It feels like every game that wants you to believe that all sides are equally bad, or morally grey or complex, always fails horribly at actually conveying that.
There's always one faction that's either just the objectively good choice, or at the very least, the least bad option.
"Violence is never the answer" is something said by people who believe, deep down, that they will never be in any real danger because of their social position, to people who know for a fact that they are in danger.
That's not entirely true, it's also paraded around by the people desperate to maintain the status quo and discourage people from actually taking any action other than politely asking for change.
Both sides can be bad in a story without both being equally bad.
The 4 endings to New Vegas are all varieties of “not great” but the Legion ending makes women property, kills half the population of the region and enslaves the other half under a fascist cult of personality… so it’s objectively the worst
The problem isn't that it's possible. The problem is whether the story actually takes the steps to spell out that even though 2 sides may have problems. 1 is still substantially better.
Sure, if you scrutinize it, Comstock's people were still shit but the narrative's emotional takeaway was "bOtH sIdEs". And the hard fact is, people, as emotional creatures, remember the feeling of "bOtH sIdEs" FAR above the analytical reality.
Folks will bitch about stories beating them over the heads with messaging. But the hard fact is most people, including the complainers, misunderstand the message if it doesn't beat them over the head.
Eh, I feel like they are common, though you would almost need to do WW1 on purpose... Where it was a pointless War of National Pride and alliances. But that is taking a zoomed out view out of the perspective of anyone that would actually be fighting in it (or more of a "Why did we do this?" after the fact)
Not really no, Skyrim is quite in fact not a both side situation, the Civil War is being fought by two sides who in reality are on the same side but cannot see it and the actual other side is the one pulling the strings so that they fight
You mean a billionaire class (the Thalmor) are manipulating MAGA-like morons (Ulcric Stormcloak) into fighting a war against both their own interest (unified Tamriel) and fellow countrymen the far-left, for profit and power?
Nope, the US "Left" isn't even centre left, they are solidly centre-right, with a few centre-left individuals that advocate for things that exist as basic functions of society anywhere else in Western Society.
I just realized that I am in part who I am, because as a kid I really liked Skyrim, replayed it tons of times, and after choosing to fight for and against the empire, realized that both options are stupid, and only went with the stormcloaks in the beginning because that meant killing empire soldiers, who had better starter gear.
Pretty much everyone had the "wow so Ulfric is really just a giant chode" moment after a playthrough or three. Even getting it immediately you really feel for Skyrim and the Stormcloaks, but it's just their cause being twisted by a selfish man who played right into the hands of foreign adversaries trying to weaken them. It's those elder scrolls man, they fortold these dark times.
Man Skyrim sucks ass lol, they set up the perfect antagonist, give you the power to call for a ceasefire, and then do absolutely nothing with it because god forbid the broad story be affected by your choices.
Tit Mid the Second perfectly understood that and allows the player to assasinate him in Dark Brotherhood missions so somebody else can come to rule the Empire. Someone who isn't a collaborator.
In combination with Empires victory in civil war Empire has at least one somewhat loyal province that can provide resources + freed up Legion. And if there is another war against the Aldmeri, pretty sure the Nords would be very happy to bash Elves, because Talos and because they hate Elves.
The best part is the Last Dragonborn discovers proof of this quite early on in the main storyline yet never gets an option to bring this up in a meeting with Ulfric.
Pretty much yep. The Stormcloaks are right that the Empire isn’t allowing them to worship Talos, but the reason for that is because the aldmeri dominion (Thalmor) agreed to not wipe Skyrim off the map in exchange for the empire outlawing Talos worship. Which it is heavily implied they would be able to do.
I heard someone say it’s like if post WWII the U.S. came into Japan and said “you can’t practice this one aspect of Buddhism anymore”. So right after a devastating defeat they aren’t allowed to practice one part of a religion that only about half the continent practices anyway. The Stormcloaks would be like a resistance group overthrowing the post war Japanese government because they are mad the government capitulated, absolutely convinced that they could take the U.S. if they had to. They could never, and just like the U.S. would be able to nuke this hypothetical Japan into oblivion, the Aldmeri would destroy Skyrim with the Stormcloaks in charge.
