[PATV] Monday, August 1, 2011 - Extra Credits Season 1, Ep. 7: Enriching Lives

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[PATV] Monday, August 1, 2011 - Extra Credits Season 1, Ep. 7: Enriching Lives

This week, we discuss a moral choice sequence in Mass Effect 2, and the power video games have to teach us about ourselves.

Read the full story here

lehoangminh

I have to sign up for this particular episode. Through moral choice in games these day I have been able to think about myself pretty much. If there is something wrong about this that is I hardly make a different choices when play the game over and over again.
When I made one it hard for me to choose another one, I would rather read about them on a wiki, forum rather experience it myself. I think - in many ways, I have a huge moral wall that prevent me from enjoy the game fully or perhaps, because of these kind of interaction exist, I have put myself into the reality of game : Unable to redo.

Xenari

i have to sign up saying one thing

when i play mass effect 2. yes ii believe it is brilliant

but after playing ME3 and seeing its ending. bioware them self make the decision we make in this game rather pointless.

Im not gonna spoil anything to those who haven't play this game but
by the time ME3 came out, they're not a genious anymore

brunoais

nice video, funny educating and touches the subject in a very good way. Great job!

garyscary

It seems like this video caused many people to sign up myself included. I sort of remember making that decision in mass effect 2 and making the heretics join the other geth. After watching this I began to wonder why I had doe it. Then I remembered why. I had thought the geth had been reprogrammed against their will by the reapers and I was merely righting this wrong. It didn't even come to my mind that they might have chosen to do so. Pretty eye opening.

Le_Flemard

I never played me2 (I have watched lp thought) at the moment of this choice, not mine, I have paused the video and balanced the reason why one choice is better than the other. I have started liked this :"okay", mentally french speaking might be a little different, "I know that the geth are really concious robots, no, really conscious species will be better in that case (revelation number 1). They can think, different than me maybe, but they have the free will. The no-agressive geth saud that the other geth have made a different choice than them. Can I deny this choice ? (revelation number two)...When I ended my reflexion, I watched the choice of the player, listen his reason, search why that reason make him choose. Bref... I have passed one hour on a 20 mn video in a philosophical mood.

Visual.Pollution

This is a point I have tried to make to many of my friends when it came to the end result of this choice. Sadly it seemed to be some people choose only the paragon or renegade based on how they have played the game to this point, if they were paragon, the chose the "paragon" choice, and vice versa... For me, I stopped and wondered, even though I had played and normally play as a paragon, this was a conflicting choice. Mass Effect 1 - 3 had several of these. I loved but feared those moments because when I was given the choice of either a) genocide, or b) changing the mentality of an; at the time, nearly sentient being I was conflicted. I remembered my grandfather, who told me of his trials and tortures in the residential schools for aboriginals. they literally attempted to tear away the culture, language and beliefs of him and all the other native children here in Canada. While the geth would not remember any ordeal with a loss in identity, and the fact that yes they are working against me in joining the reapers, this was the choice they made. to take that away is like trying to destroy a culture, belief or ideology through control and brainwashing. in the end I made the choice to save them, which ultimately went against much of what I believe in, but only because this "paragon" choice was in my eyes as bad as the "renegade" option I couldn't bring myself to destroy legions people, whom he had hoped to save. This choice was amazingly agonizing, and in the end my decision came to how Legion might "feel" about it. The only other decision I found more difficult to make was in Mass Effect 3, where the war for Rannoch left me with a choice, I was so sure could not go well either way. To choose ultimately whether to save the Quarians, who so badly wanted a home, or the Geth who by now were on the verge of full awareness and were not the villains the previous games had made them out to be. They were vulnerable, scared as any organic would be and deserved to live. I remember grinding my teeth at the choice of which race to help thinking it could only go one way or the other. I was overjoyed when the fruits of my previous labors were in fact the catalyst to Quarian / Geth peace and cooperation. And people complained that ME3 didn't take into account the choices you made in the past! Rant complete.

vrie

I also signed up specifically to comment on the ME2 dilemma.

Questioning whether it was better to annihilate or forcibly control was like trying to decide which shade of black is darker. I eventually decided that I'd prefer to die than be forcibly converted, so it only made sense to give the geth the same, terrible respect. (But just because I find it right doesn't mean it would be right for them! Agh! And on the questioning goes.)

It was especially difficult as I decided on the renegade option when I had always played paragon characters. It's more comfortable to be on the writer's 'side' with moral issues. It's instant affirmation: I'm making a choice with clear moral consequences. Going against the color-coded morality the mechanics had so ingrained in me was stunning. And yet, that uncomfort it exactly what made the choice so meaningful, if painful.

