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I *finally* completed the celebrated Fallout 3 about a weekend ago after a number of starts and stops and spurts and various hiatuses. This is generally how video games go for me: Each neglected game the victim of my daily, fickle whim, each game always in danger of being abandoned and never picked up again. Occasionally, a video game will be exceptional enough to incite the obsession bug in me and while my pace is generally still glacial by the standards of my peers, at least I complete them. Of the last five games I’ve purchased (that were not sports or fake music-related), I’ve finished two and abandoned three. My track record is not good.

But I finished Fallout. Because I love Fallout. I’ve always loved Fallout. I want DAAATE Fallout.

Anyhow, I dabbled in the original Fallout and I went apeshit over Fallout 2 (though I honestly can’t remember completing it, OBVIOUSLY) and for years I and a gajillion other Fallout geeks anticipated the release of Fallout 3. On the whole, I don’t think it disappointed anyone. I am not going to clumsily attempt to provide a review of this game in this post (you can find a review here, here, or here, or even here; rather, I wanted to touch briefly on one aspect of the game that raised some questions about my own personality.

Quicky quick side note:

My laptop ran out of juice and I didn’t bring home my AC adapter. The result is that I’m sitting on the couch typing this on my trusty iPhone (with the intent of just filling in all the hyperlinks and stuff later). I have Intervention on in the background and the subject is an alcoholic who drank so much he had to be taken to the emergency room. After he became conscious and was alone in his hospital room, he squirted hand sanitizer into a styrofoam cup and mixed it with water to get a booze fix! I’m not making this up! Just say no, kids!

OK, so I briefly wanted to mention Fallout 3’s karma system. This system is not unique to Fallout 3, but the first that was attached to a series I actually cared about. Below is a description of this system:

Karma System
An important feature of the game is the karma system. Each player has a total amount of karma which can be affected by his/her decisions or actions. Beyond acting as flavour for the game’s events, karma can have tangible effects to the player, primarily affecting the game’s ending. Other effects include altered dialogue with NPCs, or unique conflicts with evil or good characters. Actions vary in extremes of karma; pickpocketing receives less negative karma than unprovoked homicide, for example. The player’s relationships with the game’s factions are distinct, so any two groups or settlements may view the player in contrasting ways, depending on the player’s conduct.

I’ll be honest with you: Whenever I play a game with open-ended dialogue choices, or one that provides the ability to attack anyone within the game, or dangle the tempting capacity to rob, cheat, steal, lie, maim, or participate in other random skullduggery, I ALWAYS choose to play the very straight and narrow GOOD GUY path. Every dialogue I select is kind and helpful, every action I take is one which clearly any hero worth his salt would (heroically) seize without hesitation, and every beggar, orphan, and mother-separated-from-child gets me on the job to help him or her (or It) out.

On the flip side, I’ll be REALLY honest with you: Once in a while, when I’ve been playing for a minute and it’s getting late and I’m tired or bored or both, I’ll take my character into an area (like a town or building), start at one end of the defineable area, and clear the entire map of every living thing: friend, foe, or furniture. Boredom-bred violence against innocent digital beings with simple AIs. When there is nothing left to shoot at, maim, or speak to unkindly, I quit my game WITHOUT saving its progress. The next time I load up my game, everything is as peaceful and calm and full of POSITIVE karma as it was before the tedium-breaking bloodbath.

Am I a pent-up, bloodthirsty freak? No, I don’t think so. I think if I asked a dozen of my friends if they’ve ever attacked an innocent video game character out of boredom, I’m guessing that nearly all of them will say they have. So, I guess if I AM a freak, I’m not alone.

But this isn’t the part that was intriguing to me.

The part that was intriguing to me is the fact that upon completing Fallout 3 (with perfect karma obviously), I attempted to start the game over with the intent of playing a negative karma player. If boredom drove me to find interest in becoming a villain, why not create a villainous character and play through the entire game in that way? GENIUS.

But you see, this is where I hit a snag. I started my new game, created my character pumping up the attributes I thought most DASTARDLY and then formulated a truly EVVILLL visage for his post-apocalyptic victims to cower before. When I thought he could get no eviler, when the brown and more brown hue of the future District of Columbia had never witnessed a more vile soul, I started to play the game and COULD NOT say an ill word toward a single computer-controlled person. I just couldn’t do it. We’re not talking about having a dilemma between choosing to KILL or not KILL. No, we’re talking about a personal internal struggle between being RUDE or not RUDE. It didn’t feel right. I forced myself to play along like I had intended, but I wasn’t having any fun. I didn’t want to kill, I didn’t want to steal, I wanted to be polite, I wanted to rescue kittens out of trees for old ladies. Some evil-doer I turned out to be.

After only about 30 minutes or so of not having any fun, I gave up. I don’t intend to try again.

What does it mean? Am I a flawed person for taking a good character and having him do bad things that I know can be undone by not saving? Am I a good person for feeling uncomfortable about intentionally choosing to do bad things as the status quo as opposed to the occasional bored freak out? Does it mean anything at all?

Maybe the ability to DO and then UNDO is pure fantasy. Without consequence and substance: The joy of knocking down a house of cards knowing that you can snap your fingers and have it reappear unharmed. How many times do you think Superman fantasized about zapping the mayor with his heat vision? He didn’t, because it could not be undone. But what if it could? Fantasy.

On the other hand, playing a game where you intend to save your evil-doing could be considered different. It’s your reality. Nothing will be undone here other than the formerly peaceful lives of your digital victims! I think that’s what unnerves me. I think it feels less akin to fantasy for me than the former scenario. It’s not a departure, it’s a status, and perhaps that’s what I can’t get behind. I can allow myself the occasional violent fantasy, but I cannot accept that as my being.

That’s natural, right?