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| 13 | * ''VideoGame/AceCombat'': |
| 14 | ** The games are known for carrying the theme that nuclear weapons are bad. However, the wars in this series break out [[ForeverWar every five or so years]] because nuclear proliferation doesn't exist in its universe (only one country in the series is known to have developed, much less used, nuclear weapons), on top of everyone suffering from BystanderSyndrome and completely refusing to involve themselves even to broker a truce in a war directly along their border (e.g. the Aurelia-Leasath War in ''VideoGame/{{Ace Combat X|SkiesOfDeception}}'' or the Anean Continental War of ''VideoGame/{{Ace Combat 6|FiresOfLiberation}}'' both taking place right next to the respective America and Russia superpower stand-ins). Even worse, the various super weapons that are ''supposed'' to serve as a deterrent fail as such for a variety of reasons, typically because nobody outside its country of origin knows about it until it's used to fire the opening shots of a war or pulled out to turn the tide of a war that's gone badly, completely defeating the point of a deterrent. Combine this with the fact that ever since ''VideoGame/{{Ace Combat 5|TheUnsungWar}}'', Belka - the aforementioned only country known to have nuclear weapons - has in some way or another turned out to be TheManBehindTheMan for [[PlotTumor every single bad thing that's happened in the series since]], even {{ret|con}}roactively, and the message turns from a valid "nukes are bad because they have the potential to destroy the world" to a simplistic and childlike "nukes are bad [[HitlerAteSugar because only bad people use them]]". |
| 15 | ** ''VideoGame/AceCombatAssaultHorizon'' tries very hard to sell itself as a ''VideoGame/ModernWarfare'' with fighter pilots instead of SAS operators, with the same "WarIsHell and not at all glamorous" message. All well and good... except, much like the entire rest of the series, all the "hell" on the ground is invisible from the air unless [[DeathFromAbove you're directly causing it]] (at which point it is awesome), "fighter pilot" is one of the most (if not the ''only'') glamorous MOS in existence, and you are not only a fighter pilot, you're one so legendarily good that allies praise the Lord and enemies crap their pants just when you ''show up'' over a battlefield. War Is Hell... unless you're an awesome fighter pilot, [[DoNotDoThisCoolThing because then war rocks?]] |
| 16 | * ''Franchise/AceAttorney'' often tells us that the ends never justify the means. This is even repeated often enough to the point of being ArcWords of Case 3 of ''VisualNovel/PhoenixWrightAceAttorneyDualDestinies''. The thing is the phrase is used to justify using questionable means to achieve ''noble'' goals, while the villain who represents this viewpoint has anything but. The "end" that is supposed to justify those means is getting away with murder, which was commited because the villain was taking bribes and wanted to get away with it. What's more the main characters who generally ''do'' have noble goals in mind have no choice but to use said "means" to save the day. In the very first game, Mia Fey is forced to blackmail Redd White into turning himself in, as he just has too much money and influence to be taken down cleanly. And later games show main protagonists like Miles Edgeworth and Phoenix Wright ultimately being forced to resort to illegal evidence to take down villains who are similarly "above the law". |
| 17 | * ''VideoGame/AlwaysSometimesMonsters'' has its moral crammed succinctly into the title: no matter who you are, you will inevitably be the villain in someone else's story someday. The entire game centers around strings of cause-and-effect where one character serves themselves at the cost of someone else, whether they intended harm or not. This all hinges on the broken book contract at the start of the game; the publisher is refusing to pay the protagonist on the grounds that they haven't written the promised book yet, and now the whole world is judging them for being lazy, broke and incompetent for it. [[spoiler: Except that's not at all true. The protagonist later has the option to take a humiliating warehouse job, hauling endless boxes of ''unsold copies of their published book'', meaning that the protagonist ''did'' honor their contract and the publisher refused to pay for a non-bestseller, the publisher not getting one is their [[LaserGuidedKarma consequence]] for not extending the deal to Sam, and cutting Sam is their own punishment for stealing the protagonist's work all along.]] The story never recognizes this, so if the player manages to get through the game without victimizing anyone, they'll be the only character in the entire game to Never Be A Monster. |
| 18 | * Misha's route in ''VideoGame/ArTonelicoMelodyOfElemia'' has an event where Aurica's best friend, Claire, is being harassed by a couple of bigoted thugs. Things are escalating, and it looks like it’s about to turn physically violent in a few seconds. The protagonist, Lyner, steps in tells them to knock it off. This angers the thugs, who attack him. Lyner, a highly trained and gifted member of an elite knighthood, kicks the crap out of them with ease, and they scuttle off, terrified. His thanks? Getting scolded by everyone in his party, because "violence is never the answer". Never mind that his intervention probably saved both Claire and her bar from a beating, and [[CrimeOfSelfDefense the thugs attacked him]]. Apparently the solution is to just stand there and let them send you to the hospital and possibly kill you, because that's exactly what Lyner does later in response to this valuable lesson. |
| 19 | * ''VideoGame/BaldursGateIII'': The game teaches the player that people should not always judge people by appearance, origin, or race, with characters across the game having HiddenDepths and more layers than initially shown, such as with the game's companions. The problem with this moral involves The Emperor, who revealed to be the reason as to why the player and their allies are not changing into mind flayers themselves, yet he is overseeing the imprisonment of a githyanki named Orpheus to prevent the Absolute from assimilating him into it’s mind flayer hive mind. When it’s revealed that The Emperor is a mind flayer, the player can choose to be rude to him constantly and judge him for being a mindflayer and that rude judgement has the emperor reveal that he is manipulating the player by calling them his puppet. This revelation completely undermines’ The Emperor’s overall morality and convinced some players to turn on him by freeing Orpheus, showing that they were right to judge the Emperor by his appearance and race. This undercuts the moral of not judging others and looking past stereotypes, because even trying to work with the Emperor while not fully agreeing with his actions has him turn against you. The Emperor will even justify his actions (such as hiding the truth) as being the result of ''being'' a mindflayer, playing into the common assumption people have of mindflayers as being controlling and manipulative, meaning he is just as manipulative as his kind are commonly shown to be. |
| 20 | * ''VideoGame/BioShock'': |
| 21 | ** The original game, ''VideoGame/BioShock1'' is intended to be a deconstruction of the works of Creator/AynRand, with the fate of Rapture demonstrating the inherent failings of Objectivism, which Ayn Rand is credited with creating. However, Rapture survived and thrived by some measures for some time, despite its flaws, until [[BigBad Frank Fontaine]] exploited those on the losing end of it to hook them on the PsychoSerum ADAM, leading to civil war. While flaws with the ideology certainly played a part in Rapture's downfall, it also failed for reasons that could happen to any system as opposed to the innate flaws of Objectivism. |
| 22 | ** ''VideoGame/BioShock2'' is supposed to depict the collapse of a collectivist {{Utopia}}, but in actuality it shows nothing of the sort; Ryan at least believed in his ideals and had a society which ''sort of'' worked before it failed, but the villain of the second game was a dystopian insane cult leader whose society was dead on arrival. |
| 23 | ** ''VideoGame/BioShockInfinite'' has a theme of "Constants and Variables" as a metaphor for video games themselves, with the "Constants" being the same story of every playthrough, and the "Variables" being all the different actions that different players will take while playing the game. Aside from the fact that it's the only game to not have MultipleEndings, the final DLC campaign tries to enforce a CanonEnding to the first game to make [[spoiler:Elizabeth's HeroicSacrifice to save Sally]] mean something. The player is still free to render it pointless by getting the bad ending or ignoring any blonde Little Sisters. |
| 24 | * The moral of the original NES ''VideoGame/ABoyAndHisBlob'' is an anti-junk food one: Don't eat lots of candy, and healthy foods are better for you. The bad guy is even a blob of sapient fat. The problem is that your main weapons to stop him? Are ''jelly beans.'' Which give your blob friend ''magical powers.'' And extra lives are peppermints. Whose side is that game on? |
| 25 | * ''VideoGame/BravelyDefault'': |
| 26 | ** Many characters tell you to go against what is expected of you. By doing this, however, you will get a bad ending that cuts the story short with no real closure. What you are supposed to do is... just repeat what you have been doing the whole game, [[EndingFatigue many, many times]], completely ignore the hints that what you are doing might not be a good idea, and pretend to be surprised when things go downhill. Only then you can fight the TrueFinalBoss and get the GoldenEnding. The only way that this aesop makes sense as presented is if you assume that the game is pulling a double bluff on you, [[MindScrew expecting you to rebel against the game and rewarding you for rebelling against the rebellion and going along the track]]. |
| 27 | ** After you get the bad ending and load your game again, there's a very short scene in which one of your characters says something like "We know we're being tricked, but [[TrapIsTheOnlyOption we need to pretend to be fooled]] because it's the only way to reach the true enemy." This is never mentioned again and the game's story proceeds as though you never saw the bad ending. |
| 28 | * ''VideoGame/CallOfDutyModernWarfare2019'' pushes the narrative that WarIsHell and that, sometimes, good soldiers have to do questionable things to protect their country and people, with a defining moment being when Garrick asks Price where they're supposed to draw the line, and Price tells him "[[MoralPragmatist wherever we need to]]". The problem arises in that the game never properly demonstrates this, especially in any of the points the developers hyped up in the leadup to release where the player would have to make tough, morally-ambiguous decisions. Farah's missions are all flashbacks which consist entirely of her fighting for survival against a despotic invasion force who has taken her and several other civilians captive just for living in the same country as the terrorist group they're supposedly trying to fight, where she is never put in any situation where her actions could be called into question. Garrick only gets one decision that has real ramifications, that being [[spoiler:leaving a child held hostage by the Butcher to die, since opening the door to let the Butcher and his forces in results in them killing everyone, including the child, anyway]]. Every other time Garrick or Alex are put in any sort of morally-ambiguous position and given a choice, picking any option other than the most morally clean one [[NonStandardGameOver immediately sends you back to a checkpoint]]. Indeed, even the questionable things the player characters ''are'' allowed to do in-story are undercut by [[BlackAndGreyMorality the opposing sides being so evil]] they may as well have [[CardCarryingVillain name tags announcing "We're the Bad Guys"]] - Al Qatala regularly targets civilians in other countries to punish their governments for interfering in Urzikstan, Russia responds by regularly targeting civilians in Urzikstan who ''might'' be affiliated with Al Qatala, and such a reaction is [[TheExtremistWasRight ultimately proven justified]] when Al Qatala takes over the entire country almost the instant Russian forces are pushed out. |
| 29 | * The ''VideoGame/CaptainAmericaSuperSoldier'' game for the Platform/PlayStation3 is about Cap punching and shield-smashing his way through a Bavarian castle on his way to rescue his teammates and drive Hydra out. This tends to get accompanied by bold statements about how the whole "Master Race" thing is crap, because the Invaders prove that no man is any less valuable to the war effort than any other... except this is coming from ''Captain freaking America'' after a game where he handles almost all the direct combat by himself. |
| 30 | * ''VideoGame/ChronoCross'': |
| 31 | ** The overarching moral of the story: that humanity should be able to create its own future, rather than be coddled and manipulated by higher forces. [[spoiler:FATE's only goal, in summation, was to protect humankind, although it believed UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans. This is painted as wrong, but come the end of the game, we learn that all of FATE's actions (and the actions of ''many millennia worth of events'') were all orchestrated by [[TheChessmaster one man]] in order to save the universe. Sure, it all worked out in the end, but so much for manipulating destiny being a "bad" thing.]] |
| 32 | ** The game's attempt at a GreenAesop is about [[HumansAreBastards how horrible humans are]] and that they destroy the planet, but [[InformedAttribute doesn't do much to back it up]]. This is made even worse by the fact that the player is meant to be sympathetic to some dwarves that [[{{Hypocrite}} do every single thing that the game says is wrong about humans]], and the game completely fails to acknowledge them as the hypocrites they are. It doesn't help that the message really has no effect on the game's characters either, [[CrueltyIsTheOnlyOption nor is there any way to turn around or reach some kind of agreement]]. The characters just keep going, over and over, "hmm, maybe what we're doing is bad and we should stop doing it," [[IgnoredEpiphany and then go nuke another formation of dwarves.]] To make it worse, the world is in surprisingly great condition in spite of the fact that humans are "destroying" it. Aside from the only city that can be seen being, well, a city (which is remarkably clean and isn't visibly polluting any of the surrounding area), the entire map is completely at harmony with nature. Except the poisonous swamp the dwarves live in, which may be poisonous due to their own fault. [[spoiler:An ending even suggests that demi-humans actually ''envy'' humans for building civilizations instead of living off the land, by occupying their homes after killing them all, but they're simply either unable or too lazy to build their own civilizations.]] |