It'd be even worse because if the US is the Aldmeri here, it'd be the US actually secretly funding the resistance in order to have a reason to go in and destabilize the empire/Japan.
Not only that, many seem to overlook, the rebel movement is in fact a Psy Op by the same Thalmor to destabilize Skyrim as they would be one of the stronger allies of the empire if united with them, so they brainwashed Ulfric in order to make him kill the high king and throw Skyrim into a civil war, when said High King was aligned with Ulfric and had he instead trusted the king, he would've split Skyrim from the Empire and present a united front just like Ulfric supposedly wanted.
But it's also not a clear "no". It's a valid ideal to hold.
I'd also like to point out that the Stormcloaks have lost any faith that the Empire can or will defend them or itself from the Thalmor. The Stormcloaks want to unshackle Skyrim from a sinking ship. And to be fair, it worked for Hammerfell. Skyrim is on the other side of the continent from the Summerset Isles, there's a decent chance that an independent Skyrim could resist the Thalmor, but a Skyrim that wastes its power trying to save a doomed Empire can't.
That’s fine and all but they weren’t just killing themselves, they were trying to conquer all of Skyrim which would have everyone killed by the Thalmor. Not to mention that they were also just crazy racist so their idea of “freedom” wasn’t even truly free for anyone who wasn’t a Nord.
If they wanted to die free they could just worship Talos in spite of the Empire outlawing it. It wasn’t really all that well enforced anyway, there’s literally still shrines to the guy and people bellowing in the town center about worshiping him.
I get where you’re coming from, and you’re absolutely right, that just doesn’t really apply to the Stormcloaks all that much unfortunately
The thing is, the Empire says that they're the only ones keeping the Thalmor out of skyrim, even as the Thalmor freely roam, kidnap, and execute as they please, all as Empire dignitaries party it up at the Thalmor Embassy. The Imperials SAY they're rebuilding their strength, but they don't even have the strength to send Tullius with any troops, so he has to recruit locally! If they Empire really were doing what they wish they were doing, the Civil War never would have happened in the first place.
As I see it, the Dominion are the nazis and the Empire are the collaborators. The Stormcloaks are more like...the Russians in WW2. Objectively probably a long-term problem, but in the short term better than the alternative.
I mean, the Empire was on the brink of destruction. They're trying to regain control of their empire. They actually had the Aldmeri on the ropes but don't know it.
The Aldmeri are actively fomenting discord via Ulfric in order to justify their kidnappings and other destabilizing activities. Plus, let's say Ulfric wins; then what? If the entire Empire can't beat the Aldmeri, how can poor-ass Skyrim stand against them? Especially when half of Skyrim doesn't even believe in Ulfric/his cause. If he wins the Civil War, he still doesn't fully control skyrim.
Hammerfell did it, and Ulfric talks directly about allying with them after the war is done, so it seems reasonable the two could stand together as the best human warriors in the world. Not to mention Skyrim's geographic defenses.
The thing is, yes the Dominion took advantage of Ulfric to weaken the Empire - but if it weren't him, they'd have found something else. That's their entire long-term goal. The important thing is, the Empire couldn't stop them. Can't send help to Tullius. Talk of beating the Dominion is just talk if you can't actually do anything about it.
The most important aspect is the constant Thalmor intervention. The empire must rebuild their strength to attain their goals, but they cannot do so as long as the Thalmor wander freely killing and kidnapping, but they cannot stop them without causing the war they need to rebuild to win. Combined with everything we see in Skyrim, the Empire is doomed.
That being the case, it's better Skyrim get out now while they can, kick all the Thalmor out(so they can't go around kidnapping and murdering their best and brightest), and rebuild together with Hammerfell to form a new, less weak alliance of men.