If the choice was presented as renegade vs. renegade, it would have made more sense, mechanically.. although, I'd guess many people would assume indoctrinating people to their side of thinking is "better" than slaughter due to the lack of violence, so being more subtle requires deeper thought.. I dunno. I lean both ways on that one. Other options could have been to have two neutral choices, or even the aforementioned options as renegade with a third paragon that didn't take advantage of the opportunity. Of course, the extra "paragon" option wouldn't be entirely good, as it'd drag a war on and produce casualties on both sides, but it wouldn't require a surprise total takeover or suppression.. so there'd arguably be more "honor". That gets into a whole bombing Japan at the end of WWII vs continuing the bloodshed discussion, though, so I'll stop rambling now. (Sorry, folks.)

Mass Effect still amazes me for how much it made me question my ideals and open my mind.

Vonriel

I actually never considered the question from that standpoint. As I played through the games, I arrived at that part at the very end of the story, and due to the events of both games, I was led to believe this faction had already been forcibly changed by another outside source. And as I considered the very same problem, I came to think: If I had been brainwashed against my will, how would I prefer to be treated? Would I rather have the brainwashing removed, or would I rather merely be destroyed? It was without much hesitation that I decided, removing the brainwashing from them was the correct course of action.

I didn't give this question enough thought, however, as I now realize. Sure, from the subjective standpoint I have now, I'd much rather have the brainwashing (Sidenote: Is this really the best way to say it? I can't think of any other way to put it, but simply using the word feels like it detracts from the objectivity I'm trying to approach this sentiment with.) merely reversed, so I can go back to thinking and behaving the way I already do, with the freedom I currently have. But what if I were already brainwashed? How would I feel about having this choice removed from me? I would know, with absolute clarity and beyond any doubt, that what I believed was correct. How would I feel about being changed so fundamentally? I would like to think that, even after being brainwashed, I would still choose to have it reversed. However, how would I ever know that I wasn't merely being brainwashed again? How would I know it had happened in the first place?

For me, this was the question. Not merely, "Is it okay to brainwash someone instead of destroying them, in order to prevent their destruction?" The question was, "Is it okay to undo the brainwashing of someone against their will, in order to prevent their destruction?" I feel the second question is even harder to answer, for the reasons listed above. In essence, although I have this inkling that both questions are the same, the second just feels more complex to me, for the additional level of insecurity it provides.

Material Defender

I have a belief. A philosophy of the idea that the most happiness for the most people is the ideal state of good. It's impossible to bring all the happiness to all the people, such it cannot be an ideal. Just a dream without any conclusion. Not all people can ever be happy, especially since some people only find happiness at the expense of others. This belief though has often trivialized decisions others find hard. "Choose Anora in Dragon Age as Queen because ALister can barely rule himself and clearly lead everything into the ground." Thinking with this cold, logical perspective does tend to impersonalized these decisions. It makes a certain worth in people who may be viewed as evil themselves, even if the consequences of their actions result in a better world.

THe Main issue I had here was the idea that there was no third option. Neither option is really good. Happiness cannot exist without free will. But death is the ultimate opposite of happiness, usually. Thus both decisions basically headbutt with my philosophy directly. Why can't we wipe the virus, destroy the reaper core, and leave these 'heretics' to their existence. Make their own decisions on data that is left by their brothers and organics. The idea that you cannot simply destroy their ability, disarm their super weapon, without killing them all seems a tad forced. Why the lack of a third option in many video games is a glaring and painful lacking option.

Also, I need more Witcher Dilemmas because they forced me to carefully consider my calculations and sometimes throw my personal feelings in because it's not clear which is the 'better' option in terms of my philosophy. But at the end of the day, I felt satisfied with my decisions and attempts to pursue the other side of the debate left me far more dissatisfied with my experience than my previous playthrough. SOrt of why I had to stop playing LA Noire because what I thought Cole Phelps was as an upright, if a tad uptight, individual was just veneer. It disgusted me, that level of dishonesty and giving into a system just rendered it unplayable beyond that point.

JayVeeDee

That happend to me, what happened to james :O (it was this love scene where you had two options, the kid didn't know that the girl was in love with him, and you had two dumb answers xD) But it changed me somehow i don't know why

Mogg

OMG tv commercials. I stopped watching tv because of this crap.
No to the topic... it is a shame though that Mass Effect 1 and 2 have pretty much no impact on the 3rd installment. Also because it is a game I play a character with a set mind frame outside of my own morals. Now that is probably because I am used to doing such as I play pen and paper rpgs. There is always a smidge of myself there, but really not enough to question my own self as it is possible to be any possible mindset/behavior given the right circumstance. And comparing one thing to another is pretty bad as with the example of the geth and changing their current beliefs. Circumstance is similar but in no way is it the same. It's like comparing picking up a $10 note off the floor that you find, or taking a $10 note from a wallet you found. You are still getting the $10 but it is completely different circumstance - so changing a computer's way of working is different from brainwashing a religious fanatic to be an atheist.
Also, the game itself lacked options- a good vast number of options I would have taken besides the ones presented. Kill him/Let him go... No I want to take him in and make him answer for his injustice:: just a random example, but you get the gist, the options were severely limited and had very little impact from the first game, through to the third game.
Good and Evil is also a bad mechanic.. there is no right or wrong, just choice and consequence.

