Epic Mickey Offers No Choice

[Lazarus Long]

The central choice in Fallout 3's Pitt expansion knocked me for a loop:

Wow. You made an account to ninja me. Impressive. Welcome to the Escapist, by the way.

Fallout 3 morality by and large suffers from pet the puppy/eat the puppy extremes, but this one case made me walk away from the computer and think for a good long while. I still can't say which option was "good."

I ended up taking the kid just because it meant I got to kill a bunch of slavers with a baby in my inventory like Chow Yun-Fat.

As utterly un-realistic as this is, there really isn't any other way a single person could be sacrificed to stop a moving train.

Hope this helps explain.

The train is made of Explodium?

 

[Svenparty]

It's a shame Yahtzee couldn't see some of the New Vegas moral choices. You literally had to do nearly everything to have a lasting effect on a faction-granted- you were shoved more in the direction of NCR but it offered some good choices.

Hopefully the system will get better and more meaningful as games evolve as a medium.

 

[gravitii]

It curious to think how much better moral choices could be using the mechanics already in place.

I've always wanted to make a war game and at one point have this moral clash:
You're a medic and your army is trying to defend a city. It's a losing battle, your fellow soldiers stand no chance but are still desperately holding the line to buy more time for escape. In the city they're unprepared and attempting to evacuate the people and it's complete chaos, and at this point the enemy is breaking through in spots and mortars are coming down, so essentially ever second soldiers and civilians are dying.

Here's the problem:
You want to evacuate the city as fast as you can, which means coldly cramming everyone into the cars, separating families and not giving the sick, hurt, disabled, young, etc help. People will be crying everywhere, but the sooner they're out of the city the sooner their lives are guarantied, although who knows if they'll ever get past the trauma or find their families.
You can take more time so people get the assistance and supplies and reassurance they need, but while you're taking all that time helping them you're too busy to help others, and the mortars will pick them off.
Along with that there's something else that can top it off. As stated before, you're a medic, and you're not supposed to be in the city but at the front lines treating your comrads. At any time you can hop on a convoy to where you're supposed to be and help the battle, thus buying more time and saving the lives of your fellow soldiers. As long as you're not helping them you can have another soldier nag you on the radio to get over there, and if you take too long, he can become hysterical and plead with you because eventually they're gonna get caught by surprise and suffer very heavy casualties. If you still don't show up after that, he'll tell you to not even bother, they've already lost, then maybe throw in an insult about your cowardliness. They will be finished off and then you and the NPC's in the city helping with evacuation will be on their own to defend against the advancing enemies. All of this can climax with a side quest option of helping a scared little girl by escorting her to her house to grab a jacket and her teddy bear, then get her on a car that will take her to her mother, who was at the market when it happened. It'll be fun provided the deaths of people evoke emotion.

 

[Vault101]

I'm surprised to see an article that talks about free will lobotomization vs. destruction, and Mass Effect, without mentioning mass effect's extremely well done choice of free will lobotomization vs. destruction. Extra Creditz did a whole episode on that one decision.

Spoiler: This video has spoilers in it, but also contains its own spoiler warning. Consider this a spoiler warning warning

Extra Creditz, Enriching Lives [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/1974-Enriching-Lives]

while I do think the moral choices in Me 2 are excellent the only thing I have a problem with is that it clearly shows which are "renegade" and "paragon" choices which takes some of the thourght out of it since the game punishes you for not ridgidly sticking to one side of the karma systm (but other than thet great game)

 

[duchaked]

yes, coke is better than pepsi

hmmm that one small mission in ME2...stop one of two missiles. stop one and it kills colonists, stop the other and it saves a valuable Alliance spaceport. honestly? all the people I saved in ME1 really just appear here and there to say thanks and maybe give a little exp/other rewards in ME2. maybe saving the spaceport, and it'll benefit me more if I work more with the Alliance than Cerberus in ME3...

well okay personally I went with saving civilians (no paragon/renegade points either way) cuz I just wanted to stick one at the Alliance at that point in the game. ha!

