Morality in Games

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Chris Avellone, Creative Director at Obsidian Studios, has posted a Q&A on morality in gaming on his blog, over at the Obsidian forums. The interview was originally for a student's Masters thesis, but has become something of a discussion topic. Here's a snip:

Do you consider moral choices in games to be an important aspect of game design? If so, why?
At the risk of being quoted out of context, I don't think it's important. I think that the player should have difficult choices to make and moral choices are one of the best ways to present it, but the most important thing from a role-playing game standpoint is that there be reactivity and consequence to your actions, whether they are moral choices are[sic] not.

In what game design phase do you think one should begin to think about moral issues in the game world, and why?
Generally, I think it should be considered as early as possible in the game design, preferably at the time that you decide upon the game's "theme." For our Aliens project, for example, the moral theme that we're trying to communicate was considered an important establishing point in our early pre-production phase (as it was for Mask of the Betrayer).

The full interview is on the Obsidian forums. As always, we're hungry for opinions from you guys.