Being nice in Dishonored sucks.....

[Pinkamena]

So am I missing something here, or is everyone just playing the naughty Corvo?

Spoiler: Read only if played

Seriously, who felt like the good guy after sending Lady Boyle with that creepy guy who gave you overly attached girlfriend chills?

That's exactly the thing. No matter what you do, you're still being the bad guy. And I loved it.

In regards to OP, I never had much trouble playing nice Corvo. Just stock up on tranqs. It's true that most of the cool toys are reserved for "I want to kill everything that moves"-Corvo, which means I will probably play the game once more, but not in a stealthy way.

 

[Arina Love]

and that's why i bother with stealth and nice non-lethal means only in MGS games.

 

[Warachia]

Huh?

I'm confused... what are you talking about? I was being sarcastic in that post you quoted, obviously, but I can't figure out what your point is. That games shouldn't change based on playstyle?

In these types of games you can kill somebody or accidentally put somebody in a position in which they die and the game will never let this go, this is on of the reasons why it is a bad thing to let the general gameplay decide the outcome of the game, and going by the rest of your post, it is pretty obvious you never bothered to learn why people were complaining in the first place.

 

[CyanideSandwich]

I think being Nice Guy Corvo adds a certain degree of difficulty to the mix and I thoroughly enjoy it. It's not like Assassin's Creed (don't get me wrong, I love AC) wherein you just stab your way to success. You really need to be a shadow.

 

[Ragsnstitches]

The Chaos system isn't good and evil. Every action you take is bad (Mutilate a guy, put 2 into slavery, abduct another; these are the "non lethal" approaches).

You have a few small chances to be good, generally by rescuing innocents, but they only factor in as minor influences to the overall chaos.

Chaos is that grey area people keep talking about when arguing against the traditional binary good and evil games. Yes Dishonoured has a "good" and "bad" ending (well... good, bad and bittersweet), but the game doesn't strictly punish you for doing something bad.

In my first low chaos run, I focused on avoiding detection altogether, only incapacitating people who were obstructing my path or about to call an alarm. To avoid some alarms I even killed people, since the impact of an alarm can lead to higher chaos scenarios (guards on high alert makes it harder to sneak, even on high elevations).

In my second run I aimed to remain stealthy, but decided to kill all my marks (instead of non-lethal). When I got to one particular point towards the end of the game I was still on low chaos, despite being more liberal about killing (guards and thugs included). That only changed when I decided to rampage my way to the target... which was particularly satisfying since he looked as though he shat himself upon confronting him.

Corvos Motivations are pretty simple, though its up to the player to decide what's more important. Redemption or Revenge. This is probably the games Achilles heel... there is very little attachment between you, Corvo, and the world you're in.

Also... quick-loading because you were spotted? This game is all about consequences and dealing with them. The game doesn't go to a gameover screen upon detection for a reason you know.

 

[Dfskelleton]

I felt that way too. For a while, I was going for the nonlethal, passive playthrough, because I wanted the good ending. After getting detected enough, I said "Screw it", and began blinking behind every guard and stabbing them in the throat, one after one.
The game suddenly became fun.

I found a good comparison that I used earlier for what Dishonored is like:
Say you're walking on the sidewalk when a man approaches you. The man is holding a carton of chocolate milk. He hands you the carton of chocolate milk, and says "drink up!". You drink the chocolate milk, and it's really good. Possibly some of the best chocolate milk you've ever had. You then notice that the man who gave the milk to you is staring at you funny. After a few moments of silence, he smacks you in the face and yells "WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU!?"
See, you weren't supposed to drink the chocolate milk, you were supposed to drink a small bottle of tap water sitting on a ledge near you.

Also, the game doesn't seem to realize the first rule of nonlethal options; give players an incentive to use the nonlethal options. Take Thief, for example. Not only were the nonlethal options more various and fun, but the guards were somewhat endearing to the player. The game makes it so you don't want to kill these people, something Dishonored does the opposite of.

 

[The Madman]

In these types of games you can kill somebody or accidentally put somebody in a position in which they die and the game will never let this go, this is on of the reasons why it is a bad thing to let the general gameplay decide the outcome of the game, and going by the rest of your post, it is pretty obvious you never bothered to learn why people were complaining in the first place.

Why are you so intent on insulting me?

And for the record you can kill people and still get a low chaos rating, it's if you kill over 20% of a levels inhabitants that things begin to go horribly wrong. Unless you're adamant about trying to get an achievement, one or two slip up deaths make little difference to the story in Dishonored.

 

[ShiningMetaLord]

The problem comes in when the amount of non-lethal takedowns are very limited. You have one ranged method (Sleep Darts) and one close up method (strangling) where as you have a bunch of lethal ways to get rid of foes (unless I've missed a blueprint I have yet to find a Sleep Darts capacity upgrade). This is the problem where Arkane wanted to make a stealth game and an action game.

This is how I did non-lethal: I had Blink (leveled up to two, very easy to get around), Dark Vision (Arkham City spoiled me too much with Detective Vision....again leveled up to two) and Possession (mainly for getting past walls of light but also in case I couldn't sneak past some guards) and Bend Time for the trickier parts with those lightning towers that zap your ass. I also got blueprints for softer footsteps and I was lucky to get the Strong Arms bone charm early on in the game. I also kept grenades and rewire tools on me at all times. I found a useful trick for grenades where the explosion will alert guards but you will remain undetected. Then you can sneak by while all of the guards are in one corner of the room. I also had rewire tools to shut down the alarms so even if I did screw up I could easily run without having to worry about more guys showing up.

Unrelated, but I wish I had a save that had all the powers and items maxed out which allows you to just go nuts with everything.