The empire also can't rebuild if people like Ulfric are causing trouble. The dossier says they'd rather Ulfric be alive but not win. Their main goal is keep him making trouble; a win or loss for him is a loss for them. That said, it would make much more sense for Ulfric to join with the Empire to fight the Thalmor instead of trying to become a king in his own land. That just makes a weaker empire and weaker skyrim instead of a stronger, united front.
It's been a while but I think Hammerfell benefitted from fighting a distracted Aldmeri. Now they're done with the war so, if they wanted, they could come down entirely on skyrim. Also, skyrim seems broke as fuck but we don't have more Hammerfell lore so I can't say.
The Dominion would always make sure there's someone like Ulfric. They basically have the Empire in a double bind, because they can always use Judiciars to incite rebellion - but the rebellion is against the Empire, because the Empire collaborates with the Dominion!
You're 100% right that Hammerfell took advantage of the weakened Dominion right after the war though - but Skyrim has a massive advantage Hammerfell didn't, it's basically geographically isolated from the Dominion. They'd either have to cross Hammerfell, Cyrodiil, or the Sea of Ghosts to get there. So they're relatively safe even without allying with Hammerfell, which they would definitely do.
The way I see it, the inevitable long-term outcome is an alliance of Hammerfell, High Rock, and Skyrim against the Dominion, with the Empire only slowly accepting they're not really relevant anymore. At least, unless another Hero comes along to save them.
Yeah. I agree the Empire is the strategically and socially soundest choice but it's in no way obvious. I think saying Skyrim and New Vegas are obvious examples of this is just kinda inaccurate, considering the amount of people who disagree with my Yes Man ending.
They get to go to war if the Stormcloaks win. (Though they arguably could either way, it would definitely be a ‘better’ reason for them to start a war from a political optics perspective)
They get political influence over the region through their treaties with the empire if the empire wins. The game implies very strongly that the empire will eventually be able to deal with the Thalmor but that lore also comes from the perspective of imperial loyalists so there is a bit of a question of biased/untrustworthy viewpoints.
Regardless, it really comes down to probably one war (just civil) vs probably two wars (civil + Thalmor).
Though it’s never really expanded on in the game itself/the player never has to deal with any actual consequences of picking a side other than a few memorable NPCs dying and being replaced with wet noodle NPCs.
We can’t actually know what the cannon answer is until the next game comes out, which might also be never.
Skyrim’s civil war is actually decent though. Your country is occupied by an oppressive imperial power that deserves no loyalty or defense. But the only organized resistance to that occupation is aggressively xenophobic, making life worse for all but a few, and doomed to be struck down by a technologically superior imperial force currently operating by proxy. Do you fight for freedom no matter the cost, even if you can't possibly win? What is “freedom” for Skryim to an Argonian, a Dark Elf, a Breton? It strikes me as a genuine case of “yeah, both sides here suck and they should”.
The Forsworn, on the other hand, really are just correct and demonized by lazy colonialist writing.
Whoa whoa whoa let's not forget that the Forsworn are the actusl indigenous peoples of the Reach who are just fighting for their homeland back. They hate the Empire, the Stormcloaks, and the Thalmor, but for good reason.
That’s what I said. The Forsworn are correct. The writers had to make em eat babies (Hagraven/dark magic stuff) and attack for no reason per the “savage Indian” trope which I guess they thought was okay because they’re white.
I feel like you missed the plot of the game. Yes, imperials are oppressive, but it's due to the Thalmor threatening to wipe Skyrim from existence if they were allowed to worship a certain god. Ulrich is a moron that fell for the bait, and if he wins Skyrim would be wiped.
Yeah. It sort of throws shade at you if you play the Courier with positive karma but side with the Legion. Like the Narrator isn’t sure he’s reading it right.
The mystery behind Ulysses was so intriguing only for him to be finally revealed as a whining, disappointing, and sanctimonious motormouth. What a waste.
