Today I saw Playing a bad guy is hard, and I felt completely identified.
Whenever I try to do an evil playthrough I can’t help to feel bad. For example, I feel bad when I have to kill Narfi, I feel bad when I have to break Bersi’s urn or when I have to threaten Keerava. I don’t even kill Nazeem.
What’s wrong (right?) with me? What’s your experience about this? Do you feel the same way about being evil in a game? And, since this is a modding community, do you have any mod recommendations?
100% relate to this. Same thing in every game. Especially RDR2, literally no way I will ever make different choices through multiple playthroughs. Same with Witcher 3 and really any game with choices like that. I don’t know of a mod that could help really.
The thing is, I don’t really feel like I’m missing much by not doing a bad playthrough. If I really want to I can go watch a video or something. That’s just me, though. In the end, I guess what I am saying is, there’s nothing wrong with playing like this. Just play the way you want to. :)
Witcher 3 is my favorite game to be heroic in since the correct choice is often either not obvious or otherwise totally unpredictable. I got into character with Geralt’s personality because even though I was trying to be a hero, the consequences of my decisions were often out of my control. As I got used to how things worked and was exposed to how terrible it was for most people, playing heroically became more rewarding.
I think that a mod that lets you ask for something (money, knowledge, power…) when a NPC asks you something would be a good start. It won’t make you evil, but it would help to make you feel less good.
For example, a mod that lets you demand Jarl Balgruuf to make you Thane when he asks you to kill the dragon before killing the dragon. The outcome would be the same, you would be Thane either way, but this would feel like you’re acting seeking your own interests instead of helping because you’re a good guy.
Mods that let you lie, like Silence is Golden, would also help.
Oh I feel this. There’s been playthroughs I’ve started purely to be evil, yet I still end up feeling bad most of the time.
I think the only run through I’ve had where I actually felt like I did a good job “justifying” it was with my very old Nerevarine Telvanni Sheogorath-worshipping sorceress that I played through Morrowind-Oblivion-Skyrim with. In her case, she wasn’t trying to be necessarily evil, she was just blunt, had little patience, was straight to the point and didn’t consider how her words or actions may affect someone, as long as she could continue hoarding artifacts and doing nutso mage things, she was happy. She also didn’t understand why murder and thievery were illegal, if she saw something she wanted, she took it, she didn’t get why the guards would be upset over it and was usually disgruntled with Skyrim’s law system.
You mentioned Narfi, and that’s one I remember giving a justification for on that play through. In my sorceress’s mind, he deserved to be in a better place more suited for him, like the Shivering Isles, so off she sent him via a Lightning Bolt to the face.
I don’t have any mod recommendations, but I wanted to give an example of how I justified it myself. I didn’t feel as bad as I usually did with prior evil play throughs. :)
I feel like Bethesda games make it difficult to be bad. In order to progress through the game a lot of the time you’re pushed to be the good guy at least briefly.
I had this in Fallout 4 most recently. I pushed the Minute Men back to the castle with the Nuka World Raiders wiped out everyone else but was still railroaded into being buddies with them to finish the game.
I feel like Bethesda games make it difficult to be bad. In order to progress through the game a lot of the time you’re pushed to be the good guy at least briefly.
That’s true, it would feel as if the character had a split personality.
Pretty much. I played my only playthrough of Fallout 3 as a bad guy - not a pure nihilist, but the egoistical, pretty chaotic mercenary. Karma in the lowest rank for the whole game.
The thing is that when the choice that comes between saving the world or not, even the most egoistical, remorseless of bad guys would probably not choose the latter: most bad guy archetypes are in it for personal gain, but what gain is there to have if there is nothing left?
This is interesting because when I was a kid I would always try to do every bad thing the game would let me because I found it hilarious that in the context of the game there could be no consequences for bad behavior. My favorite moment was in KOTOR during a trial where I committed numerous crimes, went on trial for those crimes as part of the story, admitted to my crimes proudly in a court of law, and was let off the hook for story reasons. Now when I play games I have more fun playing heroically and trying to help out as best I can because that’s what I have more fun doing and would find trolling the hapless npcs boring since I used to do it so much.
When are you on trial in KOTOR?
I feel ya… I tried being evil in many roleplaying games, but I kept feeling sorry for the other characters haha. Maybe we’re just too nice lol
I used to steal everything that wasn’t nailed down in Elder Scrolls games. Somewhere along the line, I stopped being a pickpocketing klepto and started being a boring paladin, even with the sign of the thief on me. I did a playthrough recently with the goal of getting all the daedric artifacts to get the acheivement, and oh my god, I hated killing Erandur. I will not do that again. It felt awful.
I don’t have the urge to play a bad guy. If I did, I’d maybe replay Mass Effect?
I don’t think there’s necessarily anything wrong with you, just like how I don’t think there’s anything wrong with bdsm practitioners.
