Fable
In Fable (2004), Lionhead Studios presented a morality system that gave players the freedom to choose between being a selfless hero or a malevolent villain. While the game allows players to embrace their inner hero, it subtly punishes them for taking the righteous path. From financial constraints to missed opportunities and slower progression, the game makes the "good" path more challenging and less immediately rewarding than the "evil" path.
Gold and Resources: The Cost of Heroism
Playing as a good character in Fable often leads to financial strain. Being a hero means sparing lives, helping the needy, and choosing kindness over personal gain. For instance, when interacting with traders or townsfolk, choosing to aid them or forgive debts instead of exploiting them means passing up opportunities for quick gold. In quests, the good choices frequently result in less monetary reward compared to taking the darker path. For example, sparing enemies or completing tasks altruistically earns respect but rarely fills your coin purse.
Meanwhile, the evil path is littered with shortcuts to wealth. Stealing from shops, killing innocents, or accepting morally dubious jobs is far more lucrative. Players pursuing an evil playthrough can amass fortunes quickly, making the financial side of the game significantly easier. In contrast, good players must work harder, rely on trading or honest labour, and manage their resources more carefully to progress.
Combat Difficulty and Morality
A good playthrough in Fable often requires restraint, particularly in combat. Evil players can ruthlessly slaughter anyone who stands in their way, including innocent bystanders, for experience points and loot. Good players, however, must avoid collateral damage, sparing civilians and non-hostile NPCs, which sometimes complicates fights. Certain moral choices also force players into more difficult combat situations. For example, sparing a group of enemies might mean facing them again later or enduring ambushes that could have been avoided with a more ruthless approach.
Moreover, good players must frequently deal with the repercussions of their decisions, such as protecting vulnerable characters or refusing shortcuts that could compromise their morals. These choices lead to harder quests and slower progression, emphasizing the patience and effort required to stick to the heroic path.
Slower Power Progression
Evil characters in Fable gain power more quickly due to their willingness to take shortcuts and seize opportunities without hesitation. Stealing, murdering, and exploiting others often result in faster access to better gear, more experience points, and increased wealth. Good characters, by contrast, progress more slowly because they adhere to stricter moral guidelines. This slower power curve reflects the game’s underlying theme: being good is not the easiest path, but it is ultimately more rewarding in terms of character growth and the story’s resolution.
Social and Cosmetic Consequences
The morality system in Fable extends beyond gameplay mechanics to visual and social effects. Evil characters quickly become feared and intimidating, which can make interactions with NPCs easier in certain contexts. Good characters, on the other hand, are admired but also targeted by enemies who seek to exploit their kindness. Additionally, staying good often requires rejecting the temptations of corruption, which can be costly in terms of time and resources.
The Witcher 3
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt by CD Projekt Red is often praised for its morally complex narrative and the depth of its decision-making system. Unlike many RPGs, where good choices lead to universally positive outcomes, The Witcher 3 frequently punishes players for trying to do the "right" thing. Whether through unintended consequences, tragic twists, or the harsh realities of its world, the game reinforces that morality is not black and white. Instead, even the best intentions can lead to devastating outcomes.
The Complexity of Good Intentions
In The Witcher 3, Geralt of Rivia frequently finds himself in situations where no choice is entirely right or wrong. The player, as Geralt, is tasked with making decisions that feel morally good, but these decisions often have unintended consequences that subvert expectations. This narrative complexity often leaves players questioning whether being good is truly worth it in a world as unforgiving as the Continent.
For example, helping the Bloody Baron reconcile with his family—arguably a good deed—leads to a bittersweet resolution. While his wife may be saved, she suffers lasting trauma, and the Baron’s eventual fate is grim. By trying to heal a broken family, Geralt only mitigates some of the suffering but cannot undo the damage caused by years of abuse and neglect.
Ciri’s Fate: The Price of Protection
One of the game’s most heart-wrenching examples of being punished for good intentions is how Geralt’s treatment of Ciri impacts her ultimate fate. Throughout the story, Geralt has opportunities to guide Ciri’s actions. Choosing to shield her and protect her at every turn—a seemingly good and caring approach—can lead to Ciri feeling stifled and doubting her abilities. This, in turn, can contribute to her tragic disappearance.
