Do you play as 'good' or 'evil' in RPGs?

[ZedClampet]

Just read this article on PCG: https://www.pcgamer.com/i-cant-believe-35-of-baldurs-gate-3-players-already-took-the-evil-route/

After reading the article, which sort of decides that players tried the evil route and then reloaded an old save, I read the comments. There weren't many comments, but most of them seemed to be in support of an evil playthrough whenever one was available. The most evil I've ever managed, really, has come in Fallout games, but even that is very rare for me. Right now in BG3 I had decided to be morally neutral, but couldn't stand it, and I actually reloaded an old save.

But evil seems to be a natural choice for a lot of gamers. What is at play here? Are they finally able to let their true selves come out without major consequences or is it something else? And what do you decide to do in games? Do you play on the side of good or evil?

 

[mainer]

I've never played an evil character in any RPG, it's just not something I'm comfortable with and I wouldn't enjoy it. I tend to help people, rescue kidnapped maidens, and just generally help people in my travels as best I can. Back in the early games of D&D where you had to choose an alignment, I was almost always a "chaotic good" character, being sympathetic with the common folk, but a bit ambivalent towards government & laws , especially if they were oppressive.

As to why some people like to play that way, I really have no idea what motivates them to play that way, but the choice is there (in most RPGs).

 

[Pifanjr]

I think I always play a good character, at least on the first playthrough. Even if I don't plan to, I end up doing good anyway (my current Fallout 4 playthrough being a perfect example). If I do a second playthrough I might try the evil options just to see what happens. Whether I manage to stick with it depends on how the game handles it. In Black & White for example being evil was quite fun (and a lot easier than being good).

 

[JarlBSoD]

I tend to chose what seems good in any given situation, I hardly ever set out to be either good or evil in an RPG but most of the time i end up "good" because 99% of all CRPGs dosn't realy let you be evil in any meningfull way if at all so there rarely is any point in chosing evil actions other than for maybe gaining a few more coins and pissing of your entire companion party. Will be interesting to see if it works being evil in BG3.

 

[Alm]

I tend to try to be true to my feelings in RPGs as 1). It feels more immersive, and 2). I feel more rewarded when things work out.

I used to try a second evil playthrough on games like KotOR to see alternative cut scenes but don't generally bother these days.

 

[Zloth]

In my second playthroughs of Oblivion and Skyrim (neither of which I finished), I played what I guess would be Neutral characters. Really, I was just playing the stuff I didn't get to the first time through for roleplaying reasons or just because I didn't find the stuff the first time, so the character came out rather insane when it came to good/evil.

The problem with evil play is that, well, you're evil. Unless you move faster than news of yourself, people are going to be pretty hostile. It's hard to get supplies and new quests in a town that has "wanted, dead or alive, 400gp reward" signs all over it.

 

[ZedClampet]

I'm not sure if this counts, but maybe. In Remnant 2, an RPG shooter, there is a class of character that, by its nature, is evil. You summon creatures that you sacrifice to varying effects. These aren't exactly dancing little woodland creatures--they are the stuff you spend all your time killing anyway--but the character is described by most as evil. I suppose they are, but I'm not going to lose sleep over playing them and sacrificing giant, flying leeches.

The problem with being evil in Remnant 2 would be that the opportunity for being evil really doesn't exist much outside of this one class's basic behavior. You can refuse to help people if you really want to, but then you would just be missing out on getting powerful weapons, rings, artefacts, etc.

Now some of the creatures are morally grey, and sometimes you suspect that doing what they want you to do won't yield the results they were looking for. In one world in particular this was definitely the case. You help one of them--a seemingly well-meaning person--to basically...

Spoiler: Remnant 2 spoiler

commit suicide and mass murder by destroying his massive ship which has become its own world (but so far as I could tell the only creatures left on that world were evil themselves)

...and you basically know that's going to be the outcome of his plan. Since the game is replayable by re-rolling your world, I'm interested to see what happens if you don't do what a couple of these people want.

 

[Brian Boru]

What is at play here?

That is indeed puzzling. Perhaps the masochists who play RPG occasionally need to see how the other half lives?

Count me in the goody-2-slippers side too, whenever there are such choices to be made in games.
♣ Bioshock—couldn't harvest the Little Sisters
♦ Far Cry 3—didn't execute Sabal or Amita when given the choice
♥ Far Cry 4—let Pagan Min go in his golden chopper

But I have no problem playing the baddie side in a campaign—eg Nod in C&C games—or launching WMD to melt bones when required, so there's that. Maybe I have a RPG mutation waiting to break thru?

selfie --> 😇 <-- selfie

 

[JarlBSoD]

That is indeed puzzling. Perhaps the masochists who play RPG occasionally need to see how the other half lives?

Count me in the goody-2-slippers side too, whenever there are such choices to be made in games.
♣ Bioshock—couldn't harvest the Little Sisters
♦ Far Cry 3—didn't execute Sabal or Amita when given the choice
♥ Far Cry 4—let Pagan Min go in his golden chopper

But I have no problem playing the baddie side in a campaign—eg Nod in C&C games—or launching WMD to melt bones when required, so there's that. Maybe I have a RPG mutation waiting to break thru?

selfie --> 😇 <-- selfie

Well if we count other types of games then i often tend to lean towards evil. Orcs in Warcraft, NOD in CC, Megalomaniac with empirical dreems in Stellaris, etc. Apart from a few factions like Woodelf and Lizzardmen i allmost allways play Chaos alligned factions in Total war warhammer, though one could argue that all factions in Warhammer are evil in some way
Problem i have with the good side in many games is that they are way to goody two shoes allmost to the point of being slimy.

