It's not everyday that you're asked to trust someone enough to throw a baby into an oven, but I can't think of a better way to illustrate what makes The Witcher 3's choices so compelling. If you've played CD Projekt Red's fantasy RPG, you'll no doubt know that I'm referring to the unforgettable "Possession" side quest that sees you investigate the suspected curse of a Jarl. With the help of Cerys an Craite, you'll eventually come to some possible solutions. Then, in a dramatic moment that refuses to leave my memory, Cerys bursts through the door with the Jarl's baby clad in her arms, before instructing you to throw the poor infant into a nearby stove.
Without much time to consider your options or really process what's unfolding, you're pushed to act fast. I can remember every instinct in me screaming against it. I felt uncomfortable, torn, and utterly at a loss as to whether I should follow Cerys' instructions, but I was living for it. On the surface, it seems like an unforgivable act, one that no one in their right mind would want to ever commit. But as with all choices in The Witcher 3, you never quite know what will lead to the best outcome, or whether or not you're doing the "right" thing. And that's the crucial point. There are so many scenarios that throw your very notion of right from wrong out of the window, because the choices you can make frequently straddle the line in between.
You're often asked to do what you think is best in a world that's varying moral shades of grey over clear cut black and white. It's those shades of grey that make The Witcher 3 one of the best RPGs around, and I've been reminded of that fact thanks to Avowed and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2. While Obsidian and Warhorse's adventures offer up distinctive RPG flavors of their own, they too present questlines and choices that teeter on the edge of moral ambiguity.
Ends justify the means
Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, in many ways, is about survival and what you're willing to do in the name of it. Sometimes that means toeing the line between right and wrong in favor of making the best of any given situation. The medieval world is unforgiving, brutal, and will do everything it can to push you to retaliate in kind. Early on, committing crimes is constantly dangled in front of you as a man of no means, but the dubious dealings keep coming your way even when you have groschen to your name. Of course, you have the freedom to choose not to do them, but the world will also toy with your ideals, make you question what you're doing, and sometimes lead you to do things that, in my case, I'm not always completely comfortable with in the hopes of finding a peaceful resolution in the bigger picture – not unlike The Witcher 3.
When it comes to morally grey scenarios that test me, the quest Necessary Evil immediately comes to mind. Just before you go down to a chamber holding prisoners that you're about to interrogate and torture to get information for a lord, Hans says a line to Henry that turns out to be pretty pertinent: "You know how they say, ''The ends justify the means'? That applies exactly to our situation." As it turns out, that statement could arguably be applied to a lot of situations you're faced with in Bohemia, but it's especially true in this questline.
While I try my best to avoid outright torturing the men being held captive, I do get a little rough, threatening and harranging them both until I get what I need. During the whole ordeal, I constantly question what I'm doing, with no way of knowing where this is all leading or if I'm going too far, which immediately reminds me of the questionable choice in Geralt's curse-lifting quest. Just as the outcomes in The Witcher 3 are full of twists and unexpected turns, my actions in the torture chamber – as unpleasant as they are – actually allow me to prevent further bloodshed later on. I'm still not exactly sure "good" really means in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, but I love it all the more for the way it pushes me to examine my choices.
Two sides of the same coin
While there's thankfully no torture to worry about in Avowed, Obsidian's RPG constantly pushes you to think about where your loyalties lie and which side of yourself you want to listen to or lean into more. As both an Envoy of Adeyr who's tasked by the emperor to look into the plague spreading across the Living Lands, you're also trying to piece together more about the mysterious deity who blessed you as a godlike. There's a constant tension between the two sides of yourself, and it really is a role-playing dream to be able to approach situations that can feed into either side, or even in some cases, both aspects of yourself.
But this divide does often mean that I've constantly been questioning if there is a "good side" in the world of Eora. Will Adyr's influence actually benefit the Living Lands or do more harm? Can the god who speaks to me in my dreams be trusted? Or are they actually planning something nefarious? As these questions constantly shape my experience in Avowed, there are also lots of choices that tap into the ethically-ambiguous magic of The Witcher 3, with one major choice pushing me to question if there's even such a thing as the "right choice" in this story, and that's what constantly makes it so compelling.
In fact, my companion Giatta echoed this sentiment to me recently in the wake of one of my choices. "I don't believe there's a right or wrong choice to make here. Just the one you believe in". That idea, right there, is stuff dreams are made of in RPGs. Sometimes your decisions won't always lead to the best outcome, and maybe the outcome was less than ideal, but when you're thrown into morally grey scenarios with no cut and dry answer in terms of good vs evil, you just have to go with your gut. Just as I choose to trust Cerys, I choose to trust that I can help Eora by trusting this mysterious patron god.
I've always been a huge fan of the way The Witcher 3 and its world deals in shades of grey. You may not always know where your decision will lead you, and your own morals will be tested, but everything you do will be far more memorable because of it.
