Good VS Evil in Games

[Mitsuki]

In many games nowadays, the developers give you an option to make a certain standpoint: good or evil. Will you play as the good and noble knight, or will you sing "It's oh-so-good to be bad" while terrorizing innocent villagers for fun? Which side do you usually lean on when playing games like Mass Effect, Fable, Skyrim, etc? Do you sometimes find it hard to execute an 'evil' action in a video game, even if you're curious to see the reaction?

I tend to stay on the good side of things for my characters and play-through. In ME2, the morality system was a bit more complex to me. I tried to get all paragon choices as best as possible, though at the same time, a renegade action can equally solve a problem (without necessarily killing anyone). I would have loved to see some of the renegade options for ME2, and I think for ME3, I will do a little bit of both.

I do have a bit of hard time making 'evil choices' or what have you, when offered that good vs evil decision. Generally I like my character to be 'good' though, so usually when confronted with this popular mechanic, I don't need to think twice. I'm always on someone's good side.

 

[Shaissa]

In my first play through of a video game that gives you "moral system" I seem to always lean towards the "good" side (or at least what I think is the good side when I make the choice) Usually my second or third playthrough I will usually try to pick the "evil" side just to see how different the game can be.

 

[Mitsuki]

What about 'accident kills'? You know, where you get so excited that your character acquired a new weapon, so you carelessly swing it around and kill the person next to you? (Not that it's your fault, of course. The idiot should've dodged, right?)

When that happens, I tend to restart the game/checkpoint. Especially in Skyrim...you kill an innocent, and those guards will come after you. It's generally easier to be good. Makes life easier.

 

[Will Graham]

I usually play as the good person, then later do the evil or rogue option on a second play. Despite it being a game I often feel too bad in taking the evil options on my 'real' playthrough.

Though I don't like the moral choice system at all in games, it always makes games worse and never better. You can only succeed if you choose all good or all evil actions. If you're in the middle of the road you get no special abilities or skills that come with being evil or good. So the games become less about what you would actually do and more about what you pick to get the best upgrades. Story also suffers as the game has to be able to adapt to your choices, so things come across as bland and unexciting.

 

[Shaissa]

What about 'accident kills'? You know, where you get so excited that your character acquired a new weapon, so you carelessly swing it around and kill the person next to you? (Not that it's your fault, of course. The idiot should've dodged, right?)

When that happens, I tend to restart the game/checkpoint. Especially in Skyrim...you kill an innocent, and those guards will come after you. It's generally easier to be good. Makes life easier.

In games that it does matter, yeah I do restart... in games where I know that no matters what you do it wont change anything (like Skyrim) I tend to say screw it.
Really sometimes (like in Infamous) an accident happens and you can usually make it up by doing something good later, just how it works.

 

[The Master]

I always try to do both if I have the option.

It's good to be good, but it's also VERY fun to be the big bad meany-face... I try to be good at first and then make an evil person later on... I like to role play WITH the character; become them. I play to which fits my mood at the time as well...

 

[Marquis of Granby]

i always go with the good side. it reflects how i am in real life. honest, sincere too nice for my own good, big jock, not a percy. mainly all the good things.

i dont ever get so excited by a new weapon that i accidentally kill someone so that isnt a problem for me.

usually i require a team to carry my wallet because it's just jam packed with £50 notes.

 

[Squid]

I have always loved the evil side in games, movies, books, whatever. I find that I always root for the badguys. But when I play a game that gives me that kind of choice I am usually too scared to go with the evil side so I never do.
In games like fable I've always gone with the good side. I was so good I even got a halo

 

[L]

I've always been a neutral kind of character.

If you're a goody two-shoes, then you turn out to be a self-righteous bigot. If you're evil, you're the biggest dick in the world. Sometimes I try to be neither, sometimes I end up being both at the same time.

I think the only games I've ever been "Evil" in are Mass Effect games. I don't know what it is, everyone in the Mass Effect games just piss me off. Decking obnoxious News Reporters is how the fuck I roll.

 

[Linnaete]

I think my answer will surprise a few. Or no one. Depends how well you know me.

Being evil is fun. It's a nice bit of escapism when I'm pretty much a friendly, nice and cuddly person in real life. At least that's what I would like to believe.

I know it's not necessarily being evil, but in Mass Effect, I've decided to go for a Shepard who mostly goes for the renegade options, with a side order of paragon from time to time. I usually go for the latter when interacting with my crew, because they're all wonderful people and I just can't imagine my commander being a bit of a dick to the crew. Well, except for Ashley. She's a bit too racist (species-ist?) for my liking. I've decided that seeing the snarky renegade dialogues offers more enjoyment and laughs than the boring goody two-shoes responses.

In ones like KOTOR? Yup, I'm just evil. Evil and loving it. I straight up decided that my Darth Revan and Exile should be Siths, or just Dark Side in general. I find it entertaining to watch my Revan turn on some of my party members with a brutal display of betrayal, or the Exile deciding to just kill a poor merchant on the street because a rival small business begged me to do so for a reward. I guess that's the main reason why I want a third KOTOR. The games just bring out the repressed sadism in me.

It's when a game punishes me for my evilness: e.g. every town wants to lynch me or something, if I go within a mile of them; that I'm deterred from having an evil character and I have to settle for at the very least, a neutral one instead, until I can find some way of becoming strong enough to wreck deserved havoc on the masses. Bah.