 

[ZedClampet]

Well if we count other types of games then i often tend to lean towards evil. Orcs in Warcraft, NOD in CC, Megalomaniac with empirical dreems in Stellaris, etc. Apart from a few factions like Woodelf and Lizzardmen i allmost allways play Chaos alligned factions in Total war warhammer, though one could argue that all factions in Warhammer are evil in some way
Problem i have with the good side in many games is that they are way to goody two shoes allmost to the point of being slimy.

There's a significant difference between "evil in some way" and "evil in every way", and I definitely wouldn't call anyone in Total War Warhammer too "goody two shoes". It's more of them being completely full of themselves, particularly the High Elves. Now in 40k, there really are only shades of grey, but even then, the Empire is the lightest shade by a good distance. Granted, they do some awful things, but compared to the other factions and what they want, you would have little choice but to throw your hat in the ring with space marines. Just like in real life, you aren't going to find anyone who is 100 percent good, but that's kind of an unreasonable expectation.

I should point out my only experience with Warhammer is through a bunch of video games and a couple of novels. I don't play the tabletop game.

 

[JarlBSoD]

There's a significant difference between "evil in some way" and "evil in every way", and I definitely wouldn't call anyone in Total War Warhammer too "goody two shoes". It's more of them being completely full of themselves, particularly the High Elves. Now in 40k, there really are only shades of grey, but even then, the Empire is the lightest shade by a good distance. Granted, they do some awful things, but compared to the other factions and what they want, you would have little choice but to throw your hat in the ring with space marines. Just like in real life, you aren't going to find anyone who is 100 percent good, but that's kind of an unreasonable expectation.

I should point out my only experience with Warhammer is through a bunch of video games and a couple of novels. I don't play the tabletop game.

Yeah, maybe I should have been a bit more clear here, I don't consider any faction in Warhammer fantasy to be goody two shoes, rather the oposit where most factions could possibly be considered borderline evil in some cases seeing as they in general want to remove everyone who is not like them, that being said, there is a difference between the High elf who are just super elitists and Darkelf who are mass murdering slave hording super elitists

 

[mjs warlord]

I do both good guy and bad guy..... first playthrough where i do the right things right to the end game and then another playthrough where i do everything that can and will get me into trouble

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

On a first play mostly good, but usually I react to the situation based on my feelings about it, sort of roleplaying as myself. Generally thats kind of chaotic good, but might stray to technically evil or lawful depending.

In 40k arent the Tao basically the only good guys, or is there something sinister about them I dont know?

 

[ZedClampet]

On a first play mostly good, but usually I react to the situation based on my feelings about it, sort of roleplaying as myself. Generally thats kind of chaotic good, but might stray to technically evil or lawful depending.

In 40k arent the Tao basically the only good guys, or is there something sinister about them I dont know?

I guess it just depends on your perspective. They are violent, communist imperialists. In the real world, they would be considered the bad guys by many, but in 40k they look rather angelic.

I should note I've only ever come across them in the Warhammer wiki, so I actually don't know much about them.

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Fair enough, my exposure to 40k lore is me sometimes putting on a Youtube lore video to fall asleep listening too. I've listened to a lot of it but in reality its the first 5 minutes of all of them. It is all pretty dark for sure.

 

[Zloth]

Oh, good point, Zed! Getting outside of RPGs, I can play much more evil folks.

In MechWarrior: Mercenaries, I was really pretty evil. It's a nasty kind of evil, too, where the people controlling the mercenary group are very friendly and nice to each other but haven't the slightest qualms about tearing through cities like a whole pack of Godzillas to kill somebody the employer wants killed. I was supposedly doing it so I could get strong enough to take revenge for my father being killed. I presume there are now thousands of people in the Inner Sphere looking to exact that same vengeance on me.

 

[WilhelmScream]

Haven't played that specific game or read the article*

I myself comfortably tend toward the good choices but i am also willing to make some difficult decisions usually when the options involve behaving idealistically vs pragmatically- depends on the context and how the choices are presented.
But i may also look up the effects of choices and then weigh the narrative integrity of my character vs the mechanical boon/bane in question.
Also there's the consideration of doing/seeing as much of the things as possible. In Mass Effect 2 i'm pretty sure that i triggered every single quick time interaction regardless of what alignment symbol it was showing me (it's been ages). In the first Witcher there was this...interesting mechanic of a picture book of women that Geralt had slept with in the game. I "gotta f**k 'em all" to complete the collection so that's what i did. Since that didn't fit my Geralt or, honestly, me then i scratched the itch by "collecting all the women" over the course of my playthrough but when it didn't fit my narrative i would reload and actually Save my true interactions. The collection was completed in my head but the Save file had my true characterization of Geralt.
As to the comment section: isn't it often the case that the commenters are the ones who have one of the extreme stances on the subject ? They're the ones who have made up their mind and have all the questions answered. That and/or they feel that there's a publicly accepted "right answer" and if it's not the stance that they have then they want to show their rebellion against it./?
My *assumption* is that most people tend toward good in games. Some just mess around and do what seems most entertaining. And comparatively few actually roleplay or express having evil/"evil" tendencies.