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[Sergarr]

Games with a forced, unavoidable moral message

I can't explain it decently in the title, but I'm talking about something like this:
you are talking with the evil enemy, and he says something like "Well, look at all the people you killed. We are not so different, you chose to be evil too".

The only problem: the game never gives you any other option; if the only way I have to win a level is by killing people, I won't feel so bad when you call me out on that. It wasn't much of a choice if it was the only way possible.

(Can't remember the example right now, but I found this in some game I played a while ago)

I'm almost sure that the game you're talking about is Spec Ops: The Line.

[94dima94]

I'm almost sure that the game you're talking about is Spec Ops: The Line.

Yeah, that's it. I understand the message and everything, I think the game is quite good, but without that, it's just weaker.

[Aseaheru]

 The game does react differently depending on how you do some things, but yah, you cant avoid most of it. Its mostly little things, like telling your minion to shoot a guy while you do a thing instead of you shooting the guy while minion does the thing.

[94dima94]

Related to that, I also hate when a game technically gives you a choice, but that choice doesn't matter anyway.

I believe it was Watch_Dogs? I think? Maybe?
You have the option to take down enemies with non lethal attacks; nothing in the game is in any way different because of this. A player killing everyone and another killing nobody will have the exact same dialogues, scenes and reactions.

[itisnotlogical]

That reminds me of Rainbow Six 3, an Xbox shooter nobody seems to remember (it was honestly quite forgettable).

You're supposedly an international police force. Lone terrorists will occasionally surrender to you without a fight. You can still totally blow their brains out and nothing happens. Not even flavor dialogue from your NPC squad. Arresting them doesn't give you bonus points or new gear or anything. Leaving them alone doesn't do anything either. It's weird and pointless. IIRC, it's not even mentioned in the manual.

Although, this is also a game where foreign troops enter a sovereign country and plant a bomb on a civilian plane owned by a private citizen on the basis of off-screen "evidence", so there's that.

[Rolan7]

In Time Shift, you can disarm enemies with time powers or just by shooting their guns out of their hands.  They usually panic and surrender, particularly if their buddies are dead.

...  Except that the second you look away, or even if you watch them long enough, they always make a run for the nearest weapon.  Even engineers that only had pistols to start with.  I get that it's fascist techno-dictatorship and all but...  Come on, the PC is basically the Flash with a rapidly regenerating powershield.  He was waaay over there, ate a rocket to the face, then suddenly 4 guys heads explode from explosive darts and the 5th gets flung across the room.  And he's holding your gun.

no yeah go for that pistol, sigh

I know most games are basically like this, this one's just disappointing because you can disarm them and they very clearly surrender, begging for mercy.  Then change their mind.

[94dima94]

I know most games are basically like this, this one's just disappointing because you can disarm them and they very clearly surrender, begging for mercy.  Then change their mind.

Doesn't that happen in Skyrim too? Sometimes enemies give up and run away, but if they are healed in any way they come back and attack again?

I'm not sure, but I distinctly remember playing and saying "he gave up, but I'll kill him anyway, he'll start attacking again in a few seconds".

[Metalax]

Yes, in Skyrim most living humanoids if brought to low health would stop fighting and claim that they submitted only to get back up and start fighting you again after their passive regen brought their health back up again. A number of animals would flee if injured to the same extent, but again would return to attack as soon as their health had crept back up over the threshold.

Fortunately this being a elder scrolls game mods were able to fix it.

[ThtblovesDF]

Games with a forced, unavoidable moral message
-snip-

I'm almost sure that the game you're talking about is Spec Ops: The Line.

I really liked that game, except for:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Where you have to napalm-motar (or phorperus?) the civilians.

In each other situation you have a choice, to some degree, like

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

shoting down the rope of the guys being hanged.

[itisnotlogical]

It's not like in the games/movies/books except it totally is so nevermind

A cliche that applies more to storytelling in general than games specifically, but it's one that has annoyed me in a video game lately.

VTM:B has every second or third character telling you that things aren't like they are in the books or movies... yet they're pretty similar. Vampire societies aren't uncommon in urban fantasy, and maybe the Vampire tabletop game came first, but I'm pretty sure that at least The Dresden Files were out by the time Bloodlines was released.

Besides that, it's incredibly egotistical. "Yeah, my setting's so cool and original, you can't just skate by this shit on what you learned from popular culture!"

[Rolan7]

While you're mostly right...  Our coterie has an in-joke that the Blade movies are vampire tutorials.
Following the Blade movies would get a WoD vampire killed on the first sunrise, if not sooner.  (Or paranoid of harmless stuff like garlic or UV light, or *silver*).

[Neonivek]

Though in an interesting reverse of the situation one of the Vampires says they are immune to crosses. Which is true, except that myth is actually based on fact as the crosses of those with "True Faith" can, in fact, repel vampires when wielded by that person.

Besides that, it's incredibly egotistical. "Yeah, my setting's so cool and original, you can't just skate by this shit on what you learned from popular culture!"

I wouldn't take it to heart. The Vampires of the World of darkness aren't trying to be so much different. so much that they are a combination of every bit of vampire lore and versions of vampires into a cohesive setting.

Heck it even has "Blade" Vampires (well Old World of Darkness did). Heck Dhampirs exist.

[Rolan7]

I wouldn't take it to heart. The Vampires of the World of darkness aren't trying to be so much different. so much that they are a combination of every bit of vampire lore and versions of vampires into a cohesive setting.

Yeah I never played Masquerade (except Bloodlines) but the Requiem manual is actually pretty explicit that each clan represents a separate vampire type from myth.  So you've got your vampires of unquenchable passion, hideous monsters, superior nobles, and werewolves (okay shapechangers).

It's kinda telling that every Masquerade clan claimed Dracula as a member, and had a decent case!

I think the weirdest Requiem clan is probably the one I'm playing, Mekhet.  It's Egyptian, and kinda similar in some ways to the Kuei-jin.  They're basically... spies who preserve and trade knowledge, like librarians.  They seem a bit un-Dracula compared to the rest, and I think they were a bit rare in ancient Rome (more common in Carthage and Alexandria).

Also there are even Twilight "vamps", sorta maybe, if you believe in that Golconda nonsense (;

[MrRoboto75]

Rasputin also apparently belonged to every vampire clan IIRC

[Neonivek]

Rasputin also apparently belonged to every vampire clan IIRC

Kind of accurate.

It is more that they all are trying to claim he was part of their clan. Double bonus that there isn't even any evidence that he was a vampire (In fact... more evidence that he wasn't).

Kind of makes the Vampires more human that they have petty squabbles like this.