Being Evil in RPGs

[LarryTyphoid]

you can force zaalbar to kill mission due to his life debt
also other things I've long forgotten

Balista will fall to the dark side as a part of the plot, but you can capitalize upon it. I believe you can turn Juhani back to the dark side as well.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Right, but he hates it and you for making him do it.

That's what makes it so evil.
Killing a 13 year old homeless girl? Meh!
Forcing her best friend to kill her against his will because you have a life debt over his head?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

In Trudograd, you can convince a young man to move out of his mother's house.

Spoiler

By himself. Eventually you find him living homeless behind a trailer addicted to drugs. You can go back to his mother and inform him of this, who dies of a heart attack. Pick up some of the drugs he's addicted to, go back to him, and inform him of his mother's death. He says he wants some drugs, which you can trade for sex.

 

[notpl]

I also enjoyed the Cyrano de Bergerac side quest where you have to help a lovestruck nerd get the woman of his dreams, and if you have high charisma one of your options is to fuck her, get her pregnant, tell her that you aren't going to help her raise the child and that she should shack up with the nerd to avoid being a single mother.

 

[KörangarTheMighty]

This is part of my problem with both KotOR games. You aren't really allowed to be your own character. Any backstory you come up with for your character gets wiped by plot reveals.

My issue with the PC in KotOR is primarily that his dialogue options are dogshit most of the time. Bioware went the safe and boring road of the generic/ inquisitive pair of pants. Rarely do you get a chance for the character to strongly assert an opinion like in K2 or be the smooth operator, socially engineering his way through confrontations or else actually planning shit out like the big-brained tactical savant he was supposed to be. More of his original personality should have been slipping out as the game went on but it never worked out like that. To their credit, Bioware did eventually start getting near to that feeling during the infiltration on Korriban segment, but it could have been so much better if there was more interplay with the companions. Being able to directly seduce Bastila and a few others into falling or participating in heinous shit would have been kino.

 

[Bastardchops]

Battle Brothers and Mount and Blade let you raid and kill civilians. If you can't profit from war crimes it's not a real rpg.

 

[0sacred]

In Trudograd, you can convince a young man to move out of his mother's house.

Spoiler

By himself. Eventually you find him living homeless behind a trailer addicted to drugs. You can go back to his mother and inform him of this, who dies of a heart attack. Pick up some of the drugs he's addicted to, go back to him, and inform him of his mother's death. He says he wants some drugs, which you can trade for sex.

wow that... sounds totally creative and desirable. Who wants power in an RPG? Money, items, stat gains, killing people and making pacts with the devil for it? When you can solicit male crackwhores and give a mother the jumpscare of her life.

Muh nuanced evil!

 

[rusty_shackleford]

In Trudograd, you can convince a young man to move out of his mother's house.

Spoiler

By himself. Eventually you find him living homeless behind a trailer addicted to drugs. You can go back to his mother and inform him of this, who dies of a heart attack. Pick up some of the drugs he's addicted to, go back to him, and inform him of his mother's death. He says he wants some drugs, which you can trade for sex.

wow that... sounds totally creative and desirable. Who wants power in an RPG? Money, items, stat gains, killing people and making pacts with the devil for it? When you can solicit male crackwhores and give a mother the jumpscare of her life.

Muh nuanced evil!

The real world isn't very nuanced.

 

[0sacred]

In Trudograd, you can convince a young man to move out of his mother's house.

Spoiler

By himself. Eventually you find him living homeless behind a trailer addicted to drugs. You can go back to his mother and inform him of this, who dies of a heart attack. Pick up some of the drugs he's addicted to, go back to him, and inform him of his mother's death. He says he wants some drugs, which you can trade for sex.

wow that... sounds totally creative and desirable. Who wants power in an RPG? Money, items, stat gains, killing people and making pacts with the devil for it? When you can solicit male crackwhores and give a mother the jumpscare of her life.

Muh nuanced evil!

The real world isn't very nuanced.

And yet you would take this... travesty over good old merchant extortion and killing for loot?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

In Trudograd, you can convince a young man to move out of his mother's house.

