Study Shows Most Gamers Are Goody-Two-Shoes With Moral Choices

[Cynical Panda]

I'm always the evil option; have been since I played the first Fable as a kid. I like how comically over-the-top the choices are. Eventually, you become worse than Hitler (not Mecha-Hitler though, that'd be ridiculous)

 

[hickwarrior]

I'm going to say that games that do good and evil never do it right, and can never do it right. Bioware 'evil' is just 'dickhead' because if they really let you be evil it would completely destroy the plot. Only good guys cooperate with the script. It's just a fundamentally broken mechanic. Something like Witcher or Fallout where you just make choices and there are consequences is by far the better (and more adult) way to go.

Agreed. But that would take better writing.

Kind of like how I like the games in the SMT franchise that let you choose what you want to do. Shall I kill god today, or side with Him? Shall I be quiet when this one guy keeps talking over me or keep interrupting him? The game doesn't care, do whichever option we give ya.

But that's been my experience. And my experience tells me I can't go evil, no matter which path I take.

Spoiler: Hell, in devil survivor...

...I take Naoya's invitation to become king of Bel, or demons really. But when that happened, Yuzu, Keisuke and Midori all left because they didn't agree with me. It kind of left me with a hollow feeling afterwards, especially considering what we all went through. Now I've gotta press on to see where I'll be going with this, though to be fair, I'd rather choose someone else now...

 

[Hirolsx]

I guess I'm the odd ball here then because i pick choice by choice. I mean yeah I tend to learn for the good choices but there are sometimes when the if done right "Evil" choices just fit so much better to be honest. Now also who here hasn't reloaded a save to just see the evil choice and what happens huh?

 

[Kargathia]

To be fair, few games offer moral choices where evil is something other than 'murder puppies for fun'.

Honestly, video games already went wrong by defining moral choices as "Good" and "Evil".

I'd like some more choices in the vein of Game of Thrones: comparisons between options such as Ned Stark (well-meaning but unsuitable for politics), Stannis Baratheon ("just", but would cause civil war in less than a year), and Tywin Lannister (Obviously competent, but don't mind the occasional massacre).

 

[Teriver]

Like pretty much everyone has said, most evil options are over the top. However sometimes they're not evil at all and just slightly more extreme.
My example is from Mass Effect 2 during the Archangel mission. You get the opportunity to take a free shot at a mech but this is considered evil, despite the fact that you are shooting a mindless robot operated by evil people. Even the most white knight character would take that shot.
You could argue Mass Effect's renegade options aren't evil but I think punching reporters in the face for asking rude questions is a bit evil.
So yeah, evil options are either hitler or not evil at all and this is why few people play evil.

 

[WanderingFool]

To be fair, few games offer moral choices where evil is something other than 'murder puppies for fun'.

Unfourtuntly, this is very true. I cant even think of a game I played in the last few years that had a decent evil choice, and by that I mean one that not only was something more than "being evil for the lols" evil choice, but that offered a actual incentive to be evil. For the second, it seems being the good guy pays off more so than being evil, when it should really be the other way...

 

[Clovus]

I always find it strange when people play games with choices as a version of themselves. If given the option to help a traveller get his wife's ring back from the cave o' monsters, my personal choice would be to run away.

I generally think about the type of character I want to play and stick to that. I like to create a different moral background for each character. Like, I played as an Elf in Dragon's Age: Origins. Given how that game starts, I played as an Elf who was racist towards humans.

However, most of that gets thrown out the window if the game clearly intends you to play a certain way. In the situation above, if the only options are to help the person or say something like, "Figure it out yourself," then I'm going to help them so I can do the quest and get the reward/XP. I'm not going to get anywhere if I basically just kill everyone in town. Some games do make those situations interesting though. If you can respond, "Oh sure, I'll find that ring for you!" to get the quest and then have the option to keep the ring. That's especially interesting for both playstyles if the ring is especially powerful. Keeping that powerful ring is a proper "evil" decision. Giving up something that is actually useful to the player with no expectation of a reward would be a proper "good" decision.

The best choices are in game like The Witcher or Walking Dead where all options are, in some light, reasonable. Or if the evil choices are not crazy murderer but more like the D&D definition of evil: they only care about what is best for themselves; they're not just blood-thirsty lunatic.

 

[deadish]

No surprise here.

"Evil" people don't play video games much as they are serving life in prison or on death roll for stuff like murder.

 

[FoolKiller]

Unfortunately, the problem is that we all know that the leveling of abilities in games like Mass Effect only reward you for going White Knight or Devil. There is no in between. While I've tried playing through games with choices I would make, there seems to be a punishment (in the form of lack of unlocks) for doing anything where some choices are good and some are bad.