 

[duchaked]

that was pretty interesting, but in all honesty, was anyone expecting boundary pushing human experience art from DISNEY?

No, but people expected it from Warren Spector. That's why people were disappointed. At least that's why I was.

mhmm pretty much that

for me (and probably Yahtzee maybe) it was the thought that Disney would actually do something epic and drastic in the way they portrayed and messed up their perfect little world for great effect in the game...but as ZP pointed out: compromise :/

guess two early concept arts and a brief description really don't paint the picture

 

[Something Amyss]

aaaah *head explodes*

that was pretty interesting, but in all honesty, was anyone expecting boundary pushing human experience art from DISNEY?

I don't expect the moral choice system to be explored successfully by the media in general. "Moral Choice" has become short hand for "a way to coax replay out by making them play twice for both endings." Mass Effect does it better, but not particularly good, and there's been little in the two games that actually makes long term choices something that stick with you.

Not that it stopped me from enjoying it, but the industry has hardly made much of a compelling case for morality in games.

 

[quantumsoul]

The best moral choice system is one that isn't constantly in your face.

As soon as you're conscience of the fact that you're making moral choices in a game instead of your own choices, you'll start to comform to the way the game wants you to play it.

I'll sound like a broken record, but fuck it: Silent Hill 2 has the best moral choice system of any game, because you're never aware of the choices you make. For all you know, you're simply playing a game without choices, untill you receive one of the multiple endings.

I totally agree with you. I really hate when they use a moral choice point system, especially to level up. You'll be making choices purely for those points.

 

[Netrigan]

Having been spending a lot of time with Fallout & Fable of late, I find myself musing on the whole morality thing quite a bit.

Fallout: New Vegas probably had the right idea by pretty much ditching the importance of morality in favor of factions. Obviously, the Caesar faction is the evil one, but your karmic alignment doesn't have much to do with anything else in the game. Fallout 3 tried to make it work, but apart from how Three Dog reacted to you and which companions you could travel with, it made no difference.

As for Fables, the system is so thoroughly superficial that they could actually make it interesting if they embraced its superficiality. Instead of equating purity with beauty, I think they ought to expand the interests of potential mates. Employ something along the lines of The Seven Deadly Sins and have potential mates be more attracted to you based on your personal quirks. If you're a violent bastard, have some girls around who are into that. If you like drinking in the pub, then the bar flies should be into you. No matter what type of character you are, there should be people who are totally into that... and for god's sake, do something that prevents the prostitutes from nagging me for marriage proposals. It's totally ridiculous when I'm collecting half a dozen hookers for an orgy and having the lot of them talking marriage. You should be able to pick up someone in a bar for random sex and have them trying to sneak out the next morning.

 

[DivineBeastLink]

while I do think the moral choices in Me 2 are excellent the only thing I have a problem with is that it clearly shows which are "renegade" and "paragon" choices which takes some of the thourght out of it since the game punishes you for not ridgidly sticking to one side of the karma systm (but other than thet great game)

I agree with this. I just finished another runthrough of Mass Effect 2, and every time I made a choice I felt like I had to make the Paragon choice, because the game rewards you for sticking to one path, and there's no reason to waver from it.

Granted, I actually agree with the Paragon choice much of the time from a real-life moral standpoint (not in every situation, but in many). However, I do feel that if the game completely did away with the +X Paragade boxes and the meters showing morality, and completely eliminated any bonuses or perks for choosing a moral side (Charm/Intimidate), the actual moral choice aspect of the game would be greatly improved.

For one, I wouldn't feel forced to pick any one side, and could thus feel free to choose based on what I feel I should do. For another, not telling you which choice is good or bad forces the player to consider the ramifications of his actions instead of being told his choices are good or bad.

EDIT: I feel I should clarify.

Spoiler: Mass Effect 1 Spoilers

One of the choices you are presented with in ME1 is whether or not to free the Rachni Queen and let her remake her race. The Rachni were destroyed centuries ago (mostly by the Krogan) because they threatened to destroy and conquer the galaxy.

