History Main / SelectiveCondemnation

* ''TombRaider: Angel of Darkness'': Lara is framed for Von Croy's murder and chased by the Paris police force; never mind the many, many people she actually does kill in the game and in the earlier games; including innocent museum guards in the middle of London, most of the staff of Area 51 (surely the USA must have some cameras at one of its most important facilities?) and a gang massacre in broad daylight on the streets of Venice.

* Averted in the dumbest way possible in the TekWar game. Your mission control (played by William Shatner) will complain at you for your body count before and after missions if you kill anybody. So far, so good. However the game's kill counter includes every enemy killed, regardless of type, so you can wind up getting a reprimand for all the blood you've shed when you, among other things, kill rats in the SewerLevel or blow up remote operated gun turrets. It does not ''at all'' help that police in civilian are programmed to react to your drawing a gun, but [[CantGetAwayWithNuthin not anybody else]], meaning it's fairly likely to be on a subway with half a dozen criminals shooting bullets at you while the police stand by and ignore it, then they sudden fire on you and call for backup because you pulled out your taser in self defense.

* Nathan Drake, protagonist of the Uncharted series, is the most accomplished spree killer / mass murderer in the history of mankind by the end of the third game.
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* ''VideoGame/KingdomOfLoathing'' gives you [[http://kol.coldfront.net/thekolwiki/index.php/Finger-Lickin%27..._Death a chance to bet on a cockfight]]. If you choose to walk away, it mentions how disgusted you are by the concept, and that you should go slaughter some more Yetis for their meat.

Occasionally a JustifiedTrope if the character surrenders or is at the characters mercy, as opposed to self-defense. If jail or some non-lethal alternative is not available, though, one wonders just what the character was supposed to do.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Galerians}}'', Rion, the main character, seems upset and remorseful after killing [[spoiler:Birdman]], when the player could and most likely DID kill several scientists, [[spoiler:security guards, insane people, guards in mechanical armor that initially appear to be robots, artificially created but intelligent monsters, and fellow psychics]], and also destroyed [[spoiler:an android that the player and character thought was human until he was severely injured]] before reaching this point in the game.
** Slightly subverted in the fact that it is entirely possible to run from and not even have to ATTACK a single enemy in the game up to that point [[spoiler:with the exception of the first boss, who is actually just an android]], though this is somewhat difficult and due to the fact that [[spoiler:Rion's powers can 'short' and cause him to automatically kill any normal enemy in the area until calmed down]], a player has to practically go considerably out of their way to avoid killing anyone.

* In ''StarWars: KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'', there is a quest to find Sunry, a Republic spy charged with murdering Sith spy Elassa Huros, innocent in court. The player can only free him if they convince the judges that Sunry was not the murderer (in a twist, he actually ''is''). Yet the player can (and, in fact, has to) infiltrate the Sith base, slaughter its entire personnel, and then convince the judges to let them go. In fact, the game [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] this when Sunry says to Jolee Bindo, one of the player's party members: "All I did was kill a Sith! How many have you killed? Hundreds? Thousands?" Of course, there is a ''slight'' difference between killing armed enemies who are shooting at you, and murdering a defenseless woman in her sleep. After having sex with her. Which Jolee himself will point out.
** Better than the other way around.