 

[putowtin]

I find myself playing more as a "good" girl in games as the "evil" choice make Dr Evil look mild and restrained.
The only game I enjoy playing where I pick "evil" is Fallout: New Vegas and even that's not really evil, just morally grey.


What the.... Never gonna give you up.... capthcas Rick Rolled Me!

 

[Sarge034]

I do usually play a "good" character the first round and I try to play an "evil" character on the second but it usually gets boring because my choices have no weight or evil is just that much of a dick.

The only games I really played through multiple (multiple, multiple) times were Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2. I loved that series so much that I truly wanted to roll play myself so I would play my Shep over and over until I maxed paragon and then I would play until I maxed renegade. Only then would I take that save and craft my "porting save". I would just pick what felt right to me in the dialog (having seen all solution at that point) and meticulously craft all of the other choices/actions.

 

[Reincarnatedwolfgod]

It usually not pragmatic to be evil in games. I need a justifiable reason to do evil things. Drowning a puppy for lols is not valid justification for drowning a puppy.

I am being a psychopath in fallout 3 because it hard to play as anything else when the writing is sucks enough prevent me from caring about most of the ncp's. Sure I could poison the water and kill many people but it will be poisonous to me as well. I get good karma for not poisoning the water but I am not being good and that not even a moral choice. I am being pragmatic and everyone I help is simply a bystander who benefits from my the logical choice I made while only thinking about my self in the game.

I have hard time seeing how someone not plays as a psychopath in bethesda games. To be able to care about any characters it requires good writing. In game with good writing being an evil bastard can be difficult. I have no desire to be abhorrently evil person in planescape torment because some of the things evil thing you can do in the games is horrible and it has good writing back it up.

 

[Lightknight]

Well, most game's evil choices are insanely evil, like drowning a bag full of puppies evil. If games provided more morally questionable options that a sane person would actually do in pursuit of their best interests then I may consider it more.

As is though, I'll continue to be the classic hero in all my actions and consider a second playthrough if I deem it worth my effort (inFamous 2).

 

[TiberiusEsuriens]

To be fair, few games offer moral choices where evil is something other than 'murder puppies for fun'.

This, pretty much.

I almost always choose the "good" option, because, to steal a phrase, it generally comes down to "Mother Theresa or Baby Eating", and I've no interest in the latter. Pointless cruelty is stupid and fundamentally aggravating for me to witness, so I never choose it. The evil option should be the 'cruel yet practical' solution, while the good one should be the 'virtuous but harder' solution.

Designers for games with a morality bar rarely understand that concept.

I mostly agree there. In BioWare games I find the 'evil' choices to be simply annoying, but the 'not-inherently-good' choices are very interesting in concept. The problem that this dev in particular has is that they bifurcate the games too much: in order to get "the best" endings we have to be ALL good, or ALL bad. In Mass Effect for instance, I don't particularly want to partake in genocide, nor do I want to punch EVERYONE I meet, but most of the big decisions we face I prefer the latter. ME2 especially,

Spoiler

the idea of giving Cerberus all the reaper tech

was simply too interesting to pass up, but the game had taught me by that time that I should only be picking one side forever, even though there was nothing else that the morality score would impact in that game.

Morality bars need to just go away completely. The problem is that these types of systems prevent people from actually thinking about their games. Important moral choices are not choices AT ALL if the game is designed in a way that punishes players for actually choosing, and changing, on a case-by-case basis.

 

[DrunkOnEstus]

I find it really difficult to choose the "evil" option 95% of the time. I guess for me it's that conundrum where you're trying to enjoy fiction where you the player is the protagonist, and usually his/her main arc is one of growth and learning until he/she saves the world or infects all of the species with whatever "The DNA and energy from synthetics" is.

And like everyone has said here, the "evil" options are usually too ridiculous to take seriously. If my options are "donate 1000 gold to save the orphanage" or "Wipe your ass on the faces of the orphans because their tears cure hemorrhoids, only after you get them addicted to crack". It reaches a point where choosing those options just makes the story a farce, especially when by the time you reach the end you're going to save the world and be all noble about it anyway.

The only time I went full blown evil was the first Infamous. I didn't care about any of the characters, or the cut-outs living in the city, so when I saw that choosing "good" meant "your powers are nowhere near as good and you're going to have to watch where you're firing so that you can maintain them" I just said fuck it. I hear the story gets better in the second one, but in the first one I just didn't care enough about it to make the gameplay less enjoyable.

 

[GamerAddict7796]

I guess I'm the odd ball here then because i pick choice by choice. I mean yeah I tend to learn for the good choices but there are sometimes when the if done right "Evil" choices just fit so much better to be honest.

