Sorry, poor choice of words. I meant I have red lightning because I go for the evil options every time, and maxed out my evil karma bar.DaKiller said:
Can YOU manage to be sincerely EVIL in games??? Either/or Video/table RPGs...
- Thread starter Basement Cat
- Start date
I played as morally good as I could in Red Dead Redemption - no killing of innocents, do the good deeds in side missions blah blah. Then I picked up Fallout 3. That changed everything. After nuking Megaton... There's no going back. Then it was a case of buying everything from everyone, then killing them, then cutting ears off, then devouring them, then selling said ears. And slaves. I became incredibly efficient at collecting slaves. And to top it off, I infected the water supply at the end, wiping every impure human out.
I was walking desolation. And I loved it.
For the Enclave.
I was walking desolation. And I loved it.
For the Enclave.
I tend to play Chaotic Evil in table top RPGs, never really have a plan as that will hold me back. Just kill, torture and steal when the mood strikes. My current character is a good ranger who just snapped, he now worships Lolth and follows her chaotic religion almost to a fanatical degree. The party as a whole is pretty dark on the moral spectrum so I don't really have to worry about being caught out by them. I have a few plans with drow about selling them out though and I recently finished poisoning one town's water supply and burning another town to the ground for my drow employer's expansion onto the surface.
I tend to play 'assassin for hire' in most RPGs like Fallout - That is, I don't give 2 damns about morality as long as I get the biggest pay. It's actually quite interesting because my character actually does both good and evil deeds for the money(destroy a bandit camp(good), kill a contract target(evil) etc.)
But eventually I end up with a pile of money big enough to shame Mt. Olympus and I just go evil from there on... At the end of the day, I just find it hard to care about any character besides my own.
Except maybe the little sisters in Bioshock.
But eventually I end up with a pile of money big enough to shame Mt. Olympus and I just go evil from there on... At the end of the day, I just find it hard to care about any character besides my own.
Except maybe the little sisters in Bioshock.
In a Call of Cthulu game from a while back, I role-played as Hannibal Lecter (a 1920s version) and the game began with me being released on a mission to work with another player. That player was kinda fooling around and not playing properly, so he started messing around with me and hitting my head against the wall while I was still handcuffed (we were on the mission by this point, in a small western town). He stole some of my things and left me there to die while he went to do the mission by himself, meanwhile I picked the lock on my handcuffs, picked the lock the house to a door and entered. It was late at night by this point, so I was able to sneak in without being seen. Inside I opened a door to find what looked like a married couple lying in bed together. I use my Martial Arts skill to silently slit their throats with a knife that I started with. After that, I went into the next room to find a small boy who, in the complete darkness, asked me if I was his father. I rolled for Persuasion skill and landed a crit, successfully convincing this newly orphaned child that I was indeed his father. I took the kid on my shoulders into the kitchen, with him cheering all the way. I then opened the oven, threw him in, locked it with a chair and turned the heat up to full (apparently neither the DM or I realised that such ovens didn't yet exist in 1920). After that, I went into the living room and listened to some smooth classical music on the radio, accompanied by the sharp screams. I spent the night in the family's marital bed, beside the bodies.
In a D&D campaign that is still running, I am playing a halfling rogue. At one point, we got a quest from some minotaurs to sneak into a human military camp and assassinate the commander. I was elected, as I was the only rogue, to infiltrate the camp and get the job done. I snuck in, after a few successful roles, and made my way into the commanders tent where I found a bed with the commander's corpse in it. I'd been beaten to the job, somebody had slit his throat before I could get there. Now, no one had seen me come in, and I doubted anyone would dare disturb the captain while he was meant to be sleeping, so I figured I had enough to to skin his corpse without being caught. Crit roll - perfectly sliced commander skin. I was quite happy with this loot, but wanted more, so I decided to use my Disguise skill to wear the commander's skin as a suit. Another crit roll. Then the DM had decided that my chosen alignment of Chaotic Neutral was no longer correct, and changed me to Chaotic Evil. Anyways, I used my newly gained disguise to stroll right out of the base and return to hand in my quest. When the Minotaurs saw me they got a little tense. Remember that humans are around 6 feet tall on average, whereas halflings (as their name suggests) are around 3 feet tall. Try to imagine a toddler that had been messing around in his parent's closet. The Minotaurs were quite intimidated by my level of overkill, and asked me to lead the assault into battle as a kind of morale weapon. It worked like a charm, and around half of the enemy army ran in fear at the site of me wearing their captain and the Minotaur hoard charging behind me. This made it a fairly easy victory. Later I went back to the Minotaur camp and fashioned the skin into a +10 intimidation Cloak of Humanskin.
