Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Why can't you kill the tiefling kids?

If we'd like to consider a more thoughtful angle of concern here...

I'm not going to talk specifically about representation and treatment of juveniles in games; what I would talk about would be moral arbitration by games. Larian have been up front and overt about how they wanted to make a game where you could be who you like and do what you want, even if (especially if, judging from their advertising) that meant choosing to be a murderous, evil monster that delighted in causing suffering to others, or a greedy sociopath who values the lives of others less than the coin and shiny items they might have. They've been clear about wanting to make a game where you can choose to murder anyone in cold blood if it takes your fancy, and that you'll just have to deal with the consequences of your own actions. Setting aside the apparent watering down of actual consequences, that overall philosophy runs up against the situation we have here.

The moral arbitration becomes a problem, because on the surface they've said "We're not going to restrict you by what's right and wrong, and we're not going to tell you what you can and can't do; go wild!" ... but then they've stepped in and said "Wait, no, this is Wrong! You Can't do That!", which reduces their initial stance from "We're letting you do what you want, our hands are clean" to "We have a very relaxed view of what is and isn't acceptable, and everything below this line is fine!" - which is a much more morally dubious thing to say!

In itself, it's a concession that could be accepted; I doubt anyone would fault them for drawing the line at literal on-screen child murder... they show it being perpetrated by 'evil' people, but don't permit the player to simulate it by their own hand. However... The problem with this is that Larian have also permitted players to do this very thing elsewhere, and even encouraged it by creating a small penalty to the situation if you don't (extra reinforcements).

Where does this leave us? It leaves us in a pretty precarious and unpleasant situation, really: It leaves us with Larian back-handedly telling us that it's okay, and even encouraged, to murder children of one particular ethnic/racial group, but not another. Make no mistake: the goblins presented are a fully sapient, culturally structured people, and their children are as well. Larian did not have to present them that way, and they did not have to put goblin children in the space, and they did not have to put them in combat situations and offer incentives to kill them... that was all their personal design choice, alongside their other personal design choice of rendering the same action impossible against children of a different ethnic/racial group in the same chapter.

Larian definitely have the right to design a space and say "You can do what you like here, we will not stop you; your actions are on you, our hands are clean" - they absolutely can make that their stance, and I will defend to the hilt their right to do so! When they put their thumb on the scale and block some things but not others, however, they have abandoned that stance, and it leaves them saying "This is not acceptable... but that is!" And that particular kind of moral arbitration, especially over an event of this nature, and especially when their pitch has been that they aren't making any such arbitrations, is not okay in my book.

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P.s. It should be noted that this stands aside of any discussions about whether it's okay to kill goblins specifically, or their nature or alignment. In this particular situation, it's about presentation and subsequent action: the goblins in this game, and in these specific situations are presented, one hundred percent, as fully sapient, intelligent people, capable of feelings and emotions; of love, hate and apathy; of fear, hope and aspiration; of genuine attachment and sorrow; acknowledging these traits may not be favoured in their culture, but they are absolutely and deliberately depicted as being capable of such as presented in this game... and for the issue of moral arbitration of action, that is what matters.