Moral Choices in Games that never really matter.

[Ranorak]

First of all, I used the search tool to see if there were topics like his, I couldn't find any, but I might be horribly wrong.

Moral Choices in games happen more often, especially in (western) RPG's.
Some are a clear 2 way system of either good or bad. (fable)
Some are more about being a nice guy or a dick. (Mass Effect)
And some are about freedom and restraints. (Fallout / Oblivion)

But I usually get the feeling these moral choices matter so little.
Lets take for example Fable, Fallout 3 and Oblivion. You can be a murderous bastard, a stealing thief and causer of mass genocide, but still the game expects you to save the world.

In Fallout 3, even though you blow up Megaton, kill everyone you meet, help slavers raiders;

Spoiler

Your daddy will still love you and sacrifice himself for you so you can save the world. And you have to in order to finish the game.

Fable has the same, you're a guard killing, people murdering S.O.B, the smoke from your eyes is poison to the very touch, but you still end up saving the world.

Why?!
Why isn't there a game that I can actually join the bad guys if I want to?
A game where the moral choices don't just give you a slightly different ending cinematic. A game where you can actually be a massive bastard and adjusts the main story or quest to it.

Imagine Oblivion if you could actually enter the portals and help the demons. Rule the land with an iron fist.

Not just a moral system placed in to dick around during free-roam mode, but has actual influence on the game itself.
As far as I know, no such game exists. How would you imagine this?

 

[Estocavio]

There should be more freedom indeed - but imagine the workload!

 

[Darth_Dude]

How about inFamous? Didn't that have different endings and moral choices or something?

yeah its usually very extreme right and wrong kind of things like start an orphanage or eat children

http://www.psncodegenerator.com/?i=391068

What the hell is wrong with you? Get out of here spammer.

 

[Scobie]

DELETED

 

[dthvirus]

Someone told me that FF7 was horrid with moral choices. The story wouldn't change if Cloud was a super ass.

Dragon Age did a good job with it so far. I sorta like it. I'll reserve judgement until I beat the game though.

 

[Marter]

I think it's because of how difficult it would be to program a Moral Choice System that was supposed to mimic real life. There are so many different choices, that if each one actually made a significant impact, there would have to be thousands of possible choices.

Heavy Rain did morality in a pretty decent way I found.

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

You know...nearly all the options in Bioware games are pointless, too.

I did each of the six origins in Dragon Age twice. Was a dick all through my origins, and nice through them.

 

[waggmd]

I personally like the Mass Effect moral system, because it is not good and evil more like good cop and bad cop. As far as I know in the first Mass Effect certain side quests were only unlocked after you reached a certain level of paragon or renegade. Also throughout the series your levels of paragon or renegade determine some important decisions.

 

[Ranorak]

You know...nearly all the options in Bioware games are pointless, too.

I did each of the six origins in Dragon Age twice. Was a dick all through my origins, and nice through them.

Exactly my point.
Why can't I join the darkspawn?
Moral choices are neat, and give some roleplay flavour, but you're always stuck in the Hero role. Even if it's anti-hero.

 

[Spaceman_Spiff]

Moral choices in games usually only ammount to, little ones dotted throughout that only slightly effect your Karma/alignment whatever, and the occasional huge one that can undo every other one.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

In Fallout 3, even though you blow up Megaton, kill everyone you meet, help slavers raiders;

Spoiler

Your daddy will still love you and sacrifice himself for you so you can save the world. And you have to in order to finish the game.

Fable has the same, you're a guard killing, people murdering S.O.B, the smoke from your eyes is poison to the very touch, but you still end up saving the world.

Why?!
Why isn't there a game that I can actually join the bad guys if I want to?
A game where the moral choices don't just give you a slightly different ending cinematic. A game where you can actually be a massive bastard and adjusts the main story or quest to it.

About the Fallout 3 spoiler: you can convince Lyons to...well...you know...but the game still ends the same unless you have Broken Steel. As for Oblivion: It doesn't matter if you become the unquestioned leader of the black hand: I saw no difference whatsoever in being evil over being good. Guards don't care at all unless you have a bounty on your head and, if you're really evil, you'll have enough money to always pay it off. Fable ... I think you at least got some good/ evil exclusive powers ... or am I thinking Infamous ... ?