This post is starting to amass size, and I can't be bothered typing a whole lot, so here is a short list of other things I did in that campaign.
- skinned an entire family (including kids) and shoved their detached body parts into an oven.
- Accepted a quest to find a missing child, found the child, skinned the child and delivered the skin in a package to their doorstep.
- cut a hole inside a hooker and slept inside her Ton-ton style.
IRL: I have never been in a fight, become ill at the sight of blood and disagree with the freedom granted by American gun laws. So why do I love all of those things in games? Well, because they are all very mechanically fun game elements, and thinking up the most ridiculously gruesome story of child-skinning psychopathy is very, very fun. Also, I have little empathy for characters that aren't fleshed out in any way (no pun intended) and never have any meaningful dialogue, which is exactly what all D&D characters are.
Sorry for any un-desensitized people that were in any way offended or disturbed.
TL;DR: Fucking yes.
EDIT:
Just thought of Red Dead Redemption, a game with a completely out-of-place morality slider. Being evil just makes no sense with the cutscenes in the game, which aren't dynamic to suit whatever personality the player might want Marston to have. I played a good guy in that game because Marston was just unlikable otherwise.
I also sometimes prefer playing a good guy in games, just depends how I feel at the time. Although, the only game that made me feel genuine guilt was Deus Ex: HR. Being a bastard in games usually causes NPCs to react terrified and for the guards to come at you, but HR had NPCs that you liked, who didn't like you back, and that made me feel upset. From what I hear, Mass Effect does something similar, but I actively detest that series for a multitude of other reasons.
In a D&D campaign that is still running, I am playing a halfling rogue. At one point, we got a quest from some minotaurs to sneak into a human military camp and assassinate the commander. I was elected, as I was the only rogue, to infiltrate the camp and get the job done. I snuck in, after a few successful roles, and made my way into the commanders tent where I found a bed with the commander's corpse in it. I'd been beaten to the job, somebody had slit his throat before I could get there. Now, no one had seen me come in, and I doubted anyone would dare disturb the captain while he was meant to be sleeping, so I figured I had enough to to skin his corpse without being caught. Crit roll - perfectly sliced commander skin. I was quite happy with this loot, but wanted more, so I decided to use my Disguise skill to wear the commander's skin as a suit. Another crit roll. Then the DM had decided that my chosen alignment of Chaotic Neutral was no longer correct, and changed me to Chaotic Evil. Anyways, I used my newly gained disguise to stroll right out of the base and return to hand in my quest. When the Minotaurs saw me they got a little tense. Remember that humans are around 6 feet tall on average, whereas halflings (as their name suggests) are around 3 feet tall. Try to imagine a toddler that had been messing around in his parent's closet. The Minotaurs were quite intimidated by my level of overkill, and asked me to lead the assault into battle as a kind of morale weapon. It worked like a charm, and around half of the enemy army ran in fear at the site of me wearing their captain and the Minotaur hoard charging behind me. This made it a fairly easy victory. Later I went back to the Minotaur camp and fashioned the skin into a +10 intimidation Cloak of Humanskin.
This post is starting to amass size, and I can't be bothered typing a whole lot, so here is a short list of other things I did in that campaign.
- skinned an entire family (including kids) and shoved their detached body parts into an oven.
- Accepted a quest to find a missing child, found the child, skinned the child and delivered the skin in a package to their doorstep.
- cut a hole inside a hooker and slept inside her Ton-ton style.
