Choices Matter: What's the best game for significant choices that you've played?

[ZedClampet]

I don't really have a good answer for this, myself, but I've been playing Dying Light 2 which makes you choose a lot of different things and was wondering about what games do it well (I think, so far, that Dying Light does it about as well as I've seen it done). My problem playing these games is that I make the choices too complicated. I've especially done this in DL2. What I need to do is think, "What are they really asking me here? They don't really want to know if I think eavesdropping on CharacterA might be a good idea. What they really want to know is am I siding with CharacterA or CharacterB, regardless of whether A has been acting suspiciously.

One thing I don't like about these games is that I don't ever remember being given an option to second think a decision and change your mind. That would be a nice feature, I think.

Edit: I just remembered one case where I thought that DL2 did it poorly. I'm not going to put spoilers here, so I'll just give a general example.

Say you have a choice between siding with Character A and Character B. They both seem okay. You think for a moment and decide to side with Character A. Shortly after that, you discover that Character A has an absolutely horrible plan they are putting into place, and you are stuck going along with it because you sided with them earlier.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Coincidently I watched a video about game choices just last night that was pretty interesting. I hadnt even realized there were those kind of options in Spec Ops: The Line.

 

[WoodenSaucer]

I'm not sure this is the best example, but in Skyrim, your choices make a pretty big difference if you get into the political storylines. Also, there are a few times when you can make a choice for something that you can never go back on. Like in one quest, what you choose to do determines whether you end up with Azura's Star or the Black Star. Also, if you get into the vampire thing, it pretty much jacks up the rest of the game for a while.

 

[WoodenSaucer]

Haha. Sorry for the double post, but one obvious answer to this is The Stanley Parable.

 

[Johnway]

probably games where characters are killed off. Like Mass Effect or the walking dead. Although that said, in the walking dead its pretty meaningless when everyone dies and my decisions don't really matter between games.

 

[Brian Boru]

The Civilization games, by a wide margin—they and other 4X follow Sid Meier's design philosophy of offering the player 'interesting choices' at almost every turn. Civ4 is the one I know best, so:

Hugely significant choices before you even begin to play, especially if you go the Custom Game route. A few of the many things you can choose:
Always war or always peace;
1 opponent or 21;
Which leader you are, who your opponents are;
Tiny map or huge;
One landmass or continents or islands;
One of 9 difficulty levels;
Choose everything, or leave some/all random.

Then you launch YOUR game:

Where will you settle those vital early cities?
North towards the opposition, to claim land before they do, but risk inciting war thereby;
Or East towards those tasty natural resources you need;
Maybe one South so you have access to the coast.

What kind of economy will you pursue—commerce towns, food-rich specialists, industry-based?

Will you pursue shiny world wonders, or stick with more practical buildings?

What's your diplomacy stance? Early appeasement, aggressive out the gate, peacefully wary.

Which tech path to pursue, once you have those for your local resources? Will you prioritize science or commerce or military or religion or culture?

How do you react to your opponents frequent diplomatic approaches?

All the many 'next-step' decisions you have to make each turn.

When are you ready to pick a victory condition to shoot for?

You choose.

 

[ZedClampet]

The Civilization games, by a wide margin—they and other 4X follow Sid Meier's design philosophy of offering the player 'interesting choices' at almost every turn. Civ4 is the one I know best, so:

Hugely significant choices before you even begin to play, especially if you go the Custom Game route. A few of the many things you can choose:
Always war or always peace;
1 opponent or 21;
Which leader you are, who your opponents are;
Tiny map or huge;
One landmass or continents or islands;
One of 9 difficulty levels;
Choose everything, or leave some/all random.

Then you launch YOUR game:

Where will you settle those vital early cities?
North towards the opposition, to claim land before they do, but risk inciting war thereby;
Or East towards those tasty natural resources you need;
Maybe one South so you have access to the coast.

What kind of economy will you pursue—commerce towns, food-rich specialists, industry-based?

Will you pursue shiny world wonders, or stick with more practical buildings?

What's your diplomacy stance? Early appeasement, aggressive out the gate, peacefully wary.

Which tech path to pursue, once you have those for your local resources? Will you prioritize science or commerce or military or religion or culture?

How do you react to your opponents frequent diplomatic approaches?

All the many 'next-step' decisions you have to make each turn.

When are you ready to pick a victory condition to shoot for?

You choose.

I was talking about narrative rather than choices in a strategy game or game options, but I do like how much Civ lets you customize your game.

 

[Pifanjr]

I think Mass Effect had the most impactful choices. Or at least was good at making them feel impactful, I've only played through the game once so I'm not sure how much actually changed.

The Witcher series also has some pretty significant choices you can make, but they didn't feel quite as impactful, though that's probably also in large part because I just didn't care for the story all that much.

 

[Brian Boru]

talking about narrative

I suppose Bioshock then. How to treat the Little Sisters was a difficult choice to make.

 

[ZedClampet]

I suppose Bioshock then. How to treat the Little Sisters was a difficult choice to make.

Never played that, but Steam has been recommending it to me for years.

 

[mainer]

I love in depth dialog and difficult choices in games, particularly when they have an impact on the story, characters and companions. Many of the games I've played had them: Mass Effect 1-3, Dragon Age 1-3, Pillars of Eternity 1-2, any Piranha Bytes game, Witcher 3, Fallouts 1-4 and New Vegas Oblivion & Skyrim, Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic, Baldur's Gate 1 & 2, and Planescape Torment.

