I wanted players to think ‘Oh, I have to steal this wallet from this person, and now they look a little bummed out… I did that’”įrom lifting the wallet of a condescending neighbor to carefully hustling a stockbroker out of hundreds of dollars, The Big Con’s tale of blurred morality, swagger and desperation resonates on a profoundly human level. I think that makes you dissociate from what you’re actually doing. “I love Fableand Mass Effect – they’re both wonderful games – but I didn’t want to do that,” Proctor continues, “I didn’t want you to have to play Paragon or Renegade. ”I just want you to think about what you’re doing, to have those conversations with yourself and never put it on a meter.”

“The thing that I really didn’t want to do was beat people over the head with mechanical and systemic consequences of their actions,” explains the game’s creative director, Dave Proctor. Refreshingly, that’s simply not the case in The Big Con. For Ally the choice is clear – steal or become homeless.ĭespite the interactive medium’s massive potential for generating empathy, too often morality is little more than a meter to be gamed. With Ally’s mother unable to raise the funds, the once straight-laced teen finds herself suddenly needing to find tens of thousands of dollars. Put in the shoes of sassy teen, Ally, in-between puns and legally safe MTV references, you overhear that your mum’s video store has been plunged into life-shattering debt by a greedy landlord. Yet The Big Con’s tale of pickpocketing and hustle is one that’s wormed its way into my brain. A cutesy point-and-click adventure, at first glance you’d be forgiven for writing this off as another quirky coming of age story. This ‘90s-set grifter caper puts players into what’s essentially one big morally ambiguous situation, and lets them live their life, judgment-free. READ MORE: ‘Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin’ preview: The ‘Shadow the Hedgehog’ of soulslikes could be a smash hit.Yet last week, an unassuming-looking indie game called The Big Con offered me exactly that. If I’m honest, it’s hard to remember the last time an interactive outing left me reeling from a series of conscience-racking choices. Yes, AI-policed open worlds peddle a solid illusion of actions having consequences, but few games really nail the stress of ethical decision-making. Sure, Mass Effect offers a slew of ‘this good, that bad’ binary decisions. When it comes to teaching people the nuance of morality, video games aren’t exactly our go-to guide.

Is origin safe for pc