Spoiler

By himself. Eventually you find him living homeless behind a trailer addicted to drugs. You can go back to his mother and inform him of this, who dies of a heart attack. Pick up some of the drugs he's addicted to, go back to him, and inform him of his mother's death. He says he wants some drugs, which you can trade for sex.

wow that... sounds totally creative and desirable. Who wants power in an RPG? Money, items, stat gains, killing people and making pacts with the devil for it? When you can solicit male crackwhores and give a mother the jumpscare of her life.

Muh nuanced evil!

The real world isn't very nuanced.

And yet you would take this... travesty over good old merchant extortion and killing for loot?

In that it showcases some of the lowest human behavior which you can find just by wandering around any major city at night compared to near-parody hollywood crime films of extortion?
Sure.

 

[0sacred]

In that it showcases some of the lowest human behavior which you can find just by wandering around any major city at night compared to near-parody hollywood crime films of extortion?
Sure.

"Gibz money or me bash" dialogue is not even attempting the thing you're saying. I can't remember an RPG where I felt like my character was impersonating a mobster.

Anyways, people bashing the simple extort & loot behaviour you can find in many RPG's forget that it actually makes sense in the context of the game's logic. You're a murder hobo on a mission, you need resources to support yourself, why not take them from others if that's your personality? I literally laugh at people getting riled up about it.

I don't know what's worse, tranny communists asking for better "reasons" for evil behaviour, or people asking for a Good Guy/Bad Guy Simulator. Alignment and choices should matter in the grand scheme of things, but the game shouldn't revolve around them in minute-to-minute gameplay.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

In that it showcases some of the lowest human behavior which you can find just by wandering around any major city at night compared to near-parody hollywood crime films of extortion?
Sure.

"Gibz money or me bash" dialogue is not even attempting the thing you're saying. I can't remember an RPG where I felt like my character was impersonating a mobster.

Anyways, people bashing the simple extort & loot behaviour you can find in many RPG's forget that it actually makes sense in the context of the game's logic. You're a murder hobo on a mission, you need resources to support yourself, why not take them from others if that's your personality? I literally laugh at people getting riled up about it.

I don't know what's worse, tranny communists asking for better "reasons" for evil behaviour, or people asking for a Good Guy/Bad Guy Simulator. Alignment and choices should matter in the grand scheme of things, but the game shouldn't revolve around them in minute-to-minute gameplay.

Can you explain how what I posted doesn't make sense in the context of the game it's in?

 

[0sacred]

"Gibz money or me bash" dialogue is not even attempting the thing you're saying. I can't remember an RPG where I felt like my character was impersonating a mobster.

Anyways, people bashing the simple extort & loot behaviour you can find in many RPG's forget that it actually makes sense in the context of the game's logic. You're a murder hobo on a mission, you need resources to support yourself, why not take them from others if that's your personality? I literally laugh at people getting riled up about it.

I don't know what's worse, tranny communists asking for better "reasons" for evil behaviour, or people asking for a Good Guy/Bad Guy Simulator. Alignment and choices should matter in the grand scheme of things, but the game shouldn't revolve around them in minute-to-minute gameplay.

Can you explain how what I posted doesn't make sense in the context of the game it's in?

reading comprehension?

I said simple evil behaviour makes sense in the context of the game's logic, not that nothing else can make sense.

I haven't played ATOM (yet), however if what you described is the end-all be-all of that particular quest line, yeah, I fail to see how a game giving me the option to act like the parody (your phrasing) of a teenage punk or a cantankerous asshole makes sense in the context of what you're actually trying to achieve in that game. Like, does doing what you described have any benefits to the player?

 

[notpl]

In that it showcases some of the lowest human behavior which you can find just by wandering around any major city at night compared to near-parody hollywood crime films of extortion?
Sure.

"Gibz money or me bash" dialogue is not even attempting the thing you're saying. I can't remember an RPG where I felt like my character was impersonating a mobster.

Anyways, people bashing the simple extort & loot behaviour you can find in many RPG's forget that it actually makes sense in the context of the game's logic. You're a murder hobo on a mission, you need resources to support yourself, why not take them from others if that's your personality? I literally laugh at people getting riled up about it.

