PaigeFTW: The worst thing I ever did in a game
Your behavior in a game reflects, to a certain degree, your character outside of it. This isn’t true all of the time, but it is more true than we would like to think.
This is the story of the most morally repugnant thing I have ever done in a video game.
The Last of Us follows Joel and Ellie, an unlikely pair traversing the ruins of post-zombie apocalypse America. Joel has been hired to bring Ellie to the Fireflies, a holdout group trying to find a cure.
At the game’s climax, Joel is unmoored. The Fireflies inform him unceremoniously that Ellie will be killed and her brain dissected. His services are no longer required, and he cannot say goodbye.
But Joel thinks of Ellie as his own daughter, now. If Ellie must die to save all of humanity, Joel would rather let the world burn — and so would I.
When I finally got to Ellie’s operating room, I already had my shotgun out. The doctor warned me to stay back. He brandished his scalpel at me. I shot him in the chest before he could finish speaking.
The other nurses cowered in the corners, on their knees, hands up, unarmed. I could leave now — take Ellie and go, and I know they will not follow me. The alarms have already been raised. They have surrendered.
But instead I walked right up to the first nurse and shot him point blank in the head. Rinse and repeat. Only then did I pick up Ellie and run.
I never thought about it until I talked to a friend who had done exactly the opposite — ignored the nurses and ran. Why did I kill them? I didn’t have to do it. But I did. I wonder what it means. I wonder if that cruelty exists in the real me, and not just the virtual me that pulled the trigger.