Alternatively, encouraging her independence and allowing her to make her own choices can help her grow into her role as a leader. However, this path often involves Geralt stepping back, which feels counterintuitive to players who want to prioritize her safety. This moral dilemma highlights how good intentions, such as overprotection, can have harmful effects in the long run.
Helping Those in Need Can Backfire
Many side quests in The Witcher 3 showcase the darker side of altruism. For instance, sparing the lives of certain NPCs, such as monsters or morally ambiguous characters, often leads to them betraying Geralt or causing harm later. Sparing the Sylvan in “Contract: The Whispering Hillock,” for example, can lead to the destruction of a nearby village. Similarly, showing mercy to a repentant criminal may lead to them committing further atrocities.
Geralt’s moral compass is constantly tested, and the game often makes players question whether their good deeds truly make a difference in the grand scheme of things. In a world driven by self-interest and survival, kindness can sometimes be seen as a weakness to exploit.
A World Without Simple Solutions
The Witcher series thrives on presenting moral ambiguity, and The Witcher 3 takes this to new heights. Its storytelling reminds players that doing the right thing is rarely simple and often comes at a cost. By punishing players for trying to be good, the game reinforces its grim worldview, where even the best intentions can lead to suffering.
Metro: Last Light
Metro: Last Light challenges players not only with its post-apocalyptic survival gameplay but also with its morally nuanced choices. Following the "good" path—choosing mercy, non-lethal actions, and kindness—makes achieving the best ending harder and often punishes the player with more difficult gameplay or unintended consequences. Unlike traditional games, where morality is rewarded directly, Metro: Last Light offers a world where being good doesn’t guarantee an easy road.
The Morality System and Its Challenges
In Metro: Last Light, morality is tied to the actions and choices players make throughout the game. Killing indiscriminately, ignoring innocent NPCs, or failing to explore opportunities for compassion moves you closer to the "bad" ending. Conversely, sparing enemies, listening to conversations, and helping others unlock moments of moral enlightenment, eventually leading to the "good" ending.
However, adhering to the good path is no easy task. It requires patience, skill, and often makes situations more dangerous. Unlike choosing the lethal route, where you can eliminate threats quickly, being non-lethal forces you to rely on stealth and avoid direct confrontations, which are mechanically more challenging.
Examples of Being Punished for Doing Good
Sparing the Bandits in the Swamp In certain levels, you encounter bandits and other hostile human factions. While you can dispatch them with ease, sparing their lives (by knocking them out instead of killing) takes significantly more effort. You must carefully sneak through areas without triggering alarms or engaging in combat, which can result in more tension and retries if you’re spotted.
The Fascist and Red Army Soldiers In the war-torn world of Metro, both the Nazis and the Red Line soldiers are presented as hostile forces. Killing them feels justified given their actions, but sparing them is necessary for the good path. Letting them live often puts you at a tactical disadvantage, as they will continue patrolling, making stealth routes more challenging.
Pavel’s Betrayal Early in the game, you form a bond with Pavel, only for him to betray you later. While killing him in the end would be cathartic, sparing his life is the morally good choice. However, letting him go leaves you with lingering doubts about whether he deserved your mercy.
The Dark Ones and the Forest Guardians A pivotal moment occurs when you encounter the Dark One, a species thought to be dangerous and alien. By choosing to interact peacefully, you unlock a deeper understanding of the Dark Ones’ perspective, but this decision contrasts with the broader fear and hatred of them in the Metro world. Standing against that prejudice doesn’t reward you immediately but builds toward the good ending.
Difficulty of Achieving the Good Ending
To earn the "good" ending, where Artyom spares the Dark Ones and finds hope for humanity, you must play thoughtfully and consistently choose compassion. However, this path means foregoing the easier, more violent solutions the game often presents. The bad ending, where violence and destruction take over, is far simpler to achieve, emphasizing that mercy is the harder choice.