IRL: I have never been in a fight, become ill at the sight of blood and disagree with the freedom granted by American gun laws. So why do I love all of those things in games? Well, because they are all very mechanically fun game elements, and thinking up the most ridiculously gruesome story of child-skinning psychopathy is very, very fun. Also, I have little empathy for characters that aren't fleshed out in any way (no pun intended) and never have any meaningful dialogue, which is exactly what all D&D characters are.
Sorry for any un-desensitized people that were in any way offended or disturbed.
TL;DR: Fucking yes.
EDIT:
Just thought of Red Dead Redemption, a game with a completely out-of-place morality slider. Being evil just makes no sense with the cutscenes in the game, which aren't dynamic to suit whatever personality the player might want Marston to have. I played a good guy in that game because Marston was just unlikable otherwise.
I also sometimes prefer playing a good guy in games, just depends how I feel at the time. Although, the only game that made me feel genuine guilt was Deus Ex: HR. Being a bastard in games usually causes NPCs to react terrified and for the guards to come at you, but HR had NPCs that you liked, who didn't like you back, and that made me feel upset. From what I hear, Mass Effect does something similar, but I actively detest that series for a multitude of other reasons.
I never really go for good or evil, I just do whatever is best for ME. In FallOut 3 I murdered a library full of so called 'good guys' because one of them was wearing a cool looking coat that I wanted. I did always go easy on the undead looking guys tho, I felt kinda sorry for them. Get treated like shit by all the haters, just because they got a face full of radiation and survived it.
But one said he'd pay me well if I helped him, so I just shot him and took his money instead... wasn't even that much, lying prick.
Games seem very random about what's evil though, in Fable 2 people kept being mean to my dog, which was always swiftly replied to with an axe in the face... and that's evil!? How can loving your dog be evil? ... Stupid peasants.
But one said he'd pay me well if I helped him, so I just shot him and took his money instead... wasn't even that much, lying prick.
Games seem very random about what's evil though, in Fable 2 people kept being mean to my dog, which was always swiftly replied to with an axe in the face... and that's evil!? How can loving your dog be evil? ... Stupid peasants.
I've done some pretty fucked up things in EVE Online. Piracy comes immediately to mind, and I enjoyed every shot I ever fired at every stupid carebear who got in my way.
Then there was the espionage, a corp theft or two, a few lottery and contract scams, hiring those mercs to trash an entire corp because I wanted to see if I could make minerals in the region cheaper. It sorta worked.
Then there was the espionage, a corp theft or two, a few lottery and contract scams, hiring those mercs to trash an entire corp because I wanted to see if I could make minerals in the region cheaper. It sorta worked.
renegade7 said:
I've read about EVE Online. I think it was Wikipedia that described the online world as practically being run by the players which has lead to major PvP internal sieges like the take over/destruction of large corporations, etc, which would be impossible in most MMO's.
I remember thinking that the EVE Online universe sounds seriously cutthroat, but in a good way.
On the other hand I read that griefing is practically unrestricted. It took something like a guy proclaiming that he was suicidal and some other EVE player publicly exhorting other players to hound him to actually go through with it to get the mods to step in and quell the matter. Sounds ugly.
Do you know anything about that story? The implications of good and evil/right and wrong that go hand and hand with this forum subject actually spill over into real life in such a case. As such do you think it's a case of people mixing up their gaming personas with real life or does it have something more to do with the MMO communities themselves.
NOTE: I've never played an MMO either, though TOR has me feeling MMO curious.
I can never bring myself to be evil. Bad, maybe (if it isn't nailed down, it's mine), but evil, no (which confounded my brothers since they liked to call me the spawn of Satan).
The closest I came to playing evil in a game was Fable 2 where I made an Assassin-ish person (ended up not really doing the assassination jobs since they were dull and needlessly specific [kill X gender person with Y body trait at Z location at A time of day]) that people only really thought of as evil due to the assassin outfit I wore.
The closest I came to playing evil in a game was Fable 2 where I made an Assassin-ish person (ended up not really doing the assassination jobs since they were dull and needlessly specific [kill X gender person with Y body trait at Z location at A time of day]) that people only really thought of as evil due to the assassin outfit I wore.