| 33 | * ''VideoGame/DCUniverseOnline'': Players are given missions to fight Bane and [[{{Mooks}} Bane's Streetgang]], who abuse the super-steroid [[FantasticDrug Venom]], yet anyone can use the Neo-Venom Boost Iconic Power, "an experimental derivative of Venom" with no adverse effects. |
| 34 | * The Dreamcast game ''Death Crimson OX'' puts a lengthy one in at the ending. [[spoiler:After defeating the final boss, its spirit goes on a long rant about the evils of the gun and how we would all do better if we just got rid of the darned things. Did I forget to mention that this is a ''light-gun game''?]] |
| 35 | * ''VideoGame/DetroitBecomeHuman'''s entire plot is a PrejudiceAesop that draws several parallels to the UsefulNotes/CivilRightsMovement. Problem is, this is presented by having the discriminated-against group in question be defective RidiculouslyHumanRobots that are [[JobStealingRobot directly responsible for a second Clutch Plague]] as they've put ''40%'' of America's workforce out of jobs. Not only is the FantasticRacism completely justified as they and [[EvilInc their creators]] are [[CrapsaccharineWorld actively ruining the country]], the choice to [[CluelessAesop compare literal nonhumans to Black people's past struggles against dehumanization]] comes off as ridiculously insensitive. It's even worse when you take into account the fact that neighboring Canada banned androids altogether, and as a result is doing quite well, with no mass unemployment due to jobs being replaced by androids and the country still keeping much of its environment and political freedoms in the process. |
| 36 | * ''VisualNovel/DokiDokiLiteratureClub'': |
| 37 | ** At one point, a character conversationally talks about depression and says that it's good to remind people suffering from it that they have something to look forward to later. This may be good real life advice, and it's probably written with that intention -- but during the actual story, the PlayerCharacter makes kind of a big deal to talk to a depressed [[spoiler: Sayori]] about how they're going to the school festival together the next day, and... well, it turns out it really doesn't help. And besides, it comes between his saying things that ''aren't'' appropriate, so this one just seems like another one in the list. |
| 38 | ** During the third act, [[spoiler:Monika, a fictional character who has gained awareness of her fictional status, dismisses the other girls as "a group of autonomous personalities, designed only to fall in love with [the player character[=]=]]]. One must wonder if [[spoiler:a visual novel with a fixed script and a limited amount of content (in spite of the many different subjects Monika can talk about)]] was [[CluelessAesop the best place to bring something like this up]], considering [[spoiler:Monika is ultimately exactly what this sequence is meant to criticize, doing what she does only because that was how the game was programmed]]. It's unclear if this was intentional or not, as [[spoiler:while Monika is clearly the VN's antagonist, she is also written to be a TragicVillain]]. |
| 39 | * ''VideoGame/DontStarve'': Wortox's backstory has the moral, as said by the narrator, "taking things that aren't yours may lead to [[DemonicPossession possession]]". However, it was only because Wortox decided to oppose Krampus' stealing that they got into a fight and Wortox became cursed. If he hadn't intervened and had kept on stealing with Krampus then he'd have been fine. |
| 40 | * ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'': |
| 41 | ** If you ask party member Iron Bull about his [[BlueAndOrangeMorality exotic culture]], he'll say that most Qunari don't think much about the Qun, the religious philosophy that dictates their lives. They may have different beliefs than most of Thedas, but the average Qunari is still a normal person with a day-to-day life like anyone else. However, Bull's personal quest is solely about whether or not he fits in with them. The player has to help him decide whether to save [[SadisticChoice a Qunari war ship or his mixed-race mercenary company The Bull's Chargers]]; saving one will sacrifice the other, and saving the Chargers will make Bull an outcast to the Qunari. Most players will opt for the second choice anyway since the Chargers are popular supporting characters (especially [[EnsembleDarkhorse Crem]]), and it's heavily implied to be the ''right'' one. [[spoiler:If you save the ship and keep Bull in the Qunari's good graces, then in the game's final expansion ''Trespasser'' where the Qunari are the villains, [[FaceHeelTurn Bull will betray your party]] and you'll be forced to kill him, even if you [[BetaCouple or Dorian]] are in a romance with him. After all, you ''did'' teach him to place the Qun above personal ties. He'll only stay on your side if you got him to save the Chargers]]. So despite his insistence that the Qunari aren't defined by their religion/culture, it's the crux of his personal quest, and leaving it makes him a better person. |
| 42 | ** Likewise, elven party member Sera insists she's "[[MySpeciesDothProtestTooMuch not like other]]" EnslavedElves because she's happy as she is, yet most of her dialogue and character content make it clear she's a [[LowerClassLout maladjusted]] teenager who has a ''lot'' of vitriolic self-loathing and InternalizedCategorism against other elves and herself. Yet every time you try to help her overcome this, the game suddenly flips to imply that ''you're'' trying to pressure her to conform to elven culture because you can't accept an elf who's different. The culmination of her friendship/romance even strongly implies that you're the first person to accept Sera for who she is instead of trying to change her, even though most of the narrative before this was either implying that her feelings were negative and needed to be overcome for her own sake, if not other people's, or acting as though you were doing the ''exact opposite'' of accepting her as she is. On top of that, playing as a female elf and taking pride in your people's history explicitly leads Sera to breakup with you if you try to romance her but refuse to accept her views on the history of the elves, with the player character being framed as the one who is wrong for not doing so. |
| 43 | ** A running theme in ''[=DAI=]'' is whether or not religious faith in something unproven or disproven is a good thing, with most characters and the narrative itself ''overwhelmingly'' leaning towards "yes." ''Everyone'' chooses to believe [[AnAdventurerIsYou you]] are TheChosenOne sent by [[{{God}} The Maker]] and His bride [[CrystalDragonJesus Andraste]] to save Thedas in its darkest hour. Even after you [[spoiler:discover proof that your power isn't divine, and the woman thought to be Andraste guiding you out of peril was just the spirit of a regular mortal]], most characters agree that objective truth doesn't matter, as long as faith brings people comfort in dark times. However, when the second half of the game and the ''Trespasser'' DLC reveal a troubling number of {{Awful Truth}}s about the history and religion of the elves[[note]]Namely, that their pantheon of gods were just powerful mages with political clout, and the elven facial tattoos were originally slave brands[[/note]], [[DoubleStandard most characters deride faithful elves]], especially [[RacialRemnant the Dalish]], as ''stupid'' for believing in a history and religion BasedOnAGreatBigLie. City elves treat mass abandonment of said heritage and religion as the only logical choice to be made. |
| 44 | ** Madame Vivienne was intended to be a change of pace from previous mage party members in the series, who were almost all apostates: mages that are outlaws for practicing magic outside the church-mandated school system, the Circle of Magi. Vivienne is presented as a mage who not only supports the Circle, but has flourished within the system, proof that the schools are not just prisons for mages. But it soon becomes clear that while Vivienne ''is'' skilled at magic, her social connections stem from her long-term relationship with an Orlesian nobleman, and even before then, her Circle in Montsimmard was one of the nicer and more permissive ones. At the start of the game, she is adviser to the Empress and has her own suite in the palace. Meanwhile, she looks down on mages who speak out against mistreatment that she personally has never had to live with. So rather than "You can be successful within the system if you work hard," her message is closer to "I got lucky and I support the system because it benefits ''[[ItsAllAboutMe me]]''." |
| 45 | * ''VideoGame/FableIII'': |
| 46 | ** You, the ruler of the kingdom, must choose between "good" decisions (mostly benevolent social programs) that cost the kingdom money, and "evil" decisions (cutting off said programs, poor environmental practices, etc.) that save the kingdom money, all in preparation for a supernatural invasion that will kill off many of your citizens if you don't put enough funding into the defense budget. Making this more difficult are that the "good" options are always tear-jerkingly cloying (repair and upgrade the damaged orphanage) while the "evil" alternatives are always [[CrossesTheLineTwice ludicrously evil]] (turn the orphanage into a brothel); there is no third option, even to defer to later, and you cannot remind anyone that ''doom is barreling down on them'' and maybe this isn't the best time to disturb the King with their crap. The intended moral appears to be about having to make hard decisions about security vs. prosperity / quality of life, since the early portion of the game revolves around you deposing a tyrannical king only to learn his tyranny was [[WellIntentionedExtremist the best way he could think of to prepare for that supernatural horror]]. The problem with this that it's possible to pad the kingdom's treasury out of your own pocket. Like in the previous game, the way you really make money is by buying up lots of property and letting the accumulated rent money roll in every few minutes of play time. And despite there being a countdown to the day of the invasion, [[TakeYourTime it won't get any closer]] as long as you don't complete any main storyline quests. All the player needs to do to be able to bankroll all the "good" programs and still be able to save all of their subjects is kill a few hours doing sidequests and letting their income pile up. |
| 47 | ** Getting a particular special weapon almost requires this. The key needed to get it is hidden in an alcove high in the room in your hideout where all your money is stored. To get it, you need to accumulate 5,000,000 gold to climb up a hill of coins to reach the key. Now that you have the key, where's the chest it opens? Underneath all that gold, which you now have to get rid of access the chest. Technically you could ''spend'' all that money to reveal the chest, but with how far 5,000,000 goes in that game[[note]]plus how merchants keep a limited stock, meaning you can't just go to the alchemist and buy 5,000,000 worth of healing potions even if you have 5,000,000 to spend[[/note]] and your attempts to get rid of the money being offset by the hefty property income you almost assuredly have coming in every few minutes by that point, by far the quickest and simplest way to reveal the chest is to just funnel the money into the royal treasury. Now you not only have a rare weapon, the treasury has most of the amount it needs to keep all your subjects alive, and you're beloved by your people for generously donating your personal fortune to the kingdom like that. Any questions of having to sacrifice quality of life or your reputation for the good of your people are wrecked. |
| 48 | * ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'': |
| 49 | ** Overall, the general setting and lore are supposed to satirize the worst aspects of American ultra-nationalism and [[CapitalismIsBad hypercapitalism,]] both of which supposedly lead to the Great War. But like in ''VideoGame/BioShock'', the scientific advances made by the society that's supposed to be being mocked were truly sci-fi in nature. Granted, Pre-war America's advances came over a more realistic timeframe (the point of divergence started after WWII, but all of the advancements came over 120 years) and we're shown China made some advancements as well. But the established timeline shows that, by the Great War, the US had invented tech like the fusion cells and humanoid robot workers that all but make conventional resources and labor obsolete, and by all the info we're given it was Communist China that started the Great War by launching the first nukes. A more accurate aseop might be "{{Eagleland}}, while far from a utopia for the foreseeable future, will invent tech to solve the common issues of capitalism, and only get destroyed if DirtyCommunists invade it, then decide to [[TakingYouWithMe nuke the world when they lose.]]" |
| 50 | ** [[WordOfGod According to the developers]] of ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 1}}'', the risk of a Broken Aesop was why one of the MultipleEndings for the town of Junktown was changed. The player has to decide between aiding a sheriff or a sleazy casino owner. Originally, the ending for assisting the Sheriff reveals that he [[spoiler:becomes a low-grade KnightTemplar]], and Junktown [[spoiler:stays small because people avoid the hassle]]. Assist the sleazy casino owner, though, and Junktown [[spoiler:thrives, because [[PragmaticVillainy the sleazy casino owner understands that slavers, drug users, and actively immoral people are bad for his business, and wipes them out]]]]. In the game proper, though, the Sheriff is the 'good' choice. Fans tend to interpret it as less an aesop and more a moral dilemma; namely, is a thriving but seedy community better than an upstanding but poor one? |
| 51 | ** ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'': |