Now, imagine if, instead of being told that freeing the Queen was good and killing her was evil, you were simply given the two choices, and the background of the Rachni themselves. A race so dangerous that the sentient races of the galaxy would commit genocide to stop them. Would you give them another chance, knowing that once they repopulate themselves they could do the same thing again?

Come to think of it, this reminds me of Ender's Game. I wonder if Bioware took a cue from Mr. Card.

 

[Thousand Tides]

Personally I think games with a morals system are great fun...as long as you see the results of your actions and decisions. *Looks at dragon age* I'm not terribly fond of the meter showing which side of the scale I'm leaning towards though. It is kind of cool but I don't need a meter to look over my shoulder telling me not to kill the nice farmer or everyone will hate me. I'm going to do what I want. Hence the choice system. Let me accept the consequences chose.

 

[CatmanStu]

The Witcher had the best morality system I've come across in a game because the decisions you made were never directly connected to your quest but rather a means of deciding how future events would pan out.
The way it's done usually is: Kill A, get evil points, evil powers become better or more evil choices become available; Spare A, get good points, and so on.
The way The Witcher tried to do it (didn't always come across clearly); Kill A, nothing happens, later in the game you get info from an NPC and have to fight a group of enemies to finish a quest; Spare A, nothing happens, later in the game A has killed the NPC making your quest last longer but when the final fight comes A will turn up to offer you a quicker, less violent solution.
I think that as morality is unique to the individual, the only way to implement it effectively in a game is to make the decisions as invisible as possible as well as making the game judge you on the way you play.

 

[RIOgreatescapist]

More philosophical wish-wash. The only difference between contemplating all those moral dilemmas and crying into your cappuccino is that eventually you'll realize that crying into your cappuccino just isn't cutting it anymore so off you go, stumbling back to your old life or whats left of it anyway as to filling your head with everunanswered questions would be the equivalent of planning to travel around the world in 80 days and on the 1896th hour you'd still find yourself in bed with both your hands down your pants.
Decently written and formulated though, kudos.

 

[brunothepig]

A good article.
I've yet to find a game I feel did moral choice systems right. As Yahtzee said, being good seems to bring no rewards. Being evil brings greater reward, but oh no, you may have harmed the collection of pixels and programming.
Now, KOTOR was weird. It sort of came close a lot, but never was a good moral choice system. There's one point on Tatooine where some woman ran up to me and asked me to buy a hunting trophy, which I could sell later. There was neutral, buy it for the same value. Good, wave the fee. And evil, which was overcharge. I never see this woman again. It doesn't matter what I do. Of course I got the extra money.
The only people I was kind to were most of my companions, because Bioware did do a good job characterising them. So I liked them... Well, ok I didn't like Carth... Can you blame me?
But I was disappointed in one respect. In the Star Wars lore, the Sith ideals are emotions make you stronger, and not every decision should be totally logical. It's not just being evil. KOTOR touched on this, but basically if you were evil, you were a Sith.

Spoiler

Did anyone else find it interesting that the jedi pretty much killed Revan? It's the whole morality thing, is it worse to kill someone, or totally change there personality? I thought that was a cool twist, though not explored enough.

Ah well. KOTOR's still fun, just a lot of wasted potential with the moral choice system.

 

[Motiv_]

Snip

The comment about the man's weight was only meant to be said for the final choice, as his weight was supposed to be enough to halt the train. As utterly un-realistic as this is, there really isn't any other way a single person could be sacrificed to stop a moving train.

Hope this helps explain.

It does a bit but wouldn't it make more sense for the one man to be rigged with explosives by whoever set up this bizarre morality play?
That way the mans life is equal to the life of one of the others and personal bias doesn't come in to it.