I figure if I can't be evil for the hell of it against a Jawa in KotOR, then I really should just give up. A sarcastic troll is easy, but true evil? Nope, I cringe and immediately jump to a previous save to grovel and beg for forgiveness and get that shiny halo over my character's head.
Tried being evil in KotOR: FAIL
Tried ignoring the hobo on Nar Shaddah: FAIL
Tried killing the Water Dragon for her power: FAIL
Tried kicking Alistair out of kingdom: FAIL
Tried selling Fenris off to magister: FAIL
Tried killing the Rachni Queen: FAIL
Killed Lucien Lachance (sp?) in Oblivion. Had to walk away from the game for a long while.
I can't at all. I just can't disconnect myself from the moment unless I know "It's for an achievement and I'm deleting the save as soon as I get it."
Being a Renegade on ME1 was painful.
Tried being evil in KotOR: FAIL
Tried ignoring the hobo on Nar Shaddah: FAIL
Tried killing the Water Dragon for her power: FAIL
Tried kicking Alistair out of kingdom: FAIL
Tried selling Fenris off to magister: FAIL
Tried killing the Rachni Queen: FAIL
Killed Lucien Lachance (sp?) in Oblivion. Had to walk away from the game for a long while.
I can't at all. I just can't disconnect myself from the moment unless I know "It's for an achievement and I'm deleting the save as soon as I get it."
Being a Renegade on ME1 was painful.
I might start trying to be evil. Maybe one or two murders, maybe something that is legitimately evil in the beginning. Then after that I start slowing veering back into being the good guy. Every time I try, I always end up being the super good savior guy with only a few crimes from the beginning of the game.
One of the reasons I absolutely love Fallout New Vegas is because the faction that in most games would have just been portrayed as unrepentantly evil is instead given reason and logic, that is to say, they have reasons for doing what they do. Given time, they could very well prove to be the best hope for civilization in the mojave.Ninjat_126 said:
"Thesis and antithesis. The Colorado River is my Rubicon. The NCR council will be eradicated, but the new synthesis will change the Legion as well... from a basically nomadic army to a standing military force that protects its citizens, and the power of its dictator."
I'm almost never evil, can't bring myself to do it. I was going to do Dark Side in KoTOR til I heard about killing Mission. On the other hand, I do like being a jerk (generally after my 'good' run), playing Renegade in Mass Effect, going lethal on the NSF and Purity First in Deus Ex, playing Just Cause 2 at all.
Nope, and I can never be "just good" either. Like in ME I almost always toed the middle line because my personality just doesn't fit one side or the other. I can never be evil 'cause I don't see much thrill in it. Yeah... we can just forget all those people Ive slaughtered in GTA >.>
I hate morality gauges in games. They're not always weighed right. Some choices don't make much sense (lookin' at you InFamous)Take for example New Vegas: Stealing and death were weighed strangly to me. Killing a feral ghoul isn't good karma... at least to me. It's not human as we know anymore and you're saving yourself from danger. Not really "good", just had to me done. Sometimes you'd lose karma for stealing from criminals. Those are very broad opinions on good and bad. If I'm stealing stolen stuff from a killer, am I bad? Even if I was going to use the stuff to fix something for someone?
I hate morality gauges in games. They're not always weighed right. Some choices don't make much sense (lookin' at you InFamous)Take for example New Vegas: Stealing and death were weighed strangly to me. Killing a feral ghoul isn't good karma... at least to me. It's not human as we know anymore and you're saving yourself from danger. Not really "good", just had to me done. Sometimes you'd lose karma for stealing from criminals. Those are very broad opinions on good and bad. If I'm stealing stolen stuff from a killer, am I bad? Even if I was going to use the stuff to fix something for someone?
Never played a table top rpg but I always choose the evil options in rpgs(except Dragon Age Origins, now make an evil character in). It is just fun to be evil.