 

[Tyler Breeze]

Damn, it's been so long since I've last played a mainstream game. I had no idea that games have this option now. It sounds hella dope, that's for sure. I'm really interested in it.

Anyways, I'd probably be the good guy at first. Just so that I could go through the game with a serious mindset. Once I finish it though...

I'll play as the bad guy and cause havoc. I like doing that. That's actually the only reason I'd even consider playing a GTA game. It just looks awesome to run around a city and cause havoc. So if I'm the bad guy in a game, I'll feel like it's my priority to do that.

Meh... Yeah, I'll always be the good guy first.

 

[Sir Kenneth]

I much prefer being evil. Like most people, I try to be a nice guy in real life, and real life generally offers plenty of opportunities to do good. Gaming to me is about escapism though, so if a game offers me the chance to cast all morals aside and go in guns blazing without a care in the world for my surroundings, I generally opt for doing that. There are some exceptions though. If the moral dilemma between good and evil is interesting enough, I some times opt for being a good guy. A lot of games don't really punish you for being good or evil. One way or the other, you don't really receive any handicaps and the potential benefits of either choice tend to balance out each other. One of the reasons I really loved Fable 2 was that being evil was really easy, but being good some times required sacrifices.

Spoiler

I remember the part of the game where Reaver sent you to do a job for him and you encounter the shadow council. You then have the option of either sacrificing the youth of an innocent you encountered or giving up your own youth in order to complete the quest. Given up your own youth is the good and noble thing to do, but it will make you old and ugly and make NPCs in the game more likely to react to you in a negative way.

 

[The Welsh Paddy]

I do good. Can't say I've played many games like this, though. Very briefly played Fable II and Knights of The Republic. But I have played both Elder Scrolls Oblivion and Skyrim. In Oblivion it wasn't so bad being more evil because I found much of the characters lacked personality, so killing innocents was more like killing zombies or robots. In Skyrim, however, everyone is so full of personality. There were so many characters that I just disliked, and there were so many that I found to be quite likeable, so being evil was a much harder choice to make in that game. (In real life, I'm too nice for my own good, apparently. )

Playing Skyrim, I opted to join the Stormcloak Rebellion, but after having to launch an attack on Whiterun, I promptly decided Ulfric Stormcloak was a dick and I restarted the game and sided with the Imperials.

 

[iSmiff]

I like to mix it up. Usually i'm good although it really depends on the game. In Skyrim for example it depends which race I pick. If i'm a dark elf or a argonian i'm more likely to be an assassin style sellsword with no conscience whereas if i'm an imperial i'd more than likely be noble. It depends what people do to me too. If someone stabs me in the back I wont hesitate to put them through as much pain as possible.

 

[Ed Elric]

I'd like to do both, when I'm presented a choice. For example, in Mass Effect I like to do a bit of both.(since it's the game I'm currently playing) I'm more paragon than renegade, but only because I generally go for the paragon option. I really only choose renegade to get something out of my enemy. If its with my crew or a character I like, I side as the good guy. It's sort of a guilty pleasure to be evil in the game... gives an edge if you ask me. However I would feel bad as a person if I was an asshole in the game all the time. It's a good way to lay morals down. Even if you choose to be evil, doesn't always mean (no pun intended ) you're bad IRL.

 

[Thule Esperada]

I usually play as an "incorruptible paragon of justice" on my first playthrough, and as a complete monster on the second. Playing the badguy is a pretty good way to relieve stress for me. Althoug there hasn't really been that many mainstream titles that would actually allow you to be evil this generation. Usually the options you have are classic hero and muscleheaded brute, and even then you would always save the day at the end (looking at you Dragon Age and Mass Effect). The last game where you could be truly malevolent for me was Star Wars: The Old Republic, but the mmo-grind prevented me from actually enjoying that game.

 

[Ethics]

Easy answer is that I like to play as the good character more. I just enjoy it, I usually find extra challenge in trying to appease everyone and the evil alternatives usually turn me away.

The curve ball answer is neither, because both options are pretty shit. Usually overly generic, only change a few varying cutscenes or abilities but very little narratively. Many stories also struggle with karmic systems because cutscenes paint a character who already has a personality which takes all meaningful agency away from you. If you are going to add a "karmic" system I feel like it should be abstract and robust. I feel like the game Kenshi does (or at least aims to do) this right...and Telltale's The Walking Dead is another fantastic example. How, exactly, does one quantify good? Shouldn't our choices be more meaningful than filling a meter? Why, exactly, are our hands held like this?

Kenshi has a diplomacy system, not a karmic system. You can walk a tight line if you want, do whatever you please, or go full on groveling/murdering. It's difficult for me to really explain, but it's implemented fantastically and aims to go even higher.

As for TWD, honestly, just play it yourself or look it up. The game is great at making you consider your choices on a deeper level, and often times will remind you that it's keeping track just to fuck with you. Characters will "remember what you did" and that could be absolutely meaningful to everything or never be brought up again, they've done a fantastic job of adding a weight to the system beyond blue is good and red is evil.

At the end of the day, the morality system is a pretty useless feature without a meaning beyond "different toys than those other guys" or a slightly different cutscene right before credits roll.

 

[Miasma Dragon]

I tend to prefer being Chaotic Evil, but never are there really evil choices. Mass Effect & Dragon Age are horrible examples of a proper moral system as you can only choose between lawful good, neutral good, and chaotic good (BioWare's classics from a bygone era, such as Jade Empire & KOTOR actually had decent moral systems).