Red Dead Redemption 2
Red Dead Redemption 2 by Rockstar Games is a masterpiece of storytelling, where morality plays a central role in shaping the player’s experience. As Arthur Morgan, you navigate the brutal world of the Wild West, torn between loyalty to the Van der Linde gang and your own evolving moral compass. Choosing to play as a "good" Arthur—helping those in need, avoiding unnecessary violence, and sticking to a code of honor—leads to significant challenges and sacrifices. While the narrative rewards you with a more fulfilling conclusion, being good in RDR2 often feels like an uphill battle with the world itself punishing your decency.
The Honour System and Its Consequences
RDR2’s honour system tracks your actions, with high honour representing a moral and virtuous Arthur. However, sticking to the high-honour path makes gameplay harder and less lucrative, as it often requires resisting greed and violence in a world that rewards both.
Examples of Being Punished for Being Good
Refusing to Steal or Kill for Profit
As a high-honor Arthur, you’re encouraged to avoid robbing or killing innocent NPCs. This restraint, while morally admirable, deprives you of easy money. Low-honor players can rob stagecoaches, stores, and strangers without a second thought, amassing wealth much faster. Conversely, sticking to honorable choices means relying on bounties or hunting, which take more effort and time.
Helping Strangers at Your ExpenseThroughout the game, random encounters present opportunities to assist strangers. For example, stopping to help someone bitten by a snake often results in nothing more than gratitude or a free item later on. While rewarding in a narrative sense, these acts don’t provide significant material benefits compared to simply ignoring or exploiting these NPCs.
Example: A farmer asks you to help him retrieve his stolen wagon. You can return it, but the monetary reward is minimal compared to what you’d gain by keeping it or selling it yourself.
Paying Off Bounties
High-honor players often avoid unnecessary violence, which means they’re less likely to accrue bounties. However, in certain story missions, bounties are unavoidable. Good players who want to keep a clean slate end up spending significant amounts of hard-earned cash to clear their name. Low-honor players, on the other hand, can let their bounty rise, engaging in shootouts without caring about the consequences.
Arthur’s Sacrifice for the Gang
As a good Arthur, you prioritize protecting the gang and helping John Marston escape the gang’s chaos. This path often involves self-sacrifice, such as refusing Dutch’s greed-fueled plans or standing up to Micah. While low-honor Arthur focuses more on self-interest, good Arthur chooses to leave a legacy of redemption, even at the cost of his own happiness and well-being.
The Emotional Cost of High HonorHigh-honor Arthur faces more emotional weight in his interactions. His final moments reflect his struggle for redemption and acceptance of his fate. While this provides a satisfying narrative payoff, it is deeply bittersweet, leaving players with a sense of loss despite doing the "right" thing.
Dishonored
In Dishonored (2012) by Arkane Studios, players take on the role of Corvo Attano, a royal bodyguard turned assassin, seeking to clear his name and restore order to the city of Dunwall. While the game offers multiple paths to achieve your goals, it explicitly encourages stealth and non-lethal approaches for players aiming to maintain Corvo’s morality. However, this path—referred to as the "low chaos" route—is far more difficult, less rewarding in the short term, and punishes players mechanically and narratively for choosing mercy over carnage.
The Chaos System and Its Implications
The core mechanic that determines the outcome of the story is the Chaos System, which tracks the player’s choices. Killing enemies, leaving bodies in the streets, and causing general havoc all contribute to "high chaos," leading to a more dystopian world, with greater levels of violence, disease, and paranoia. Conversely, "low chaos" requires players to avoid killing, take non-lethal approaches, and remain as undetected as possible.
Choosing the low chaos route aligns Corvo with a more hopeful and moral path, but it also makes the game significantly harder, less immediately rewarding, and emotionally taxing.
Examples of Being Punished for Being Good
Non-Lethal Options Are Harder The most immediate challenge of the low chaos route is that non-lethal methods require more effort. While lethal options allow Corvo to quickly eliminate enemies with swords, pistols, or grenades, sparing them means using sleep darts or other non-lethal tools, which are limited in number. Additionally, stealth becomes mandatory, as knocking out enemies and hiding their bodies takes more time and precision than killing them outright.
Example: In missions like "The Royal Physician," eliminating your target non-lethally requires sneaking past dozens of guards, carefully setting traps, and solving environmental puzzles, while killing your target would take seconds.
