8 Obvious Moral Choices In Video Games You Couldn't Make
6. Fallout: New Vegas – Are The ‘Good’ Factions Really All That Good?
The set-up: On their journey through New Vegas’ post-apocalyptic wasteland players can align themselves with one of three factions, the New California Republic, Mr House or Caesar’s Legion, or go solo and take the Independent route.
The obvious choice: The NCR is democratic, and the Independent option offers self-governance. With Mr House being a manipulative autocrat and the Legion a brutal military dictatorship that uses slave labour, the morally superior choice is clear, and most players agree.
The reality: Look closer and what you think is clear cut, really isn’t. The NCR brings democracy, yes, but don’t give people a choice in joining. Independence means self-governance, sure, but you’re the one left calling the shots, and power is a fiendishly corrupting little devil. As for the morally grey choice, House may be a sly capitalist, but he saved Vegas from the nuclear apocalypse and created a society out of some barely civilized tribals. And for the downright bad, while the Legion may be savage they also keep the peace, so much so that New Vegas traders prefer to trade in their territory.
As a dilemma it’s a thoroughly realistic one, and what makes New Vegas such a fascinating moral quagmire to navigate.