I don't know what's worse, tranny communists asking for better "reasons" for evil behaviour, or people asking for a Good Guy/Bad Guy Simulator. Alignment and choices should matter in the grand scheme of things, but the game shouldn't revolve around them in minute-to-minute gameplay.

To be clear ATOM RPG does not have an alignment system, and the writing skews very strongly toward the (darkly) comedic.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

quest line,

It's not a quest, it's just one of many world/character interactions.

Like, does doing what you described have any benefits to the player?

Maybe you're more interested in tactical or strategy games than RPGs?

 

[0sacred]

To be clear ATOM RPG does not have an alignment system, and the writing skews very strongly toward the (darkly) comedic.

that makes more sense, being able to do that for the lulz (not that having sex with male crackwhores is what I'd do for a laugh, but different folks). It seems like that quest hit home for rusty_shackleford in a different way though

 

[rusty_shackleford]

To summarize,

What RPGs can you think of that really allow a player to be a legitimate villain and overall evil piece of shit?

"hey, ATOM lets you be an evil piece of shit like when you can..."
0sacred busts in through the window
"WHAT ABOUT POWER??? HOW DOES THIS BENEFIT ME???"

yea idk maybe you're the evil piece of shit?

 

[0sacred]

Like, does doing what you described have any benefits to the player?

Maybe you're more interested in tactical or strategy games than RPGs?

"Finally a game that lets me act like a hoodrat for no reason! Must play 10/10"

 

[Cryomancer]

What is "evil"?

• Is FNV Mr House evil? Only an commie would think so
• Is VtMB Maximillian Strauss evil?
• Gothic's 2 Xardas?
• Committing an orc genocide in Gothic 1/2/3 is evil?
• Giving blood and healing Heather Poe, is evil?
• Using enchantment to get hoes for free or domination in VtMB is evil?
• (...)

Evil and good are merely perspectives. For example, some people think that committing an genocide against Dwarfs is evil but IMO that is good since it prevents this magicless manlet races for reproducing and creating even more magicless manlets which is a huge tragedy. We could easily do that with the least amount of suffering aka an spell which freezes their hearts. And their corpses can be used for magical experiments which maximizes the society well being.

 

[0sacred]

To summarize,

What RPGs can you think of that really allow a player to be a legitimate villain and overall evil piece of shit?

"hey, ATOM lets you be an evil piece of shit like when you can..."
0sacred busts in through the window
"WHAT ABOUT POWER??? HOW DOES THIS BENEFIT ME???"

yea idk maybe you're the evil piece of shit?

People ITT wanting to act like a dick in games without being rewarded for it mechanically or with a different ending or whatever.

What's wrong with you? Your mothers will hear about this.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

Examples are sacrificing companions at a blood altar for stats gains

I fail to see how sacrificing Durance is Evil, the way I see it, I'm doing the world a favour

You can sacrifice all companions.

 

[Daemongar]

I'll say this: I played Pools of Radiance on the C64 back in the day. I was generally NG or CG for my chars but had a Paladin in the party because of their ridiculous skills. Went to a friends at the time and he said you can have free plate and all the gold you need pretty early in the game. So, he was killing the guards in Phlan, taking their plate and items, and leaving the city and coming back and selling, and they'd reset.

I have no idea what his parties alignment was, but he played that game on evil mode without the developers telling him what to do. I was mortified but again, part of the LG me said: fuck alignment and quest choices, maybe evil is the approach you bring to the game, not what the game devs intended?

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

yes, actually. if what i said is apparently so obvious, then why people keep posting "oh, sacrificing your companions is pretty evil" "feeding zombies with children is evil i guess"

They are evil in context, and in the make believe world of videogames.

 

[Reinhardt]

Battle Brothers and Mount and Blade let you raid and kill civilians. If you can't profit from war crimes it's not a real rpg.

war time is the best time to trade in Battle Brothers. half of the town burned down and ambushed trade roads? BEST PROFITS! killing bunch of peasants for scraps is so petty. just wait and they will bring their last shirt to you themselves.

 

[Harthwain]

yes, actually. if what i said is apparently so obvious, then why people keep posting "oh, sacrificing your companions is pretty evil" "feeding zombies with children is evil i guess"

Because some people, unlike you, are capable of abstract thinking.