And before you say "but that would kill the passengers!" at no point were passengers (or even a driver) mentioned, for this bizarre test someone would have had to set this up in advance, otherwise what's stopping the driver from putting on the brakes?
For this to work the only factors should be 1 life vs 5, and obviously, if you do nothing five will die, if you kill this one the same five will live.

In the infinitely unlikely situation this happened during the train's normal running schedule I'd let the five die, no sense in making all those people late!

In theory, that's a perfect substitute, but if he's strapped with explosives and willingly blows himself up to stop the train, then that's no moral choice of yours, it's simply him being a hero in a strange way.

However, if you pushed him in front of the train, then it really defines your moral fiber, because the question is basically meant to ask, "Would you murder one man to save five?"

Maybe, a man is strapped with explosives, and YOU have the detonator? I dunno.

 

[M4yce]

I really think it matters more "who" the people are, unless I'm missing something (sorry I kinda skimmed up to this point).

Like if the one person was someone you loved and the 5 were strangers but kids, if they're all just strangers then it's just about math at that point.

On topic, Yeah I'm always really iffy when I hear about some kind of moral choices in games, as they usually boil down to pat puppy on head or drown it....

 

[T. S. Wolf]

The problem as i see it with moral choices in video games is that the creator seems to think that most people will be kept up at night if they make a bad choice vs. a good choice. I mean, come on, its a bloody video game; no one is going to lose sleep over the fact you made the existence of a pixel character bad. Mass Effect was sorta heading the right direction where choices you made could change the outcomes of different events in the future, but then again it all comes back to the fact that good choices seem to make it so trouble just "bounces" off of you while making bad choices makes all the interesting shit happen but then you're character is made out to look like a total asshole. If they want to impress me, they should make a video game where being good sometimes gives you worse consequences than if you were just an ass about the whole situation; but there i go day dreaming again. . . . .

 

[Ocelano]

I'd say that the best moral choice system was the one seen in "Heavy Rain" (SPOILERS!)At the moment when I was at the end of the trial where you have to kill a person, I really had to think. Because there was no answer to that question, would you end a human life which is worth as much as any other to save your son? When I finally made up my mind and shot him, I had to look away from the screen because I felt like horrendous monster. That's the kind of moral choice I like, the kind that actually makes feel bad for taking the "evil" alternative.

@mjc0961: "inFAMOUS" is one of my favorite games of all time, the thing that didn't work in it was mainly that you were required to choose a path and stick to it, there were moments where I really wondered (again SPOILERS!) if I should save Trish from her dead, or rather save the doctors, which would in turn, save a lot of lives, or at the time where I found a guy that wouldn't let me through a gate until I reunited him with his wife, should I tell him that his wife is dead, and let him live in suffering, or should I put him out of his misery. And while, yes some choices ended up in the same thing, they felt meaningful at the time, and I hope these two issues are solved by the time "inFAMOUS 2" comes out (I´m so preordering the shit out of that game!)

I did like infamous but it's choices weren't actually good V evil they always in my mind came down to the needsof others V the needs of self.


There are loads of morally blank dilemmas that dual-choice games don't explore enough. Would you give up a miserable but familiar existence for an exciting but unknown one? Would you rescue one baby or five old people? Is Coke better than Pepsi? Well, yes, but they both make you fat.

Answering yahtzhee's q's above in order
1 give up familiar distance everytime I hate my life
2 baby babies are cute old people are annoying
3 both taste nasty but I do like diet coke

 

[metal mustache]

i'm always happy to find another coke person

 

[Worgen]

"Or in games like Metroid Prime 3 or Dark Earth where you can use the evil force possessing you to gain a temporary power boost but doing so makes it likelier that you'll succumb to it. But even these don't so much paint you as a "bad" person, just a weak one more mindful of short-term benefit than long-term effects."

that brings me of mind of something in breath of fire 4, in the game you got access to dragon powers, and they were a big "fuck you" to any enemy in the game, I couldnt find a single one who could stand to the powers but if you used them too much then you became corrupted and the game ended so it was best not to use your "fuck you" powers unless you really needed them