| 52 | *** Unfortunately, Bethesda wasn't so smart with the infamous Tenpenny Tower questline. In synopsis, there is a conflict revolving around a heavily fortified and luxuriant hotel between a thuggish band of wandering [[OurZombiesAreDifferent Ghouls]] who want in and the existing human inhabitants, who are rather displeased with the motion. The player can either murder one party on behalf of the other, or go through the trouble of diplomatically convincing the humans that these ghouls can be trusted and so earn them a place inside the tower, which is big enough for them all. Except that, afterwards, you find [[spoiler:the ghouls have murdered the human inhabitants and dumped them in the basement while you weren't looking]]. Now, this could easily pull off any (or all) of three {{Hard Truth Aesop}}s: the oppressed can be as bad as their oppressors when given the chance, diplomacy doesn't always work, you can't always get a happy ending. Except the game is very clearly aiming for you to ''support the ghouls'', to the point of giving Good Karma when you get the ghouls inside and causing Three Dog to hound you incessantly for "racism" if you murder the ghouls instead, even if you only kill Roy ''after'' TheReveal. This has frustrated many a player, since the blatant anti-racism motif to the quest is undercut by A: the fact you can convince the humans that they were wrong to be racist to begin with and B: the ghouls are just as racist, as shown by their [[spoiler: ''murdering the humans once you get them in'']]. |
| 53 | *** The developers suggested in interviews that one of the goals of the game's KarmaMeter was to impress upon players the kind of people they would be in the post-apocalyptic setting; will they try to be good no matter what, or will they fall into selfishness and seek their own advancement? Unfortunately, this moral test doesn't really work, because every "bad" decision you can make, aside from petty theft, is straight into StupidEvil territory, along the lines of "murder a bunch of people for no reason bar a maybe small amount of cash." A good number have no conceivable motive aside from spite, and either provide nothing or are outright dangerous--the biggest being to let President Eden's plan happen, which will turn all drinking water into a deadly poison that affects ''everyone who has ever set foot in the wasteland, including you''. The moral is less "hold on to your goodness no matter what" and more "don't be an OmnicidalManiac." |
| 54 | *** The original ending of the game had a pretty simple moral of "self-sacrifice is good, being selfish is bad." A lot of people didn't like this, as the execution ([[spoiler:all your radiation-immune companions refuse to walk into the area full of deadly radiation, so you either kill yourself walking in there or order a Brotherhood paladin to do it instead]]) was so clumsily written that it came across as a StupidSacrifice. The ''Broken Steel'' add-on made it even worse in two ways: one, it retconned it so that you somehow survived, meaning that now the moral was completely pointless since you didn't actually sacrifice anything; and two, it also added the pragmatic option to [[spoiler:actually send one of your radiation-immune companions to do what's needed]], only for the ending narration to still treat you as just as big a bastard as if you'd [[spoiler:sent the Brotherhood paladin in with full knowledge that she would die from the radiation]], which takes the "self-sacrifice is good" message and warps it into something like "if you get a chance to sacrifice yourself, [[HonorBeforeReason you are a coward and a failure if you don't take it]]". |
| 55 | *** In the tutorial, one of the choices involved is to kill the Overseer. If you do this, Amata [[WhatTheHellHero tells you off]] and you lose karma; the intended message evidently being the old-fashioned "killing people is bad." Except to get to the Overseer, you need to get past a half-dozen or so security guards who are JustFollowingOrders, with there being no option to talk down any except the very first one who sees you, no option to non-lethally take care of them other than simply running away as they shoot you in the back, and - despite them, like the Overseer, being people you've known your entire life before then, and who you probably got along with miles better than with the Overseer - [[WhatMeasureIsAMook no penalty whatsoever for killing them]]. And even with the "self-defense" argument, over the course of the game, you'll kill a ''lot'' of people, many of whom [[NonActionBigBad pose even less threat than those guards did]]. In many cases, [[ViolenceReallyIsTheAnswer you even gain karma for it.]] This gets broken even further by ''VideoGame/Fallout4'', where [[ActionizedSequel killing people en masse is so accepted]] that a PacifistRun is only possible through exploiting bugs. |
| 56 | ** The actual ''narrative'' of the ''Fallout'' series does not shy away from pointing out that DrugsAreBad, as they are produced and sold almost exclusively by terrible people and used by people who are, at absolute best, 'troubled.' They also come with the risk of addiction, even for the player, and some fairly severe stat penalties. However... addiction applies '''only''' these vague numeric penalties, and addictions can be removed nigh-effortlessly by certain cheap and readily available methods. So, for the player, [[DrugsAreGood drugs are awesome]] and should be used copiously for great bonuses. One of the DLC packs for ''[[VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas New Vegas]]'' even adds a perk that removes the possibility of addiction, though at the cost of removing the increased level {{cap}} you normally get for owning any of the DLC. |
| 57 | ** The "nukes are bad" message has been frequently broken thanks to [[DependingOnTheWriter the different writing teams]] between Black Isle/Obsidian for ''1'', ''2'' and ''New Vegas'', and Bethesda for ''3'', ''4'', and ''[[VideoGame/Fallout76 76]]''. The series generally tries to show that the world is entirely screwed because of all the nukes that were dropped, even beyond [[SceneryGorn the first and most obvious sign of such]], going so far that Caesar's Legion from ''New Vegas'' fully immerses itself in several utterly savage practices like slavery, mass rape/murder, etc., [[WellIntentionedExtremist purely out of desperation]] to attempt to properly reunite the people of the wastes. The first two games and ''New Vegas'' take this message to heart and for the most part show just how shitty nukes, and the ravaged world their overuse brought about, really are. By contrast, ''Fallout 3'' has a super-awesome giant death robot that assists you by tossing nukes like footballs all over the place in its climax; ''Fallout 4'' mostly brushes the question aside in favor of a somewhat more optimistic look at how the people are trying to rebuild, but then ends with you [[ButThouMust almost invariably]] nuking one faction on the orders of one of the others, despite this being an active hindrance to one's goals and completely at odds with another's philosophy; and ''76'' requires dropping nukes as part of the story and lets you do so at will to spawn awesome bosses that drop all sorts of cool loot. |
| 58 | ** A case of an Aesop being broken by players rather than the story: One of the ''New Vegas'' DLC packs, ''Dead Money'', conveys the message that {{Greed}} is a bad thing that leads people to the grave. To illustrate this, the developers present the player with a pile of gold ingots before the end of the plotline - all of which weigh a hell of a lot, thus quickly over-encumbering you. Take too many of them, and they'll significantly hinder either the fight with the final boss or evading him, both of which [[TimedMission have a time limit]]. Leave them be, and [[PermanentlyMissableContent they're lost forever]]. However, players [[{{Munchkin}} being players]], easy methods to avoid the boss while still carrying every single ingot out were quickly discovered. |
| 59 | ** ''Honest Hearts'' has the final major choice. Joshua Graham is a man seeking redemption for his time in the Legion, and caught between his need to protect the tribes of Zion and his fears of falling back into being a psychotic killer and inspiring the tribes of Zion to become killers as well. If Joshua Graham executes the warlord Salt-Upon-Wounds, this is treated as him falling back, and the ending notes that he becomes just as monstrous as he was before and the tribes of Zion become warlike. Sparing him leads to Graham finding personal peace and the tribes of Zion moderating their warlike desires. But in the game proper, killing evil people (regardless of circumstance) gives ''good'' Karma, so killing Salt should actually make him more moral.[[note]]For some reason, Salt-Upon-Wounds is marked as having Neutral karma, meaning killing him neither raises or lowers it.[[/note]] And then there's the fact [[BadGuysDoTheDirtyWork if the player kills Salt themselves]], the tribes still become warlike, but Graham finds a (lesser) degree of peace. It leads to a bit of a confused message, since Graham, the tribes, and the player all seem to be running on different systems of morality. |
| 60 | * ''VideoGame/FarCry5'' tries to tell players not to let themselves be manipulated by things like drugs or overzealous, charismatic cults because it will only bring destruction to those around them. This is shown with Joseph Seed's cult, the mind conditioning they use for their sleeper agents, and the drug they make called Bliss, which causes those who take it to commit multiple atrocities (up to and including murder) to those around them, including loved ones. It shows that faith, like anything else, can be used to bring disaster if used wrongly. Unfortunately, the entire moral is ''literally'' blown up in the "good ending", as after Joseph Seed is defeated and is on the verge of arrest, a nuke goes off -- [[TheCuckoolanderWasRight proving that Joseph's claims about the collapse were right all along]]. Worse still, this means the cult continually advising you not to fight them is the correct option- you are literally told not to play the game and do anything to deal with the cult. |
| 61 | ** The Seeds also spend the game trying to convince you not to use violence on the cultists. However, this option is not plausible- the cultists always try to kill you the exact moment they spot you, and most of the times you interact with the Seeds involve them kidnapping you against your will without any way to prevent it from happening. Not to mention, each of them indulge so heavily into violence that their commands to stop are hypocritical. |
| 62 | ** The game’s other moral is not to escalate a situation until it gets out of hand, as shown by the secret ending where you refuse to fight the cult and leave. However, by this point, the cult has already broken the law in several ways, and the player is shown Joseph outright murdering someone for speaking against him. Thus, deescalating the situation would be unlawful, especially because leaving would not cause the cult to magically stop committing crimes. On top of this, the nuclear war in the ending occurs because of factors that happen entirely offscreen and out of the player's control. There is no way to deescalate the geopolitical situation because there is no way to leave Hope County. |
| 63 | * ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'': |
| 64 | ** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXII'' pulls one of these at the end of the Gil Snapper hunt, when Elder Brunoa chides the quest-giver that you should never kill an animal solely to sell parts of it. The single best source of income in ''Final Fantasy XII'', of course, involves running around killing massive numbers of animals in order to sell parts of them, including the ones that start out non-hostile because that's the only way to get access to all the lore. |
| 65 | ** ''VideoGame/LightningReturnsFinalFantasyXIII'' has the moral that, "Humanity doesn't need a God." Except to help the souls of the dead reincarnate. And to hold back the chaos that's engulfing the world. And to create a new world after a human (an immortal human, but still definitely human and not a god) succeeds in screwing up the old one to the point where it can't be fixed. Sure, the God of the game is a {{Jerkass}}, but he's still all that's standing between humanity and extinction. If you were trying to write a plot that proves how much humans ''do'' need gods, you can't do too much better than this game. |
| 66 | * ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'' has plenty, befitting its status as being ''quite'' a large game: |
| 67 | ** The game falls into the same problem as ''XII'' in one quest from a member of the Conjurer's Guild. She asks for your help in gathering ingredients for a ritual the guild is going to perform soon, which involve killing various animals out in the forest and gathering parts from them. When you return with the ingredients, she compliments you for only taking exactly as much as you needed and that reckless slaughter of random beasts in the forest will spell doom. While from a purely monetary standpoint, it does make sense to not just murder everything you see: the drops you get from beasts tend to be more useful as crafting ingredients than as a source of income directly, which is likely to be outweighed by the damage done to your gear from fighting, and not everything you can kill in the game will attack you on sight (especially once you're more than ten levels above something else's level, at which point even actively-hostile mobs will ignore you, and attacking any one enemy will usually aggro one or two others even if they never worked together before). But on the other hand, you ''do'' also have various hunting logs for all of the possible beginning classes, which grant experience bonuses by way of killing specific beasts just for the sake of killing them... |
| 68 | *** Interestingly, your Grand Company also gives you its own hunting log, which you are required to complete up to a certain point to get promoted past specific ranks and be able to buy better stuff from the quartermaster, but it's not as bad about "wanton, needless slaughter" as a class's hunting log is because, the Grand Companies being more interested in the safety and security of Eorzea's people as a whole, most of what it sends you to hunt are, in fact, not only actively hostile in-game but also major threats to the people in-story - the first level of each Company's log, for example, invariably includes sending you after specific types of Amalj'aa, who regularly attempt to kidnap people, and by the point you're allowed to join a Grand Company have already summoned their primal Ifrit and tried to feed several of their captives, you included, to it. |