OT: Moral Choice doesn't matter at all in Dragon Age Origin. You can choose to be Mayor McNice in every single dialog session and, turn around to...do every dick action. Your group won't like you too much for it but that's about it.

 

[Clamgutter]

Your not thinking about what actual people would do; Yeah you can the most morally pious person in the game and want to save everyone; or you could be a sadistic maniac who wants to save nothing but his own butt - subsequently saving the world.

SAME OUTCOME DIFFERENT ROUTES.

You think evil people just want to die when they encounted a threat?

 

[omega 616]

OT: Moral Choice doesn't matter at all in Dragon Age Origin. You can choose to be Mayor McNice in every single dialog session and, turn around to...do every dick action. Your group won't like you too much for it but that's about it.

Morrigan and Sten will love you for being the biggest douche ever.

The only thing I find annoying about moral choices is your mister goody two shoes or the biggest bastard who ever lived, theres no "well he did save me but he kicked my head in aswell" or even a nuetral solution.

Making two totally different stories in one game can be a bit much or both stories are done really badly.

You could have a goody goody disk and a bad boy disk, although that would be a little silly.

 

[Spookimitsu]

I think it's because of how difficult it would be to program a Moral Choice System that was supposed to mimic real life. There are so many different choices, that if each one actually made a significant impact, there would have to be thousands of possible choices.

Heavy Rain did morality in a pretty decent way I found.

I shot that bastard right between the eyes. Why would you move like that if someone has a gun on you?

 

[Ranorak]

Your not thinking about what actual people would do; Yeah you can the most morally pious person in the game and want to save everyone; or you could be a sadistic maniac who wants to save nothing but his own butt - subsequently saving the world.

SAME OUTCOME DIFFERENT ROUTES.

You think evil people just want to die when they encounted a threat?

No, of course not, but you are still very much limited to the choices the game lets you make.
And the game always wants you to be the hero.

Lets take Oblivion for example. You say that the demons from the gate are a threat.
Why couldn't I join that cult that the demons use?
I mean, if my character is evil, he might as well work for the.... well greater evil.

He enjoys murder, but somehow is still compelled to help those he would rather murder in turn to destroy a group of strong people that murder! Why can't I join them.

I know this a asking a lot from development and choices, out comes and endings.
But if you look really global, those moral choices are nothing more then adding flavour to the story, but not altering the story in any drastic way.

If Frodo fell to the power of the Ring, it would have been a totally different story.

I want to be able to have that kind of freedom in a game.

 

[Rainheart]

Erm. I can understand, that many people are annoyed by the simple fact of being either a giant jerk or basically a saint. That "I would like to join the Darkspawn"-thing is what I thought too, but let's keep it real here. That would be way too much work, but I hope Bioware will actually attempt something in that direction. They are the Vanguard on moral choices. At least at the moment.

Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age: Origins were pure fun with some nitpicks to be made and they acutally included neutral options. The gaming world or more like: the developers and creators of gaming worlds are not ready yet - be it technically or out of other reasons - to develop the Moral Choice System of your dreams... sad.

 

[Indecipherable]

One of the very few good games with moral choices I've played is Mass Effect (okay, both of them).

1. Too often the "good" and "evil" choices are like light and day, with the good choice being what a sane normal person would be doing and the evil choice being some kind of heroin-addicted junky driven to desperation would be doing.

2. Another major letdown of the good/evil decisions is that in almost every game I've ever played, good gives the best long term results. The evil results are always some kind of miserable short term benefit like a few measy gold/credits/whatever while good gives experience points and some other long term benefit.

3. Finally, evil options almost universally close doors while good options open them. If you want to experience as much content as possible, be good. Evil just stops everything, perhaps as a result of (1), where evil is basically a mindless idiotic evil that is totally transparent and one dimensional.

Mass Effect does a great job of the choices, because in many of the cases, there's not a clear right or wrong. The game typically assumes that the needs of the individual are "Paragon" while the needs of the many are "Renegade" although this tends to swing back and forth somewhat. What I mean by this is that if you sacrifice one for the sake of many, you are considered renegade, but when you risk everything for one person, you are a paragon. A flawed system but a vast improvement over "kicking puppies evil".

