Karma Meter/Quotes

"There are only two endings, a good one and a bad one. In the good ending you're a virtuous flower child with love and a smile for all the shiny-coated beasts of God's kingdom. In the bad ending you're a hybrid of Hitler and Skeletor whose very piss is pure liquid malevolence. I'm tired of games that claim to give you choice but it only really comes down to either Mother Teresa or baby eating. I'm just saying that a little middle ground would be nice [shows a picture of Mother Teresa eating a baby]."

—Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw, reviewing BioShock (series)

Scientist: "These interactions are robust and filled with profound choices."
Alex: "Choices? Like what?"
Scientist: "Like right now. You have the choice to shoot me, or -- get this -- to not shoot me. Think about that for one second."
Alex: "What? Why would I shoot you?"
Scientist: "I don't know. Maybe I've got one of those multitools or something. Or maybe some money. Or maybe nothing at all!"
Alex: "That's it? That's my profound choice? To murder you, or not, for random items you might not even have?"

Scientist: "Yes! Think of the possibilities!"

—A Deus Ex Invisible War fancomic

"It seems as though the floodgates are beginning to creak open on inFamous, including the revelation of 'Karma Moments' - a tracked morality system with effects on player progression. It wasn't meant to be funny, but for some reason we found it very funny, because like many mechanisms of this kind your choices tend to come down to being an omnibenevolent supercherub or the Goddamned devil."

—Tycho Brahe, on inFamous.

"Real choices, the kind you get in real life where the consequences completely change the trajectory of every event that follows, will never be practical in video games. It costs enough to program a full-length game that will keep you entertained throughout. They're not going to program the equivalent of 10 or 20 games just to give you a whole bunch of branching paths that 90 percent of gamers will never see since they'll only play through once."

—5 Plot Devices That Make Good Video Games Suck, Cracked.com