My Species Doth Protest Too-Shut Up!: Morality In The Elder Scrolls Universe and How It Works (Part I)
The citizens of Nirn and its outer areas are…interesting in behavior to say the least. Some do some things, others do other things; some individuals are some things and others are other things. These actions and peoples are perceived differently depending on the individual mindset and personal views. That is why we get things like “That dude was a dick!”, “That dude was awesome!”, and “That dude ate babies!”.
Morality in TES is very simple yet strange. So I thought I would clear up some of that strangeness, by defining the six types of mortality and identifying them with TES concepts as well as marking the changes in morality throughout the games.
WARNING: I am completely serious in this piece. I’ll be incredibly offended if you treat any of these sentences as humor. ^Nah, ^I'm ^Just ^Screwing ^With You.
OY. YAMWTSDFT. ^Oh, ^Yeah. ^You ^All ^Might ^Want ^To ^Sit ^Down ^For ^This.
####1. WHITE AND WHITE MORALITY
The Battle between the Nice and the Nice. Essentially, W&WM is basically ‘good versus good’. Everyone in this type of setting rescues puppies, all worship the same god(s), have community picnics, celebrate each day with a brand new song like a Broadway musical, only have sex until they’re married, braid unicorn hair, and shit rainbows out of their ass. Whenever conflict breaks out, the opposing side settles things by seeing who can say I’m sorry the most sincerely.
Basically, it’s Teletubbies: a place where everyone is super great and don’t have wars or are racists or perform eugenic experiments or create nigh-omnipotent diseases or have slaves or build world-negating robots or talk about doing sexual acts in literature.
…
Obviously, this is the type of morality the TES universe runs on! TEAM LOVE HUG 4LIFE X3!! Let’s look at all the more depressing and clearly wrong morality stuff after this one just to laugh at them, and then go watch The Informative Argonian Teacher written by that Anti-Sexism Professor Curio guy at the theater later.
####2. WHITE AND BLACK MORALITY
The benevolent and the malevolent; the good (boring) and the evil (sexy). Out of all morality types, it’s W&BM that most people try to fit Tamriel into. Frankly, that wont work. Mostly because entities in TES aren’t clearly evil or clearly good. However, this type of morality was used in The Elder Scrolls I: Arena (1994). Jagar Tharn was the Big Bad of the game (he even had GLOWING RED EYES OF EVULZZZ), and the Eternal Champion was the Big Good. The Player had to travel through the land as a smexy Knight in Shining Armor to rescue their Emperor while defeating all the evil monsters that stood in their way. Tiber Septim was a peaceful ruler who united the people of Tamriel into a prosperous nation using absolutely no questionable tactics, the races of the land are friendly citizens, Imperial Battlemages are confirmed avatars of evil, all monsters encountered have no souls and just want to kill you, and oh yeah Orcs aren’t playable because generic fantasy stereotypes. And Khajiit and Argonians were people obsessed with cats/lizards respectively because animal people are just weird.
No gods and goddesses either, because people might get offended. ^I ^am ^IFW ^and ^I ^approve ^of ^this ^message.
(I would just like to say that I am in no way making fun of Bethesda’s first TES game. If it seems like this, you should send the DB Assassins to a member of /r/teslore’s house and silently send them to the Void. Trust me, this act of horrible violence will make me change my evil ways as I escape from the country with a new identity.)
Let me go ahead and say it: Pure Good vs. Pure Evil is boring. It doesn’t make sense because it’s not only impossible but it’s also silly. It kind of limits the potential in a game, book, movie, or TV show and leaves us wishing for more context other than ‘this evil warlord stole the MacGuffin and you need to get it back because you are a symbol of our everlasting pure light and that dark dude can’t sit on the throne’.
Ironically however, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2006) kind of went back to this format for the main quest (and other quests as well). The Empire is just and good and wise, and the Nine Divines are all heavenly and stuff, and Martin Septim is an all-round nice priest formerly devil worshipper. Mehrunes Dagon has apparently become Satan, and the Deadlands suspiciously seems to be an (although cool) analogue for Hell. It is the Hero of Kvatch’s (and therefore the Player’s) job to vanquish these evil demons I mean Dremora coming through these stargates I mean Oblivion Gates and rescue Tamriel from the apocalypse I mean- wait, nevermind apocalypse still works actually.