Nope. Not at all. When I try to do an Evil Walkthrough in Fallout 3, many of the evil options are either dumb and lead to worse rewards or just going along with a stupid decision, or just being a dick which I guess is the point.
Being bad has always been a curiosity to me. It never was the goal and never actually gives me satisfaction. It was the easy way to do things, the one where no effort was required nor where the most satisfaction could be had.
Like "Haha I killed an entire village, stolen the magical artefact they possessed and am going to hork it for cash." All I gained was nothing really. I did the same thing I could have done without killing the entire village by passing a simple test maybe, to boot I destroyed a community and robbed myself of interactions with the characters in the town.
On the other side being good has always been a chore to me. It always seemed like even though I was a paragon of good and stoic justice they just enjoyed making me jump through hoops. Arcania is a good example of that were several characters will literally laugh in your face after pulling a fast one on you by sending you out on a quest.
Like "I know you are the hero of time and space and you are the only thing you can stop the evil god from breaking through the barrier, but before I allow you access to our library of ancient world saving spells I first want you to go and get my niece from her ballet recital." It was such bullshit at times and in the end there was a far simpler and more logical solution rather than running around being nice or not doing something evil to prevent greater harm.
I think the Closest to my natural play style would be the Renegade from Mass Effect. Not really Evil, nor really Good. He just does what is most efficient, sometimes the Paragons choices were more logic or more evil than the "evil" Renegade and I would pick those if they suited me better in the character I played. Kick a power socket and shock the mechanic to prevent him from using a gunship in battle. Is that evil? You killed a dude that probably just works there, on the other hand you probably saved several lives both in the future and in the coming battle. By not killing him you would put your team in danger. Is it not Evil to willingly risk your team mates just to ease your own conscience?
For example in New Vegas I would often just shoot a bastard in the head and get along with my life if he was testing my patience simply because he was being a moron in delaying me with mundane tasks for cheap change. Is that Evil? Isn't it more evil to send a man down a monster invested hole to retrieve a worthless trinket that only got lost because the person that owns it is a moron and then pay him barely enough money to pay for the radiation medication he needs to stay alive? What's even stranger is that this hole houses vital equipment, has several corpses in it from dead adventurers so is this just a racket to kill and loot good natured wanderers? It's quite strange isn't it?
My point is Good and Evil is eternally debatable. There really is no true good or true evil. You could make a point on each side. Which is why I often play a gray character, even if that results in horrible powerups because developers can only think in Good or Evil terminology. During a story I might side with one side then backstab them if something speaks to my personal motivations or not. I think the closest thing to actual evil is to act in the most self-serving way possible, throwing away your own ideas and opinions in favour of the biggest reward.
This of course means that if you look at the rewards to missions many people go by the biggest reward, more often than not the good side, meaning that in fact these good paragons of virtue are the evil ones, because they are not good because of what they think but because there was greater gain in it for them at that time.
The worst part however is how evil and good is written. Usually being evil is being a dick and being good is being a pushover pansy. More often than not being good or being evil is the only choice there is, you never get questioned on what the implication of a choice or action are. What it says about you, how you react to things or ideologies of others. It's just a two sided choice of be a dick or be a pansy.
I want to bring up the Geth brainwashing from ME2. Brainwashing was Good and Not Brainwashing was Renegade, ie evil. Does that make sense? Enslaving a race to your way of thinking Good. Not doing that Evil. Wouldn't it have been amazing had they suddenly removed the Paragon, Renegade bullshit? Just have you sit there, with no moral hints or colour coded compass to guide you. Allow you to make a decision, weigh your options and decide which choice you wanted to make? The choice was made for you, someone somewhere defined mental enslavement and forcing them to fight in a war for your side as Good and allowing them to remain free possibly harming others and fighting against you as evil.
So yes in short I play a Grey character as much as I can, each event gets evaluated and I make the decision from there. You might classify one as evil and the other as good but in the end there is no good or evil. There is only a choice you make based on who you are, if the game allows you to, if it doesn't I force my own choice upon it.