Non-Lethal Solutions Can Be Morally AmbiguousMany of the non-lethal methods in Dishonored aren’t as "good" as they seem. Sparing targets often means subjecting them to fates worse than death. For example:
In "High Overseer Campbell," sparing Campbell involves branding him as a heretic, ensuring he is exiled and reviled by his own people.
In "Lady Boyle's Last Party," the non-lethal option involves delivering Lady Boyle to an obsessive suitor who imprisons her for life.
These choices force players to question whether their commitment to non-lethality is truly moral or simply another form of cruelty.
Gameplay Challenges
Low chaos not only demands precision and patience but also limits the tools at your disposal. Lethal tools like grenades, pistols, and swords become largely unusable, as they result in permanent deaths. This restriction makes certain areas, like heavily guarded checkpoints or dense enemy patrols, significantly harder to navigate without detection.
Reduced Short-Term Rewards
Killing enemies often leads to immediate rewards, such as loot, dropped weapons, and cleared paths. By sparing enemies, players lose out on these benefits, making the game more challenging from a resource management perspective.
The Narrative Punishment of High Chaos
While low chaos leads to a more hopeful ending, it is emotionally gruelling. Players must constantly make sacrifices, endure harder gameplay, and resist the temptation of easier paths. High chaos, by contrast, allows for quick gratification but results in a dark, destructive world filled with suffering.
Conclusion
In Dishonored, the game actively punishes players for being good by making the low chaos route more challenging, morally ambiguous, and less immediately rewarding. However, the payoff of preserving hope and achieving a better future for Dunwall makes the struggle worthwhile. The game’s unique approach to morality forces players to weigh the cost of their decisions, proving that the hardest path is often the most meaningful.
Dark Souls
The Dark Souls series, renowned for its punishing gameplay and bleak storytelling, thrives on moral ambiguity and difficult choices. While many RPGs reward virtuous actions with clear benefits, Dark Souls often subverts these expectations. Choosing to help others or follow a moral path can lead to unintended consequences, personal loss, or even the doom of the very characters you sought to protect. In Dark Souls, being good doesn’t always pay off—it often leads to greater suffering.
A World Where Kindness Goes Unrewarded
In the world of Dark Souls, the few NPCs you encounter are often struggling to survive or achieve their own goals. While aiding them seems like the right thing to do, your assistance frequently leads to tragic outcomes. Unlike traditional RPGs where helping others strengthens bonds or creates allies, Dark Souls punishes your good intentions by showing how little impact they have on a world consumed by decay and despair.
Examples of Being Punished for Being Good
Solaire of Astora
Solaire is one of the most beloved characters in Dark Souls, a knight searching for his "own sun." Helping Solaire on his quest feels noble, but it leads to heartbreak. If you don’t take specific steps to save him, he succumbs to madness after being possessed by a parasitic creature. Even if you successfully save him, his quest ultimately ends in failure, leaving him dejected and questioning his purpose.
Siegmeyer of Catarina
Siegward (or Siegmeyer, depending on the game) is a kind and bumbling knight who seeks adventure and purpose. If you assist him throughout his journey—rescuing him, solving his problems, and even saving his life—you inadvertently cause him despair. In Dark Souls, Siegward may fall into depression when he realizes his own inadequacy. In some scenarios, he sacrifices himself needlessly, leaving you with the guilt of having tried to help.
Anastacia of Astora
Anastacia is the Fire Keeper of Firelink Shrine, someone whose presence is critical to your survival. If you choose to restore her voice by returning her soul, her dialogue reveals a deep sadness, as she never wished to regain her ability to speak. Your "good" act only increases her suffering.
Rhea of Thorolund
Rhea is a cleric who becomes trapped in a tragic cycle. If you assist her during her journey, she eventually becomes hollow—a fate worse than death in the Dark Souls universe. Trying to save her doesn’t spare her from her grim fate, but it does leave you to witness her downfall firsthand.
The Player’s Role in the World
Even your overarching goal of linking the fire to "save" the world from the encroaching dark is a morally complex act. The world is in a natural cycle of decay, and prolonging the Age of Fire is an act of defiance against the natural order. Being "good" here might not save the world but instead trap it in endless suffering.