Those are just off the top of my head, but they all had significant dialog options/conversations that could change the way the game played out. Planescape Torment was unique because it's the only game I played where you could actually talk your way out of the final battle through dialog if your charisma was high enough for the skill checks.

Choosing one is difficult, but if pressed, I'd narrow it down to the Mass Effect & Dragon Age series, and if pressed further, it would be very close between Dragon Age Origins and Dragon Age 2. But I think I'll have to go with the black sheep of the Dragon Age family; Dragon Age 2.

That game was much maligned for it's small maps and reuse of maps/environments over and over. But the one thing it did better than, or at least equal to, the others was the characters/companions and the dialog and choices your character had to make. Life & death, who you supported or didn't, and some characters would fight against you in the final battle (or leave you) if you didn't help them throughout the game. I thought it was very well done.

 

[Zloth]

Witcher 2 had a huge one. Depending on your choices in the first third of the game, the second third would be played in one of two completely different areas!

Mass Effect has a lot of impactful choices that can last multiple games. I don't think any were anywhere near as impactful as Witcher 2, though. The Dragon Age games should have had the same thing as Mass Effect, but they bunked it up with the rushed Dragon Age 2. (It would have been so awesome if Hawk had come back exactly as you built him/her back in DA2!)

Oh! Your choice of characters in Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines made a lot more difference than how you deal with combat. Stories can play out very differently for different vampire types. Nosferatu can't even show themselves in public because they're so hideous!

 

[ZedClampet]

The Civilization games, by a wide margin—they and other 4X follow Sid Meier's design philosophy of offering the player 'interesting choices' at almost every turn. Civ4 is the one I know best, so:

Hugely significant choices before you even begin to play, especially if you go the Custom Game route. A few of the many things you can choose:
Always war or always peace;
1 opponent or 21;
Which leader you are, who your opponents are;
Tiny map or huge;
One landmass or continents or islands;
One of 9 difficulty levels;
Choose everything, or leave some/all random.
You choose.

This is sort of off topic, but sense you mentioned it, you should see how much Ark: Survival Evolved and Atlas allow you to customize your game. Even coming from Civ, you would be amazed, If it didn't seem so much like work, I'd take screenshots of all the pages of customization options and post them. It's really remarkable. It lets you do things like set how much each individual stat goes up per level gained. Not just for your character, but you can set it differently for NPC's and pets. Well, there's too much for me to just give examples, but you can spend over an hour going through and setting everything up.

 

[mainer]

Mass Effect has a lot of impactful choices that can last multiple games. I don't think any were anywhere near as impactful as Witcher 2, though. The Dragon Age games should have had the same thing as Mass Effect, but they bunked it up with the rushed Dragon Age 2. (It would have been so awesome if Hawk had come back exactly as you built him/her back in DA2!)

All just a matter of personal opinion of course as we all have different viewpoints. But I feel that all the Dragon Age games had just as many, if not more, impactful choices and conversation choices that made a difference in the games as the Mass Effect games did. The one thing that the Mass Effect games had is that your Shepard and his/her choices carried over in all three games, which is one of the reasons that I really loved those games.

In the Dragon Age games, each one had a different protagonist, and while the stories were connected, they weren't direct sequels as in the case of ME1-3. But the choices you made in all 3 DA games, had impact on how the story developed, as well as the various companions involved.

I'll agree that DA2 was rushed to publication, and it had certain issues, but the conversations, choices, companions, and main characters are some of the best that Bioware has created. Without those things, there wouldn't have been much of a game. Exploration was basically nonexistent, and combat was the least fun out of all 3 games. The story, characters, and dialog are what saved DA2. It's often felt like a prologue to DA Inquisition with the introduction of Cassandra and Varick.

 

[Zloth]

Weeelllll, technically you played two different characters in the Mass Effect series.

I would count Witcher 2 as having the most impactful choices because your choices in the first third make a really huge impact on the second third, but the impact between games wasn't so large. There were some, like a tattoo you can get in W2 showing up in W3, but I don't remember anything that made a big difference off hand. Shani, the alternate love interest from W1, was basically forgotten until a DLC for W3 showed up. So, for single games, I would say W2 had the biggest impact. Over the course of the series, Mass Effect did.

The Dragon Age series is a special case. If you take notes on what decisions you're making (is there still a web page for that?), it can match Mass Effect.

 

[Withywarlock]

I'll admit right out the gate I'm an Obsidian Entertainment fanboi, and though they're the first to own their shortcomings, I've not really noticed the more common criticisms myself. That said, Alpha Protocol is my choice. A spy game that lets you be one of the 'Three J.Bs' of espionage (that is to say James Bond, Jack Bauer, or Jason Bourne), with time-sensitive dialogue choices that put you on the spot for making or breaking character relationships. It's not a game about morality, more about whatever aligns with your goals: redeeming yourself, making a ton of money, or perhaps trying to surpass the main antagonist. Factions and members of them will determine how much help or hindrance you'll receive in missions, including hints from your assistant, of whom there are a number and can also be romanced.

It is quite close to Mass Effect in this regard, and including its UI it's very clear who was poached from BioWare or at the very least what inspiration Obsidian took.

Unfortunately the game is no longer being sold due to music rights being lost with SEGA not wanting to pay the royalties for another year or so. You can still buy it for consoles pre-owned, and you should of course beware of any third parties selling keys today.