it.

What I'm wondering is whether this is necessary to tell a story in a game, the hard kinds of moral choices - because I like the reputation system in DA:O, and it had a bearing on how I experienced the game, but SHV was more memorable because of the harder options. What do you guys think?

[Aldurin]

Moral choices are cool if they're used as alternate gameplay paths, but they need to be flexible (with Infamous you lost all of your good powers if you turned evil, and vice versa, without xp refund). But moral choices need to be more in depth and varied, unlike Fallout 3 where your choices are 1. Help everybody 2. Kill everybody once you've gotten everything possible out of them 3. Help or kill as it serves you best.

So yeah, moral choices aren't necessary, but they could be awesome if done right.

[Mannix]

I generally like being made to make moral decisions in games, but the problem that I have is that those choices are too limited in general. Whenever presented with options in a game I'm usually able to come up with an option that would better serve the situation but to no avail because it isn't one of the three or four options the devs came up with. For instance: In Fable III you're give an option towards the end of the game on how to decorate your castle -good guy motif or bad guy motif. But it turns out there's a war going on and you're trying to scrape up cash to pay for an army, and my first thought before the options were presented was to strip the interior of the castle and sell the goods to the highest bidder. No such luck for the people of Albion, I'm afraid. I can't think of other examples off the top of my head right before work, but I think you guys know what I mean. I'd like to see a system that somehow rewards creativity and resourcefulness, but I'm pretty sure that's asking an awful lot just in terms of lines of code written. Not to mention all of the work that would have to go into the creative end of things.

[Krylo]

Moral choices are cool if they're used as alternate gameplay paths, but they need to be flexible (with Infamous you lost all of your good powers if you turned evil, and vice versa, without xp refund). But moral choices need to be more in depth and varied, unlike Fallout 3 where your choices are 1. Help everybody 2. Kill everybody once you've gotten everything possible out of them 3. Help or kill as it serves you best.

This is pretty much the entire reason I've replayed Dragon Age multiple times but have only played KotoR once. In DA your moral choices are generally justifiable regardless of which way you go depending on whether you prefer a more 'do it right or not at all' or 'the ends justify the means' approach. Such as is it worth making golems if it means enslaving the spirits of dwarves? The golems are going to be much more useful in stopping the blight/clearing the deep roads, and might save far more lives than they could cost, but on the other hand you're enslaving living beings to control rods for, basically, eternity.

On the other hand, KotoR was:
NPC: Get my cat down from a tree!
Option 1: Ok! And don't bother giving me a reward.
Option 2: No.
Option 3: I have eaten your cat, and killed your family, now give me all your money.

It was basically impossible for me to play dark side without feeling like some kind of comical caricature of evil as opposed to actually feeling like anything remotely important or believable.

[Kim]

It was basically impossible for me to play dark side without feeling like some kind of comical caricature of evil as opposed to actually feeling like anything remotely important or believable.

TBH, this was my favorite thing about playing dark side in KotOR.

Also, <3 the alignment system in SMT games.

[Krylo]

If I had played it first it'd probably have been ok, but I did light side first, so doing all the same stuff but as a comical caricature didn't really appeal to me.

The fact that I also did guardian first and consular is much slower to start, with the whole burning through FPs like it's going out of style thing, didn't help either.

[Azisien]

I'm sure there would have been more offense taken, or perhaps just creepiness factor, if you were ALLOWED to show the death of children in games head on.

Would you have so easily harvested Adam from the little sisters if you got to watch them get drained into a raisin-y husk as they screamed for you not to harvest them?

The answer is yes. Damn kids.

[Krylo]

I'm sure there would have been more offense taken, or perhaps just creepiness factor, if you were ALLOWED to show the death of children in games head on.

Would you have so easily harvested Adam from the little sisters if you got to watch them get drained into a raisin-y husk as they screamed for you not to harvest them?

The answer is yes. Damn kids.

It also might have been better if you didn't end up getting more Adam by not killing them.

There's no actual moral choice if the 'good' response is also the 'tactically best' response.

[Kim]

If I had played it first it'd probably have been ok, but I did light side first, so doing all the same stuff but as a comical caricature didn't really appeal to me.

Yeah, I didn't even hesitate to go after the evil options and see how horrible things could get.

[Azisien]

It also might have been better if you didn't end up getting more Adam by not killing them.

There's no actual moral choice if the 'good' response is also the 'tactically best' response.

Or even some game play change...like you have the scent of dead little sister on you, so all Big Daddies aggro on detection.

I mean I know that's still not morality, and more tactics, but it would have been something.

[Krylo]

That would have been ok, if it also gave you more Adam and made you more powerful. Also if you didn't get Little Sister help in the end if you had gone about slaughtering them all, but were strong enough to just not need their help. Have some other 'I have drank ALL the Adam!' super power that's used instead.

[Toast]

I agree that moral choices need to be both flexible and more in depth and varied. I think games should also deal more with the consequences of choices, both good and bad ones. For example, I think letting the batarian in me1 escape should come back to bite a paragon shep in the ass in me3. Probably won't happen, though.

