I.... can't bring myself to play evil?

[Hemlet]

I don't really have a filter for characters I can't play I don't think, seeing as there's been a few D&D and d20 Modern games where I've played as some truly despicable motherfuckers. How despicable you may be asking? Well, for one d20 Modern game, I played as a full blown goddamn Nazi. To this day I have no idea how I got away with it. It wasn't a case of "hurr durr kill all non-Aryans hurr durr" either. Oh no, it was a case of the character being a methodical, heartless monster of a person with an ugly political agenda.

He would smile, joke, laugh, and be perfectly polite. He would look you in the eye and call you his friend. But the instant he achieved what he was after you'd find a syringe in your neck injecting 500ml of either morphine or air. That was if he was feeling kind and wanted to end you quickly as opposed to using you as a guinea pig.

As for games like Skyrim and the like, I've always found it very easy to go full psycho and just start killing everyone left and right out of the blue. If I'm really roleplaying, I can even justify my character being power-hungry enough to actually do all of the Daedric quests to collect everything. Sure by the end his soul is literally being ripped to pieces from being promised to so many different godlike beings, and he's a hollow husk of a person consumed by an insatiable desire for power, but by god he has all of the Daedric artifacts so it's totally worth it.

 

[VoidWanderer]

I do agree, I find playing as evil or dark, or whatever they are calling it now to be contradictory to my character.

Then I played the Sith Inquisitor in Star Wars The Old Republic. It is hard to NOT play evil as it is so damn fun!

 

[Jeroenr]

I can't do evil very well either. I have to rationalise every decision I make and many RPGs' evil options are so pointlessly cruel I can't do it. Remember the evil option in Jade Empire and how it comes down to basically betraying everyone and everything for full power over the world? All my attempted Closed Fist runs eventually devolved into standard good guy runs after a few hours. I played that game like 10 times at least too.

Personally, i useally do play a good character.
But in for example TES series i do steal just about anything thats not nailt down.
It isn't considered evil (bay the game anyway), but just don't get caught.
Same goes for killing for the dark brotherhood.

I find a binarie good or evil system flawet at best.

Like you said, the evil options are often pointlessly cruel.
Or are not evil, but just make you look like a jerk.

Also asking for a (higher) reward often puts you in the evil camp, but in the end you did help even when it was not required.

But the option to betray everyone and rule the world sound pretty evil though.

I like a reputation systems a bit more.
like Fallout:NV, You still have a overall karma rating, but how people response to you depends on your reputation with certain factions.
Although there were way to many points to do a 180' and jump sides

Skyrim did an atempt at this as well, but slightly less well in my opinion.

 

[sagitel]

i can and will play evil unless the game gets too emotional. then i cant take it anymore. the one kind of character i can never play though are mages. i can never play as a mage. they need mana to fight and they stay at the back and if they reach you, you die. i dont like that. i want to be the first that goes in and last to come out.

 

[dragonet111]

i can and will play evil unless the game gets too emotional. then i cant take it anymore. the one kind of character i can never play though are mages. i can never play as a mage. they need mana to fight and they stay at the back and if they reach you, you die. i dont like that. i want to be the first that goes in and last to come out.

You are my Evil Twin

I'm a freaking boyscout l always choose the good guy road and the magic users always. It never matters if it's a video game or pen and paper rpg. ALways good always magic.

 

[Commissar Sae]

While I generally prefer to play a generally good character, I have nothing wrong with playing sadistic assholes either. Started a new game of New Vegas recently and have two characters running at the moment. One is a generally decent guy, but also a tech fetishist and so he has nothing but disdain for tribals and junkies. He is basically good, but in the brotherhood of steel way that loathes outsiders and would happily leave people to burn for his own interests. The other character is a straight up monster who kills anyone who gets in his way and then eats their corpses. Hell in some cases he will help someone out, only to then stab them in the back (and then eat their corpses.)

 

[Drops a Sweet Katana]

I feel your pain, OP. I can bring myself to be anything more than slightly dickish but ultimately still pretty good. If stealth (if done well i.e. NOT Skyrim) and non-lethal are options I pretty much aim to complete my objective with as little damage as possible, only going on the offensive when it no long becomes an option.