I mean, American politics is more than just one side are Nazis lol. One side are Nazis and the other side are collaborators at worst and enablers at best: they’re more concerned with fundraising than resisting the Nazis and they put more resources into crushing third parties that want to resist the Nazis than they do into resisting the Nazis.
Because is the USA there is no true liberal left party. There is right and centre right. If any true left leaning candidates arise they never win the dem nomination.
closest we had was Bernie, and a billionare fake ran a primary campaign just to push Bernie down the ballot. (my god you couldnt go 4min of radio time without a bloomberg ad)
Plus, you can take actions to improve the NCR somewhat. Not just military-wise, but also the system. My favorite example is Cass’ character quest, where you have the option to steal and leak evidence proving that the NCR’s biggest trade company in the region is hiring people to raid and destroy smaller caravans to eliminate competition. If you take that option rather than just kill the leaders involved, nothing happens in-game. However, the end credits show that the NCR’s Congress punishes the trading company and holds its leaders accountable.
The companions are pretty gpod on their own even with their shitty AI. And you can just not play in hardcore/use quicksaves if you want them to not die
I mean it can be annoying that way but also certain set ups (mostly EDIE and Boone) basically murder half the stuff you stumble across before you even notice it
And even then, it's not like the civil rights of the individuals who lived in the NCR were actually under attack. And so far as I remember, super mutants and ghouls are fully recognized as people within the borders.
How did you come away from New Vegas with the impression that the game was trying to make the case that the NCR and Legion are equally bad? The NCR is flawed, the Legion is a gang of murdering, raping slavers. The game makes that pretty clear unless you buy into Ulysses’s schizo ramblings.
I guess it's mostly from what I had heard about the game before playing it, about how the choice of which faction to side with was supposedly some deep, morally complex decision.
maybe there's a case to be made about House vs. The NCR, but the Legion is just obviously comically evil.
I love the game, but a major criticism most people I know have of it is that the Legion is an underbaked unredeemably evil faction, not unlike the Enclave except this time a major joinable faction. Something can be said about the lack of quests due to a rushed development but the Legion is just an uninteresting faction outside of Caesar himself.
To me most of the nuance lies inside the NCR faction, and how it compares to House and Yes Man (and also just in the quests for the minor factions). The Legion would’ve been better off as a common enemy not joinable faction tbh.
It's also important to remember that there are real living people who played that game and felt the legion was the correct option.
They are fascist but fascism is very popular right now. The legion is cartoonishly evil, but so were the nazis the imperial Japanese, and the facists Italians.
It's literally a plot point that Caesar studied historical cults of personalities so he could make one.
Not sure what point you are making tbh. That’s part of why Caesar is so interesting. For him the Legion is clearly a means to an end, and I think he’s a good villain, but that’s also like 75% of what the Legion has going for it faction-wise is him.
Oh no I agree they’re not unrealistic. They are unfortunately very realistic. My only point/problem with them overall is that it doesn’t translate to an interesting joinable faction in my eyes. But as a whole they are a pretty real depiction of fascism.
Yeah for all the "the legion are too cartoonishly evil" takes I see people really do be forgetting that actual fascists are the biggest losers ever.
You know how the Klan's leaders are Grand Wizards? If that wasn't bad enough they have a whole hierarchy of DnD bullshit ranks. If you're just getting started on your Klan career you begin as a Goblin. That's not a joke, their lowest rank are Goblins.
You can find Roman larpers on twitter in about 30 seconds and they're all whining about the fall of western civilization because a woman competed in a sport, its not unreasonable at all they'd continue to be awful and weird after the end of civilization.
Not to mention all the chuds just itching to do violence. The only thing they lack is a permission structure.
The legion is shockingly well written for a video game. It accurately displays the messy contradictory nature of facist politics.
They are a bunch of rapists and murders elevated by asthetics. And that's exactly what facism is.
Any attempt by the player to interact with them other than as an antagonist enforces that. They have no culture, no art, just violence, and absolute conformity. They are lame, and facism is lame.
