The ethics of Fable 3

Many people have already pointed out extensively that Fable 3 failed to live up to the expectations set by its predecessors. In fact one of the top listings for a Google search of "Fable 3" is one of the most polemic reviews I have ever read, though it is mostly fair. However, despite all the problems with the game, there is an interesting moral point to be made (Spoiler alert!).
Peter Molyneux, creator of Lionhead Studios and morality charged games such as the Black & White and Fable games was truly an innovator of the use of moral consequences in video games. Black & White allowed the player to be either a benevolent, giving god or a malicious, vengeful one. This gimmick proved to be very popular with players and Molyneux included it in the first Fable game, where moral actions adjust certain aspects of gameplay (for example, if you kill Whisper in the Colosseum, her brother takes vengeance on you). It all culminates in the end when the player is given the opportunity to slay his mother and sister for a very powerful sword or let them live and not have it. Fable 2 incorporates many of the same qualities but makes the morality grid more complex, adding corruption to the mix.
Fable 3 removes the corruption scale and goes back to a simpler form like the original Fable, but the morality choices have greater impact on the game. There are, of course, the standard, "do you spare this man's life or kill him" options, the decisions are more difficult and more serious. In the beginning of the game, the player is asked whether to have his/her lover executed or a handful or revolutionaries. The "ethical" choice is to have the lover killed, but if the player decides not to choose, all of them are executed. Midway through the game, the player is asked whether or not he would like to spare his tyrannical brother's life after staging a coup. If the player does, the brother informs him that he is grateful the player is taking the difficult burden of the kingdom off of his shoulders, and, oh, by the way, the reason why he was so tyrannical is that he was trying to raise up funds to pay for an army to defeat evil incarnate which will soon destroy the land.
The rest of the game, then, revolves around making moral choices about how to best spend the kingdom's money and the player is given a prisoner's dilemma: If the player becomes a spendthrift and withholds public spending, the kingdom will have enough money to defeat the coming evil and everyone will live. If the player spends the kingdom's money on public works, the coming evil will kill everyone in the country. On the one hand, the player can increase his morality but lose in the end, and on the other, the player can be just as bad as his brother and save everyone. I, of course, cheated and purchased every piece of property in the kingdom and raised taxes and rent as high as I could (effectively becoming a despot) and used that money to pay for public works as well as the army. This effectively kept my morality up and saved the kingdom, though it required me putting an unbearable tax burden on my subjects (tenants).
The question that this raises (as it does in all Fable games) is what is the real point of the morality system? There's no really good way to win this and in the third game it does not seem like keeping a high morality has any discernible consequences. Furthermore, like many other "sandbox" style games, there is a great temptation within the Fable universe to commit crimes that one could not commit in real life (eg murdering peasants, breaking into houses, destroying others' property) that results in no real consequence. In the first Fable game, it even allowed the player to gain experience and good weapons. In the second and third games, being good costs the player. So the real question is, in a game that explores morality as a major part of its gameplay, what is the motivator for being good?
This is where the true ethical philosophy of the Fable universe steps in. The point is there is not much of a real difference. Let me return to the three major ethical examples I provided to illustrate this. In the first choice, the most ethical thing a player could do would be to not decide (unless the player is a utilitarian, in which case choosing the lover is obviously the more ethical choice). Thus, the false notion of being responsible for the death of innocents would not be presented to the player's conscience. However, if the player does not choose, both parties are executed mercilessly, suggesting that the player's decision to remove the culpability of the slaughter of innocents from himself has, in fact, made him responsible for more death. Thus, the first choice teaches us that consequences are unavoidable and our actions do little to cure the world of evil.
The second choice teaches us that making either an ethical or an unethical choice is really rather inconsequential, that is, the ends remain the same. If the player kills his brother, he can still save the kingdom and win the game. If the player dose not kill his brother, he can still win the game. The only difference is that the brother gives the back story for why he became such a tyrant. No monetary gain, influence or strategic advantage is gained or lost for choosing one way or another. The ending remains the same.
The third choice demonstrates to us that there are no real "good" or "evil" choices. The good choices to create public works and improve life in the city cause the death of six million citizens. The "bad" choices to cut funding and increase taxes saves the lives of six million people. And, of course, the decision to do as I did and increase rent on all six million people keeps the financial burden too high and increases injustice.
Thus, Fable 3's ethic is one of futility. It borders on the Stoic notion of apathy, that is, our choices don't make much difference one way or another. However, it might be more rightly assumed that rather than apathy, the message of Fable 3 is a Nietzschean ethic. The will to power is, in this game, truly the most powerful motivator and justification. The character spends half the game coming to power and the other half trying to maintain that power. The most practical choice a player could make would be to 1) have the villagers killed, 2) have the brother killed in vengeance and 3) keep the money in the treasury while putting a high rent and tax rate on the citizens. I finished the final battle with little more than 500,000 gold (after amassing over 20 million) to my name. I could have kept that 20 million and saved the country (each citizen is one more person to lord over) had I simply decided to not give them anything they wanted.