* 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.
** 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 hell-bent on killing you, is a whole different matter.
* In ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'', attempting to loot a corpse that was killed by another player prompts your character to say "That would be ''stealing''" - never mind the questionable ethics of scavenging the corpses of thousands of [=NPCs=] the player has himself killed.
** Made particularly entertaining by the fact that this message only comes up when the server lags badly enough to interrupt the loot process - [=NPCs=] killed by other players don't even appear as lootable in the retail version. This is probably an artifact from the alpha/beta versions.
*** Especially entertaining because your character gets involved in murder, assassination, arson, kidnapping (of infants in some cases), slavery, genocide, chemical/biological warfare, killing refugees, ripping people's hearts out to summon demons, killing prisoners, killing allies, backstabbing and a whole host of other [[strike:fun]] morally reprehensible actions.
** Also, in Northrend, a certain faction gets very upset for a while when you kill animals in the zone... but killing animals anywhere else is fair game.
*** Especially since they're clearly investigating you very closely to determine whether the blood on you from the thing you killed three or less minutes ago came from a humanoid or beast. Killing people is okay, but not the wildlife. Probably intentional. Those wacky druids!
**** Definitely intentional, since the group in question is an AnimalWrongsGroup.
* At the end of the movie ''{{Equilibrium}}'', the BigBad argues that the hero cannot kill him, as doing so would be murder, something that should be reprehensible to the hero now that he can feel emotions. The BigBad seems to be conveniently forgetting the 60 or so Mooks the hero just slaughtered to get to him, a dozen or so of whom are laying dead ''right at his feet''.
** Given his statement of "I live, I breathe, I feel" he might have been differentiating between himself and [[spoiler: the people on Prozium, who aren't "alive" in the same way as the BigBad and Preston.]] Of course, he took a fraction of a second to think it over, so still not very effective.
*** If anything, the speech just ''motivated'' Preston, because the BigBad is demonstrating how much he needs to go by marginalizing the soldiers who are [[spoiler: on Prozium]] while he himself is being the consummate hypocrite dictator.
* In ''SpiderManWebOfShadows'', you're often given a Light Side or Dark Side choice after defeating each boss. The Dark Side choice typically results in you beating the crap out of (but not killing) the boss (who's still in fighting condition, by the way). Somehow this is considered an "evil" act, despite the incredible pummeling you'd inflicted on the boss during the boss fight itself.
** Except that there is a slight difference between ''doing what you must in order to stop a dangerous man from harming innocent people'' and ''using excessive force in order to turn someone into pudding ForTheEvulz''. That's the whole point of morality; it's not what you do, it's the way that you do it and why.
*** Of course this issue is subverted... averted...? It does a triple axel backflip before hitting the ground at mach three, at least. One of the particularly bizarre morale "quandries" is thus; Dark Side - Rough up Electro and call him a loser for dying. He -gets up- out of pure rage and survives to help with the symbiote invasion. Light Side - Handle Electro with kids gloves, he dies peacefully in your arms. DIES. What's the moral of this story exactly??
* 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. Then again, they ''are'' homeless people. TruthInTelevision and all that.
* Your VoiceWithAnInternetConnection in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'' gets very upset if you massacre animals (even attack dogs). Nobody bats an eye if you kill guards, even if you do something [[VideoGameCrueltyPotential horrible]] to them. Except in [=MGS3=], where [[spoiler:The Sorrow]] will [[VideoGameCrueltyPunishment punish you]] quite frighteningly.
** Well, the people you run into in ''MetalGear'' games typically are either enemy soldiers or AxCrazy supervillains; you're an agent sent to stop their plans (in effect: Kill them before they nuke something), so killing them is precisely the goal that your supervisors want done. Meanwhile, gunning down rats does nothing except waste ammo and demonstrate sadism.
** Actually, Liquid speculates that Snake ''does'' enjoy the killing, and [[HannibalLecture calls him out for this]] at the end of ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid''. Snake claims that Liquid's plot to catapult the world into a chaotic, war-torn state is insane; Liquid argues that it was their father's dream to create a world where soldiers are respected. Snake claims he doesn't want that world, and Liquid counters by [[NotSoDifferent pointing out most of FoxHound and many mooks were killed by Snake]]; this is presumably intended to make the player think about their actions.
** 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.
* ''{{Runescape}}'', like many other [=MMORPGs=], is particularly heavy offender thus making your main character extremely hypocritical. That is {{Lampshaded}} quite often in this game.
* Averted in ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphonia''. Main character Lloyd does ''not'' consider any one life to be more important than another, from the lowliest Mooks to the Big Bad himself, and his biggest goal in the game is to avoid deaths on both sides of the war. Mind you, he'll still kill endless hordes of enemies [[GameplayAndStorySegregation if the player is so inclined,]] but he'll at least feel bad about it later.
** Furthermore, it's {{lampshaded}} by Genis, who says he has no right to condemn Regal for being a self-admitted murderer when he's [[RandomEncounters had to kill several dozens, if not hundreds, of people to get to this point in the story]].
** That said, that skit about bearing the responsibility for Magnius's life seems a bit awkward, as you've fought quite a few humans by that point. Also, Lloyd doesn't seem to care about having taken out the Desians that saw his face at the Human Ranch very early in the game.
*** That was perfectly understandable in the beginning, considering the [[PathOfInspiration Church of Martel]] depicts the Desians as TheDevil.
** Also, ''TalesOfVesperia'' in spades, where an important subplot is the KnightInShiningArmor Flynn, who believes that justice is something that needs to be worked through its own rules, and Yuri, who is a vigilante. Especially comical when Flynn, then Yuri's party, call him out on [[spoiler:the murders of two corrupt nobles]]. Because all the knights crawling the capitol and all the bandits you meet on the road don't count as much. And the everyone else ''helped'' with those.
*** Those knights and thieves were ''actively trying to kill the party''. Ragou and Cumore were defenseless and could have been caught and brought in to the (horribly flawed) justice system.

