The Murderhobo Problem; or, You're Playing The Game Wrong

[Bellvedere]

I kind of do see it as the fault in the writing in some games. It can seem strange when a game fails to acknowledge or reconcile that you're playing the game in a different way to whatever characterization they're placing on the main character. It's more desirable to have the your character behave the way you play in story scenes or at least have other characters acknowledge that you're a hypocrite or a psychopath than it is force yourself to play in the way the game wants you to in order to have a story that makes sense. I'd say that it's a valid criticism to make (in general, not specifically in the case of watch dogs - I have played it), however given how long this kind of stuff has been present for and how tolerant gamers have learnt to become of it, the specific game in question would have to be a pretty bad offender for it be a necessary or interesting criticism.

 

[loa]

I'd rather have the game notice that I'm being a murderhobo and reflect that in the storyline.
It's a game for a reason, this medium makes this possible.
So if I get the broken glass bottle to murder 500 innocents with and the cutscenes just keep laying out the tale of "you're the good guy" that this game wants to portray, how is that not bad writing?
Take my broken glass bottle away or acknowledge what I'm doing with it but don't ignore me!

I find games that have their gameplay not happen in a vacuum sepparate from the story much more engaging.
That's the entire reason why tabletop roleplaying is engaging in the first place.

 

[Evonisia]

I kind of do see it as the fault in the writing in some games. It can seem strange when a game fails to acknowledge or reconcile that you're playing the game in a different way to whatever characterization they're placing on the main character. It's more desirable to have the your character behave the way you play in story scenes or at least have other characters acknowledge that you're a hypocrite or a psychopath than it is force yourself to play in the way the game wants you to in order to have a story that makes sense. I'd say that it's a valid criticism to make (in general, not specifically in the case of watch dogs - I have played it), however given how long this kind of stuff has been present for and how tolerant gamers have learnt to become of it, the specific game in question would have to be a pretty bad offender for it be a necessary or interesting criticism.

Or in other words: If you must have a story driven sandbox game, write it like Saints Row 2 through IV. The Boss implies that he both enjoys doing it and does the mayham constantly. In the first two games you have to do all this bizarre crime because that builds respect amongst the other gangs so they will back off your territory.

 

[chikusho]

The problem he's talking about in the article, which I agree with, is that the game forces you to tell a story (the developers story) to yourself rather than present a coherent narrative from the outset.
The dissonance between what the game lets you get away with doesn't rhyme well with the premise or the characterization they are forcing on you. The mechanics which allow the character to do all of these crazy things are basically actively working against the story they've created.

Granted, I haven't played Watch Dogs, but this dissonance is very apparent in GTA 4. Niko Bellic is always talking about how he doesn't want this violent life, yet throws himself head first in to every massacre offered. Why? For money.. Money which you can't actually use on anything in the game world. He's not trying to do anything with it in the story either, like send it home to his family or build an empire. Just pay hospital bills and buy guns to do better and more efficient massacres.

A possible solution to this is to alter the narrative and cut-scenes based on your in-game actions in order to say something about them. For instance, if you kill more people the main character gets more and more erratic and distraught, either doubting his cause and what he has become or beginning to follow it with an increasing ferocity. Because he's done so much wrong, it can't be for nothing, right?

But this being the AAA games industry, the number one priority is to make sure things blow up pretty. And story comes, like, tenth.

 

[Maximum Bert]

The trouble I find with most open world type games is that you cant interact with anything why do you kill all the drones walking about the place? well what else can you do with them? you can ignore them or kill them thats basically as far as your relationship goes with them you cant talk to them, make friends with, ask them to accompany you or anything else they are literally 2D characters. The elder scrolls is the only one I can think of where you can actually interact with a lot of people in more than one way i.e violence.

If your game is classed as open world and supposed to give players choice this is a problem. If your game is linear and its telling you a story I have no problem with being forced to do stuff i.e that I have to kill loads of people in the new Tomb Raider game (or a lot of other games) or that I cant explore or kill someone in the Walking dead unless it gives me express permission.

 

[Thunderous Cacophony]

What happens in the sandbox stays in the sandbox. The mass murder Aiden isn't the same Aiden you are watching in the cutscenes. One is their Aiden and the other is yours

But it's still Aiden Pierce all the time. You're told what the character is like, up front and repeatedly, and your choice to play him in a non-characteristic way is on you. Watch_Dogs, Assassin's Creed, GTA IV, and similar games are different from Skyrim, Fallout, and their ilk because you're not a blank slate; you're playing as a specific character, with their own stated morals and motivations. Choosing not to role-play as them is fine, but breaking the unwritten contract of the game- you jump off the rails, the game can only go so far in trying to steer you back.

This works not just as a reply, but as a general comment: Games and NPCs can only react so much to your choices (at best with a Paragon/Renegade thing, as game development stands today). It either gives you more freedom to make moral choices and deal with the consequences, or it expects you to roleplay and act as the character you're playing would act.

Also, I'm all for games that have interactions other than killing. The problem is doing it well; GTA IV had the infamous 'problem' of your cousin calling you to hang out and be human with him, but people wanted to keep blowing stuff up. I'm totally with @small and @nomotog, Watch_Dogs definitely dropped the ball on what they could do with the vigilante justice aspect; they brought all the judgement and none of the mercy. Hopefully the next one does it better.

