Morality in games

[philios82]

Most modern RPG's have a similar system of judging how good or evil your character is. In KOTOR this amounted to a Jedi/Sith scale, Mass effect had Paragon/Renegade even Bioshock let you choose to murder little girls or leave them to roam around a fast disintergrating underwater complex. Now obviously these scales are arbitrary and not really adequate, most people would agree that they're not the best solution. I recently started playing a relativley unknown game called Fallout 3, this game has a revolutionary system that lets you play as a neutral character with benefits equal to being good/evil. The problem is that to stay neutral every once in a while you'll have to do something evil, for instance you can shoot a beggars legs off when he asks you for water. See since every time you do somthing good you get good points, you have to balance them out. Free a prisoner from the supermutants, why not enslave them to balance things out.

With the realistic graphics games have these days is it necessary to tell us that killing that unarmed pensioner was evil. Back in the days of Fallout 2 my character forced her Lesbian wife to work as a fluffer on a porn set before selling her into slavery, it wasn't a big deal, it was hard to become attached to those pixelly characters. However, when a well rendered virtual woman whose been selling her body just to survive asks me to save her from sexual slavery in Fallout 3 then the moral choice is clear, even without the Karma points.

Books and films rely on the emotional response of the consumers to create drama. Now that video games are reaching a point where they can create emotional situations isn't it time to retire these old imersion breaking mechanics.

 

[Gxas]

Search bar next time, please. This topic has been repeated plenty of times.

Morality is relative. There is no correct way to pick how its set up.

 

[Amnestic]

relativley unknown game called Fallout 3

To quote any robot or computer ever: Bzzrt. Does not Compute. Does not compute.

I have yet to play Fallout 3, but seriously, you think it's obscure/unknown? :s

And yes, I do believe that if a game is going to have "morality" it could be a little deeper. Fable 2 briefly expanded on it with not just a Good-Bad scale but also a Corruption-Purity one, however obviously it's not nearly as flexible as real life in regards to variety of choices.

 

[ThePlasmatizer]

I'm guessing that was sarcasm Amnestic.

It's difficult to understand the point you are trying to make, Philios.

 

[NeedAUserName]

...Lesbian wife to work as a fluffer on a porn set...

I love you. Also

...even Bioshock let you choose to murder little girls or leave them to roam around a fast disintergrating underwater complex.

I just thought of it as euthanasia. I mean if I didn't kill them then they would just die slower, more horrible (grammar?) deaths.

 

[Kermi]

At the end of the day, a game has to follow rules. In real life you can do evil stuff and ultimately your choices will determine the way your life pans out. Games are a little more restricted than this. No, a game doesn't need to tell us stealing is evil, or killing an innocent is evil, or blowing up a town with an atomic weapon is evil.

But it does need to measure how evil we are in order to make us aware of what choices are available. Until games can serve as true life simulations, this will always be necessary.

 

[hem dazon 90]

there is no such thing as morals

 

[Good morning blues]

I agree that the linear scale with only the two extremes is outdated, but for most games there's no other practical alternative other than to have a middle value in there, too. I would love to see some games with more moral ambiguity, however. In the original Fallout, there was a town where the sheriff asked you to help him kick out a gang that had set up shop; originally, if you helped him, the sheriff would end up turning the place into a totalitarian hellhole, while if you left the gang alone, they would have kicked the sheriff out and created a peaceful, safe, well-regulated little hamlet. This got removed in the final version. I think this sort of thing would be great in modern RPGs.

I'm actually working on a game with a bunch of branching storylines and I'm trying to include this sort of thing whenever I can. There's no reason why video games shouldn't have these more developed examinations of morality, in my opinion.

 

[Uskis]

Morality is relative. There is no correct way to pick how its set up.

Yep. I once set out to rescue a prisoner from being executed in Fable 2, since I oppose to capital punishment and thought this would be a good thing to do. The game disagreed with me, and i got a lot of "evil points" or whatever the hell fable called the good/evil system thing. It's a general problem, that the moral choices reflects the moral and ethics of the game designer, and thus it's impossible with "free choice" since the game condemns one as being "evil" and another of being "good".

 

[ThePlasmatizer]

Morality is relative. There is no correct way to pick how its set up.