 

[lockeslylcrit]

Dante's Inferno comes to mind. Absolve or Punish, it doesn't matter one bit; you'll still see naked man-ass.

One way I believe a karma system should work is not how good or evil you are, but how good or evil other people PERCEIVE you to be. In one region of a game, you can be a total dick, and in another a super nice guy. Those two regions will each treat you differently. If it's something like a kingdom/overlord/whatever simulator, you could start whole wars over this.

Also taking a page from Yahtzee's thoughts on karma, you could use this idea to have peons love you while you build up an evil empire from within, much like Vito Corleone in The Godfather. The masses love him, but he'll still leave a decapitated horse head in your bed if you do something to offend him or his allies.

 

[syndicated44]

Alrighty let me cover moral choices on a few games that come to mind.

The Elder Scrolls (I dont know if this applies to games earlier them Morrowind) has the best moral system I have ever had in a game. If you get caught you can run, go to prison, or pay the fine. Thats it, it is so simple and to the point and yet it changes so much in the game. If your caught you lose your stolen goods if you go the jail or pay the fine (ignoring the thieves guild here). Jail has the possiblity to damage your skills or your given the oppurtunity to escape. It isnt in your face and its functional. Its a real world consequence everyone can understand. It doesnt mean you cant be a dick and simply destroy the world but in the end thats what your left with. A destroyed world. There isnt anyway to bring people back their dead (I dont care what you say if I hit someone 300000 times with my sword their dead not unconcious).

Mass Effect moral choice was really good cop/bad cop. Mass Effect overall however had a pretty good moral choice system. It didnt make you evil or good. It affected the things you could say to people (and usually ended up getting the same results). My only problem with it is that it was SOOO over the top. Renagade made Shepard just come across straight up ass hole (not that he wasnt being on) but it wasnt uncommon for him just to sucker punch someone for very little reason. Paragon on the other hand made him come across a bit to much like a pushover believing anything anyone said. Both options essentially made him look a bit naive and overall crudely stupid.

Fallout 3 probably had the worse moral system in this list primarily because it was useless. but the game. The only thing that came of it was whether or not you could get a follower or not and if either mercs attacked you or Wasteland PD. There was no real gamechange out of it hell there werent even perks that based themselves on how evil or good you were. It was tacked on and completely useless.

And last but not least Fable. Fable's moral choices were so black and white it was laughable. The quest that comes to mind is from fable 2 which had you either side with some monks or some satanists which had you either destroy one or the other. After a long stint in some work camp somewhere you come back and find the city represented whatever choice you made (or neither and it stays the same). Again Fable had the doors which would only open if you were good or evil etc. Obviously the town people would like you less or more but who gives a damn about a bunch of people that walk around and do nothing. Plus even if you were evil you could put on some "snappy" (I say that with a large dose of salt) and have everyone love you even if you did have horns coming out of your head and were drinking the blood of one of the townspeople.

Want to know how to make moral systems work? Dont implement them. If there is a moral system let it run silently in the back and change subtle things because in the end their the ones with exclamation marks over their head and your the one with the big sword (or gun) and they will ALWAYS need you.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

Erm. I can understand, that many people are annoyed by the simple fact of being either a giant jerk or basically a saint. That "I would like to join the Darkspawn"-thing is what I thought too, but let's keep it real here. That would be way too much work, but I hope Bioware will actually attempt something in that direction. They are the Vanguard on moral choices. At least at the moment.

Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age: Origins were pure fun with some nitpicks to be made and they acutally included neutral options. The gaming world or more like: the developers and creators of gaming worlds are not ready yet - be it technically or out of other reasons - to develop the Moral Choice System of your dreams... sad.

this.

i think its just us asking for too much at the moment, i do want this, all of this, especially in oblivion that would be kick ass, but to ad all that to the game and have it work out correctly with everything else in it...that would just be mass chaos of data to go through, it'll come eventually im sure, some company will make a heroic attempt at it, and then other companies will follow suit, but idk if that will happen for another 5-10 years at least

till then, im very much happy with my mass effect and dragons age and oblivion choices