| 69 | *** On the other hand, the same "only take what you need" moral is brought up for the Botanist and Leatherworker classes, which are respectively a Disciple of the Land (a class that gathers crafting materials) and a Disciple of the Hand (a class that crafts things). Leatherworker in particular has part of its story mention how a specific animal was hunted to near-extinction because people wanted its leather so badly. However, crafting and gathering are ''all'' the crafters and gatherers can do, and so the moral is much more readily broken: regardless of what [=NPCs=] tell you about only taking exactly what you need, since enemies and gathering nodes invariably respawn after a short period (and you'll invariably need to kill [[TwentyBearAsses more than one of an enemy per crafting ingredient]]), nothing is stopping you from spending several hours killing monsters and gathering crafting materials until your inventory is crowded out with them, and then actually crafting things with it all to make back a bunch of money for your time investment. |
| 70 | ** The Samurai questline for 60-70 in ''Stormblood'' is all about how a bloody rebellion against a corrupt government is not always the solution because it would cause a much larger civil war, and sometimes you have to work ''within'' the system to change it. A noble goal that would have fit with the trend of Dystopian Rebellion stories that were very popular around the time this was made (2017). Unfortunately... the ''main plot'' about Stormblood that ''everyone'' (including Samurai) has to go through is ''all about'' how some of the oppressed people have no choice ''but'' to stand up to their oppressors and should be willing to do so at almost any cost, making this seem somewhat odd that the game would go from saying rebellions are good to "Oppressive peace is better than a bloody civil war". |
| 71 | *** Further undermining this aesop is the fact that when the instigator of this rebellion gives their MotiveRant... ''everyone agrees''. Several of the people who say that the rebellion must be put down happened to have been born within privileged positions of Hingashi society - making it seem very easy for them to be all about maintaining the peace when the plights of Doma and Ala Mhigo showed this was ''not'' an option, making it seem almost as if they can take advantage of the system that works for them. |
| 72 | ** The aesop of Yotsuyu's arc is supposed to be a tragedy saying that not everyone will get their redemption and sometimes even victims of society will happily [[ThenLetMeBeEvil turn against it]]. It's undermined by the fact that prior to the post-Stormblood quests, she had [[HateSink absolutely no redeemable qualities at all]] and [[spoiler:proved civilians right that if she regained her memories, she ''would'' once again become the Witch of Doma. Even if she did it because she thought she was truly evil, she still ''did'' go along with Asahi's EvilPlan to sabotage the peace talks by violating the "No summoning Primals" agreement.]] There is a reason why some people feel she got her just desserts and didn't deserve the AlasPoorVillain treatment they were trying to go for. |
| 73 | * ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'''s aesop is that sometimes, one must sacrifice themselves in order to save many lives. The two characters who do that, [[spoiler:the Avatar and Emmeryn]], both end up [[DisneyDeath surviving]]. [[spoiler:However, while the Avatar turns out perfectly fine, Emmeryn is so brain-damaged that she can no longer serve as Exalt or recognize her siblings.]] |
| 74 | * ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV'' takes on a lot of different themes and modern issues, but tends to fall flat when it tries to confront issues that the game itself is guilty of. One can listen to the in-game radio endlessly spoof American society's chauvinism, misogyny, and sexual objectification of women... and then gleefully head off to buy a lapdance or solicit a prostitute. Throughout the series there's also lots of very heavy-handed criticism of violence in America... while the overwhelming majority of violent deaths in the games are caused by your player character. |
| 75 | ** Likewise, the series consistently criticizes American police by making (almost) all of them out to be willfully [[PoliceBrutality violent and power-tripping]], yet shows that the court systems are so screwed up that they'll happily let your murderous psychopath of a player character OffOnATechnicality (and presumably your gangster allies too), meaning that violence really would realistically be the only way to stop a typical player-like rampage. |
| 76 | * ''VideoGame/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy2021'': A central theme of the narrative is dealing with grief and loss and having to let go of loved ones who have died. The galaxy is almost destroyed because [[spoiler:a twelve-year-old girl couldn't cope with the loss of her mother.]] This theme is somewhat diluted by the fact that [[spoiler:Groot is able to perfectly resurrect people, namely Fin Fang Foom and our protagonist Peter Quill, with little to no issues. However, it's implied that it only works on the very recently deceased.]] |
| 77 | * ''VideoGame/{{Haze}}'' gives the message that war is not the [[BlackAndWhiteMorality good-vs-evil]] affair that video games portray it as. However, this is undermined by the fact that Mantel is ObviouslyEvil while the Promise Hand are borderline angels. As a result, once the player defects from Mantel to the Promise Hand, the story turns into the exact same kind of black-and-white generic shooter it claims to criticize. |
| 78 | * In the postgame of ''VideoGame/HiFiRush'', Chai is given AnAesop about how he should have put in the work to become a rockstar instead of using Project Armstrong as a shortcut... except that Chai's arm, as seen in the opening, was ''disabled'', so "putting in the work" without the ArtificialLimbs from Project Armstrong was never an option for him. |
| 79 | * ''VideoGame/{{Killzone}} Shadow Fall'' tries to inject some GreyAndGreyMorality into the Vekta/Helghast conflict and create an Aesop about how xenophobia and intolerance are bad by moving the remaining Helghast to Vekta and giving them half the planet, where they live in horrible, polluted, totalitarian conditions. Main character Lucas' half-Helghan ally Echo repeatedly lectures Lucas that the horrible conditions are because Vekta is oppressing the Helghans, and implies the Helghast terrorist organization the Black Hand is partially Vekta's fault. She also blames Vekta for the Helghast being on Vekta to begin with, since [[spoiler: Helghan was rendered uninhabitable when Vektan forces blew up a doomsday weapon on Helghan]] at the end of ''Killzone 3''. The problem is that for the past three games the Helghast have been warmongering [[ANaziByAnyOtherName Space Nazis]] who lived in similar conditions on their own planet, and on Vekta the Helghast are autonomous. There are a few news articles scattered about the game which describe Helghan workers being discriminated against, but for the most the Helghast's problems are not the fault of discrimination but their continuous support of the fascist doctrine that repeatedly put them in the situation they're suffering under. Furthermore, the [[spoiler: doomsday weapon that destroyed Helghan was developed by the Helghast, and was only destroyed by Vekta forces because it was going to be aimed at Earth]]. Lucas never calls Echo out on any of this. |
| 80 | * ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'': |
| 81 | ** ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsI'': After winning the Hercules Cup, the player is treated to a heartwarming scene in which the hero realizes that anything is possible with the help of his friends. This scene is immediately preceded by said hero demanding that he face the final boss of the tournament by himself. |
| 82 | ** The whole series preaches [[BalanceBetweenGoodAndEvil Balance Between Light and Darkness]]... despite mainly having LightIsGood heroes vs. DarkIsEvil threats. ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsBirthBySleep'' is bad with this as well. At one point, Xehanort preaches about how the Worlds must have a balance of Light and Darkness. Fine and dandy there, but every threat the heroes have faced has used the powers of Darkness to further their own goals or to destroy the Worlds. With the extremely rare exceptions of Riku, Naminé, [=DiZ=], and Terra -- and even then, they each catch a '''''lot''''' of hell for it -- nobody uses Darkness as a benefit, and those aligned with it are almost always evil. It's so one-sided that Mickey explicitly says that Riku is the '''''only''''' person that he's ever met who's actually been able to use Darkness as a good power, and Riku's still half-Light-aligned on top of it. Quite frankly, the "tyranny of Light" seems to be the preferable option, especially since there hasn't been a single light-using villain in the series (the closest is Eraqus, whose BlackAndWhiteMorality frankly comes across as being ProperlyParanoid). And ''VideoGame/KingdomHearts3DDreamDropDistance'' just reinforces this even more by introducing the [[spoiler:setup for the final battle between the Seven Guardians of Light and the Thirteen Seekers of Darkness; guess which side are the antagonists]]. Furthermore, the Spirit Dream Eaters -- TheHeartless counterparts meant to embody DarkIsNotEvil -- are heavily implied to actually be [[YinYangBomb Yin-Yang Bombs]] instead of full-on Darkness [[note]]They come from positive, not negative, emotions; [[spoiler:Riku, explicitly half-Light himself, temporarily becomes one to help Sora in his Dreams]]; and ''X'' reveals that the Spirit partner of someone corrupted by Darkness will turn into a Nightmare (the hostile version of a Dream Eater), as well.[[/note]], thus making the whole Dark Is Not Evil thing seem more like "Dark Is Evil kept in check by equal, if not greater, Light Is Good" anyway. |
| 83 | ** Master Aqua is a tragically perfect example of this trope in action, not by breaking an aesop, but having one taught to her broken in her face. She learns over the course of the game, starting with Fairy Godmother that sometimes, the Light itself may only cause to create a greater shadow and that things aren't always cut and dry "light good, darkness bad"...then she ends up having to deal with Xehanort who uses darkness; which in turn costs her both of her best friends and a pseudo-imprisonment into the world of darkness where she has been fighting for her life constantly for over 10+ years with her sanity and resolve being attacked and broken constantly. This essentially culminates with [[spoiler: Aqua giving up on the light, falling to despair and darkness and turning against the heroes briefly]]! For someone who was supposed to learn about "the balance", Aqua ended up back at square one fully accepting that "Darkness really is only hate and rage". |
| 84 | * ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'' encourages light-sided players on Tatooine to negotiate and make peace with the Sand People tribe, who are at war with the intergalactic colonists and the Czerka corporation in particular. While it's true that the Sand People are the natives of Tatooine and the Czerka Corporation is awful, inhuman, and thoroughly amoral and act as bad guys every other time they show up in either game... it's hard to find any sympathy for the Sand People, as they are ''intensely'' isolationist, xenophobic, violent, and merciless, a characterization that remains consistent with their treatment in other ''Star Wars'' games that only feature them as a local, non-Stormtrooper variety of cannon fodder for the player to cut through or shoot down in the obligatory level set on Tatooine. Even in this game, the only context in which the player ever encounters them are when they are trying to kill or enslave people, and the player will routinely kill adversaries who have done far less without a second thought. |
| 85 | ** Light sided players are also encouraged to have the wookies run Czerka off of Kashyyk. The revolt targets ''everyone'' except for a few people. Which includes non-combatants, people who are presumably ''trying to escape'', and people who were at worst a PunchClockVillain. Things that would get you dark side points for doing - but because you didn't do it, it's alright. |
| 86 | * ''VideoGame/TheLastOfUsPartII'' has the messages that violence isn't always the answer and revenge sometimes just becomes a cycle of violence and further revenge and can even destroy everyone you love, with an attempt to call players out on their treating death as nothing by making the death animations very brutal and giving every character a name. There are three problems with this, however: |
| 87 | ** One: The game often gives you no choice but to kill [[BlamedForBeingRailroaded and will continue to call you out on it]], even if [[PacifistRun you avoid violence as much as the game will allow]]. Furthermore, although some wounded enemies [[VillainsWantMercy will beg and plead for mercy]], if you do decide to spare them then as soon as you turn your back and try to walk away, [[ISurrenderSuckers they'll get up and attack you anyway]]. |
| 88 | ** Two: Much of your killing/violence is in self-defense against those who have actively done worse things than you (like the Wolves, who kill anyone who happens upon them, danger or not). |
| 89 | ** Three: Inconsistency of character reactions to killing and death. This one depends on the character. |
| 90 | *** Ellie avoids it. Each successive chapter, which if the game is played according to the typical gamer's behavior, has her violently killing swathes of Wolves and Seraphites, mostly in self-defense, and at times killing one of [[spoiler: Joel's murderers]]. This brings her nothing but agony. She's in a downward spiral psychologically and emotionally, being torn apart by what she's doing, as a real and truly decent, and traumatized, person would be in a world where ThereAreNoTherapists. It culminates in her killing [[spoiler: Owen and Mel when they try to fight against her, forcing her to kill them both...and she realizes to her horror that Mel was pregnant]], an act that she believes she can't come back from, and right after decides that revenge may not be worth it. The narrative treats her as being wrong for this: [[spoiler: She ends up losing everything that matters to her by the story's conclusion, and this is treated as being a result of her lust for revenge, which she doesn't really have.]] |
