One of the most fascinating things about videogames is how they instantly allow us to indulge in our worst, most craven impulses - murder, deceit, betrayal, and abject cruelty all come SURPRISINGLY naturally to us when we're allowed to get away with it in the auspices of gaming. Is it because we're curious about inflicting our will and seeing the consequences in the safety of the virtual world? Or are we all just cruel monsters deep down who want to do terrible things and this is the only acceptable way to do it without becoming a legitimate psychopath?
Well, we don't know the answer to that - but this r/AskReddit thread captured some of the more notable tales of videogame evilness from across the years.
1. Peter Molyneux is responsible for disappointing a lot of people over the years, but at least his work gave us gifts like these. (from IIamMoose)
Fable.
Become a savant so people will follow you with out question, take them to a cult and sacrifice them. Go back to town, buy their property, repeat till you're wholly evil, raise the taxes on the property to exorbitant levels, save game, advance the time on the Xbox 20 years, come back and rake in that sweet dough. Donate like .001% of it to the church to become holy again.
2. A pretty good test for sociopathy is give someone any Fable game and see what happens. (from thebook92)
In Fable 3, I married a woman to have a child with her for the achievement. I then killed my wife, which sent my kid to the game's orphanage, which I later had converted into a brothel.
3. Joking about nuclear war is a little less funny nowadays, but I guess Civ games show none of us should ever run for president. (from ChrisWalley)
Yesterday I played Civ 5, and basically got a great start, then befriended all the other civs, allied with every city state, and basically was the all round peace loving and scientifically successful nation. Then I rushed nukes, put some carriers around the world and nuked every single other civ and state in one round. I felt pretty bad afterwards.
4. This is BASICALLY the plot of "I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream." (from thestickytrenchcoat)
I started a World War because Alexander the Great wouldn't fuck off from my continent. This douchebag had bloated to 40 something cities on a different continent and would just. not. stop. AND he had a monopoly of votes in the world congress because he sucked the dick of every city-state leader in the game.
I left him with one tiny city, on a one tile island, and I always had one city producing atomic bombs, and I perpetually nuked him until I fucked off to Alpha Centauri and won the game.
5. "Your words will disappear. Your house will disappear.Your name will disappear. All memory of you will disappear." (from FinnSolomon)
Civ IV, I like to turtle so I'll do my own thing, researching and building wonders. But when some asshole like Montezuma declares war and raids a couple of my cities, I raise a giant army and counter attack. I don't capture his cities, I burn every last one to the ground. I don't want anyone to remember that he or his people even existed. Then I send out settlers to establish new cities on the burning ruins of his forgotten ones.
6. Skyrim made kids unkillable for a reason: because we would murder them all if we could. (from DeliberatelyAcute)
Wanted to adopt a kid in Skyrim, but I didn't like any of the ones at the orphanage. So I googled the list of children who could potentially be adopted. Decided on Erith because she came with a dog. So I headed out to Left Hand Mine and murdered her mother, making Erith available for adoption. Joke's on me, though- the game glitched so I didn't get the dog, and it turns out Skyrim kids kind of suck.
7. Sometimes to make an empire, you need to murder a few popes. (from Barbalias)
Medieval Total War 2, no doubt.
Playing as the French one time, I had it out with the Catholic Church on an epic level. The Pope kept declaring me an enemy of the state, so I would assassinate and replace him. Wash, rinse repeat. Eventually I conquered the entire world, hunting down and assassinating something like 45 popes. I found the very last pope hiding out in North Africa as an actual army unit. I sent 2000 elite troops to wipe out the last vestige of Catholicism. To his credit, the pope solo charged into battle against 2000, pope hat and all.
If you haven't played, the game was notorious for its poorly conceived religious system. Basically, the pope would name a country and say "you're not a very good catholic. It's ok for other catholic nations to go to war with you." Then that country was kinda on their own. Problem was that the pope would then revoke that status at any moment, like 1 turn before you took their capitol city and wiped them out. And, if you defied his orders, you were on the chopping block.
8. The only thing more evil than this is becoming a Minecraft Youtuber. (from ManMan36)
There used to be a mod for the game Minecraft where you could run villagers into a grinding block and it would spit out meat and emeralds. You could then eat the meat that you produced.
So murder in a dragged out and awful way followed by cannibalism.
9. Fifa 95 this way is basically Mortal Kombat with a ball. (from EffityJeffity)
Fifa 95 - injuries on, fouls off. Press B + C together, punch other team to death. Win league. Win World Cup. Win everything.
10. That'll teach Mr. House for setting Benny on me. (from ObeseMorese)
Fallout New Vegas. I opened Mr. Houses containment chamber, dropped a bunch of food and mushroom bits in, then closed it again. Sealed in the flavor.
I'm sure his excellent immune system had fun dealing with that.
11. The ones who die on incomplete rollercoasters are the lucky ones... (from AntiparticleCollider)
Roller Coaster Tycoon. Gather all the unhappy guests. Drop them all into water. Wait until everyone had drowned but for one survivor. Put him on his own special 1x1 island. Repeat until I have many survivors. Drown them, again saving the lone survivor. Repeat for generations.
12. This guy is about as close to Craster from Game of Thrones as you can get. (from rodneyabcd)
Sims 3.
Introduce self to rich neighbor. Seduce wife. Move in. Kick husband out onto street. Impregnate wife. Kick pregnant wife out onto street. Rinse and repeat with richer neighbor until all the money and bastards are mine.
13. I hope the adoption agency remembers this. (from zulan)
Back when I played WOW they used to have this orphan event where you could get an orphan and show him around the world. The first year, or maybe even only the first couple of days the kid could draw aggro and get beat on by the monsters in the area.
I used him as a distraction to loot and pillage while the kid was eaten by a variety of monsters.
14. DON'T F*CKLE WITH SHUCKLE. (from Velonic)
In Pokémon Silver, this one kid asked me to hold onto his Shuckle for fear that some people were gonna steal it from him or something. After I defeated those people, he thanked me and asked for Shuckle back.
I didn't give Shuckle back.
