A lot of people are griping that there isn’t a clear option for bad guys in Fallout 4, that all the choices are either good or grey.
BEWARE SPOILERS!
At first, I was in agreement, but I’ve changed my mind. And it does roughly follow on from my first impression.
As I noted in the other article, I felt uneasy when I entered the Institute about how they actually seemed to be decent folk. Up until that point, every Institute synth I had met had been out to kill me.
I put that down to my having allied with their enemies the Railroad and the Brotherhood, but I did wonder why they didn’t at least try to talk to me if they knew who I was.
So let’s say it was all some misunderstanding. Some potentially fatal misunderstanding that could have left the father of the Institute’s leader dead in an abandoned warehouse somewhere. Still doesn’t sit right.
Anyway, trying to put that aside, after entering the Institute, you’re welcomed by your son Shaun, who names you as his successor. There are some in the Institute who are understandably unhappy about the idea, and one even goes so far to threaten your life (again).
Meanwhile, you’re sent on missions that are pretty much in direct opposition to what the Railroad would have you do. Although I didn’t have much issue with taking out an escaped synth who had become a raider leader.
You’re also given assistance from X6-88, the synth Courser who had a hand in helping to raise your son.
This guy, who was there to see a baby stolen from a vault to be raised in the Commonwealth Wasteland by a cyborg merc, and to go on to become the leader of his organisation, should have learned something about what it means to be human. But instead you’ll quite often hear him comment on how he looks forward to the day that the Institute wipes out the people of the Commonwealth so that they will be all that’s left of humanity.
Meanwhile, the Institute continues its game of kidnapping and replacing people with synths. I can only assume the kidnapped victims are murdered and their bodies hidden, as I’ve not found any type of holding cells in the Institute, and no one who says that they used to live in one of the settlements but was invited to live underground in the new paradise.
They’ll even affect your owned settlements. I got the message that Oberland Station was under attack, so I rushed over there and found a ghoul settler dead on the ground. On searching the body, it was revealed that she was a synth. At which point several Institute synths opened fire on my settlers.
Now, I’m not sure what the story is here. Was the dead ghoul synth an Institute spy and the Mark 1s and 2s were getting revenge, or was the ghoul synth a Railroad refugee who the Institute were trying to recapture? Either way, the Institute was attacking real people, who were only trying to survive.
The reason I suggest that she may have been a spy, is because that exact thing is going on at Warwick Homestead. The father of the family has long since been replaced by a synth replica, and is there on surveillance and for doing various experiments. So the real father was probably murdered so that the synth could be put in place.
It seems that to the Institute, the people of the Commonwealth are completely expendable. They are basically subhuman and not worthy of the advances that are being made in secret.
I think any organisation that routinely dehumanises people and kills without remorse falls under the category of evil, even if they don’t realise it.
