Keep in mind that I know that there is a Morality system all set out for the game, and that chances are it will have its own sets of guidelines. This is more a set of thoughts that was originally intended as a response in another thread, but eventually got long enough to have it stand on its own. Even with a Morality system, I think that there is more than enough room to fit something like this in.

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Usually when people think of Moral Choices or Conversation Trees or Mission Paths or other things along those lines, they think of the standard Bioware-esque choices that you are presented with, where you are aware of what general direction your actions are going to take you due to the location of the choice (up for good and down for bad), as well as the colors that each choice is highlighted with (blue for righteous and red for jerkbag). This can be handy for a lot of things, from letting the players feel like they're truly sculpting an individual due to the way that they are choosing their choices, and also for allowing characters to pick their alignment because they might get some gameplay perks on either side, and want a certain set.

But the problem with this system is that it doesn't really jerk at your heart at all. You know exactly what you're going into when you make a choice, and you know what's going to happen when you're done. Either way, things are going to be alright, and the game is going to give you a little nod and a pat on the back before handing over your experience points and a shiny new gun. In other words, [I]you get closure every time[/I]. When it comes to choices that truly feel meaningful and haunting, the best way to do that is to provide the player with as little information as they need in order to make that choice. You trap them in a situation where both sides could be lying, and you have no idea which one is in the Right, but it's too late. You're too far in, and you have to make a decision.

This is where things get tricky, and players start to question what it is they really want to do. It is human nature to enjoy having all the options clearly displayed in front of you, along with what each option is going to do in the long run. But as soon as someone doesn't know, they get uncomfortable. This is, at least in my opinion, the single greatest and most effective way to get a player inside of the head of a character that they're playing. There's no Meta aspect such as Designated Good or Undeniably Evil. When the Bad Guys that you've been hunting for half a quest-chain turn around and not only say that you've been duped, but also [I]provide sound and clear reasoning for why that might be the case[/I], who are you going to trust? The answer is that you don't know. You couldn't [I]possibly[/I] know.

And when you finally make that choice and the quest-chain draws to an end, when you take your reward and start heading home, it'll stick with you, and you'll wonder what could have happened if you chose differently. And hey, maybe you'll go back on another character and see where your path takes you if you did something else. There aren't very many things that are quite as haunting as that.

And why stop there when you can do something like make that choice that the player made come up again later on in a quest chain, or in a different one? It could be something as subtle as a reminder, or even something big like the return of one of the factions. Maybe that gem that you took from that rich banker for the homeless people really [I]was[/I] a family heirloom, while the bums were a bunch of robbers, and now he's out to ruin you. Maybe that girl that you took to the corrupted police really [I]was[/I] innocent like she claimed, and now that you need her family's help, they want nothing to do with you.

Things like that can run pretty deep.

That's all I really have to say about this sort of thing for now, but there's no better way to generate ideas than community discussion. Maybe something neat has the potential to come out of this.