But then The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall (1996) came out. And it kind of kickstarted the lore. So, yeah you know, it was kind of a big deal.
####3. GRAYING MORALITY/WHITE AND GREY MORALITY
Eventually – as they grow more complex in nature – most W&GM videogames begin to abandon the usual “Good vs. Evil” territory and enter the “Good vs. I Think I’m Pretty Sure That Person Is Evil” Territory. Personalities, mindsets, and new background history begins to make the game universe more defined and ‘realistic’ than that of a fictional universe. Basically, its when Evil tells the Good Guys its only evil because it gets things done faster to help save the world. Moral decay. Things also begin to take a turn for the darker and edgy, with less fun and more grim being introduced into the mix.
The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall was the game that introduced this to the series as a whole. In here, the Empire is still the Big Good of Tamriel (although some texts have now been introduced painting it in a slightly less favorable light). TESD also introduced most of the Aedra, the Daedra, lycanthropes, actual vampire clans, and the creation myth of the universe (so adequately named The Light and The Dark), which really begins to pan out the Tamrielic faith. The races themselves get a revamp as their histories and provinces are expanded on, making them more diverse and interesting. Animosities are mentioned between mortals and mortals, gods and gods, and mortals and gods. The Mages Guild, Thieves Guilds, Fighters Guild, and the Dark Brotherhood are around but in limited capacity compared to their finalized(?) versions. And we even have books to read and a Reputation System (SOMETHING ALL TES GAMES SHOULD ALWAYS HAVE) now. Oh, and we can’t forget the abundant nudity. ^But ^is ^that ^such ^a ^bad ^thing…?
The main questline for the game was this. You, the Agent, are trying to discover the truth behind the dastardly (I can’t believe I used that word…) murder of King Lysandus, who is now a vengeful ghost king leading an army of undead. Clearly, someone is an evil prick that needs to be put down. But as you begin to dive deeper into the plot, you begin to realize that something really weird is going on as you discover that everyone is searching for some device called a Mantella or something that is supposed to activate some giant brass god to destroy their enemies.
…What. Why is all this political intrigue in my TES now? I liked it better when I knew who was evil and who was good, and I was always good. Here are just a few reasons that makes TESD grey:
- You know King Lysandus’s son? Well, turns out he might’ve sold out his own father to the kingdom of Wayrest so he could have the throne.
- There are seven people you can give the Mantella to, and they’re all assholes: the Underking (who hates everyone equally and wants his heart back by all costs), Gortwog (who pretty much wants to turn all Orsimer back into Aldmer by following Trinimac instead of Malacath. Noble, but insane), Mannimarco (who’s one of the few people in TES history that one can say might actually be truly evil and is also pretty much the founder of necromancy), the Royalty of Sentinel (who killed their own son because he wasn’t a warrior like they wanted), the Royalty of Daggerfall (who seems to delight in killing/banishing each other), the Royalty of Wayrest (Wayrest is just all kinds of fucked up), and the Blades (Jerkass Spies).
- If you really wanted to be a selfish bastard, you could use the Mantella on Numidium yourself only to get smashed into the ground by a rather large foot (this ending never made it into the game though).
- To further the point on Orcs, although they’re still enemies in the game TESD really makes you realize that the ‘monsters’ you’re killing are actually sentient, and not wholly evil.
- Lycanthropy requires you to murder innocents a few times a month are you begin to weaken. Heck, to cure yourself of Lycanthropy you got to kill a child.
- The Daedric Princes make you do all kinds of crap. Hell, the Divines make you do all kinds of crap too. The gods actively hate each other in-game.
- The Dark Brotherhood are around murdering and the Thieves Guild are around stealing.
TESD was then followed by The Elder Scrolls Legends: Battlespire (1997). Not only is TESLB (at least in my opinion) the darkest and edgiest TES game to date, it also introduced the more complex personalities of the Daedra and showed that even demons can sometimes be nice to the forces of good and also have lives, hopes, and dreams outside of serving their masters. They’re people too. Mehrunes Dagon’s motivation for invading the Battlespire, although it can easily be seen as an action of pure Evil, is much more than just that.
W&GM began to really drive home the feeling that Tamriel isn’t really a fun place to live in, but also constructed the universe into something a bit more than TESA did before. And then The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard (1998) and The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (2002) came along and pretty much declared Nirn a Crapsack World (you know, the one we love to death?) in its entirety.