| 91 | *** Abby doesn't avoid it. Her character's ascent from HateSink begins when [[spoiler: she becomes playable, and it's clear through her dreams that killing Joel brought her nothing.]] The guilt from this subtly eats at her, encouraging her to try and find redemption by helping Yara and Lev escape the Seraphites. This is fine. But the problem starts when she's in active combat against Seraphites, wiping out swathes of them in the same way Ellie killed numerous Wolves. [[spoiler: Eventually, the Wolves, which she was part of for four years, betray her, forcing her to kill them.]] At no point does Abby express any [[AMillionIsAStatistic emotional turmoil or trauma over the deaths of these people]]. She's entirely unaffected by the massive amount of killing she does, flying in the face of the anti-violence aesop of the game. It gets worse when [[spoiler: she discovers Mel and Owen's bodies, and tracks Ellie down to her hideout, where she kills Jesse, beats everyone up, and gets ready to gleefully kill the pregnant Dina. The only reason she doesn't is ''not'' out of morality or guilt, but because of Lev's abject horror seeing that she was about to knowingly murder a pregnant woman.]] The narrative treats her as being right for this: [[spoiler: Abby is allowed to have these outbursts with little consequence, to the point of even getting inadvertently rescued from the Rattlers by Ellie in the end.]] |
| 92 | * ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsInTheSky The 3rd'': Star Door 15's side story has pedophelia very much PlayedForHorror. Yet, in the same game, Analece is used as a ComedicLolicon. |
| 93 | * ''VideoGame/LegendOfMana'' breaks its Aesop of "freedom is the highest ideal, therefore be true to yourself even at the cost of everything else" by forcing the player character to deal with the aftermath ''every time''. |
| 94 | * ''VisualNovel/ALittleLilyPrincess'' has this going on between routes. At the end of Lottie's route, Sara tells her that if someone keeps hurting her, she should get away from that person, even if there are still good moments.[[labelnote:Context(spoilers)]]Sara is referring to Miss Minchin, the head of the seminary where they'd studied, who'd forced Sara to become a servant and treated her cruelly after her father died penniless. At the end of the game, when it turns out Sara is wealthy, Miss Minchin tries to get her to come back but Sara refuses, noting that she's grateful to Miss Minchin but refuses to allow Miss Minchin to hurt her again[[/labelnote]] Lavinia's route, which depicts her as a LovingBully and has her act like ManipulativeBitch more often than she's genuinely nice prior to her confession, has all the hallmarks of the sort of relationship Sara warns Lottie about, yet still gets a happy ending. |
| 95 | * ''VideoGame/{{Lunar}}'' has the theme running through it that 'humans don't need gods, they can take care of themselves.' This is broken in the second game as the threat of [[spoiler:Zophar and the fake Althena]] is only noticed by [[PhysicalGod Lucia]], and everyone else being completely fooled. The plot wouldn't even had gotten started without her warning the main protagonists about this. Incidentally, the BrokenAesop also vindicates Ghaleon's belief in that humanity can't survive without a deity watching over them. As long as you ''don't'' count the plot point of [[spoiler:a god-vs-god battle being world-endingly destructive.]] Luna knew, and tried (obliquely) to tell Lucia, that the sustainable way to combat threats to Lunar is to count on its inhabitants. And in the end they save the day. |
| 96 | * ''[[VideoGame/MarioTennis Mario Tennis: Power Tour]]'' talks a lot about how doubles are about teamwork (thus using each member's strengths) and strategy and how it differs from singles, and only at low levels can one player win a game, except that you have no way to control the AI on your partner, and s/he plays almost entirely as though you didn't exist, [[ArtificialStupidity ruining game winning shots by running in front of you]] ([[GameplayAndStorySegregation one of the opponents apologizes to his senior doubles partner for doing exactly that]]). This forces you to, you guessed it, win each match mostly by yourself. Additionally, almost all the singles players have their doubles teams rated ''exactly the same''. This is made even worse when your doubles partner has the ''audacity'' to criticize the teamwork of one of the junior doubles teams. |
| 97 | * ''Franchise/MassEffect'': The original trilogy's big themes is that sometimes the hero must make hard decisions. But once the major decisions the game treats as clearly and morally ideal (like not sacrificing anyone if possible, siding with the krogan instead of the {{Jerkass}} salarian unless a even worse krogan is in power) are far more likely to get a better outcome and come ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'' which qualifies your desertions throughout the trilogy, more War Assets leading to better endings. The only times what's treated as a less idealistic choice gets a morally and objectively better outcome are [[spoiler:convincing Kelly Chambers to hide her identity saving her from assassination]], which isn't really ruthless, [[spoiler:destroying the heretic geth]] in "Legion: A House Divided", which helps get an optimal outcome in "Priority: Rannoch" but isn't required, and killing a few random [=NPCs=] who turn out to be indoctrinated (Menos Avot and Rana Thanoptis on Virmire) or evil (Elnora during "Dossier: The Justicar"), all of whom have no appreciable impact on the main story. [[IdealHero Paragon]] decisions tend to be harder and less entertaining than [[AntiHero Renegade]] so this could be "Long-term gains are better than short-term satisfaction," but the game rarely makes that distinction. Meanwhile, the choices morally grey enough to be difficult (like [[spoiler:which party member you have to leave to die on Virmire, if you save the Collector Base, whether or not to brainwash or destroy the heretic geth, side with the quarian or geth dooming the other if you fail the requirements to save both]]) will have little to no difference in Assets. |
| 98 | * ''VideoGame/MegaManStarForce'': ThePowerOfFriendship will grant you incredible might... except that the alien beings who allow you to actually ''use'' said power are originally drawn by feelings of utter loneliness, so the best way to become powerful is in fact to ''reject'' ThePowerOfFriendship until the universe hands you power on a platter, ''then'' start playing nicely with others. |
| 99 | * After the battle for Area Zero in ''VideoGame/MegaManZero4'', Neige shoots a WhatTheHellHero speech at Zero, blaming him for all the damage caused in the fight. The anti-violence message is undercut by the fact that there's no indication that, if it wasn't for Zero, she and the other refugees wouldn't have been slaughtered. Worse still is her condemnation of the resistance's actions as unjustifiable because they're both "fighting the same stupid war." The fact is, if they never fought, Neo Arcadia would've wiped out their entire race, save Copy X and his cronies. She should well understand what little choice they had as she and the other humans were struggling to survive themselves. The Reploids had no more choice in fighting then they did in fleeing. This speech actually manages to break the aesop that's been shown throughout the entire franchise, from [[VideoGame/MegaManClassic the original Mega Man]] choosing to fight Wily since no one else would, to the [[VideoGame/MegaManX X series]] showing how sometimes fighting is the only choice, to the heroes of [[VideoGame/MegaManZX ZX and Advent]] fighting to protect people simply because it's right. Even the LighterAndSofter ''VideoGame/MegaManLegends'' showed a Mega Man fighting against pirates who were terrorizing a city as the heroic action it is. So the moral goes from "Fight for the sake of protecting people" to "Don't ever fight to defend people, even from certain death because tragedy might eventually befall other people in the process". At the very least, Neige apologizes for her statement after Zero saves her ''again''. |
| 100 | * ''Monster Girl Quest'' attempts to deliver the message that humans are the real monsters for hating and fearing the titular monster girls, who are made out to be misunderstood victims. The main character repeatedly preaches this, and has devoted his life to creating a world where humans and monsters can coexist. However, ''Monster Girl Quest'' is also an eroge whose primary fetish is monster girls raping human men. Almost every single monster you meet attacks you completely unprovoked, and if you lose, rapes and then either [[SexSlave enslaves you for life]] or outright [[OutWithABang murders you]], as the main character ''pleads for mercy''. Furthermore, it's made very clear that a lot of monsters want to go even farther than they already do by subjugating and enslaving ''all of humanity'', and the only reason they're even as subdued as they are is because the ''current'' monster lord has ordered them to hold back as much as they do -- the position of monster lord is based [[AsskickingLeadsToLeadership entirely on power]], so really the only thing keeping the humans "safe" is the whims of an absolute power leadership position that could change hands at any time. Suddenly, the "extremist" humans who see all monster girls as heartless murderers, and the humans who hate and fear them, don't seem so wrong or extreme, as they effectively have a predator/prey relationship with creatures that largely view them as cattle rather than equals, which makes their predilections against "coexisting" with them feel pretty appropriate rather than discrimination. Luka does try to stop these kinds of monsters from attacking humans, but he generally hates the extremist humans more.[[note]]This is implied to be because his father used to be one of them.[[/note]] |
| 101 | * ''VisualNovel/MysticMessenger'' shows with V and Rika's relationship that trying to "cure" a mentally unstable person with ThePowerOfLove is not the answer with V's LoveMartyr behavior only letting Rika's mental illness spiral out of control and hurt him and many others. His Another Story route has him realize how unhealthy their relationship was and that he didn't truly love her and was only obsessed with the idea that he could be her savior. So far, so good... however, the Secret Endings show Seven doing the ''exact same thing'' with his BrainwashedAndCrazy brother Saeran, pulling him out of therapy and trying to get through to him with his love alone to the point of letting him strangle him, and ''succeeding''. Not only that, but Saeran gets a route of his own where the player character is able to cure all his issues -- including his psychotic SplitPersonality that locks her up and threatens to torture her -- with her Pure and True Love alone. Apparently you ''can'' fix a mentally ill, violent, and physically abusive person with the power of love if said person is a good-looking man. |
| 102 | * ''VideoGame/NocturneRebirth'' emphasizes that it's possible for anyone to change for the better, including Reviel, the VillainProtagonist. However, this aesop doesn't apply to the non-Ancestor Devils, who are mentally programmed to be AlwaysChaoticEvil. As such, Reviel's attempts to reason with one of the more sentient Devils fall flat. |
| 103 | * Broken by economic concerns: The message of the ''VideoGame/OddWorld'' series is that corporations are evil, world-destroying entities... [[ProductPlacement except for delicious, life-restoring Sobe!]] |
| 104 | * The ''Franchise/{{Persona}}'' series, especially the [[VideoGame/Persona3 third game onward]], has an underlining message about [[ThePowerOfFriendship the power and strength bonds with others brings]]. In almost every game, the protagonists defeat the BigBad because of their power given to them by their bonds with others giving them some kind of EleventhHourSuperpower, and it is regularly stated by those associated with the Velvet Room that forming bonds is a good thing. The Social Links from the third game onward however somewhat break this message, because once the player maxes one out, there is no reason to ever interact with the character again outside of story important characters. Plus, because Social Links boost the experience gained when fusing Personas, and completing one gives a unique Persona to fuse, players are encouraged to view them more for how they allow them to improve their battle skills over the inter-personal relationships formed from it. The result is that, especially in the third and fourth games, the player is pushed towards treating Social Links as investments to focus on then ignore once finished, instead of treating them as friends that you turn to like it suggests. |
| 105 | * ''VideoGame/Persona4'' |
| 106 | ** [[AlphaBitch Ai Ebihara's]] backstory is that she was bullied for [[FormerlyFat being overweight as a child]], and eventually she comes to the conclusion that beauty isn't about the way you look, but the sort of person you are. However, the cast's classmate Hanako is every [[FatBitch negative stereotype of a fat girl]] rolled into one; sure, [[TheBully her personality isn't the best]] (not that she's ever given the chance for CharacterDevelopment outside of a small instance of PetTheDog), but it's obvious that every scene where she's treated as the butt of the joke has to do with her appearance... and the fact that she ''doesn't'' care about how she looks, which would otherwise be a great message for a game that's so obsessed with staying true to yourself. In fact, most of the {{jerkass}}es in the game are ''also'' [[{{Gonk}} extremely unattractive]]. This comes across as especially apparent when you consider that quite a few of the conflicts in the game resolve around certain characters being [[SoBeautifulItsACurse too attractive]]. The often considered to be forced way that the game seems to present ugliness as something you can shrug off (suggesting you can "work hard" to overcome your flaws), but presents attractiveness as a curse, is something fans have criticized a fair amount. This is especially considering the way it's supposed to be tied into one of the central themes, and the [[spoiler:motivations of the true culprit]], with the idea that society is a repeating, fixed cycle of "those who are born with success" and "those who aren't", and that anyone who rightfully complains about how they don't like this is instantly labelled as a whining child with no backbone, so society just keeps quiet and soldiers on despite how unbalanced it is. This is made even worse still by the fact that the game [[DebateAndSwitch never actually tackles the true culprit's opinions and beliefs directly]], the characters instead essentially side-stepping by saying his opinions just don't matter. |