I actually really didn't care for DA:O's companion opinion system. It was a little too easy to offend certain characters and even easier to buy them off with gifts. Especially as my rogue, in conversations I would often agree or go along with my opponents in order to distract and deceive them, but I still lost opinion points for doing things like that.

Also, the situation at Redcliffe was and was not a hard moral choice if you knew what you were doing, which kind of took away the impact for me.

I haven't played any of the other games you mentioned, and I can't really think of any games I have played that had involved or complex moral choices. Even kotor 2 was kind of stilted that way.

[MuMu]

I think my optimal moral choice RPG would be one where the plot isn't resolved in days or weeks, but in years and maybe decades, and your character grows and has experiences which people and influence them in one way or another, but not immediately. Phearps someone will grow to idolize or hate you, a village will expand or disappear, a race will turns it's back on yours or join hands, etc.

Unfortunately there aren't many games with passage of time, one of my favorite features(I remember that both DQV and Terraenigma had it on the SNES, but not with the depth one could achieve with current technology).

[Seil]

I think my optimal moral choice RPG would be one where the plot isn't resolved in days or weeks, but in years and maybe decades, and your character grows and has experiences which people and influence them in one way or another, but not immediately. Phearps someone will grow to idolize or hate you, a village will expand or disappear, a race will turns it's back on yours or join hands, etc.

Actually, in DA:O, years do go by as you play the game. Doing the Broken Circle quest was first on my list on my latest playthrough, and when I next talk to Wynne in camp she tells me "Yes, it's been almost a year since you left the Circle."

Also, you get to influence Sten, who grows to like you but knows the Qunari are gonna come to conquer Ferelden and he's like "I hope I don't meet you on the battleground."

But we could go to Silent Hill for the Bioshock thing - like this:

I'm sure there would have been more offense taken, or perhaps just creepiness factor, if you were ALLOWED to show the death of children in games head on.

You've got people the PC feels strongly for literally being tortured in game and you can choose to leave them like that or kill them out of mercy. Not a great game - the ending scene with the drill was a little too Hostel and less Silent Hill, but even then we can go to the finger scene in Heavy Rain.

[MuMu]

I have not gotten the chance to play DA:O yet, but as soon as my PC is in order I'll put it on my List.

[Toast]

[color=pink]Actually, in DA:O, years do go by as you play the game. Doing the Broken Circle quest was first on my list on my latest playthrough, and when I next talk to Wynne in camp she tells me "Yes, it's been almost a year since you left the Circle."

I only recall getting that particular dialog as a mage and always thought she was referring to leaving the circle during my origin story, but it's been a long time since I played last so could be misremembering.


You've got people the PC feels strongly for literally being tortured in game and you can choose to leave them like that or kill them out of mercy. Not a great game - the ending scene with the drill was a little too Hostel and less Silent Hill, but even then we can go to the finger scene in Heavy Rain.
Like I said I've not played any silent hill games, but it's always seemed to me that the kind of choices you describe here are more for shock value rather than any kind of complex moral choice. Especially if there's no option to free or rescue the person in question and the kill or leave them to suffer is a forced choice. That's just personal opinion, though.

[mauve]

In regards to KOTOR, I found it funny how your party reacted to your level of...uh... goodness or evilness, for lack of a better term.

I played a super-humanly good Jedi my first playthrough, where the alignment meter in her character profile was pushed to the max for light side, wreathed in heavenly light, and meanwhile Carth is whining about not trusting me and the entire Sith Academy can't tell I'm not one of them despite the fact that I bleed sunshine and rainbows.

Then I replayed as an evil Jedi. The greatest part was during a cutscene where Bastila turns to me, in all my red-eyed, spider-veined, dark-cloaked glory, red lightsaber held high, black fog clouding my alignment meter, and mused that she occasionally sensed feint traces of the dark side in me. Her powers of perception are truly stunning.


But I'm kind of neutral on the moral choice systems in games, for the most part. They're okay if they're done well and actually serve a purpose, but I personally tend to obsess over them. Did I pick the right one?! Will I get extra cutscenes if I do this?! Does this have a point?!

[Magus]

A lot of it has thus far kind of been provided in my own head. One problem with Fable is if you play someone amoral but not particularly evil you usually end up being totally average and not having an amazing halo/devil horns and the items that go with that. Like I played a guy as a thief but didn't like, murder anybody who didn't have it coming to them, and there is simply no reward or interest in going middle of the road like that.

The same problem has occurred with other games like Fallout, Arcanum, etc., there's no real "Han Solo" option, it's either Luke or Vader.

[Krylo]

Then I replayed as an evil Jedi. The greatest part was during a cutscene where Bastila turns to me, in all my red-eyed, spider-veined, dark-cloaked glory, red lightsaber held high, black fog clouding my alignment meter, and mused that she occasionally sensed feint traces of the dark side in me. Her powers of perception are truly stunning.

