Ethical Choices

Aren't the creatures in both this case and the bug war thing supposed to be sentient? You think you have to be a green to think exterminating sentient creatures is a bad thing?

He does have an interesting point, though. In many cases, what is labelled as an evil choice is actually a good one... in the proper context. In the event where large water creatures are terrifying your colonists, it could be viewed as an ethical decision to wipe them out or keep them at bay. Incredibly disrespectful to other species and worlds, yes, but it is looking out for the best interests of your people.

There's an interesting distinction to be drawn between a society that preys on others and a society that preys on itself.

i rarely care. i look for the bonuses and base it off of that.

Well folks, look at the historal record of the planet. To people who colonize good is defined as Women and Children first, everything else is dross.

Duh

I find the ethical choices in RL much more interesting. Say, this one:

"You're in the middle of a game and your girlfriend calls asking what you want to do over the weekend. What do you tell her?"

Good: Tell her it's a surprise. Get flowers, book reservations at a nice restaurant, go to the state fair on Saturday.

Neutral: Go to dinner and a movie on Friday, but you would like a block of time on Saturday to yourself, because you like to play on the computer, too.

Evil: I can't believe the Drengin demanded 592bc in tribute!

"Good" and "Evil" are obviously relative to your point-of-view. In my current game, the "Evil" choices are what is considered "good" for my species. So ignore the labels and do what you think is the right thing - or just base it on the bonuses to be achieved as knownalien suggests.

Agreed. Wiping out sentient life so your little colony will be a third more productive? Evil. Wiping out a bunch of dumb mollusks so your citizens can live free of fear? Sounds practical to me.

Yeah heck, my current game I have built up my major trading buddy (a minor race and have given the Lenz the rest of the planets in the system.

Yeah I know it just erks me that political correctness and fluffy bunny stupidity of the ethical choices.


Ahhh but Tetleytea the neutral and evil choices does not allow you to make the beast with two backs. and if you choose gaming over that past time I think you might be ready for the monestary lol.

Duh

i think the pretense here is that a truly good would always put other sentient life first - we'll risk our lives that these creatures might live, we'll relocate our colony. i think it's written from the point of view of species-level thinking, not from the point of a pragmatic leader looking out for his/her people. though one might argue it's a fine line, a pragmatic leader might be looking out for his/her people's consciences.

Well, dystopic, if that were how the world truely worked the Roman empire would of never came about and the world would be a much colder place without Concrete (the only Roman Invention).

Think what the world would be like today if we never dropped the bomb. Japan would of been made into a sheep pasture and roughly half of us would not be here.

Well If the critter eats people and is senite thats all the more reason to wipe them out. Who knows they might take over the planet and still your tech and that is not a good choice for cuddling them. Plus think of it this way which would you rather see little Suzy playing with her cat or Traces of little Suxy and her cat found in the dung of those critters. Please... self aware or not they have no right to exist because ... all together now... they eat other self aware peoples (and thats why I wipe those Dregins out too).

dystopic having worked in the mourge and have seen a number of shaken babies, I would choose there lives over there killers. And think about those colonists to make them colonizer in that hell world where you loose 33% of your kids and spouses, it does not sound so good or right to me.

Duh

good point, but take a look to the other side:

"it's saturday and your boyfriend is surely glued to the screen in the middle of whatever childish game he's playing on the computer"

good: you call him, tell him if he rembers the romantic dinner he promised last week, wait for his sense of guilty to come out and then criticize him all over the night

neutral: you call him, don't say a word, let his sense of guilty come out, go out for dinner and don't say a word all night long

evil: either me or the dronging!

richard

Well it's a good thing he's not saying that's how the world works then. He has a valid point.

From his point of view, that "good" looks out for the good of things, they should live, be left alone, your people shouldn't die "needlessly". Needlessly would apply to thing like precursor artefacts that require life force to work.

Neutral is just that. They find a balance between loss and gain.

