History Main / SelectiveCondemnation

* ''Scarface: The World Is Yours''. Tony's whole 'morality' is built on not screwing anyone who didn't give him grief. However, optional side missions with hired guns encourage the murders of civilians. No mention of anything is made if the driver goes on a decapitation rampage in a bank.

** Granted, in Jedi Academy at least, the guy you need to kill or spare is just an unfortunate kid who was intimidated into joining the enemy, has already regretted his defection, and is on his knees, begging for his life. Killing armed terrorists (which is what the remnant are), criminals, and lightsaber wielding psychopaths he'll bent on killing you, is a whole different matter.

* ''Scarface: The World Is Yours''. Tony's whole 'morality' is built on not screwing anyone who didn't give him grief. However, optional side missions with hired guns encourage the murders of civilians. No mention of anything is made if the driver goes on a decaptiation rampage in a bank.

* ''StarWars'', ''JediAcademy'': Killing legions of antagonistic Force-Users and stormtroopers is good healthy Jedi activity. Killing Rosh Penin gets you Dark Sided.
** As with the ''Spiderman: Web of Shadows'' example above, there's a significant difference in killing enemies in battle and killing in cold blood someone who has just said that he realized he was wrong and is asking for your help in returning to your side.
*** Of course, it's [[TheScrappy Ross]], which might warrant an exception, for Light Siders. Just this once?

** And of course there's the last two ''[[DarkForcesSaga Jedi Knight]]'' games, both of which end with an IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim situation after you've just butchered your way through countless [[PunchClockVillain soldiers and technicians]] you're supposedly at peace with.

* ''Knights Of The Old Republic''. Let an innocent old man be smacked around by a mobster's henchmen? You lose vital stats in the 'Light Side' category. Rob house after house after house and terrorize those within? Apparently not a bad thing at all. Your Republic soldier ally says nothing on this.

* In the Xbox beat-um-up game Minority Report, (loosely) based on the movie with Tom Cruise, your character is trying to prove himself innocent of the "future-murder" of someone that the police psychics foresaw him killing. Most of the gameplay is your guy trying to escape the police, by violently beating the shit out of them, smashing them through tables/chairs, throwing them off of skyscrapers, throwing them into huge vats of luminous green shit in a robot factory, etc. And yet, despite the HUNDREDS of murders of police you committed over the course of the game while you were violently resisting arrest and running from the law, you are welcomed back onto the force after it turns out that you didn't kill that one guy.

* ''Assassins Creed II'' Ezio will get reprimanded by his Uncle for not showing respect to the dead, will eventually learn that killing doesn't satisfy him and is only a necessary evil and all the bad guys are represented as bad for their disrespect in human life. However the game will demand that you casually kill random mooks and Ezio will frequently stab guards in the gut repeatedly then toss them aside because they're between him and someone elses' money.

Mainly a videogame trope due to GameplayAndStorySegregation. This is where one specific death/murder is treated as far more dire than the others, despite the circumstances meaning there should be little difference from others considering the [[AMillionIsAStatistic countless people whom you brutally killed before]], especially as you were probably a [[VideogameCrueltyPotential sick puppy who enjoyed torturing them, too]].

* In the Xbox beat-um-up game Minority Report, (loosely) based on the movie with Tom Cruise, your character is trying to prove himself innocent of the "future-murder" of someone that the police psychics foresaw him killing. Most of the gameplay is your guy trying to escape the police, by violently beating the shit out of them, smashing them through tables/chairs, throwing them off of skyscrapers, throwing them into huge vats of luminous green shit in a robot factory, etc. And yet, despite the HUNDREDS of murders of police you commited over the course of the game while you were violently resisting arrest and running from the law, you are welcomed back onto the force after it turns out that you didn't kill that one guy.
** Also, even before you were wanted, your guy was pretty much the most horrifically brutal cop the world has ever seen. In the first mission, you are trying to arrest a guy who runs a catering company. Apparently, the best way to do this was to beat dozens of his employees to death with your bare hands, continue to dadistically beat them and break all the furniture in the board room with their heads after they have gone limp and stopped resisting, force their faces onto lit stoves, and throw them out of skyscraper windows to their deaths. He doesn't even arrest them. And afterwards, he gets complimented for fine police work.

** The protagonist of ''[[GrandTheftAutoViceCity Grand Theft Auto: Vice City]]'' is said to have spent 15 years in prison before the beginning of the game on account of 11 counts of murder. The player can kill far more than that in a rampage, be arrested by the police and reappear immediately afterwards outside a police station, having lost only his weapons and some cash. (There's a small Lampshade Hanging here, as an audio clip is played of the character's lawyer making vague threats to the cops, but one would think it'd take a little more than that...)
*** One Vice City mission -requires- the protaganist to shoot cars/kill people ... because apparently Vietnam really, really sucked. So, yeah.
** ''[[GrandTheftAutoSanAndreas Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas]]'' contains a central plot point involving the protagonist being forced to do the bidding of a crooked cop, who has in possession a gun used in the murder of a police officer. He threatens to use it to frame CJ, and it's implied that this gun alone is evidence enough for a murder conviction and life imprisonment sentence. However, in-game, the player can freely murder police officers in broad daylight (often dozens at a time), and subsequently actually be arrested, with no dire consequences.

*** This treads into WallBanger territory in ''The Lost and Damned'', where your playable character spends several cutscenes chastising his boss/friend for wanting to perpetuate old turf wars and not make his motorcycle gang into a legitimate/respectful and peaceful organization, but turns into a raving lunatic when you do missions or decide to smite a few dozen pedestrians.

** Also, why is there not any kind of a coordinated police response to a madman with an assault rifle firing indiscriminately into crowds of people at a street party, one where a politician is about to give a speech no less? Same goes for my paramilitary assault on the Casino. In both cases, there were HUNDREDS of casualties, and the screams of the dying and roar of assault rifle fire should have been audible for blocks around. Why didnt somebody call the cops for fucks sake?
*** Same goes for any mission after I discovered you could put a 100-round drum on the M4, really :D

** Also, why is there not any kind of a coordinated police response to a madman with an assault rifle firing indiscriminately into crowds of people at a street party, one where a politician is about to give a speech no less? Same goes for my paramilitary assault on the Casino. In both cases, there were HUNDREDS of casualties, and the screams of the dying and roar of assault rifle fire should have been audible for blocks around. Why didnt somebody call the cops for fucks sake?

** Also, why is there not any kind of a coordinated police response to a madman with an assault rifle firing indiscriminately into crowds of people at a street party, one where a politician is about to give a speech no less?

* In ''Condemned: Criminal Origins'', the player character must bludgeon dozens of homeless people to death in order to hopefully prove his innocence in the murder of two police officers. It must be said, however, that the bluedgeonings were pretty much done in self-defense.

** It goes further in MGS4, where offing too many people causes Snake to have a flashback to Liquid's "you like the killing" speech, after which he loses a healthy chunk of Morale.

** Also, even before you were wanted, your guy was pretty much the most horrifically brutal cop the world has ever seen. In the first mission, you are trying to arrest a guy who runs a catering company. Apparently, the best way to do this was to beat dozens of his employees to death with your bare hands, break all the furniture in the board room with their heads after they have gone limp and stopped resisting, force their faces onto lit stoves, and throw them out of skyscraper windows to their deaths. Afterwards, your guy gets complimented for fine police work.