I liked playing light side when I wasn't really trying to be superhumanly good, just like, normal good. And then she's all "I don't know how you do it! Resisting the pull of the dark side all the time" and blah de blah.

And I'm like, man, it's not THAT HARD to not shoot babies with force lightning or whatever the evil choice is.

[Magus]

At least it is accurate to the films' morality span. Vader quite quickly succumbs to his deep desire to murder little kids, after all. Within like five minutes of becoming a Sith, in fact!

[Krylo]

Yeah, I get that it's supposed to be a slippery slope thing, where the more you let yourself fall to the dark side the harder it gets to not fall more, but they never did anything to make that apparent in the game.

Maybe she'd have seemed less ridiculous if they forced you to make will rolls at increasing difficulty the more dark side you were in order to make good choices or something. But they didn't, so it's just like, "Man, what?"

[mauve]

And I'm like, man, it's not THAT HARD to not shoot babies with force lightning or whatever the evil choice is.
It is for Bastilla, apparently.

[Fifthfiend]

DA:O's morality system is great mainly because you have Morrigan there to tell you all your horrifying moral transgressions are actually awesome, and Alastair to cry and be upset about them and then you give him a present and listen to him go on about his feelings and shit and he still loves you. AND THEN you repeatedly reject his romantic overtures!

[Seil]

No lesbian romance with Morrigan in the console versions.

[Marc v4.0]

At least it is accurate to the films' morality span. Vader quite quickly succumbs to his deep desire to murder little kids, after all. Within like five minutes of becoming a Sith, in fact!

I always had the thought that the Dark Side was sort of like a drug, as soon as you started down the path of abusing it, you being to spirl out of control in a circle of justifications to justify justifications

[katiuska]

The other thing that got to me about KotOR's moral choice system was the ways in which it could be abused. That's not specific to KotOR, but I keep remembering the moment after you finish the Sand People's storyline where you can then piss them off and loot their gaffi sticks with no penalty. For a light-sided character, it seemed like a lot of my visits still ended with me slaughtering local encampments before running back to my ship.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

I'm still waiting for a moral system with a proper range of options like such:
Help me my cat is stuck in a tree:
A) Get it down
B) Murder the cat
C) Life is adsurb- smoke a cigarette, maybe shoot someone, it doesn't matter
D) Collapse in terror at the horrifying inevitability of death
E) Win game hrough application of will
^4) Logic is a flawed construction of your brain. Wish the cat down from the tree, then fly off into the sky.

[greed]

Alpha Protocol probably has the best implementation of this I've seen. Everything you do has consequences and being nice, diplomatic or good bites you in the ass as often if not more than being manipulative, sadistic or callous does. Being nice is also usually far less amusing than going nuts with Heck and SIE.

Mask of the Betrayer was fun too if only due to how many ways you can be evil and how evil you can be.

Edit: Planescape Torment was good for that too. Also both it and Mask track your behaviour on a DnD alignment axis.

[Marc v4.0]

On the real topic, I enjoyed ME2's moral system of "Be a huge space dick because lulz" or "Be a huge space dick because lulz, for the good of the galaxy"

Especially that part where I got to threaten to gun down a hostage to get at the bad guy AS THE PARAGON CHOICE.

[bluestarultor]

On the real topic, I enjoyed ME2's moral system of "Be a huge space dick because lulz" or "Be a huge space dick because lulz, for the good of the galaxy"

Especially that part where I got to threaten to gun down a hostage to get at the bad guy AS THE PARAGON CHOICE.

Yeah, I was really impressed with ME2 in that regard, as well as all the choices from the first game having a real impact on the universe. Granted, we got it for PS3, so all the choices came from the comic book DLC (which is so well-voiced that male-Shep actually sounds good!), so it was pretty easy to make all the best choices, but still, the choices in the game itself are actually just as good.

Also, on that, having seen the game first-hand, I'm less inclined to take Extra Credits' view on the morality of reprogramming the Geth. Like, they made it sound like some sort of attack, but those guys were going to reprogram the GOOD Geth and your options were to A) kill them all and weaken your chances of getting Geth help later (just like killing the Rachni queen would mean you wouldn't have all of them helping you in ME3) just for the sake of being a dick, or B) re-purpose the virus they were going to send out to fix THEIR programming, which boils down to a rounding difference, thereby not removing their humanity and opinions as EC indicated, but simply giving them a chance to reconsider with all their memories intact, which greatly increases their chances to later become accepted members of space society, increases the chances of the whole race serving as a regiment of the galactic army that they're pretty obviously setting up, and is overall no more morally ambiguous than what a small fringe group was planning on doing to a larger whole. No WONDER it's the Paragon option. Choosing to kill them is like choosing to kill Wrex in the comic. There's just no benefit to it for anyone.


That said, for people who are less perceptive than I am, either choice is justifiable. I saw the underlying pattern (saving people = building an army for ME3), but not thinking from that perspective, you have every reason to not feel like you owe the Geth anything from fighting them for two games. Legion himself would have gone either way on it.