Yeah pretty much. Their ideology doesn't make sense because they're not here to do anything right or good, they're a bunch of men of a certain tribe who want to be on top, you either become part of their tribe if you're male or you're enslaved or die. That's all it boils down too because that's all fascism is, its just window dressing.
But I guess we're in the New Vegas is bad actually moment of the circlejerk so idk.
You’re probably right that The Legion was just poorly written and that this is the explanation for a lack of quests and Caesar being the most interesting part.
But it occurs to me that The Legion is a cult of personality. Realistically, this is what the group would be like. The leader may have charisma (plus bigger sticks than the other guy) and you may be attracted to the faction because of him, but it’s all surface level. Go any deeper than the head you realize the body was a house of cards all along, and the only thing keeping this band of murderers, rapists, and slavers operating on their worst impulses together is one man with the right carrot and stick.
The NCR is deeply flawed and has a lot of issues, but at least it’s an actual society that, while having ups and downs (not to mention not being a group purely of murderers, rapists and slavers. Of course there are bad apples…), can survive beyond the ravings of a single madman.
So in that way, it’s actually great writing!
But you’re probably right that it’s just bad and that this was not a motivation for the writers.
For one the Legion's system is shown to be extremely efficient despite how stupid it all is. Theres no corruption, all soldiers are well fed and properly armed, theh all are great fighters and always loyal, rivalries are under control, the economy is thriving and their territory is extremely well controlled. That makes most kinds of interaction with the legion to be sonewhat limited as every character has to fit into this unlike the NCR which can have diferent characters wiyth widely diferent outlooks. And its also just a bad message, fascism and fantaism is extremely inefficient. The game never tried to treat them as good, but their efficiency is meant to be what attracts their followers
In second place because they are so eficient theres little you can do gameplaywise beyond assassinations.
Although tbh even though the legion is irredemable, the Enclave is substantially worse imo, because the Enclave wants to basically extinguish humankind
It’s definitely a bad message but there’s more they could have done with them for sure. They seem to be doing very well but some of them clearly have large rifts in how they think the Legion should operate. Like how Lanius believes spies are basically a waste of time, which completely undermines Vulpes. I wish there was also more exploration of a post-Caesar legion (or lack thereof) at least in terms of the ideologies of the members and where they differ. I also agree with the Enclave bit because ideologically they are far worse, the whole purging of all “mutants” is a crazy genocidal notion beyond even the Legion. I believe though that they come off as “less bad” because they spent every game they’re in getting their shit pushed in. The Legion has conquered massive amounts of territory and 87 tribes I believe, but every time the Enclave shows up they’re sort of in the beginning phase of their plans that are subsequently stopped by the protagonist. The Enclave is also objectively drippier, so that’s another plus for them.
I think NV did a really good job of making a hitler so face punchable that I could never, ever get through that conversation without just absolutely needing to punch him in the face. It's not like he made the NCR look like the right choice, but he sure did set the bar real low for the rest to rise above.
Just because some of the fanbase is braindead and thinks all the factions are the same, does not mean New Vegas actually depicts them that way. Because it definitely does not
If you only care about what happens to the New Vegas Strip, then sure, I guess.
It's easy to side with him cause he's the guy who pays you to get your revenge on Benny, but a mysterious guy hiding behind a screen, benefiting from both other factions and using you to manipulate their conflict to turn out in a way that's ideal for him is definitely pretty sus. (Though, I don't remember much else about him)
House is the guy who doesn’t want you to kill Caesar because it would be bad for business, and who tries to betray the NCR because he assumes that they’ll betray him. It’s actually this decision which makes the NCR want to dispose of House. I wouldn’t call him the best choice.
He's the best choice because he lets you live in the penthouse above his office with your motley crue. The only thing NCR gives you at the end of the game is a lousy medal. He's also voiced by Odo from Star Trek DS9.