This. Overall, I play as good but if there is a crime lord and the good option is to let them go after murdering all of their henchmen? Nope! He dead!

I find that their are often equal amount of stupid good choices as there are evil. Mass Effect is full of both. Love those games but I hate how allowing someone to kill a Cerberus agent in 3 is evil? As they say, that guy murdered some of his own friends for a TERRORIST GROUP! And it's evil to let him die?! Also, in the first game killing Fist is evil? He sent Tali to her death and let all his loyal guards die! Why would I let him go and then kill all of his guards?

Sorry for the rant but this stuff always winds me up.

 

[vIRL Nightmare]

To be fair, few games offer moral choices where evil is something other than 'murder puppies for fun'.

There is this.

That aside though, I don't personally find it that strange, the vast majority of people are raised with the hopes that they maintain some sort of moral standard so it is a, "well it kind of just makes sense" situation. Well that's my opinion anyways.

 

[VanQ]

Among other revelations, her research has shown that when given the choice, most of us would rather ride in with the white knights of justice, than become evil-doers.

What you did there, I see it. And it's the best laugh I've had all day. "Research shows: Most gamers are white knights." Perfect.

Joking aside, I always preferred to play Lawful Evil or True Neutral than Lawful Good or Chaotic Evil or any of the other combinations of morality. I found that the willingness to do whatever I need to accomplish my goal, while at least attempting to minimize casualties was a more fun approach to games.

Not that I didn't enjoy the occasional killing spree in The Elder Scrolls or Fable.

 

[Dandark]

I feel more gamers would choose non good choices if they were actually interesting. Usually you have the good choice of helping somebody in need or the evil choice of murdering everyone nearby then laughing manically before you head to the nearest orphanage with a can of gasoline.

 

[Kahani]

To be fair, few games offer moral choices where evil is something other than 'murder puppies for fun'.

As with most others here I agree, but I think it's actually worse than that. Too often the evil choice isn't just something silly and over the top for no reason, but the game actually punishes you for doing it. The classic Infinity Engine games, for example, mostly had evil as an option, along with evil companions if you wanted to make a whole evil group. But being good meant more XP and store discounts, while being evil meant a pathetically small bit of cash, not being able to talk to some NPCs, and constantly being attacked when in town. Even in games that don't punish you quite so blatantly, there's almost always the problem that there's absolutely no reason for an evil character to accept the vast majority of quests, so they will always inherently fall behind a good character.

That said, I don't think it's fair to blame developers entirely for this, because there are obvious reasons why it's the case. Firstly, society is, on the whole, not evil. Most people do not spend all their time murdering people and taking their stuff, or even doing more low-key things as simple as stealing. Criminals exist, but they're very much the minority. So a game world in which evil is just as viable and common as good just isn't going to feel at all realistic. The IE games may not have had much of a good/evil choice in terms of gameplay, but in terms of the game world it was actually pretty accurate - if you constantly murder people, others will refuse to talk to you and call the guards instead. PnP D&D ended up with pirate cities and the like for precisely this reason - it allowed people to play evil characters without having all their games immediately devolved into a running battle with the police.

Secondly, developers are, on the whole, not evil. This is a point usually made in regards to bad portrayal of scientists, geniuses, and so on in media - it's not easy to write things that you don't know. How do you write things a genius would say if you're not actually a genius yourself? In addition, it's very easy to spot flaws after the fact, but it's much more difficult to actually fix things yourself. Take sport, for example. It's usually very easy to see what a given sport person/team/whatever did wrong in a given situation, even though those of us sitting at home watching couldn't possibly have done any better ourselves. Combine the two and you have the situation where writers struggle to come up with realistic evil because they have no real experience of it themselves, but at the same time it's easy for us to look at what they have come up with and say it's all wrong.

So while I would love there to be better and more interesting moral choices in games, I can understand why there generally aren't. Some villains become iconic, but most of them don't because writing realistic evil just isn't that easy.

This is why I enjoyed The Walking Dead so much. So many choices were between "Evil, but safe" and "Good, but dangerous", and the game was simply too unpredictable to aim for a white knight playthrough.

While it did better than most, if you look at the stats showing how most people played it still had the vast majority choosing the same "good" options. It was a good effort, but I think it was flawed when it came to moral choices for the very simple reason that it was an adventure game and everyone knew that a choice would never make them lose. Unpredictable consequences, sure, but you always knew that no matter which option you picked the game would carry on. I think the choices could have been a lot more interesting if occasionally the "good, but dangerous" option was actually just plain wrong and got you killed.