Yep. I once set out to rescue a prisoner from being executed in Fable 2, since I oppose to capital punishment and thought this would be a good thing to do. The game disagreed with me, and i got a lot of "evil points" or whatever the hell fable called the good/evil system thing. It's a general problem, that the moral choices reflects the moral and ethics of the game designer, and thus it's impossible with "free choice" since the game condemns one as being "evil" and another of being "good".

Peter Molyneux answered a question on how they decided on the moral choices, he said they discussed it and it went on and on till they came to the conclusion that any moral outcomes should be dictated by what the villagers would think, so rescuing that criminal was an evil act because the Fable society views it that way.

 

[Scorched_Cascade]

I just thought of it as euthanasia. I mean if I didn't kill them then they would just die slower, more horrible (grammar?) deaths.

A valid point; a quick death by your hand or a struggle into humanity's blighted future with more than a slight chance of being enslaved or rad poisoned- which is the more moral choice?

 

[Uskis]

Morality is relative. There is no correct way to pick how its set up.

Yep. I once set out to rescue a prisoner from being executed in Fable 2, since I oppose to capital punishment and thought this would be a good thing to do. The game disagreed with me, and i got a lot of "evil points" or whatever the hell fable called the good/evil system thing. It's a general problem, that the moral choices reflects the moral and ethics of the game designer, and thus it's impossible with "free choice" since the game condemns one as being "evil" and another of being "good".

Peter Molyneux answered a question on how they decided on the moral choices, he said they discussed it and it went on and on till they came to the conclusion that any moral outcomes should be dictated by what the villagers would think, so rescuing that criminal was an evil act because the Fable society views it that way.

Didn't know that! That makes perfect sense actually. I just think it's weird that your overall, "universal" good/evil record is decided by the villagers in one village, but practically it makes good sense. I just wished somebody would play with this mechanic and create a different game with a whole other set of moral standards, leaving the player to figure out what goes and what not

 

[blood77]

Ahahahahaha...Oh your serious, let laugh harder.

 

[ThePlasmatizer]

I just thought of it as euthanasia. I mean if I didn't kill them then they would just die slower, more horrible (grammar?) deaths.

A valid point a quick death by your hand or a struggle into humanity's blighted future with more than a slight chance of being enslaved or rad poisoned- which is the more moral choice?

Leaving them alive is the most moral choice, playing God with other peoples lives is unjustifiable.

 

[Jursa]

Imagine that the creator of the game is GOD. He/she decides what is good/evil and how good/evil you can get. I think it implements a fate system with 2-3 choices. Whether you choose to be nice, an destructive psychopath or just a bastard you will eventually come to what the developer through to be correct. While I do agree that some things in games don't really matter whether you're good or bad because you're going to do THAT if you have any dignity whatsoever, the game picks who you are depending on whether you fire nukes at the good guys or the bad guys.

 

[philios82]

It's difficult to understand the point you are trying to make, Philios.

Good point, what I mean was do we need a morality scale in games these days when the characters are adequate to show us. In books and films the writer leaves these choices up to us. In video games the writers choose how we should see a situation. I have a problem blowing a beggars head off just for shits and giggles, another player may not. Since morality is relative can't we decide for ourselves what our character should do?

 

[ThePlasmatizer]

It's difficult to understand the point you are trying to make, Philios.

Good point, what I mean was do we need a morality scale in games these days when the characters are adequate to show us. In books and films the writer leaves these choices up to us. In video games the writers choose how we should see a situation. I have a problem blowing a beggars head off just for shits and giggles, another player may not. Since morality is relative can't we decide for ourselves what our character should do?

In what world would blowing a beggar's head off be construed as a good moral choice?

Some choices can be seen as debatable whether they are good or bad morally but you're basically adhering to the game world's rules so you know which way it's going to go.

 

[Alex_P]

Imagine that the creator of the game is GOD. He/she decides what is good/evil and how good/evil you can get. I think it implements a fate system with 2-3 choices. Whether you choose to be nice, an destructive psychopath or just a bastard you will eventually come to what the developer through to be correct. While I do agree that some things in games don't really matter whether you're good or bad because you're going to do THAT if you have any dignity whatsoever, the game picks who you are depending on whether you fire nukes at the good guys or the bad guys.

Here's the thing, though: an interesting moral story is one in which you do not know the "right answer."

So, if we do imagine the game designer is God, he's basically got two options:
- Don't tell us what you think.
- Tell us what you think but don't force it as the "right answer" -- dare your audience to question, challenge, and transcend your opinion.

Either one of these techniques requires subtlety and a light hand.

-- Alex