The Emotional and Mechanical Cost
Being good in Dark Souls often means going out of your way to protect NPCs, which adds mechanical difficulty. Saving characters like Solaire or Siegward requires precise actions, specific questline progressions, and sacrifices of time and resources. Failing to meet these conditions often results in their death or corruption, leaving you with a sense of failure despite your best intentions.
Additionally, helping NPCs rarely brings direct gameplay benefits. Instead of tangible rewards, you’re left with bittersweet moments of dialogue and the emotional weight of their eventual demise. The game forces you to confront the futility of good deeds in a dying world.
Papers, Please
In Papers, Please (2013) by Lucas Pope, you play as a border checkpoint officer in the fictional, dystopian country of Arstotzka. Your job is simple on paper: inspect documents, follow increasingly strict government rules, and allow or deny entry based on the laws of the regime. However, Papers, Please forces you into constant moral dilemmas, where being good—helping people in need, showing mercy, or defying unjust orders—often results in personal sacrifice, financial ruin, or even execution. The game’s oppressive world ensures that morality carries a heavy price.
A Job of Unforgiving Consequences
Your responsibilities in Papers, Please revolve around enforcing strict regulations on immigrants, refugees, and travelers trying to cross the Arstotzkan border. The game rewards efficiency and strict adherence to the rules, docking pay for mistakes or delays. However, as you encounter increasingly desperate individuals with heartbreaking stories, your role as an enforcer of these laws becomes emotionally fraught. Being kind or showing mercy to those in need often means breaking the rules, and the consequences for your "goodness" are severe.
Examples of Being Punished for Being Good
Helping Refugees and Families
Many individuals at the checkpoint beg for your help. A husband may plead for you to let his wife through despite her lacking proper documents. Refugees fleeing war-torn countries beg for asylum without the required papers. Letting them pass feels morally right but leads to immediate punishment in the form of salary deductions, warnings, or eventual imprisonment. Your acts of kindness may save them, but they come at the cost of your family’s survival.
Jorji Costava
Jorji, a recurring character, frequently attempts to cross the border with invalid papers or no documents at all. He’s a comical and likable figure, and many players feel compelled to let him through despite the penalties. However, every time you help him, you risk fines and reprimands, highlighting how even small acts of compassion are punished in Arstotzka.
The Order of Ezic
A shadowy group, the Order of Ezic, asks for your cooperation in overthrowing the Arstotzkan government. Following their morally ambiguous requests—such as letting certain individuals through or sabotaging the checkpoint—places you in direct conflict with your superiors. While Ezic promises a better future, their demands often lead to fines, investigations, or the eventual loss of your job if you’re caught.
Your Family’s Well-Being
Being kind to others directly impacts your family’s survival. The game’s limited pay system means that every infraction or delay in processing costs you money. If you don’t make enough, your family will starve, freeze, or succumb to illness. Helping others often means sacrificing your ability to provide for your wife, child, and other dependents, forcing you to decide whose lives are more important.
The Emotional Toll of Morality
Papers, Please brilliantly captures the weight of moral decision-making under oppressive regimes. The game punishes players for breaking the rules, yet adhering to those same rules often means perpetuating injustice and ignoring the suffering of others. This constant tension forces you to confront your own values and priorities, making every choice agonizing.
Undertale
Undertale (2015), created by Toby Fox, is an indie RPG that upends traditional gaming conventions, particularly in its morality system. The game gives players the option to spare every enemy and take the Pacifist Route, but choosing to be good in Undertale is far from easy. Mercy is not just an option—it’s a test of patience, emotional resilience, and skill. Sparing everyone requires deeper effort and dedication than simply defeating enemies, and the emotional weight of mercy often leaves players questioning whether being good is worth the cost.
The Pacifist Route: A Harder Path
Choosing to spare enemies rather than killing them makes the game mechanically more challenging. Each encounter is a puzzle, requiring you to figure out how to pacify your opponent. Instead of simply attacking to deplete an enemy's health, you must interact with them in unique ways—telling jokes, complimenting them, or enduring their attacks without retaliation—until they become open to mercy.