* ''VideoGame/TheWorldEndsWithYou'': Neku and Beat must kill at least a dozen {{Red Shirt}}s in the third week. [[spoiler: ALL the Reapers are brainwashed by O-pins, except one lucky bastard who missed the memo requiring him to wear his.]] Yet Beat and Neku only spare the three that are identified [=NPCs=], 777, Usuki, and Kariya. When Neku suggests that they erase the latter two he says something along the lines of, we can't kill them because they're BrainwashedAndCrazy. Especially egregious because Uzuki and Kariya were the only Non-Game Master Reapers actively trying to erase them at any point in the game, while the rest just made you buy stuff or fight Noise. Even if it took them till Day 6 to realise that the Reapers were brainwashed on day seven he goes back to erasing hapless {{Red Shirt}}s. Of course... The Red Shirts in question were all of the Harrier (player-erasing) variety rather than Support (fetch-quest-assigning) variety, and Kariya had been erratically nice to Neku. Of course, Uzuki was still pretty violent for pretty much the whole game.
** 777 doesn't even have that excuse, this was back when the reapers were attacking you for promotions. 777's way of saying "thank you" for running around Shibuya for him, apparently.
* In ''{{Arcanum}}'' one can streak through town all they like and get no real lasting penalties from it, but when you do it for a quest everyone reacts and you get a bad reputation out of it.

** Used in a ridiculous way in the original ''{{Fable}}''. Generally, you get good Karma Points for killing bandits and monsters, the explanation obviously being that you rid society of evil and that they can't do any more harm. However you get Evil Karma Points for killing the Bandit Chief Twinblade. Sure, he has surrendered, but it's not like you redeemed or anything, leaving him alive would just lead to him eventually doing more evil. It should be the other way round, really.
*** Especially since one the quests you DO get good alignment for, revolves around you helping the Bowerstone guards drag a bandit prisoner up the hill to be beheaded as he cries and screams and begs for mercy (once you are within sight of the bloodstained chopping block in a cutscene).
* ''[[TabletopGame/VampireTheMasquerade Vampire: The Masquerade -- Redemption]]'' consists mainly of the ever-pious Christof cutting a swath of violence through one dungeon after another. He invariably says something along the lines of "can't we work this out peacefully?" upon reaching the boss. Y'know, because ''we're all God's children''... except for those of us whose names happen to be "[[{{Mooks}} Setite]]".]
* ''{{Hitman}}: Blood Money'' - The newspaper articles quite clearly say that dead guards just aren't that important; logical when you off a drug baron, not so much at the Paris Opera.
** It actually serves a more pragmatic reason; the police simply assume that any guards that were killed were murdered so the assassin could get to his real target. As such, it just makes sense to try to solve who killed the main target; it's not like the guard was specifically targeted for death, he was just in the way.