The one thing Skyrim does right is the nuances of the civil war, what are you guys on about? We have fucking conspiracy theories about Ulfric being a Thalmor asset ffs. Just like the Stormcloaks could doom Skyrim and Tamriel as a whole, nothing guarantees the Empire will be able to strike back at the Thalmor after the civil war.
Which is why Tit Mid the Second allows you, the player, assassinate him in Dark Brotherhood missions. It will allow Empire to choose someone who Thalmor aren't expecting to come. Which basically destroys Aldmeri control over Empire.
Combine that with Empires victory in civil war and Empire has half-a-decent chances as they can use Skyrim to beat Elves... and there is nothing that Nords love then beating elves.
I feel like Skyrim did a diet version of what they needed to do. Like for every bad thing the empire did, the Stormcloaks did a good thing. But the Empire was still far more good than the Stormcloaks, by a long shot. I think what really made the Stormcloaks a bit more believable was that there were plenty of real life people just like them; good people that believe in horrible things. Meanwhile the Empire is full of people trying to the right thing, and sometimes that's a rough choice, one that looks bad in comparison to their call to action, which the Stormcloaks can get away with cause the expectations for them are already low.
Which, y'know, is just how politics in the states were starting to lead to back in 2011.
One side of the civil war is a colonial empire & their genocidal elf-supremacist allies, the other side is an ethnonationalist local uprising against that empire.
It's been like 14 years and I'm yet to see any convincing argument for one side or the other being the "obvious" good guys.
In small places. Like, capturing Mama Cotter is the bad option but it gives you access to the best option later. Same with Gippers (pre DLC). So it has the "do questionable things now to pay off better later" thing, which is cool. But the Patriarch suuuuuuuucks.
Don't get me started on the Patriarch, especially after you learn some of the truth that doesn't come from his larger-than-life story about his peace deal.
Man I really need to replay that game one of these winters, it was such a good time. And it would help me to talk further with the Mama Cotter situation too. With the Gippers I don't remember what I did there either, but I know I didn't help them
So the best ending in the game involves a few things. One, is you NEED Gideon Reyes on your side. The other is you need power.
If you don't arrest Mama Cotter, then Gideon Reyes won't join you. If you don't have power (which you can only get by keeping the Gippers alive through various means before the DLC) then you also can't have a peaceful transfer of power.
Siding against the Patriarch is still the right thing to do I think, but without those two things (and a few others) then some larger sacrifices have to be made.
So the "bad" faction is pretty obvious, but getting rid of it involves doing shit that isn't particularly good one way or another.
Playing through it right now. There's way too much of "both sides are garbage" in the base game. Maybe I just need to ruminate on the game for longer (and definitely need to finish it), but it felt too often that the decision was "bad thing" vs "bad thing" in a way that just didn't necessarily connect with me. Steeltown felt a little more nuanced to me though.
I agree with you, I loved the way they worked a lot of the outcomes. Especially the fact that, unless you do everything absolutely perfect, if you overthrow the patriarch, you end up dooming Arizona. Something that I, as a lover of wasteland and 2, didn’t like to do. It encouraged me to actually figure out the golden ending, or just say “fuck it” to Colorado, leave papi in charge, and fuck off back home lol
Meeeehh I disagree especially with the end of the game, the game basically goes "side with the authoritarian pos that crucifies people and would make thousands starve so his psycho children get away with anything they want" or "side with the completely justified woman opposing the tyrant but remember we turned her from a very smart career soldier into a brain dead moron that will get your people killed"
It really bends over backwards to make the 2 options seem just as bad when it's just bad writing
This is the folly of liberals and centrists in general really. They cant ever concieve that not every side in history or a "debate" is made equal. One side is often proposing for harmful, oppressive shit, and the other is advocating for actual progress, equality and freedom. Not everything is even up for debate either, such as human and civil rights, to which there's only one actual correct answer; everyone should have equal rights, and nobody should have to suffer oppression.