Evil is technically evil from this POV. To commit genocide against a group of sentient beings because of whatever reason. How do you think the world would react if you started killing off every type of an animal because it bothered you in some way. yeah..right. Or to kill off millions of your own people for some sort of power boost. It's E-V-I-L...and I love it.

This is why I love my wife. She's usually either perched over my shoulder watching me play and offering advice (pretty good advice I should add) or she's too busy playing Burnout in the other room to care.

While I agree that some of the "ethical choices" in this game are a little stupid and overly PC, I agree with most of them. Tell me, is it truely a 'good' choice to wipe out a species so that you can live without fear? No, you're just watching out for yourself. True goodness often requires sacrifices to be made, like choosing let that other species on the planet live at the cost of a bit more discomfort (by trying to learn to coexist with something instead of killing it because it bothers you for example). The trick is to see the ethical choices not as you choosing what is best for your people, but the choices that the race as a whole makes. A race that kills things just because they are annoying is going to be evil.

Naturally, it would be different if the other species was actively trying to kill your citizens, in that case you just do whatever is nessissary to protect yourself. I don't remember seeing any choices like that though, maybe I just haven't seen them.

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thank you, Mzuz. i was reluctant to re-argue this point. if he can't even grasp the difference between "there," "their," and "they're," i suspect the subtler points of ethics (such as the difference between sentience and conscience) might elude him entirely.

now if you'll excuse me, i must return to cuddling the blood-thirsy monsters while they still my tech.

Frankly, the whole idea of "good and evil" is bull, but thats an entirely philosophical argument.

I made a post about it a while back, but I'll say it again... more depth to the ethical decisions, like the possibility of consequences down the road (positive or negative, or not at all), would be an excellent addition to the game. It'd also be nice if the AIs would participate in the ethical games a bit, with messages being sent your way saying what they're up to.

Maybe his style of writing is a subtle dig at an overly-staid and rules-bound society? Like someone who disdains proper capitalization, for instance.

Whoa.

. . . .she got a sister?

Forget that, what about her mom?

I bet she plays Galciv better.

I hope so for your sake you base it on bonus, the choices rarely spark any emotions in me and nor it should. Otherwise I have to spend extra money to see my shrink, can you imagine I go tell my shrink that I just destroyed hospitals to make room for my hyperion logistics system in a computer game I played???

My favorite ethical "choice" is the one with the starship orbiting the planet.

The Evil choice, of course, is to seize the ship and pull it apart to learn its secrets. Okay; I'll agree -- that's evil, all right.

But how on earth is the Neutral choice of "Say hello and ask them for advice (+X% Starship bonus)" less "good" than the Good choice of "Ignore them and hope they go away"? How is that good? There are games where I try to play straight "good," and that particular choice just absolutely drives me crazy.

I'm just glad I was playing more Neutral the one game recently where I got that particular event on something like five new planets in a row.

The evil vs good theme, in my opinion, is how the OTHER RACES VIEW YOU.

You see, it may not be evil to kill a creature that is swimmin around in your beaches, if you´re afraid they may be a danger to your people. But if this species has a conscience, and you decide to kill it anyway, what is the message you send to the other alien species?

Good and evil is all about relativity. No one is truly good or evil. Its all about perceptions. And the way the game is done is so that the good vs evil theme is all about a more broad intergalactic way of viewing it.

A distinction should be drawn between cruel treatment of other races and cruel treatment of your own. They are two entirely different issues... you can have civilisations that are vicious and xenophobic, yet take very good care of their citizens.

Well what irks me is that race of intelligent critters that are war machines that eat your colonists. How is it Good to say oh well I guess the smiths will loose there smallest daughter cindy to them if we let them roam free to be. Intelligent or not it is not good to let them live. The evil choice is the only good one.

LOL... they must be greenies. shakes head If the USA was settled like that there would be thirteen second world nations and a big mass of third world nations from the east coast to the west.

Duh