VezRoth

As always from me, an old episode but I feel like I should chime in; I chose to mind-wipe the crazies. Yes, I felt they were crazies, and I can explain why I thought they were nuts! Those who played through the game might not agree, but that's the glory of that part of Mass Effect. I felt like the secessionist Geth were insane because of their worship of the reapers, who, up to that point had made reference, after reference that they did not care a whit about the Geth and who, for all of their worship and reverence were nothing more than a means to an end. Much like Saren himself in the first game. He was nothing more than a means to an end and with my... emotionally bludgeoning weapon that was FemShep I managed to convince Saren - a creature of questionable mental faculties at the time - that he was off his rocker and got him to add a new ventilation site to his head.

The Reapers did not care for anything else but other reapers, and though they were similar to the Geth in their basic design as an AI they were monsters. Creatures(?) operating in a lock-step cycle of genocide and re-evolution. They Non-crazy geth were looking for dreams of self-determination and a life/home of their own. Which I felt was something that all sentient beings should be allowed to work towards.

The crazies were looking for...destruction death at the hands of their own "gods" when the purge was complete. The Reapers used any tool they could and then discarded and picked up a new one whenever the old had lost it's use, either through coercion or flat-out indoctrination.

So I mind wiped the bastards! Yes, I was a renegade dammit.

RaphDS

I totally relate to the feeling of sitting down and thinking through the choices of Mass Effect for extended periods of time! Like James, I had my own "I don't want that either!" moment, and mine was the one for Garrus and Sidonis. There was this knot in my gut knowing what was gonna happen (or not gonna happen) and that I had to "live with that choice" later on.

I think the "embedded into the mechanics" idea was picked up on ME3! The Rachni Queen moment gives me both Renegade, whatever direction I take. Goes to show the mechanics reinforce a no-win situation - lives of Krogan or lives of a volatile Queen?

(All of Dragon Age 1 and 2 are full of stuff like this too, even if flawed. Also especially fond of DA because their "morality" system is really about the party members' moral compasses, with 'approval' ratings. So apt in showing people as being good in front of you, wicked away from you!)

Even the very ending made me ponder the first time I played it. True, I can understand why people were upset months after, but the first time I saw it I sat there, realizing how every option would potentially be so bad, I had to pick "what was gonna work for me and everyone". And I understood that life's like that: we don't always have a "win!" option. We have to deal with it.

Games give us a chance to make these choices and experiences and test them out in places that are safer than real life. I think that's the beauty of the medium.

themocaw

I hit this point in ME2 with Paragon Shep expecting that I would reprogram the Geth. It seemed the kinder option, and we would need the Geth to fight the reapers. . .

. . . then I found out the specifics of what was going on. Namely, that the Heretic Geth were trying to reprogram the other Geth to their way of thinking. . . and I couldn't do it. I couldn't become my enemy. I couldn't indoctrinate the Geth the way that the Reapers indoctrinated others.

Best 30 Renegade Points I ever earned.

themocaw

However, I think that this movie misses a key point about the moral choice system in Mass Effect 2.

Labeling "Renegade" as "bad" and "Paragon" as "good" is oversimplifying the issue. The difference between Renegade and Paragon isn't so much good and evil. . . it's the difference between a Hero and an Anti-Hero. Shepard is the good guy. This is pretty much established from the very beginning. Shepard doesn't have the choice to, say, join Harbinger and help the Reapers take over the galaxy. But Shep does have the power to choose how much he's willing to sacrifice in order to reach his goals.

It's exemplified in the background choices you make. The "Paragon" background, which improves your Paragon advancement, is War Hero: this Shepard is one who is willing to take great personal risk in order to save others. The "Renegade" background is Ruthless: that Shepard made the decision to sacrifice his men to achieve the mission goal.

I don't feel, however, that either choice in this Loyalty mission really exemplifies Paragon. The best would have been allowing Legion to decide the fate of his own people, but that option is disallowed by the game.

HLgamer

Games are a restricted medium, currently, for playing out decisions and consequences in linear game play, which even with almost infinite choices would still be linear simply because it is decision step process through the program. MMO's and MMORPG's give added dimension to what can be learned from playing games including leadership and human interaction skills, group dynamics and dealing with schizms and rejection. There are both planned, intended oportunities for learning in games and unplanned consequencial learning experiences. Even with a game as simple as minecraft, there are decisions to be made and concepts to grasp, such as resource management, understanding limited resources, dilligence to achieve objectives that you have to create on your own. I think the underliing concept here was the value of games to build learning experiences and enrich lives.