Like "Haha I killed an entire village, stolen the magical artefact they possessed and am going to hork it for cash." All I gained was nothing really. I did the same thing I could have done without killing the entire village by passing a simple test maybe, to boot I destroyed a community and robbed myself of interactions with the characters in the town.
On the other side being good has always been a chore to me. It always seemed like even though I was a paragon of good and stoic justice they just enjoyed making me jump through hoops. Arcania is a good example of that were several characters will literally laugh in your face after pulling a fast one on you by sending you out on a quest.
Like "I know you are the hero of time and space and you are the only thing you can stop the evil god from breaking through the barrier, but before I allow you access to our library of ancient world saving spells I first want you to go and get my niece from her ballet recital." It was such bullshit at times and in the end there was a far simpler and more logical solution rather than running around being nice or not doing something evil to prevent greater harm.
I think the Closest to my natural play style would be the Renegade from Mass Effect. Not really Evil, nor really Good. He just does what is most efficient, sometimes the Paragons choices were more logic or more evil than the "evil" Renegade and I would pick those if they suited me better in the character I played. Kick a power socket and shock the mechanic to prevent him from using a gunship in battle. Is that evil? You killed a dude that probably just works there, on the other hand you probably saved several lives both in the future and in the coming battle. By not killing him you would put your team in danger. Is it not Evil to willingly risk your team mates just to ease your own conscience?
For example in New Vegas I would often just shoot a bastard in the head and get along with my life if he was testing my patience simply because he was being a moron in delaying me with mundane tasks for cheap change. Is that Evil? Isn't it more evil to send a man down a monster invested hole to retrieve a worthless trinket that only got lost because the person that owns it is a moron and then pay him barely enough money to pay for the radiation medication he needs to stay alive? What's even stranger is that this hole houses vital equipment, has several corpses in it from dead adventurers so is this just a racket to kill and loot good natured wanderers? It's quite strange isn't it?
My point is Good and Evil is eternally debatable. There really is no true good or true evil. You could make a point on each side. Which is why I often play a gray character, even if that results in horrible powerups because developers can only think in Good or Evil terminology. During a story I might side with one side then backstab them if something speaks to my personal motivations or not. I think the closest thing to actual evil is to act in the most self-serving way possible, throwing away your own ideas and opinions in favour of the biggest reward.
This of course means that if you look at the rewards to missions many people go by the biggest reward, more often than not the good side, meaning that in fact these good paragons of virtue are the evil ones, because they are not good because of what they think but because there was greater gain in it for them at that time.
The worst part however is how evil and good is written. Usually being evil is being a dick and being good is being a pushover pansy. More often than not being good or being evil is the only choice there is, you never get questioned on what the implication of a choice or action are. What it says about you, how you react to things or ideologies of others. It's just a two sided choice of be a dick or be a pansy.
I want to bring up the Geth brainwashing from ME2. Brainwashing was Good and Not Brainwashing was Renegade, ie evil. Does that make sense? Enslaving a race to your way of thinking Good. Not doing that Evil. Wouldn't it have been amazing had they suddenly removed the Paragon, Renegade bullshit? Just have you sit there, with no moral hints or colour coded compass to guide you. Allow you to make a decision, weigh your options and decide which choice you wanted to make? The choice was made for you, someone somewhere defined mental enslavement and forcing them to fight in a war for your side as Good and allowing them to remain free possibly harming others and fighting against you as evil.
So yes in short I play a Grey character as much as I can, each event gets evaluated and I make the decision from there. You might classify one as evil and the other as good but in the end there is no good or evil. There is only a choice you make based on who you are, if the game allows you to, if it doesn't I force my own choice upon it.
Table top RPGs no problem atall, get me 15 minutes in and im scheming to unleash undead on a town of halflings or some such. Games provide me with more of a problem, mainly because most games dont give you a distinction between sadistic evil mastermind who wants to enslave and conquor everything and "that jerk who threatens kiddies for laughs". A classic example was Neverwinter Nights 2, sure there was evil stuff you could do, but most of it got you penalised for no other reason than they didnt really want you to do it and none of it really furthered any kind of evil agenda until the very final decision in the game.