In multiplayer, I find I can never play any sort of class that sits back and doesn't get stuck in. Even when I play support in Planetside 2 as a Medic or Engineer, I'm usually in the front healing and reviving team mates and repairing vehicles. The only time I ever sit back is when I'm in a tank if only because my faction's tank is not suited for close-quarters. Other than that, I can't do it.

 

[Chris Moses]

Infamous 2 made me feel so bad playing through the evil storyline... I too wonder now if I can ever be truly evil again in a game. I literally had to force myself to make some of the decisions at the end and then I had to stop myself from becoming so disinterested in what happens to that evil asshole to the point that I stopped playing.

No other game has tugged at my feels like Infamous 2 did. I don't deny that there are other feel-invoking games out there, or that different people become attached/invested in different games, just that this one is the one that did it for me.

 

[Storm Dragon]

I guess if I'm evil I want to be the chaotic kind, the one that just disrupts and causes mayhem and chaos everywhere, but most games only allow the more diplomatic or "lawful" kind of evil that involves being snide and conniving while twirling your mustache thinking up new ways to game the system.

Really? Because it's the opposite for me: If I'm going to be evil, I'd rather be the subtle manipulator, but the only evil options games ever seem to give are to be a kill-crazy maniac. Most of the time though, I just want to be the good guy.

 

[Chris Moses]

Evil all the way. I find it difficult to follow 'normal' choices. When I play Mass Effect as pure paragon, it's boring as fuck. Shepard is so predictable, she becomes hard to have any interest with (Never played as Male Shepard, either. Too cliché). But go full renegade, or mostly renegade, and you get a very dynamic character. The same with The Walking Dead.

Spoiler

I played Lee as if I were him. Very protective of Clementine, and a mostly honest and straight-up guy. But he also had a darker side. In the second episode, while I was rational and...for lack of a better way of putting it...the good guy, I killed both the brothers at the farm. I also had no qualm killing Lily's father (Who I did nothing but antagonise the ****, since he was nothing but an irrational and arrogant cock). In the third episode, after Lily outright murdered Carley, I left her ass on the side of the road with no resources and no remorse. I killed Kenny's son. I stomped the brains out of the kid in the Attic in the fourth episode, and had no problem threatening the cancer patients when they wouldn't listen to reason. In the fifth episode, I strangled the fuck out of the **** that took Clementine. And for the most part, Lee was incredibly calm and restrained. He was a tough nut to crack....but gods help those that crack him.

Sometimes I am baffled to see so many people's choices in video games, at how 'cliché and predictable' their playthroughs ended up looking.

Maybe some people just don't have the same aversion to "cliché and predictable" as you do. In fact maybe to them "cliché and predictable" is the preferred state of things.

If you think I am responding because you touched a personal cord- I don't even know if I am "cliché and predictable".

I'd like to think I am not, but playing "pure evil" is hard for me to do. At my worst, the most I seem to be able to pull off is the noble thief that becomes the reluctant hero but never fully evolves out of his miscreant ways. Though I suppose playing the Empire in various Star Wars games or in strategy games in general I can pull off oppressive dictator that is not above genocide to achieve his goal of total domination. Hello police-state communism a la Civ! Admittedly it's pretty easy to remain detached from what it actually takes to be evil in those games...

 

[Dandark]

I have found myself mostly playing as good characters lately. I just bought and played through Infamous 1 and 2 as a good character and my attempts at evil characters have both made me feel kinda bad.

It would be great if games had more challenging moral choice systems. Right now I hate using them just because most of the evil actions are just over the top be a jerk moves. Even worse is when you are forced into choosing good or evil options because of bonuses if you are good or evil enough. Mass effect and Infamous were awful for this.

I'd like moral systems to be more to do with your reputation, if you killed a whole village then others would have heard about it and may be reluctant to let you into their settlements for example.

Though mostly i'd like players to have more choice with their characters morals without being penalized for not going full evil or full good. I want to play as a character who tries to do the right thing but hates some people are is prone to fits of rage against those he hates. I want to play a hero who tries to be good but is ruthless in his dealing with opposition and is downright cruel to those he hates.
I'd love that rather than he freed a village from bandits but then he lost 20 hero points because he didn't pay the village half his gold to free the bandits or something. I want to free the village from the bandits and then run down the scumbags and publicly execute them for their crimes.