** Justified in that the guards really want you dead (they actively look for you and attack on sight [[spoiler: with one exception]]) while the Overseer does not show such bloodthirsty tendencies and can be reasoned with.
*** Debatable, they actively look for you and attack on sight because the Overseer ordered them to (after having them kill your dad's friend). Just because he's too cowardly or "civilized" to get his hands dirty with the actual violence, should he really be spared him from reprisal?
*** The overseer also asks you to surrender and hand over your weapon. If you do so, he starts shooting you with the weapon.
* In ''AdvanceWars: Dual Strike'', the BigBad Von Bolt dares you to shoot him in order to stop his evil scheme, claiming it would [[IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim make you as bad as he is.]] This in spite of the hundreds, possibly thousands, of enemy units you've killed and allied units destroyed under your command to get this far. Not to mention the deaths that would be caused if he did succeed. Bear in mind that you ''can'' say "Yes", in which case Jake basically points out the above and shoots him.
** No, Jake shoots his life-support device. Which has the same end effect.
* KingdomOfLoathing gives you [[http://kol.coldfront.net/thekolwiki/index.php/Finger-Lickin%27..._Death a chance to bet on a cockfight]]. If you choose to walk away, it mentions how disgusted you are by the concept, and that you should go slaughter some more Yetis for their meat.
* ''RainbowSix Vegas 2'' has an odd version. Shoot teammates or civilians too much and you get a NonstandardGameOver and lose experience points. Toss a block of C4 into the room with the captured NSA agent from the second level and blow him up along with the terrorists guarding him, though... Granted, he ''is'' scripted to die no matter what you do, but still.

Many examples of IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim fall under this, and it tends to be even more obnoxious for video games as the number of people you killed before that moment is likely to be exponentially higher. Guess all those [[{{Mooks}} minor enemies]] you sliced through on the way over [[WhatMeasureIsAMook don't count]], at least as far as the {{Cutscene}} is concerned.

* The ''GrandTheftAuto'' series does this several times:
** 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 afterward 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...)

** ''[[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 his 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.

** Oh, yes, in all three GTA games, if you are skilled you can escape punishment for murder of cops by -bribing- them.
** ''GrandTheftAutoIV'' introduces "morality choices," points in the story at which the player is given the option to kill certain characters, or let them go. The story treats murder as a very serious subject, and Niko often expresses regret if the player opts for the "kill" route. This is all despite the fact that the player is encouraged, and indeed sometimes must, kill hundreds of (sometimes innocent) people in-game, something the player can do with near-impunity.
* In ''StarWars: {{Knights of the Old Republic}}'', there is a quest to find Sunry, a Republic spy charged with murdering Sith spy Elassa Huros, innocent in court. The player can only free him if they convince the judges that Sunry was not the murderer (in a twist, he actually ''is''). Yet the player can (and, in fact, has to) infiltrate the Sith base, slaughter its entire personnel, and then convince the judges to let them go. In fact, the game [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] this when Sunry says to Jolee Bindo, one of the player's party members: "All I did was kill a Sith! How many have you killed? Hundreds? Thousands?" Of course, there is a ''slight'' difference between killing armed enemies who are shooting at you, and murdering a defenseless woman in her sleep. After having sex with her. Which Jolee himself will point out.

* In ''{{World of Warcraft}}'', attempting to loot a corpse that was killed by another player prompts your character to say "That would be ''stealing''" - never mind the questionable ethics of scavenging the corpses of thousands of [=NPCs=] the player has himself killed.

* Your VoiceWithAnInternetConnection in ''MetalGearSolid'' gets very upset if you massacre animals (even attack dogs). Nobody bats an eye if you kill guards, even if you do something [[VideoGameCrueltyPotential horrible]] to them. Except in [=MGS3=], where [[spoiler:The Sorrow]] will [[VideoGameCrueltyPunishment punish you]] quite frighteningly.
** Well, the people you run into in ''MetalGear'' games typically are either enemy soldiers or AxCrazy supervillains; you're an agent sent to stop their plans (in effect: Kill them before they nuke something), so killing them is precisely the goal that your supervisors want done. Meanwhile, gunning down rats does nothing except waste ammo and demonstrate sadism.
** Actually, Liquid speculates that Snake ''does'' enjoy the killing, and [[HannibalLecture calls him out for this]] at the end of ''MetalGearSolid''. Snake claims that Liquid's plot to catapult the world into a chaotic, war-torn state is insane; Liquid argues that it was their father's dream to create a world where soldiers are respected. Snake claims he doesn't want that world, and Liquid counters by [[NotSoDifferent pointing out most of FoxHound and many mooks were killed by Snake]]; this is presumably intended to make the player think about their actions.

