RPGs are known for creating deep narratives where players are able to immerse themselves in a compelling world and get lost in their “role”. As developers seek to create more immersive worlds, characters have become more and more customizable. Not only can players choose what their character looks like, or their base stats and abilities, but also their ethics and moral code. Will their character be a champion of the helpless, or a power crazed tyrant?

Not only can players choose what their character looks like, but also their ethics and moral code.

While this mechanic has experienced a resurgence (Mass Effect, inFamous, Bioshock, and Knights of the Old Republic series being some of the more popular examples), it is not a new one. A more classic example would be from 1985 when Ultima IV introduced a virtue system that, depending on how the player answered morally ambiguous questions, would determine their class and other gameplay details.

Do gaming motivations and demographics impact the choice of “good” or “evil” factions in RPGs? It turns out they do, but sometimes in surprising ways.

A Quick Word About The Data

Here at Quantic Foundry, in addition to the Gamer Motivation Profile, we also have additional research surveys that gamers can participate in. These surveys tackle a variety of game preference questions, and allow us to link gamers’ responses back to things like their motivation scores, gender, and age. 1,082 gamers participated in this research survey. Five individuals left this question blank, resulting in 1,077 valid responses.

Most Gamers Avoid The Dark Side

We asked gamers which of the following factions in an RPG game they were most likely to select in their initial playthrough of the game.

The Good/Light and Morally Ambiguous factions make up roughly 80% of the overall player sample, each taking about 40% respectively. The remaining players are split between No Preference, about 14% for males and 10% for females, and finally Dark/Evil which makes up the remaining (and smallest) proportion of the sample.

The Good/Light and Morally Ambiguous factions make up roughly 80% of the overall player sample.

The overall gender differences were minimal. One might have guessed that men would be more aggressive and go for the brute power that the dark side often embodies, or that women may be more inclined to adopt altruistic causes. In reality, when it comes to choosing between good and evil, gender doesn’t appear to matter.

Younger Gamers Are More Likely To Pick The Dark/Evil Faction

So if gender doesn’t influence faction choice, what about age? As we’ve seen in a previous article, age can have a large influence on how gamers play, and that appears to be the case here as well.

The average age of players who preferred the Dark/Evil side was 22.7 years old. Players who sought out more morally ambiguous options averaged at 26.3 years old, and finally those more inclined to seek out Light/Good factions were the oldest at an average age of 27.8. Overall, among gamers who have a faction preference, those who preferred the Dark/Evil side were much younger.

Overall, gamers who preferred the Dark/Evil side were much younger.