Comments on: The Morality Gauge

By: Zubon

Zubon — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 19:31:12 +0000

Of course, we know the ending by now to a 2007 game, so the big reveal is less revealing.

By: GregT

GregT — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:16:36 +0000

Overlord’s an interesting example in that the fact that it has a morality gauge, and the specific way that the gauge seems to buck the “You are the Lord of All Evil” premise, ends up having something interesting to say about who you are and free will. Unfortunately none of that becomes clear until the game’s over, by which point the ludonarrative dissonance has likely frustrated you into gaming the system. Writer Rihanna Pratchett was clearly saving herself up for the big ending, which might work for books but isn’t usually a great plan for games.

By: Tim

Tim — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 11:52:40 +0000

It’s quite amazing. Morality in the real world is such a font of dilemmas and conundra; situations where there are genuinely difficult decisions to be made. Yet games often squander the opportunity to capitalise on moral dilemmas. Bioshock, for example, was an insult to real moral dilemmas.

I guess developers have spent so much time working on emulating the real world with graphics (depth of field, motion blur, sub-surface scattering etc etc) that they’ve neglected the real world when it comes to morality.

I mean, all you need is to emphasise that ‘good’ often means making some kind of sacrifice (either giving something up or, more interestingly, not exploiting an opportunity or leaving yourself open to exploitation, a la ‘Nice’ strategies in the Prisoner’s Dilemma) for the benefit of another, while ‘bad’ often entails putting self-interest above other-interest (i.e. defecting in the PD) or deviant behaviour (which is far less interesting). Add a few situations where there’s no ‘right’ answer, and you have a genuine noodle scratcher.

By: Modran

Modran — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 11:23:47 +0000

Mmmh, I remember that corruption in the first Overlord makes your spells do more damage, but you get less money from treasure chests.
I remember a cutscene when you encounter some villagers where Gnarly tells you that you can either let them be, or kill them. But he warns you that killing them will make you stronger, but there will be less people to care for you (and in the background, the peasants are shown grovling, with bags of gold)
So, it’s not explicit (each villager makes you do 0.01% more damage, but you will gain 0.02% less gold from tresure chests), but it hints at it.

And, of course, you start having a dark aura, spikes extrudes from your body, etc, etc, but that’s just flavor.

I’m playing Overlord 2, but I… It seems more random there… I don’t know when, why or what karma change will occur…