* Averted in ''VideoGame/{{Tales of Symphonia}}''. Main character Lloyd does ''not'' consider any one life to be more important than another, from the lowliest Mooks to the Big Bad himself, and his biggest goal in the game is to avoid deaths on both sides of the war. Mind you, he'll still kill endless hordes of enemies [[GameplayAndStorySegregation if the player is so inclined,]] but he'll at least feel bad about it later.

** That said, that skit about bearing the responsibility for Magnius's life seems a bit awkward, as you've fought quite a few humans by that point. Also, Lloyd doesn't seem to care about having taken out the Desians that saw his face at the Human Ranch very early in the game.

** Also, ''{{Tales of Vesperia}}'' in spades, where an important subplot is the KnightInShiningArmor Flynn, who believes that justice is something that needs to be worked through its own rules, and Yuri, who is a vigilante. Especially comical when Flynn, then Yuri's party, call him out on [[spoiler:the murders of two corrupt nobles]]. Because all the knights crawling the capitol and all the bandits you meet on the road don't count as much. And the everyone else ''helped'' with those.

* In ''{{VideoGame/Fable}}'' you can slice, magic, and shoot through hordes of NPC enemies, villagers, town guards, and the like. You can kill your best friend in the arena, defeat her brother for the hand of an evil woman and kill an ex-hero. You can steal from shops, break into homes, cheat at bar games, and sacrifice villagers for better weapons and still be able to repent for all that. Murder your sister for the ultimate power? Its implied that you are a heartless bastard and go on to be a tyrant.

<<|AcceptableBreaksFromReality|>>
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* At the end of ''{{Fallout 3}}'', you have to option of sparing the life of Colonel Autumn, TheDragon whose only shown redeeming feature is that he doesn't want to use the modified FEV, who shot a defenseless female scientist just to encourage the rest of the team, and who willfully ordered the soldiers at Raven's Rock to attack you even after his ''superior'' had ordered them to stand down so he could talk to you. Meanwhile you don't spare a single thought for every drugged-up raider, every feral ghoul, every supermutant and every Enclave soldier following his Colonel's order that you've shot, burned, stabbed and vaporised over the course of the game. Even at the start of the game you're condemned by Amata if you kill the Overseer, but not a single word is said about all his guards you killed on the way out. ''People you've known all your life.''

* In ''{{Galerians}}'', Rion, the main character, seems upset and remorseful after killing [[spoiler:Birdman]], when the player could and most likely DID kill several scientists, [[spoiler:security guards, insane people, guards in mechanical armor that initially appear to be robots, artificially created but intelligent monsters, and fellow psychics]], and also destroyed [[spoiler:an android that the player and character thought was human until he was severely injured]] before reaching this point in the game.

* Averted in ''{{Tales of Symphonia}}''. Main character Lloyd does ''not'' consider any one life to be more important than another, from the lowliest Mooks to the Big Bad himself, and his biggest goal in the game is to avoid deaths on both sides of the war. Mind you, he'll still kill endless hordes of enemies [[GameplayAndStorySegregation if the player is so inclined,]] but he'll at least feel bad about it later.

* In ''AdvanceWars: Dual Strike'', the BigBad Von Bolt dares you to shoot him in order to stop his evil scheme, claiming it would [[IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim make you as bad as he is.]] This in spite of the hundreds, possibly thousands, of enemy units you've killed and allied units destroyed under your command to get this far. Not to mention the deaths that would be caused if he did succeed.

