Pacifism in games

[TheImplodingVoice]

One of those Far Cry games can apparently be completed without any violence whatsoever, as I found out when my kid beat it by doing what it was told during the intro.

The antagonist of Far Cry 4 recognizes you and invites you to his stronghold after the bus stop terrorist attack on his goons.

He actually is the good guy and the people you join are the bad guys.

 

[Norfleet]

I've had a bigger clash in KOTOR. When you begin your Jedi training Consular class is described as person that always seeks to end conflicts without violence- too bad it doesn't work that way most of the game.

Does electrocuting the entire room in forz lightning count as "violence"? Does this stuff have a less-lethal "tazer" setting? Because as far as the game is concerned, "Consular" = "Wizard", and we all know how wizards deal with things.

It's quite bizarre in Gamebryo games. Enemies often start running away, cover in fear or get on their knees begging to spare them, only to attack you a minute later if they're left alone.

An implementation clearly not carried through to its conclusion.

 

[Wunderbar]

Total pacifism in RPGs is a meme.

It is an understandable feature in games where it makes sense for your character to avoid bloodshed (like Thief or Hitman), but otherwise? Nah.

 

[Serious_Business]

Total pacifism in RPGs is a meme.

It is an understandable feature in games where it makes sense for your character to avoid bloodshed (like Thief or Hitman), but otherwise? Nah.

Scratch those balls boy, scratch them good

 

[deuxhero]

Was there anyone you had to kill in Alpha Protocol? Plenty of times you had to choose who died, but I can't remember any forced kills.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

can't remember any forced kills.

Me neither, I killed them all willingly.

 

[Modron]

I hated this. I was amazed and super excited the first time a Skyrim enemy surrendered. I still remember it visually, some kind of wizard in the last room of a draugr dungeon. This was going to be great, a whole new system of interaction and relationship building beyond kill/be killed. Nope, sure enough, he just went back to shooting me a few seconds later. Why they even left that in is a mystery to me, unless they just wanted to make me feel bad. Mission accomplished Bethesda.

You should feel bad for playing nubethesda games.

 

[Tweed]

Not killing people is only fun when the developer has actually planned it out as an option. Otherwise you're fighting with whatever janky systems are in place just so you can feel warm fuzzies that dumb_mook_32 will get to go home to his mook children at the end of the day because you spent 20 minutes creeping around him when you could just as easily have killed in him 30 seconds and gotten on with your life. What's even better is when killing people is expected, but killing lots of people tends to be frowned upon like the berserker reputation in Fallout 2, not that it seems to make that much difference.

 

[Carrion]

Not killing people is only fun when the developer has actually planned it out as an option.

I think some of the most satisfying pacifist runs are in games which don't explicitly present is as an option but which nonetheless allow it due to the flexibility of their mechanics. It should be a challenge and require you to use your wits and thorough knowledge of the game's content and mechanics. Of course it helps if the game's designed so that you're not expected to kill everything (like Fallout or Deus Ex as opposed to, say, Doom), but there should be situations that force you to think outside the box and don't just hand you the solution (be it a speech check or a convenient air duct or something else) on a silver platter. It's especially underwhelming when a non-lethal playthrough has basically the same gameplay as a lethal one, except that you use a stun gun instead of a shotgun or whatever.

 

[Whisper]

Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones
You have to kill Mobsters guarding the distillery.

No. You can use sleeping poison on them.

 

[Alphons]

Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones
You have to kill Mobsters guarding the distillery.

No. You can use sleeping poison on them.

Thanks, I've looked it up. I wasn't aware that you can dillute Wheat's poison at Richter's.