| 107 | ** A common complaint that gets tossed at the entire [[ThePowerOfFriendship "bonds equal power"]] aspect of the narrative is that the game's protagonist gains actual magical powers from a magic-granting figure if he forms bonds with people. Due to many people viewing the game's stance on bonds as a good thing to be outright {{Narm}}y in its exaggerated, one-dimensional idealism, the way in which this is focused on a fictional, simplistic, made up power that doesn't exist becomes a lot more apparent compared to the [[VideoGame/Persona3 previous entry]] (which isn't helped by the ultimate final boss being defeated by all of the protagonist's Social Links granting him the literal power to survive). |
| 108 | ** The game constantly pushes accepting your true self as a good thing, and admittedly, it does help the entire playable cast overcome their flaws. However, we're never shown what happens when someone with a ''negative'' true self accepts it, as [[spoiler:the one case where it would happen has the character denying it even after the fight]] and tries its hardest to pretend such cases don't exist. Interestingly, Atlus seemed to have noticed this as well, as ''VideoGame/Persona5'' focuses on villains that have morally corrupt Shadows; though then again, most of the villains never see or acknowledge this side of them either, and the point of the game is changing their mindscape so they never could. |
| 109 | * ''VideoGame/Persona5'' discusses broken aesops: |
| 110 | ** Right up to the end, ''Persona 5''[='=]s message is quite clear, [[HardTruthAesop though it's not a happy message]]: "Everyday society largely doesn't give a flying curlywhirly about injustice; they keep their heads down, even if the world is falling apart around them because they don't want to make life harder for themselves. Consequently, they allow corrupt people to get away with anything. Kids can't trust adults, especially the ones they depend on; self-centered adults are just trying to exploit them or worse." The Phantom Thieves all experience something like this themselves to various degrees, and note how people don't really seem to care about the good they're doing. In reality, what happens in this case is actually [[spoiler:society's corruption is deliberately rigged, set up and dismantled by the machinations of a false god to justify his absolute despotic rule over humanity]]. One of the Bad Endings takes this message to the logical conclusion, with [[spoiler:the protagonist letting his misanthropy and dissatisfaction with society get the better of him and thus he discards all of his comrades, gets his lot in with Yaldabaoth so that he can rule as a despot through the fear of forced heart-changing]]. |
| 111 | ** In order to get the Good Ending, you have to break this [[{{Deconstruction}} rapidly-decaying Aesop]] and pull a DeconReconSwitch. If this option is taken, the message changes to "You have to stand up to corrupt people in power, because everyday society has become apathetic, [[RousseauWasRight but since they're overall good people, they can be inspired to do the right thing]] if given the proper nudge. You can't just give up on the world and do whatever you please without regard for others, because then you're no better than the corrupt people you claim to be above. While many adults are corrupt, there are genuinely good ones, so don't write them off at large." It's pretty telling that this is the game's true intent since you can have just as many if not more adult Confidants (Ex.: Sojiro, Iwai, Kawakami) as you do teenage Confidants (Ex.: Haru, Ryuji, Hifumi). |
| 112 | * Used deliberately in ''VideoGame/PhantasyStarIV'', as part of a deconstruction. The entire game (the entire ''series'') sets up a good versus evil, darkness versus light conflict, with the revelation on what Dark Force really is: [[spoiler: The sentient HatePlague spawn of a CosmicHorror that opposed the god-like creator of the sentient races of Algo, who created them and the solar system itself to keep it imprisoned]]. But Chaz realizes that all this means is that the only difference between the good guys and the bad guys is what side of the prison door they're on, and taking up the light side's cause means [[{{Hypocrite}} doing exactly what makes the bad guys bad]]. |
| 113 | * ''VideoGame/PoleNoDaibouken'' uses this intentionally, because the whole game is a {{retraux}}-style platformer that mocks retro games and their shortcomings, instead of celebrating the "good old days". The hero Pole fights against a group of poachers that kidnapped his girlfriend, but during his travels he kills hundreds of animals, more than probably they ever did. |
| 114 | * A common aesop in the ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' games is that the player shouldn't care about how strong a particular Pokémon is, and should try to use Pokémon they like. The aesop becomes broken, however, when you realize that not only can the games be made significantly easier by using stronger Mons, but ''most of the characters who tell you this use strong Mons themselves''. For example, Cynthia delivers such a speech before the battle against her in ''[[VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl Diamond, Pearl and Platinum]]''. Her signature Pokémon is Garchomp, a [[InfinityMinusOneSword Pseudo-]][[LightningBruiser Legendary]] with a base stat total of 600 [[note]]By comparison, your starter, when fully evolved, will have a BST of 534 - Garchomp's is equal to that of a legendary[[/note]]. Her entire team also has perfect [=IVs=], the Pokémon equivalent to genetic capabilities, and impossible to obtain without extensive breeding and massive amounts of luck. |
| 115 | ** This also becomes a CluelessAesop when you consider that, due to the struggle of CompetitiveBalance in a game with ''hundreds'' of characters (mixed with evolved Pokémon always being stronger than their earlier versions), many Pokémon are ''objectively'' great or terrible, despite the game's constant assertions that this is merely "perceptions of the selfish". While the majority of challenges brought forth by the main story can be [[WhenAllYouHaveIsAHammer beaten down]] by LevelGrinding, this [[TacticalRockPaperScissors isn't true in competitive battles]], where everyone is set to be the same level and you're fighting against other human players. An NPC in ''[[VideoGame/PokemonRubyAndSapphire Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire]]'''s Battle Resort admits that some species are useless in competitive battling. |
| 116 | ** Another problem is that the games state that Pokémon must be treated like partners, not as tools or weapons. Yet players who breed thousands of Pokémon in order to get good [=IVs=] end up getting better results in battles. Admittedly, that would be a good InUniverse source for starter Pokémon, were it not for the fact that [[AntiFrustrationFeatures arbitrarily taking Pokémon away from a player would be very annoying indeed,]] and even then, those less-optimal Pokémon aren't abused or neglected, just left in the PC with their friends, traded off to rookie Trainers (or even other veterans who need a Hidden Ability or [[GottaCatchEmAll Pokédex completion]]) who would appreciate the gift, or simply released back into the wild, |
| 117 | ** This is further broken by the fact that whether you love your Pokémon with all your heart or not, it doesn't make much difference. Friendship, the main stat meant to determine this, has almost no meaningful effects: it can cause one move to become fairly strong, and it can cause certain Pokémon to evolve. If you don't use that move or a Pokémon that evolves with Friendship, then you can play the whole game with your party's Friendship at 0 and never notice. Not that it's actually ''possible'' to do that, because a Pokémon's Friendship starts going up if you do ''anything'' to it, from leveling up to giving it a single-use item to just walking around with it in your party, but only goes down if the Pokémon uses one of a small handful of situational items or faints. Even the most talentless player would probably achieve decently high Friendship by accident; to hit low Friendship practically requires you to do so on purpose. |
| 118 | ** ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'' introduce Affection to mitigate this, which can only be raised by actually treating your Pokémon like a pet/friend and taking care of them, and Pokémon with higher affection get significant benefits in battle like a LastChanceHitPoint and self-curing statuses -- benefits [[DoubleSubversion that don't apply in]] competitive battles, where you would desire them the most. |
| 119 | ** And for one more nail in the coffin, take the first game and consider Blue and Giovanni, the first being your rival who when you ultimately defeat him is told he doesn't love his Pokémon enough and that's why he lost, and the second being a crime boss. Sure, the aesop comes out on top since you're the one who won those fights, but these two people are the former Pokémon League Champion and the 8th Gym Leader, two of the most prestigious titles of the whole region. So friendship might be the best, but you can sure get far without it if you try. |
| 120 | ** A plot point in ''VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite'', with Team Plasma's vendetta against Pokémon husbandry and abuse undermined by their own use and abuse of Pokémon. [[spoiler:Which is an early hint that, save for TragicVillain N, they really don't care, and their true agenda is something else entirely.]] |
| 121 | ** Another thing is that the games often promote the "being able to breed and befriend your Pokémon and have it grow with you". However some Pokémon require you to trade them to evolve, and you can't even catch them in the wild. In other words, it arbitrarily prevents your Pokémon from growing alongside you. |
| 122 | ** ''VideoGame/PokemonSunAndMoon'' brings up another aspect of the franchise that comes under scrutiny when examined more closely. During the game, the main antagonistic force is obsessed with collecting Pokémon that are exceedingly rare. She gets called out for treating Pokémon as mere trophies and that they're living beings with thoughts and feelings of their own. The BigBad then brings up that the player character ultimately [[NotSoDifferentRemark does the same thing]], but this brief critique of GottaCatchThemAll isn't elaborated on any further. |
| 123 | ** Shadow Pokémon in ''VideoGame/PokemonGO'' are said to be suffering in pain due to Team Rocket GO's methods of making their Pokémon extremely strong. You're encouraged to save the shadow Pokémon and purify them so that they don't suffer any more and thus they are in better care with you. While the game does try to balance things out by making shadow Pokémon perform like a GlassCannon and having Frustration as a permanent move that can't be forgotten, high leveled shadow Pokémon can power through their lower defense and HP and the developers will sometimes hold events that let players replace Frustration with a regular move. To top it off, you can also choose to transfer a shadow Pokémon to Professor Willow in exchange for candy, thus you're giving away a Pokémon that's still suffering. |
| 124 | * ''VideoGame/RedDeadRedemption2'': Arthur Morgan often mentions that "revenge is a fool's game" and that revenge is just [[CycleOfRevenge a never-ending cycle of violence and misery]]. There are a couple of in-game examples of this, but the most notable is [[spoiler:John Marston, Sadie Adler, and Charles Smith hunting down and killing Micah Bell in revenge for destroying the gang, causing Arthur's death, and making Dutch van der Linde go crazy. Indeed, John's killing of Micah gets the Bureau of Investigation on his tail]] leading to the events of the first ''VideoGame/RedDeadRedemption''. However, [[spoiler:Sadie and Charles are never shown getting any sort of comeuppance for getting revenge and more or less get off scot-free]]. So, in other words, revenge ''isn't'' a fool's game ''if'' you can get away with it unscathed. |
| 125 | * ''VideoGame/RememberMe'' tells us that bad memories, though painful, are an unfortunately necessary part of life. Nilin's primary skill as a memory hunter is to "remix" people's memories, and she openly declares she can make anyone believe whatever she wants. [[spoiler: Nilin edits her parents' traumatic memories to heal the emotional rifts in her family, which just happens to require editing her mother's memory of the car accident that ruined her life. Originally, Nilin threw a temper tantrum over a toy and unbuckled her seatbelt, requiring Scylla to intervene for safety's sake and distracting her from the road (causing her to blame Nilin); after the remix, Scylla was just a sloppy, irresponsible driver (and thus blames herself).]] All the events of the game and the foundation of the Memorize corporation itself were all caused by people [[spoiler:and machines]] who couldn't ''forget'' their painful memories, and took their pain out on others. Even Nilin herself is only able to function from the start of the game because she's lost the memories of whatever happened to her that put her in prison in the first place. |
| 126 | ** Almost all of the memories that Nilin remixes involve ruining someone else's life, [[spoiler: by altering them to make them worse than they were before, which results in the deaths of at least two people: a man who commits suicide because he wrongly remembers accidentally killing his girlfriend, and a man who is going to die without the expensive medical treatment that his wife is no longer trying to procure for him because she thinks he's dead, assuming she doesn't kill him when she attacks the hospital she thinks he died in.]] Only one of these has any negative consequences for her personally, while the others all work out in Nilin's benefit and end up causing disasters for countless others. Moreover, the amnesia she suffers from the beginning of the game [[spoiler: which is self-inflicted, as she turned herself in,]] gives her the opportunity to continue on as a Memory Hunter without a past to weigh her down and gain the perspective she needs to confront her problems. So, it's wrong to want to escape painful memories even if that's the only way to heal your emotional wounds, but it's heroic to ''fabricate'' painful memories on others and [[MindRape completely change who they are]] if that [[ItsAllAboutMe gets them out of your hair]]. |