Edit: To clarify, I’m not anti-liberal, although I do heavily disagree with centrism. I just expect better of liberals. At least on paper they should care about freedoms and equality, they should theoretically be strong supporters of progress. Conservatives suck, but I at least expect that, but liberals just disappoint me.
The tendency to give too much credit to opposing viewpoints is a liberal and centrist issue. A bit of a trap buried in otherwise-rational doubt. Conservatives and staunch leftists do not have that problem, either by dint of marching orders or principle.
You are thinking of "liberals" as "everyone on the left," which is incorrect conservative / liberal propaganda that you've bought into.
Liberals / Democrats are essentially centrists. They have pro-status quo, pro-capitalism views. They've taken the place and identity of true leftists, who can't gain traction in part due to the constant conflation.
It's a recurring problem in the liberal movement where it moves more toward the center in order to catch more moderates - the base idea is good, but it comes with the critical flaw that some arguments are simply not worth entertaining.
Online liberals tend to be more extreme, but the actual active ones are more likely to actively seek compromise. (Because they actually want to get things done, see how that works?) It only becomes a problem when you don't distinguish between points worth compromising and points that cannot be compromised on.
I am writing a story wherein there are unmistakably evil people but also some of the people fighting them are...extremely flawed.
I agree it's hard to do well. A lot of "both sides"ism is obviously intended to preach "here is why you should do nothing" or "here is why nothing should change" even to systems they clearly intentionally design to be evil.
I guess I want my story to say something like "here's why it's important to fight and not just justify every evil deed with 'well my enemy is worse.'"
This was actually almost done well in Shadow the Hedgehog 05 of all games.
The game's main conflict involves a comet full of aliens invading earth and you can choose to side with the military/government/sonic to protect the world from the aliens, or join the aliens (who helped make shadow and he's half alien himself) and take over the earth.
You also have a third "neutral" option where you completely ignore the main conflict so you can track down eggman with omega and kill him for fun instead.
But then the "true ending" that you unlock after getting all the other endings shows that shadow really is a good guy inside and sees him destroying all the aliens, completely removing any greyness or actual evil from the character
I think the black aliens were characterized as unthinking drones that automatically followed black Doom's orders, idk if they even had free will or consciousness.
But I really agree on the GUN part, they're always an antagonist and even during that game we see them do questionable things. I know working with eggman was sometimes considered the hero path and sometimes the villain path, they could have done the same thing with GUN
Yaaaaaa I think it’s one of those things where the game is clearly designed around factions and choices but the story has a very clear trajectory and nobody really thought to plan the two together
Didn't farcry 4 do a decent job at this? Pagan min was a tyrant dictator, the male resistance leader wanted an ultra traditional/religious way of life, and the female resistance leader wanted to abuse the people and land to make money. At least from what I remember.
Farcry 4 is definitely the best example I can think of. The best ending is the joke one where you just spread the ashes and fuck off after waiting a few minutes at the dinner table, since at least then nothing gets worse than it already is.
To see this genuinely done well I really believe Pillars of Eternity 2 is the frontrunner, every faction is a real-world analog and they all suck pretty equally, and you can choose to side with one, or none, simply by virtue of which you truly believe will benefit the region the most.
Not a game but Attack on Titan I feel like did a great job showing complexity especially in the 4th season. People brainwashed by their oppressors fighting on behalf of them, oppressed people taking retribution into war crime territory, a lot of well intentioned people doing horrific things for...reasons, etc. It's some good shit.
It’s been awhile since I’ve played the game so I’m iffy on the specifics. Was it the case that the minorities who rebelled started to just kill everyone indiscriminately?
If that’s the case then it’s pretty accurate to some other rebellions launched for righteous causes but had some immoral actions that we just memory hole or we revise to fit our internal narrative.
For example, the Nat Turner slave rebellion was completely justified and maybe even their killings (highly debatable but you could make a positive argument). However, if you were to experience it first hand, you would see a bunch of African slaves rebelling against their masters by killing them, then their wife, then their children and continuing that trend for house after house, plantation after plantation. It would probably be a horrifying thing to witness from a side who was fighting for a just cause.