** ''TalesOfTheAbyss'' also plays a bit with this trope: There are no RandomEncounters with human enemies until Luke kills a human in a cutscene and suffers a HeroicBSOD for it: Barring cheating, it is virtually impossible for Luke to have killed a human in a battle up until that point.
* ''TheWorldEndsWithYou'': Neku and Beat must kill at least a dozen {{Red Shirt}}s in the third week. [[spoiler: ALL the Reapers are brainwashed by O-pins, except one lucky bastard who missed the memo requiring him to wear his.]] Yet Beat and Neku only spare the three that are identified [=NPCs=], 777, Usuki, and Kariya. When Neku suggests that they erase the latter two he says something along the lines of, we can't kill them because they're BrainwashedAndCrazy. Especially egregious because Uzuki and Kariya were the only Non-Game Master Reapers actively trying to erase them at any point in the game, while the rest just made you buy stuff or fight Noise. Even if it took them till Day 6 to realise that the Reapers were brainwashed on day seven he goes back to erasing hapless {{Red Shirt}}s. Of course... The Red Shirts in question were all of the Harrier (player-erasing) variety rather than Support (fetch-quest-assigning) variety, and Kariya had been erratically nice to Neku. Of course, Uzuki was still pretty violent for pretty much the whole game.

<<|GameplayAndStorySegregation|>>

* In ''{{Fable}}'' you can slice, magic, and shoot through hordes of NPC enemies, villagers, town guards, and the like. You can kill your best friend in the arena, defeat her brother for the hand of an evil woman and kill an ex-hero. You can steal from shops, break into homes, cheat at bar games, and sacrifice villagers for better weapons and still be able to repent for all that. Murder your sister for the ultimate power? Its implied that you are a heartless bastard and go on to be a tyrant.

*** One Vice City mission -requires- the protagonist to shoot cars/kill people ... because apparently Vietnam really, really sucked. So, yeah.

** Not to mention the time CJ and Ryder stole a ton of guns from a National Guard depot, shooting dozens of soldiers in the process. You know, ''treason''.
** An optional side-quest requires CJ, the protaganist, to murder about twenty police officers. Why are they gunning for him? He took pictures of blueprints for a casino.

* In ''StarWars: {{Knights of the Old Republic}}'', there is a quest to find Sunry, a Republic spy charged with murdering Sith spy Elassa Huros, innocent in court. The player can only free him if they convince the judges that Sunry was not the murderer (in a twist, he actually ''is''). Yet the player can (and, in fact, has to) infiltrate the Sith base, slaughter its entire personnel, and then convince the judges to let them go. In fact, the game [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] this when Sunry says to Jolee Bindo, one of the player's party members: "All I did was kill a Sith! How many have you killed? Hundreds? Thousands?" Of course, there is a ''slight'' difference between killing armed enemies who are shooting at you, and murdering a defenseless woman in her sleep. After having sex with her.

** 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 hell-bent on killing you, is a whole different matter.

* ''Hitman: Blood Money'' - The newspaper articles quite clearly say that dead guards just aren't that important; logical when you off a drug baron, not so much at the Paris Opera.

* In ''Spider-Man: Web of Shadows'', you're often given a Light Side or Dark Side choice after defeating each boss. The Dark Side choice typically results in you beating the crap out of (but not killing) the boss (who's still in fighting condition, by the way). Somehow this is considered an "evil" act, despite the incredible pummeling you'd inflicted on the boss during the boss fight itself.

* In ''AdvanceWars: Dual Strike'', the BigBad Von Bolt dares you to shoot him in order to stop his evil scheme, claiming it would [[IfYouKillHimYouWouldBeJustLikeHim make you as bad as he is.]] This in spite of the hundreds, possibly thousands, of enemy units you've killed and allied units destroyed under your command to get this far. Not to mention the deaths that would be caused if he did succeed.

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 probably [[VideogameCrueltyPotential enjoyed torturing them, too]].

* ''[[VampireTheMasquerade Vampire: The Masquerade -- Redemption]]'' consists mainly of the ever-pious Christof cutting a swath of violence through one dungeon after another. He invariably says something along the lines of "can't we work this out peacefully?" upon reaching the boss. Y'know, because ''we're all God's children''... except for those of us whose names happen to be "[[{{Mooks}} Setite]]".]