| 127 | ** In a more general sense, the memory-erasing technology is shown to be a way for people to escape from horrible, traumatic experiences, but as we see from Nilin's example, giving up ''all'' your memories willingly is a safe alternative to suicide, and it turns out that the Leapers' warped minds and bodies ''aren't'' from simple addiction. [[spoiler: H30 is ''forcing'' vulnerable users to take on deleted memories, with the implication that "vulnerable" means "weak-willed and strongly empathetic".]] Bad memories are important to who we are, even if they're not ''our'' bad memories... but having those memories will turn us into violent, insane monsters? [[SpaceWhaleAesop What?]] |
| 128 | * ''VideoGame/TheSinkingCity'': Much of the game deals with the evils of racism (the KKK are sidequest villains) and the plight of the Innsmouth refugees. Every figure who engages in xenophobia is treated with disgust and Reed's dialogue always makes his low opinion of xenophobes clear. However, the Innsmouthers are followers of a ReligionOfEvil and heavily involved in the city's organized crime. Given the Deep Ones are historically villains in Cthulhu Mythos fiction, it also will confuse longtime fans of the setting. The Esoteric Order of Dagon is established as the "real" evil among the Innsmouthers but almost all of them are involved with it or at least sympathetic. It doesn't help that no matter how nice Reed is to the Innsmouthers, they ''will'' attempt to kill him multiple times. |
| 129 | * ''VideoGame/SleepingDogs2012'' has a horrible one for a side quest. Wei goes after a street racer to get him arrested for deliberately forcing his opponents to crash during races and Wei is clearly disgusted with him for this. The problem? To even get access to this side quest you have to do street racing missions and you've almost definitely had to deliberately force your opponents to crash (especially on the first one where you have to race with an awful car) and most of those crashes looked pretty fatal... |
| 130 | * ''VideoGame/SpecOpsTheLine'': The game has been criticized by some for its message of "violence is bad" being subverted by continuing to not only allow, but even frequently ''[[BlamedForBeingRailroaded require]]'', the player to kill enemies with executions and live burial by sand, even after the game tries to hammer the moral home with [[spoiler:Walker mass-murdering civilians with white phosphorous]]. On the other hand, [[IntendedAudienceReaction this dissonance may have been entirely intentional]]; WordOfGod claims the only way for you, the player, to avoid committing a serious war crime was turn off and walk away from the game[[note]]In fact, earlier drafts planned on letting you do this in-game, but was scrapped, supposedly because playtesters kept taking that option and defeating the game's narrative entirely[[/note]], which would extend you getting blamed for being railroaded on a meta level. Even then, the game outright acknowledges in the [[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou fourth-wall breaking loading screen hints]] that the player is not at fault for Walker's actions, and that you're merely reliving Walker's choices controlling him, not actually doing any of this yourself. |
| 131 | * ''VideoGame/{{Spinnortality}}'' tells the player that big business is bad and their MegaCorp is a corrosive influence on the world, and the Humane Ending requires them to aggressively support worldwide democratic socialist reforms...which can only be enacted through using your corporation to manipulate laws and governments while serving the wishes of immortal, wealthy oligarchs. Furthermore, the most reliable way to increase prosperity in the various nations is to make excessive amounts of money through your business interests and spend it on development programs in poorer countries, and the best way to ensure healthcare for your workers is not to bug governments for it, but provide it yourself. Asserting that the player corporation is a bad thing doesn't really mesh with the facts. |
| 132 | * ''VideoGame/TheStanleyParable'' plays this for laughs. The Narrator's magnum opus is seen on the Freedom Ending path, in which Stanley defeats the evil corporation that is controlling everyone and frees himself from a lifetime of mindlessly pushing buttons. He does this by doing exactly what the Narrator tells him, and then pushing a button. Actually following the moral of the Narrator's story and going against his plan causes him to immediately start complaining and demanding you get back on track, and he frequently does horrible things when you don’t listen. |
| 133 | * ''VideoGame/StardewValley'' has a fairly blatant "big industry bad, small community good" message... but for a long time, the single biggest factor in [[spoiler: Grandpa's ghost]] evaluating your farm after two years was ''how much money you were making'', criticizing you harshly if you ''didn't'' optimize for profit. Concerned Ape eventually reworked the evaluation to score friendship/romance higher and soften the dialogue. |
| 134 | ** Pierre is depicted as the "good guy" simply because he's running the local shop, and it fits with the "Small community" message. Unfortunately, this aesop is broken in the sense that if you actually ''talked'' to Pierre, he reveals some less than savoury aspects of his personality that makes him no different than [=JoJa Mart=] - such as commenting about how holidays are good for business and he should [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything invent more holidays to drum up more sales]]. Pierre also, as revealed by [=DangerouslyFunny=], will [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SGyqwor0Qo take credit for your own produce if you sell enough of it to him]]. |
| 135 | ** Additionally, the idea of small town communities needing to protect their own unique identities is generally seen as one of the good ones. This is undermined somewhat by the fact that nobody ''in'' said community seems interested until you (an outsider) come in and do it ''for'' them. |
| 136 | * One of the recurring themes in the ''Franchise/StreetFighter'' series is that fighting for its own sake or for others makes you stronger than if you were just fighting for revenge or hatred. The poster child for this is Sagat, who originally hated Ryu for scarring him, but eventually realized that his hatred was weakening him, moved on, and became a stronger fighter for it. The problem with this is how this theme is related to Dan's initial motivation, especially in the ''VideoGame/StreetFighterAlpha'' series: many people, Sagat included, comment on how Dan's hatred has made him weak and silly. Sagat even comments that he used to be just like Dan. Dan has a little more to be pissed about than Sagat: Sagat just had his chest scarred in a fight that he voluntarily participated in. Dan's father was ''killed'' by Sagat. As of ''Super Street Fighter IV'', however, this Aesop may be redeemed as per Gouken's win quote to Guile. In vanilla ''SFIV'', Gouken tells him that power will not expunge his grief. By ''Super SFIV'', Gouken is astounded that Guile hs turned his anger into "strength of heart". |
| 137 | * In ''VideoGame/{{Sudeki}}'' working together seems to be the moral of the story: the BigBad exists purely because the resident God split himself in half. Therefore, it's odd that you get to use your full party for four notable story sessions and in only one boss fight, about a third of the way through the game. Generally your party is split in half, and oddly enough (and unfortunately enough. Tal and Elco don't have healing skills) it's men in one group, women in the other. |
| 138 | * The main plot thread of ''VideoGame/TalesOfLegendia'' resolves when Shirley realizes that just because Senel doesn't love her romantically doesn't mean that he doesn't care about her, AnAesop that a man and a woman can deeply care about each other without the need for romance. The second half of the game has Chloe's entire Character Quest be about her romantic feelings for Senel, and ends not when she gets over her need to be with Senel, but when she steps aside for Shirley, who ends up engaged to Senel. |
| 139 | * A good chunk of the first arc of ''VideoGame/TalesOfTheAbyss'' is devoted to the party telling TheHero [[ShelteredAristocrat Luke]] to think for himself and not just blindly trust people. Specifically, they say he shouldn't trust [[spoiler:his ParentalSubstitute Van.]] However, they ''order'' him to not trust that person, without giving him any actual reason to, despite having plenty of time to do so. |
| 140 | ** The main Aesop of the game is "people can change" with Luke (who goes from a {{spoiled|Brat}} {{Jerkass}} to TheWisePrince and an AllLovingHero) as the main example. However, character arcs are ''awkward'' as hell, with most characters only subtly changing and not always in the most effective manner to showcase their development (if it actually happens). In particular, Tear's entire subplot ends up being about a romance with Luke instead of focusing on her ''own'' changes and development. On top of that, a big part of the problem in the third arc is the majority of the world ''isn't changing'' [[spoiler:that is, accepting they must live without the Score,]] which makes the antagonists' points about YouCantFightFate and that no one can change enough to save Auldrant ring true. |
| 141 | * There is a subplot in ''VideoGame/TalesOfVesperia'' where Flynn expressed his disapproval of Yuri's VigilanteMan actions in [[spoiler:executing Ragou and Cumore.]] The problem was that both were too powerful and well-connected; one of them had ''already'' been tried in a court of law, and was given a slap on the wrist for feeding his own people to his pets ForTheEvulz. The latter is [[spoiler:one of the most high-ranking member of the knights, a combination of military and law enforcement.]] The justice system is [[KangarooCourt shockingly corrupt and ineffectual]], yet Flynn does not propose any immediate solution to allowing powerful mass murderers to walk free and continue their crimes. Since the justice system can't really touch them, what Flynn is proposing is that people get used to it until an idealistic young hotshot can gain enough power and influence to single-handedly reform the corrupt courts. Frankly, if the Empire was a corrupt as we saw it was, it may have ended with a sword in Flynn's back. While the game's intended Aesop was "justice is subjective", Flynn comes off as far more in the wrong than Yuri, especially in the original version of the game where Flynn isn't a party member, thus not having the chance to discuss it more. [[spoiler:That said, it's implied that due to the events of the game, thanks to Ioder and Flynn himself ending up in positions of power, things will rapidly start changing. Still, it's very oddly written.]] |
| 142 | * ''VideoGame/UltimaUnderworld'' has the Taper of Sacrifice, a candle and part of a set of virtue-themed artifacts. It teaches self-sacrifice, because a candle only brings light through its own destruction. And since the artifacts are necessary for the plot, it never burns down. In fact the player can leave it alight and never worry about light sources again. |
| 143 | * ''VideoGame/UntilDawn'' has the aesop "[[DeadlyPrank don't play cruel pranks on people because the consequences could be far worse than you expect]]", shown by the mean prank played on Hannah causing her and Beth to leave their cabin in the middle of a snowstorm and fall off a cliff. However, in the early stages of the game several of the characters can prank the others without any significant consequences, making it seem like Hannah was just being overly sensitive. There's also the fact that Hannah and Beth's death caused [[spoiler:Josh]] to snap and terrorise the group. However, he targets Sam and especially Chris even though they had no involvement in the prank, while leaving Mike and Jessica alone despite their participation. |
| 144 | * Creator/{{Godlimations}}' ''Vorago'' bases its story off of the Biblical description of the Rapture, and has as its primary conflict a battle of ideals between a character who believes the apocalyptic events have a logical, scientific explanation and another who thinks it's the end times as prophesied by the Bible. As the creator of the game is a Christian organization, it seems reasonable to think that the latter would be correct... except the man who is portrayed as "in the right" (and indeed, the only confirmed Christian in the game) is the ''villain'', who shoots two separate characters with little prompting (one for disagreeing with his interpretation of what's going on, and another for having a problem with the first time), tries to sexually assault the female main character and threatens a young child immediately after, and is so racist (brings up his problems with the Dutch completely out of the blue in the first conversation with him), intolerant, and preachy that he comes off as an amalgam of every religious strawman ever. |
| 145 | * ''Videogame/WatchDogs2'' has a sidequest in which [=DedSec=] deal with an internet troll who's been swatting[[note]]as in calling in wildly-exaggerated false reports on someone so the police will send a SWATTeam[[/note]] people online for both kicks as well as to get an advantage in online games. The protagonists all treat this as an exceptionally heinous act, but the game also allows Marcus to gain the ability to call down a SWAT team on a target of his choosing. |
| 146 | * ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'': |
| 147 | ** The final battle of the ''Cataclysm'' expansion, and the associated storyline and many similar events throughout canon, could be read as "[[HumansAreSpecial mortals are badass]] who can protect the world just fine." Never mind that the final battle of the ''Cataclysm'' expansion and numerous other encounters throughout the game (e.g. Illidan, Arthas) can only be completed with the help of powerful and generally immortal [=NPCs=]. In some other fights, no such characters are apparent in the game itself, but the enemy has a DramaPreservingHandicap or according to the lore the player is only FightingAShadow... because of the ''previous'' intervention of immortal beings. |
| 148 | ** ''Mists of Pandaria'' |
| 149 | *** The expansion pack had the aesop that PrejudiceAesop and "colonization is bad" aesop, but both aesops stumbled for several reasons, which wasn't helped by the tendency for the badguys to be [[FantasyCounterPartCulture based off real life cultures that were often marginalized]] and the [[HumansAreWhite heroes being white]]. |
