Adding Moral Choices to games...do they really matter?

"Game developer Andrew Doull recently asked readers of his blog whether players of his upcoming game should be able to get enemies to surrender"-Kotaku.com. It's a concept not completely new to games but it seldom works. If the game gave the player the option to choose for example a surrendering enemy I would say 9 out of 10 times they'll still kill them. Why not, with games today pushing higher and higher body counts the environment for morality seems like a mute point. If it moves, kill it. that's the state games are in right now and no one really is crying for choice in their FPS murder romps. And if there was such an implementation of choice to let one live in a fire fight it begs the question what's to stop them( the NPC) from picking up the gun once you turn your back? As for right now this AI addition has a hard uphill battle to seep into games because gamers have nothing to attach emotion to. Red Steel tried to reward the player more for letting defeated foes live but at the end of a hard fight with no emotional connection to whom your fighting why not just finish the foe because the only reason I can see letting one live would be for the reward mechanic but its still shallow at best, nothing is done in the game to encourage an honorable fight when they are constantly yelling you suck and are a "gaijin" (a Japanese slur towards westerners) So Kotaku brings up the discussion to get both sides of the argument but as for what I think Games and the players of today have been too accustomed to if it moves shoot it and when you give no incentive or reason to spare someone, why do it? So ask you the reader what's do you think? Would you welcome this addition or fail to see the point? Add your comments.

January 8, 2010