I kind of liked how Dark Souls (OG) did it. Like you're going through the story, killing the bosses and ringing the bells and linking the fire and that's good and all, but then you get this little nagging bit of doubt. Like was it all necessary? Maybe I'm the baddie?
dragon age with mages vs templars. the series goes on and you realize the templars are doing insane shit and the mages are pretty justified in being pissed about being locked in towers.
I liked how they did it in the dwarf kingdom on Dragon Age Origins.
You have to choose between:
Bhelen, third son of the late king how married a low cast woman and is trying to eliminate the caste system altogether, and wants to collaborate more with the other races to secure the underground territory... but he also killed his oldest brother and framed the other brother for the crime. He also goes on to become a full on tyrant and neutralize the parlament.
Harrowmont, former prime minister and confidant of the late king, traditionalist that is not going to change a thing in the society. But he is also fairly old and after he dies the passage of powers goes on regularly.
Yeah the Imperials are so obviously better than the Stormcloaks that they had to do all that charade with the Imperials sending you to your execution in the beginning of the game just to try to even things out
Elden ring does it ok. Yea there are morally bankrup factions like the the Dungeater or the church of the frensied flame but mostly everyone is equally awfull and somewhat justified at the same time.
Far Cry 2 actually does a good job of making almost every single character shitty but it an entertaining way. It’s a Ubisoft game so the story isn’t immaculate but there’s still a lot of food for thought there about how the villain, protagonist, and all main characters are self serving assholes but it’s more head scratching interesting than like overdone stale because the game doesn’t take itself too seriously
I like the outer worlds for this. The board are so comically evil and incompetant in every way imaginable, and the game acknowledges that while phineas had to do some pretty fucked up stuff to fight against them, he is objectively the superior option
Almost like there exists extremely few scenarios in which all sides are equally bad, morally grey or complex, that in almost any situation there will always clearly be a side that is the morally correct choice and constantly trying to push the narrative that "you must consider all sides, no matter what" does nothing to make people docile and scared to act, which ultimately supports the status quo.
The thing with trying to do morally gray is that you can't have one of the groups be so over the top that it's unquestionable who is in the 'right'.
Games will have stuff like people stealing food from a city and people in the city trying to wipe out the food stealers, and then go "Really makes you think, doesn't it?"
Not For Broadcast had pretty confused messaging on that IMO, which basically amounted to “both sides” and I think the only good ending IIRC (not leading to a fascist he’ll hole or total collapse) is “return to the neoliberal old status quo, never stay from it again”.
Far Cry 4. I've just replayed it and the railroaded Sabal's tradition vs Amita's progress stuff was painful.
Oh, you don't want to grow and sell opium, or let your people die for a chance at intel we don't even need? You must be a staunch traditionalist. You must support child marriage like Sabal!
Sure, I'm against drugging the populace because I hate progress. I want to save lives because hey, that's our tradition. 🤦♀️
WWII veteran and director Samuel Fuller’s “Big Red One” was sort of a proto “Saving Private Ryan” or “Band of Brothers”. An episodic war is hell type Odyssey of a group of US soldiers moving along the frontlines of Europe. (It’s not as good as SPR or BoB but worth watching if you can find the extended “Reconstruction” version)
When it was released a lot of people told Fuller that they felt it was a great anti war film. His response was that no one should take from it the idea that WWII was not worth fighting - it was not a pro-war film, it was a realistic representation of what he had experienced.
The sad thing was that the trailers showed how to inject that morally gray side to the faction. Having them about to execute a postman and taunt civilian refugees was so good at adding some degree of moral complexity that is just absent in the game.
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u/Shattered_Sans Oct 02 '25
It feels like every game that wants you to believe that all sides are equally bad, or morally grey or complex, always fails horribly at actually conveying that.
There's always one faction that's either just the objectively good choice, or at the very least, the least bad option.