| 150 | *** The game depicted every Orc as a bigoted and flatly evil character, with many orc [=NPCs=] that were [[SuddenSequelHeelSyndrome previously depicted as heroic being put into]] this strawman role. Conversely whenever anyone on the Alliance had any prejudice, the game emphasized they were a TragicBigot and that their feelings were justified. The game's PlayerCharacter blatantly describes Vol'jin the troll as "disgusting", "smelly" and a "savage", even insulting him to his face, with the game depicting this as a justified reaction and even adding flies around Vol'jin to justify. Essentially it made it seem like prejudice is justified as races are either [[AlwaysLawfulGood predisposed to Good]] or [[playing [[AlwaysChaoticEvil evil]]. |
| 151 | *** Anti colonization also stumbled because, again the orcs and their allies as well as the Zandalari Trolls were the only ones to be depicted as wrong for settling Pandaria, with any Alliance character being shown as treating the pandaren and the land respectfully outside of one instance where a character fell victim to an EmotionEater. The most glaring instance was Dwarf character, Twinbraid, previously shown as a genocidal colonist that massacred an entire tribe of natives, now being depicted as a hero out to protect the pandaren, whilst the native people that resisted him were depicted negatively for resisting. As a result, the aesop comes across more as "colonization is bad when evil races do it, but good when good races do it". |
| 152 | *** At the end of the progression through the Isle of Thunder, Taran Zhu gives a WhatTheHellHero to the Alliance and Horde, saying that their fighting perpetuates a vicious cycle of retaliation, convincing the two sides to stand down, especially considering that they both have a common enemy in Garrosh. At this point, Nalak the Storm Lord is unlocked as a world boss, thus leading to players sabotaging efforts from groups from the rival faction so that ''they'' get to kill Nalak, a common enemy for both factions, and collect his loot. |
| 153 | *** In the Siege of Orgrimmar raid, after killing their way through numerous Horde soldiers, a few of whom (like Nazgrim) were actually pretty decent people, the heroes suddenly decide to make a statement about mercy and justice by taking [[SuddenSequelHeelSyndrome the randomly evil]] Garrosh Hellscream alive. Inevitably, this leads to Garrosh escaping to an AlternateUniverse and creating a massive new Iron Horde for the Alliance and good Horde to deal with in the ''Warlords of Draenor'' expansion. While it's probably not fair to say the heroes should have seen that coming (time traveling dragons were involved), it still undermines the raid's intended moral when, by all rights, they could have saved themselves a lot of trouble if they'd just executed Garrosh when they had the chance. |
| 154 | *** This is partially repaired in that expansion, as Garrosh's fight with Thrall has the former berating the latter for putting too much responsibility on his shoulders too quickly - Thrall grew into leadership, whereas Garrosh (from his perspective) had it thrust upon him, which ties into his original appearance in the ''Burning Crusade'' expansion, where he was crippled with self-doubt after learning [[DealWithTheDevil what his father had done]]. |
| 155 | ** Regarding ''Warlords of Draenor'', there is another Aesop that is broken by the expansion's very existence. To keep thing simple, while Orcs invaded Azeroth thirty years before Vanilla [=WoW=], it had been explained that they had been corrupted by demons to do so, and at their core are more of ProudWarriorRace than actual villains. Then come Warlords of Draenor, where Garrosh goes back in time, prevent the Orcs from being demonically corrupted... and then has them try to use the Dark Portal to invade Azeroth, and generally making Orcs do almost the same acts they did in the main timeline, without the justification of demonic corruption. Kind of make "[[NotSoDifferentRemark they're not bad, they're not so different from the humans]]" a bit difficult to believe. |
| 156 | ** Anytime faction conflict becomes the focus, the aesop that is delivered shortly thereafter is "Revenge is wrong [[CycleOfRevenge because it leads to neverending retaliations]]" which is, in theory, a solid aesop. Except that the Alliance are the ones practicing RestrainedRevenge and told to "let us ignore the past and move on", while the Horde are the ones shown as either starting hostilities and/or escalating them to absurd degrees, which means the Aesop is either "[[SuicidalPacifism Don't fight back because it's wrong to want justice.]]" or "[[DoubleStandard Wanting the Horde to be held accountable for their atrocities is wrong]]". |
| 157 | *** This is elevated to caricature-like levels in ''Battle for Azeroth'', in which the Sylvanas Windrunner-led Horde commits ''outright genocide'' against the Night Elves - certain lore sources explicitly use that word and say that the Night Elves as a people are doomed - and yet Tyrande Whisperwind, the Night Elves' racial leader, is treated as a self-interested war hawk at best and an unhinged lunatic at worst by the Alliance leader [[TheGoodKing Anduin Wrynn]] and by the narrative for seeking to bring Sylvanas and the Horde to justice to the point that [[spoiler:Elune, Tyrande's own goddess who granted her the power to seek vengeance, removes it from her so that she can "seek renewal"]]. |
| 158 | *** Nevermind the cases where vengeance is presented as a good thing, such as as the Forsaken and Blood elves' drive to kill Arthas for what he did to them, which was presented as a ([[KnightTemplar mostly]]) good thing and Arthas was the unambiguous BigBad of his expansion. So vengeance ''is'' good... unless [[ProtagonistCenteredMorality it's against a playable faction]]. |
| 159 | * ''VideoGame/{{Xenogears}}'' has an arc, early on, with the core message that drugs are bad. It involves one of the main characters using a certain drug called Drive to grow stronger- unfortunately, it also turns her into a murderous lunatic, and she is only broken out of this after a tense IKnowYoureInThereSomewhereFight. All well and good, until Drive is available to buy in unlimited quantities later on, and gives unlimited stat boosts to your characters, with no negative effects whatsoever. |
| 160 | * The intended moral of ''VideoGame/YIIKAPostModernRPG'' is about [[ItsAllAboutMe self-centeredness]]. It treats Alex's idea that he's somehow "connected" to the missing girl as delusional and naive, and has many people inform him that he isn't the center of the universe. Then it reveals that he is indeed connected to the girl by a cosmic bond, and he ''is'', in fact, the most important person who ever lived, and the fate of the cosmos hinges on him... learning to be less of an egotist. As far as the world of the story seems to be concerned, Alex is 100% right to think of himself as the center of the universe; he just shouldn't be a jerk about it. |
| 161 | * ''VideoGame/YouAreNotTheHero'' is intended as a deconstruction of the KleptomaniacHero trope, as you play a woman named Petula whose stuff is stolen by a group of "heroes", leading her to chase them down and get it back. And in order to do so, you... go into people's houses and steal their stuff. There are no mechanics or even dialogue to point out that Petula is doing exactly what was done to her; apparently [[ProtagonistCenteredMorality it's all right when she does it but unforgivable when she's the victim]]. |
| 162 | * Creator/ZapDramatic's games are intended to teach players how to negotiate with people, but a number of them expect the player to resolve the conflict at hand in a manner which has absolutely nothing to do with negotiation. Among others: |
| 163 | ** "The Suspicious Cop" is about trying to talk your way out of a speeding ticket (while driving a friend's car that turns out to have an illegal substance in it, no less). The "correct" solution to that predicament? "Start crying uncontrollably." |
| 164 | ** The goal of "The Raise" is to negotiate a raise because a.) the player character impulsively bought a new car and now needs extra income to maintain their current standard of living, and b.) their cat came down with cancer while their credit card was nearly maxed out, and they need extra money for vet bills. Except that: |
| 165 | *** As the game gets going, the boss' pet mouse spontaneously starts talking to you by saying there's a woman stripping behind you, and if you listen to the mouse, you get a game over. The game tells you that you shouldn't listen to mice, because mice ''don't talk''. Weird, but somewhat valid... But then this mouse appears once again in "Sir Basil Pike Public School", being the main dispenser of advice. If you do start listening to the mouse, you don't ever get any option to excuse yourself from the conversation because you are clearly hallucinating from stress.[[note]]For a given value of "clearly", since this game over ends with a cop coming out of nowhere to arrest you and calling you a pervert for ogling the stripper, which just makes it seem weird that your boss seems to be the only one that ''can't'' hear the mouse or see the woman.[[/note]] Plus the mouse's advice (to quit beating around the bush and actually talk about getting a raise) appears perfectly sensible in the context of the game, but that leads us to another problem: |
| 166 | *** In order to succeed, you have to outright abandon the stated objective of getting a raise and ask your boss about his love life. Almost out of nowhere, that leads him to asking you to write a speech for him to give at an anniversary dinner for a lump sum payment of $1500. The game awards you for realizing that your boss doesn't value you enough to give you an actual raise (and the intro mentions a well-received speech you had written as the one noteworthy achievement aside from your otherwise mediocre job performance), but that doesn't explain why he's perfectly willing, with little prompting, to talk about his love life to an employee he supposedly doesn't value and then ask them to write a speech for his anniversary. In addition, while this does give you enough money in the short-term to pay for your cat's surgery, it ignores the more long-term reason for why you wanted a raise; you can no longer maintain your current standard of living, and a one-time bonus isn't going to help with that.[[note]]It could be justified if it was implied that the player character could leverage the success of this new speech to negotiate a raise in the future, but that is never suggested.[[/note]] It is also possible to propose taking a web design class, thereby making you more valuable to the company. This sounds very much like the proper solution in line with the theme of negotiating a raise, and your boss does indeed state that he will consider giving you a raise in the future if you manage to bring in extra business with your new skills. However, it still counts as a bad ending because while you're on the path to getting the extra income you were looking for, [[DownerEnding it won't do anything about your cat's vet bills]]. |
| 167 | ** ''Sir Basil Pike Public School'' was made to teach about bullying, but doesn't do a good job because the primary gameplay mechanic is in building up "Persuasive Power" to become a more popular and charismatic member of your peer group, which is primarily accomplished by bullying others. Particularly, the game tries to hammer home the idea that schoolchildren should talk to adults if they're feeling bullied, but then [[AdultsAreUseless never offers a situation in which getting an adult's attention actually helps]]. |
| 168 | *** On the boy's route, calling in a teacher to assist in the question of whether a bike was stolen or not has him very quickly shift subjects to make it into a lesson on the JudgmentOfSolomon, offering to cut the bike in two and give each of you a half. Any way you go from that point leads to a game over - if you agree that that's fair, he gives the bike to the supposed thief. If you join the other kid in protesting, the teacher belittles you for not fitting yourself into the role of the villain that he's trying to force on you and then takes the bike away from both of you. In a game that is supposed to preach an anti-bullying message, successfully getting past the first puzzle of this route requires you to make fun of the thief for his stutter, and then, when it turns out both of you just happened to get the exact same kind of bike on the same day, refuse to apologize for assuming he was a thief, because doing so costs all of your Persuasive Power. The bike puzzle even breaks its own specific moral about not making assumptions, since if you take the option to double-check that your bike is actually gone, the game congratulates you for not making the assumption that your bike was stolen after seeing a kid riding an identical bike and taunting you that you can't catch him - and then tells you that [[ButThouMust the story can't continue unless you do]], while also [[HypocriticalHumor making the assumption]] that picking that option means you either are exceptional or [[MenUseViolenceWomenUseCommunication would be better suited playing the girl's route]]. |
| 169 | *** On the girl's route, one of your friends tells you that her mother is allowing her to host a slumber party, but can only invite four out of her five friends. The correct route ultimately ends with you [[SweetAndSourGrapes invited because you offered not to come so everyone else could]], after which the friend who got left out schemes to get back at her by inviting everyone except her to go bowling instead. Agreeing on this revenge plan here results in everyone turning on you - even the friend who initially suggested going bowling, who pins it on you to get herself invited to the sleepover - after which you're given the option to turn to a teacher. He starts by saying that talking to an adult is the right thing to do if you're feeling bullied, but then says he doesn't have time to help you and that you should really fix this yourself, and thus dismisses you back to the group of girls that were bullying you, fully aware that you're being bullied. |
| 170 | *** It's an anti-bullying game where the closest thing to a protagonist besides the main character is a girl who randomly punches kids in her class for mildly annoying her, is only not belittling whoever she's talking to if they're an adult, and writes entire songs about how much better she is than they are, which is an activity supported by the only adult who takes any interest in helping the kids deal with their issues. It's not really an anti-bullying game when the correct response is to just be a ''more charismatic bully'' than the ones tormenting you. |
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