 

[squid5580]

What happens in the sandbox stays in the sandbox. The mass murder Aiden isn't the same Aiden you are watching in the cutscenes. One is their Aiden and the other is yours

I think that's the problem though. There is a distinct disconnect when your actions in game, don't have any bearing on the story/cutscenes. If your Aiden in game is a homocidal maniac, who wakes up and brushes his teeth with the blood of the innocent he killed, but then in the cutscenes, they keep playing him up as some pillar of morality, then there is a major problem IMO.


If you want to give me the freedom to be that maniac, fine, but have it have repercussions to the game and it's storyline. When the actions are completely disconnected from the story, then I feel disconnected from the game, because then it really doesn't matter what I do, at the end I'll still be considered a "hero", from the top of my pile of corpses.

Have the npc's dialogue change if I go really crazy. Have my support characters refuse to help me any more, and actively turn against me or something. Have certain missions be locked out, because I'm now a known serial killer, and there is no way in hell that the npc in question would do anything but scream and run away from me. Have what I do effect what happens.

Well the whole different dialogue is in the least unfair and at most practically impossible. Impossible due to how is the AI supposed to judge your motivations? I am a lousy driver. So many civilian dies under my wheels. Completely unintentionally. So I would be deemed as evil and get the bad cutscenes. This is of course assuming a developer was willing to do every scene 2+ times and slap it on a disc.

Now my idea is simpler. Have 2 characters like GTA online. 1 for the story which is pre made. And 1 customizable for free roam. Place the mission starts marker far away from the actual place the mission starts and do the "meanwhile in another part of the city" schtick. Maybe have the pre made walking the streets and if you kill him it wipes your save Bwhahahahaha.

 

[PinkiePyro]

I have not played watch_dogs its on my to play list though but in sandbox games I will murder whoever I damn well please... though I am not a complete psycho....

using skyrim as an example I tend to only murder assholes like the thalmor or racist dicks lol ....

my favorite thing is when I run into thalmor and then proceed to harass them not saying I worship talos(all hail shegorath) but I will worship who ever I damn please and such usually this provokes them to attack first and then I can proceed to murder their asses without worry of getting a bounty stuck on my head (I also then proceed to strip their corpses and pile them in the middle of the road/trail and give free stuff to any prisoners they had)

generally I play a sort of chaotic good I tend to stick to behaving myself most of the time but I am not above stealing and murdering for the greater good

 

[briankoontz]

What amazes me to this very day is the constant push toward realistic LOOKING worlds while at the same time maintaining the same murder-without-consequences morality that has always existed. Modern games don't even approach the level of Ultima IV's morality. They don't even TRY.

Back in the day a lot of us had the idea of taking advantage of technological improvements to make more and more *morally realistic* worlds. So if you were playing as a member of the dominant society and you killed demonized members of a marginalized society (let's say the "monsters" in Dungeons and Dragons) that society would rise up against you and would defend itself in an organized fashion.

The reason that "heroes" in modern games are actually sociopaths is that there's usually nothing that the "bad guys" actually DO within the game itself that's bad. Towns aren't destroyed, members of the dominant society aren't killed, nothing. Gamers just take it on faith that when the game developer says something is a "monster" it must be a monster. On the rare occasion that the "monsters" actually do something bad, no historical context is noted - it's just treated as a random evil act which doesn't make any sense.

And so the "hero" goes through the game, slaughtering everything that moves, gaining XP and loot, becoming more powerful, allowing him to slaughter more and more powerful "monsters" until the time comes when there's nothing left to kill and so the game's over, and it's time to buy a newer, shinier game with scarier-looking monsters and do it all over again. It hardly MATTERS whether the thing being killed is good or evil because the killing is PRODUCTIVE - it makes the "hero" more powerful and just like any sociopath, power for oneself is all that matters.

Gamers have let this happen. They, except for a scant few of us at this point, have drunk the Kool Aid of Graphical Realism or the alternate design choice of Kawaii Whimsy (think most indie games) and ignore the very concept of Moral Realism. How often does one even hear the term "morality" with respect to video games - according to "gamers" it's a word used by crusty old anti-video game crusaders or buffoons like Jack Thompson who don't even play games. Nevermind that Richard Garriott himself designed games with it in mind, though he didn't carry the concept nearly far enough and I speculate that that failure haunts him.

Where's the game developer today who puts Moral Realism front and center in his game design? Where's the game developer who builds games focused on complex, deep, and amazing *consequences* for one's actions?

 

[Dalisclock]

I'd rather have the game notice that I'm being a murderhobo and reflect that in the storyline.
It's a game for a reason, this medium makes this possible.
So if I get the broken glass bottle to murder 500 innocents with and the cutscenes just keep laying out the tale of "you're the good guy" that this game wants to portray, how is that not bad writing?
Take my broken glass bottle away or acknowledge what I'm doing with it but don't ignore me!

This reminds me of one of the big issues GTA: SA had with it's storyline. The plot kicks off when a corrupt cop threatens to frame CJ as a copkiller if he didn't do what he said and play ball.

Which stands in stark contrast to the dozens, if not hundreds, of actual cops that CJ kills over the course of the game. Somehow, this threat is still in play because reasons.