You can't please everyone

Recently I’ve been doing another playthrough of the mighty Baldur’s Gate 2. Yep, it still keeps calling to me with an eternal siren’s song – which is indeed a rare thing for many games to do when one has so many of them to keep track.
This time, however, this playthrough is different as I’ve included mods – not least is the one that combines BG1, ToSC and BG2 in one game. This is great for me – not only am I using ToSC for the first time but it’s fun to see a character grow over the course of a super-huge game. A time of writing I’m in the middle of the BG1 portion and, having conquered the ToSC regions, have made it to Baldur’s Gate itself.
Another one of the mods I’m using is one called ‘Virtue’ which takes into account the actions of the party and reputation. However having implemented the mod in the question, it effected the game already in progress. And suddenly, half my party members ended up walking out on me.

The members in question were Safina, Branwen and Khalid. The latter may come across as being surprising but the absence of Jahiera in my party may have something to do with it (but I’m not worried – if, of course, you know what happens to Khalid in BG2). But the departure of both Safina and Branwen is the accumulation of their disappointment over my actions. Being of neutral alignment, they did grumble a lot over my actions and the mod I installed gave them the excuse they were after to leave.
This in turn, is a good excuse for me to rant about the Good/Bad choices in game.

When it comes to gaming I’m far too used to be the good guy – As a child of the eighties I’ve played many games over many years where I’ve been presented with a problem and I must solve it. Such problem included saving the world/girlfriend or overcoming some antagonist. It’s a trope that was done to death in the sixteen bit era and having been exposed to it so often it’s now more like a programmed response.
And it’s still lasted long into my adulthood. As such I play a game now I expect to play the role of the hero - in fact, when presented with the option, I honestly can’t bring myself to be a baddie and do nasty things. So much so that whilst I’ve been a bad guy in games before like Mass Effect, Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic and, to lesser extent Starcraft, I’ve felt like shit afterwards. And if the game stops being fun and enjoyable then that’s a danger sign if ever there was one.
I guess it comes with the freedom of choice – if you give the player the freedom they will do what they choose along with living with the consequences. It does indeed make a difference than a game that presents little choice alongside an emphasis on consequence (Spec Ops the Line anyone?). But at the same time there is little point in being a prick for the sake of being prick – by of comparison consider Red Dead Redemption: Yes you can become a Desperado but doing so makes John Marston’s insistence of putting his violent past behind him as somewhat insincere.

Yet with age comes experience and in my experience there is no such thing as a ‘pure’ hero. You simply can’t tell me that anyone can do so many heroic things with little effort and not have a single black spot to their name. Okay yes there is Superman but if someone has to Superman it may as well be Kal-El himself. No for me, the more realistic hero is the type that does the right thing but isn’t afraid to do something unorthodox and eschew falling over backwards to be an example for everyone to follow. Indeed, it is, to me, satisfying in the Avengers movie to have the irresponsible hero, Tony Stark/Iron Man, as the leader instead of the responsible one, Captain America.
Thus I like to play heroes that save the day but aren’t the type to take shit from anyone. By way of example when I play Mass Effect I take the Paragon path but I take Renegade choices whenever possible. For, as is often the case, there is no black or white, only shades of grey.

Which brings me back to Baldur’s Gate: My character is a paladin but taking this class has little to do with background or roleplay but more with the ruleset – fighters that can heal? What’s not to like? (The high charisma doesn’t hurt either)  But to be a paladin means you’re confined to being Lawful Good and can’t really break from it. Of course, my choices are me going through the motions of being a gaming hero but, as it would seem, such choices don’t seem to sit well with the people around me – God only knows what would happen when I reach BG2 and am presented with the opportunity to romance Jahiera.
Still though, I do strongly believe that the Good/Bad paths are ultimately futile: There is no such thing as a 100% White and a 100% Black – for being somewhere in the middle is both realistic and far more plausible.
But of course, being a paladin means you can’t sip up even once. Oh well….