For example:
In the battle with Toriel, you must repeatedly spare her despite her attacks growing more intense, testing your patience and determination. It’s emotionally taxing because Toriel, a maternal figure, pleads with you to leave her alone, making the fight feel deeply personal.
Against Undyne, you must endure a relentless barrage of spear attacks while refusing to harm her, proving your resolve through pure skill and determination.
The game is designed to make mercy harder than violence, encouraging players to reflect on the effort required to choose kindness.
Emotional Toll of Being Good
The Pacifist Route is not only more challenging mechanically but also emotionally. Choosing to spare enemies means engaging with their personalities and learning their backstories, which makes the stakes feel much higher. You’re not just defeating nameless foes; you’re connecting with characters who have hopes, dreams, and fears.
For example:
Sparing Papyrus allows you to see his humor and innocence, making it impossible to imagine hurting him.
Choosing not to kill Sans after the Genocide Route dialogue reveals his despair at your choices in other timelines adds emotional weight to the decision to spare him.
This deep emotional connection makes mercy feel rewarding, but it also means that the weight of your choices lingers, especially in moments where characters doubt your motives or when mercy comes at great cost.
The Genocide Route’s Judgment
Even if you choose the Pacifist Route, the game reminds you of the weight of your choices. In the Genocide Route, Sans directly references the player’s ability to restart timelines, implying that no act of mercy is permanent. If you’ve taken the Pacifist Route but played through the Genocide Route in another timeline, characters like Flowey or Sans question your sincerity, forcing you to confront the consequences of your previous actions.
A Rewarding Yet Heavy Ending
The true Pacifist ending is deeply satisfying but bittersweet. Restoring peace to the Underground comes after great effort and emotional investment. By sparing every character, you forge relationships that make the world brighter, but the knowledge of the struggles you endured—and the fragility of peace—remains.
Spec Ops: The Line
Spec Ops: The Line (2012) by Yager Development is a psychological military shooter that turns the genre’s conventions on their head. What begins as a standard war game quickly spirals into a harrowing exploration of morality, guilt, and the devastating consequences of your actions. The game is infamous for punishing players for trying to "do the right thing," as even the most morally driven choices lead to horrifying outcomes. The game forces you to confront the futility of goodness in a world where no choice is truly right, and every action results in collateral damage.
A Narrative That Subverts Heroism
In Spec Ops: The Line, you play as Captain Martin Walker, leading a Delta Force team into Dubai to investigate a mysterious distress signal. As the story progresses, Walker becomes increasingly obsessed with stopping Colonel John Konrad, the supposed villain, believing his actions are for the greater good. However, the game’s moral ambiguity becomes apparent as your choices, no matter how well-intentioned, only escalate the destruction and suffering.
Walker’s downward spiral parallels the player’s experience. The more you try to act like a hero—helping civilians, sparing lives, or following orders—the more the game punishes you by revealing how futile or misguided those actions were.
Examples of Being Punished for Being Good
The White Phosphorus Scene
One of the most harrowing moments occurs when Walker uses white phosphorus to destroy an enemy encampment. While this is framed as a tactical necessity, you later discover that the "enemies" were actually civilians. Your decision, intended to eliminate a threat, results in the horrifying deaths of innocent people, including women and children. The game forces you to walk through the charred aftermath, making you face the consequences of your actions.
Sparing Civilians and Soldiers
At several points, you’re given the opportunity to show mercy, such as sparing civilians or disobeying orders to execute enemy combatants. However, these choices rarely result in positive outcomes. For instance, sparing certain characters can lead to ambushes or betrayals, while executing enemies often feels morally repugnant. The game constantly questions whether mercy has any meaning in a war zone.
The Hanging Men
In one scene, you’re forced to decide whether to shoot two hanging men—one a soldier who stole water for his family and the other a civilian who enforced Konrad’s brutal laws. Choosing either man leads to consequences that feel wrong, but refusing to choose results in chaos as the crowd turns violent.
Walker’s Justifications
Walker’s obsession with being a hero blinds him to the consequences of his actions. As you progress, the game reveals that much of the destruction and suffering was caused by Walker’s refusal to stop. His belief in doing the "right thing" leads to his own mental unraveling and the devastation of those around him.