 

[Something Amyss]

I hate when they divide things into good/evil with points because both sides are usually so inane in good/evil stories. I do like the option to be a rampaging monsters, though.

I don't have a problem acting evil in a game, though I do prefer good like 90% of the time.

I don't refuse to play any character type, but I stray away from tanks and general fighters. Frankly, they don't fit my play style. I prefer mobility and range, and maybe magic. Depends on the setting. But this is true in other settings as well as video games.

 

[kyomi7502]

Interesting.. I have the opposite problem. Mainly because I can't have quite as much fun when I get bored since I'd have to follow all the rules and save people and not blow up stuff. If I have to play as a "good" character (to get 100% or something), it's always the last thing I play.

I always just start out with evil if it's a choice, because it's easier to get a hang of the game and just generally have more fun. Most of the time the evil upgrades are so much better than the good upgrades that it's almost painful playing as a good character.

On the other topic.. I always like playing with magic/mage type people. There is just so much more creativity in that for me. It's basically choosing between a bunch of neat spells or what object you want to beat things with repeatedly for the next few hours.

 

[Bruce]

This morning, the first thing I did at work was put in a story about a gang rape.

She had been raped twice - the second time being when she got back from reporting the first time to the police.

The gang rapists then set fire to her. She survived just long enough to give a dying statement.

TL DR: I find real life has desensitised me to evil in video games to the point that I have no interest in roleplaying it.

 

[Hero of Lime]

Same here, for the most part. I'm too much of a goody two shoes to play as a super villain. Though I do enjoy playing as bad guys once in a while, just not for entire games like Elder Scrolls, Mass Effect etc.

Though I did enjoy playing as Darth Vader in certain missions in Rogue Leader where you kill all the attacking rebels on the Death Star and alter Star Wars history. That was pretty cool.

 

[Ml33tninja]

For me it would have to be Pure Good/Evil characters. By Sword Coast standards I would see myself as a Chaotic Good or Lawful Neutral and that is how I mostly play. I mostly like hybrid classes but mostly rouges and fighter/mage in RPGs. I like to be in the action, fighting along side my people.

I do not pull evil acts unless it is 1) something I can get away with 2) gets me something worth the acts(money or unique item. 3) or person I am talking to pisses me off. I treat people I like with respect but no one is walking on me without paying the price.

One of the reasons I love Arcanum(my favorite CRPG) so much is there is less good/evil and more just what is more acceptable for you. Very gray world.

 

[Headsprouter]

I don't do evil much, either. However, I'll dip my toes in every so often if the reward is good, unlike in New Vegas where being evil grants you no extra reward and thus you are being a dick purely for the sake of being a dick. Which I find completely pointless. I don't even enjoy saving and then rampaging...that's just called getting bored to me.

In a game where evil is done well, it will grant you a different/better reward at the cost of maybe an npc or two. Evil should always have a motive.

 

[Auron225]

I suck at evil too. The difference for me is the difference between games with morality & consequences like Bethesda games or Mass Effect, and stuff like Grand Theft Auto where running over people and gunning them down for no reason has no consequence.

If I screw over someone, I don't want to hear about how their life is ruined or their family hate me - which is why I always aim for Paragon in stuff where decisions matter. I aim to please.

However in Grand Theft Auto, I may as well be running over mannikins. It changes nothing about these infinitely-numbered nameless figures and so I will happily blow them up just to see how far I can make them fly.

 

[SecondPrize]

I can never play evil either. I just can't do it, doesn't even matter if it's a rpg or not, I never even killed a little sister in bioshock to see what would happen. There is one exception, however. I am a ruthless bastard in FTL, I show no mercy if killing would benefit me more, I accept all quests and then take the downpayment and only fulfill the agreement if it's convenient. I'm pretty much the opposite while playing FTL than I am in any other game.

 

[Alcamonic]

I have trouble playing as an evil character. Mainly because I feel like I miss out on quests and rewards if I don't play Mcnoble. Sadly, my beliefs are well grounded as well because "evil" setting is usually "Kill this quest giving character and then fuck off forever", thanks Bethesda.

That's not to say I don't mind playing a bit cruel at times (thanks Fallout 2, you're wonderful), but just kill characters left and right "because it's evil!" is something I mostly skip.