The Emotional Cost of Morality
The game deliberately punishes players for trying to act morally by revealing that their actions are often rooted in self-delusion. Walker’s desire to be a hero mirrors the player’s expectations of the genre, creating a powerful commentary on the cost of war and the futility of "good intentions" in a morally grey conflict.
Mass Effect Trilogy
The Mass Effect trilogy by BioWare is renowned for its expansive narrative, player agency, and morality system. The Paragon (good) and Renegade (pragmatic or ruthless) paths allow players to shape Commander Shepard’s actions and the galaxy’s fate. While the Paragon route emphasizes diplomacy, kindness, and unity, it often punishes players through sacrifices, betrayal, and unintended consequences. Choosing to be good in Mass Effect is rarely the easy path—it requires enduring emotional and strategic setbacks for the hope of a better future.
The Burden of Paragon Choices
In the Mass Effect trilogy, Paragon choices often involve showing mercy, sparing lives, or seeking peaceful resolutions. These decisions frequently lead to immediate disadvantages, with long-term outcomes that can be bittersweet or devastating. Unlike Renegade choices, which often result in quick and decisive results, the Paragon path demands patience and sacrifices that test the player’s resolve.
Examples of Being Punished for Being Good
Sparing the Rachni Queen (Mass Effect 1)
In the first game, you encounter the last surviving Rachni Queen, a member of a species that once plunged the galaxy into war. Sparing her life is the Paragon choice, as she promises to guide her people toward peace. However, this decision backfires in Mass Effect 3 if the Reapers indoctrinate the Rachni, forcing you to fight their forces. While saving her was an act of mercy, it risks reigniting the very conflict you sought to avoid.
Saving the Council (Mass Effect 1)
During the Battle of the Citadel, you must decide whether to prioritize the Council’s flagship or focus on defeating Sovereign. The Paragon choice involves risking resources to save the Council, but doing so weakens your fleet and can lead to more casualties among your allies. Furthermore, the Council’s mistrust of Shepard persists, making the sacrifice feel unrewarding.
Dealing with Ashley and Kaidan (Mass Effect 1)
A pivotal moment in the first game forces you to choose between saving Ashley or Kaidan, two key squad members. Regardless of your Paragon choice, one of them will die, leaving Shepard with a sense of failure and loss.
Resolving the Genophage (Mass Effect 3)
The Genophage, a genetic weapon used to control the Krogan population, is one of the series’ most complex moral dilemmas. The Paragon path involves curing the Genophage, potentially allowing the Krogan to reclaim their strength. However, this decision risks destabilizing the galaxy, as some fear the Krogan might return to their warlike ways. While curing the Genophage is an act of justice, it comes with significant risks.
Tensions with Cerberus (Mass Effect 2 and 3)
As a Paragon, Shepard often opposes Cerberus, an organization willing to take extreme measures for humanity’s survival. However, this resistance limits your resources and allies, forcing you to rely on galactic cooperation, which is far more challenging to achieve.
The Final Choice (Mass Effect 3)
At the end of the trilogy, Shepard must make a choice that determines the fate of the galaxy. Paragon players often gravitate toward the "Synthesis" or "Control" options, which aim for unity or peace. However, these paths often feel bittersweet, requiring Shepard to sacrifice their life or individuality for the greater good.
The Emotional and Strategic Cost
The Paragon route in Mass Effect emphasizes collaboration and empathy, but it often comes at a personal and strategic cost:
Sparing enemies, like the Rachni Queen or Geth, risks future betrayal or unintended consequences.
Attempting to unite diverse species for a common cause requires time, effort, and navigating centuries of distrust.
Mercy often means sacrificing resources or making decisions that feel less decisive than Renegade alternatives.
Why It’s Worth It
Despite the challenges, the Paragon path highlights the series’ core themes of hope, unity, and redemption. Being good in Mass Effect may lead to sacrifices and setbacks, but it also inspires loyalty, builds trust among your allies, and creates the possibility of lasting peace in the galaxy. The emotional weight of these choices makes the Paragon route a powerful and memorable experience.
10 Games That Punished You For Being A Good Person
Updated: Feb 4
Comments