What are some of your favourite video game endings? I’m talking the tear jerkers, the insane, the intense. And not just the cinematics or any of that dull stuff, I’m talking entire sequences. What are some of your favourites?
Recently I read a discussion of favourite game endings in the last generation of console/PC games and it got me thinking of a few.
The one that immediately sprung to mind was Mass Effect 2. The suicide mission, the build-up, the team dynamic, the whole Dirty Dozen theme. It’s probably as good an execution as I’ve ever seen in a video game in terms of high stakes and the execution of those stakes. Absolutely incredible. Shame Mass Effect 3 truly couldn’t live up to that game.
I thought Halo: Reach had an incredible ending. Very innovative in its thinking, having the player literally fight to the death. I loved that. I loved that my hands never left the controller once. I always thought Halo: Reach was a very underrated game.
Maybe my favourite ending, though, is Journey. I don’t think an ending has every brought such a bleary eyed, vibrant sense of joy. And then walking towards the light. Unreal.
Now you go!
Comments
111 responses to “Tell Us Dammit: Favourite Game Endings”
WARNING. SPOILER TAGS DO NOT WORK.
Seriously? The topic is favorite video game endings and you don’t think they’ll talk about video game endings?
What do they teach kids these days?
It was just a warning to be considerate of people who might not have played all the games being discussed. For those who want to remain considerate, there are alternatives to remaining silent: http://www.rot13.com for example.
By an extraordinarily long way…
Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater.
Spec Ops: The Line probably comes second.
Won’t be spoiling either with details.
Depends on which Spec Ops ending you took.
Personally I didn’t like the “early” ending. It really comes off as the good ending when really it’s the easy one.
Starting with the last gunfight, I consider the whole last section as the ending. Almost all the final scenes were pretty good denouements.
Just as I consider the final 95 minute cinematic in MGS3 to be the ending 😛
Are you serious about 95 mins? So I get a game AND a movie?
I don’t recall puhzactly, but I’m pretty sure I’m exaggerating. It was certainly > 45 minutes though.
After researching, I guess it’s not 90 minutes, as MGS4 holds the Guinness World Record for 71 minutes 😛
http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/records-5000/longest-cutscene-in-a-video-game/
That’s still long enough to be a movie, damn. I thought people were exaggerating 6-8 minute long cutscenes. 😛
One does not simply exaggerate Metal Gear cut scene lengths
*dishonored spoilers*
Dishonored with medium notoriety. The guy is holding the girl you’ve been trying to save on the top of a lighthouse. he says “don’t come any closer or I’ll jump and take her with me”. you wait. nothing happens. you go closer. he jumps. Fantastic.
Note to anyone that wants to write spoilery stuff, but don’t want to spoil it for others, because spoiler tags don’t friggin’ work. Go here.
Persona 3 (damn that song makes me teary eyed)
Final Fantasy Tactics (dat post credit scene)
Final Fantasy VI
Every character got their moment to shine, and that music, my gawwwd…
Journey, Portal, Portal 2 – those are the ones that stick in my mind as having extraordinarily good endings.
Edit: I’ll also add Braid to the list. That ending was a wonderful realisation unfolding. All short games it seems.
Portal 2 especially when I realised what I had to do and why I had to do it I laughed out loud – the ending had been telegraphed through the whole game.
poor Caroline
Journey’s ending (for me) is the final stage that recaps all of the previous ones.
A little while ago, I played the game once a day for a week. That final section is still amazing every single time you do it.
The ending of Silent HIll Shattered Memories had a big impact on me. For about 3 hours afterward I was complaining how cliche it all was and how it detracted from the entire game. Then all of a sudden I realised, I am not angry at all…..this was genius!!!
The original Deus Ex. Each ending was pretty damn amazing. There’s a few moments in each that send chills down my spine.
Mass Effect 3. The original ending. I don’t care what you say. It was brilliant.
It was an excellent ending that fit the themes perfectly and implied a much larger universe than what we saw in the story. It was emotionally satisfying and didn’t feel the need to pander to people or spell everything out. Until the patch, that is.
Mass Effect was always great in implying that the universe was moving on without the player. You could even say the theme of the franchise is that humanity is irrelevant.
Probably why people had a problem with the ending as they expect the world to revolve around them.
I didn’t really have a problem with the ending, but I don’t think the game was as good as Mass Effect 2.
I just felt that game to be perfection, 3 was like good DLC. You play it, but it doesn’t move it forward.
When they gave Edie the sexy robot body, I thought they’d jumped the shark. And that happened in the first mission.
I thought 2 was the worst of the lot.
Mass Effect was a really interesting take on CRPGs and despite some menu issues, was a great game. 2 dropped practically all of that for waist high-wall shootman action gaming. It played like Gears of War. I understand why they wanted to open it up to a wider audience by streamlining the (frankly overly heavy) RPG elements, but they really stripped a lot of the uniqueness out of it. I found that three was a fantastic balance between the two.
I can see why you’d say that and at first play I thought the same. But then the system grew on me, I didn’t think it was simplified, I found it refined. For me it was more about the story than the gameplay. I was invested in the characters.
Whereas in 3 I thought the story took a huge step down in quality and they made it a straight action game. Sure there were more weapons and armours, which is always cool, but in 2 playthroughs I still pretty much end up with the same load out every time.
But horses for courses. I respect your opinion and understand why you feel that way. But for me, ME2 was a shining star of amazing. 3 was just ok.
ME2 was the only game i ever got 100% achievements for. i started an insane replay basically the second the credits finished.
that intro was fantastic, id say it has both the best start and finish
That’s why I think I liked it so much, the beginning and end were so tightly done.
I did the same. Started a reply straight away. I’ve probably played through the game at least 4 times.
Yes! Let them tar and feather us alive. I enjoyed it. What it represented to me is that existence is about experiencing the journey. It’s about building those relationships. It’s about friends. It’s about finding something in life you’re good at and doing it.
Because inevitably, no matter what choices you make in life, the end is always the same.
I asked the writers when I caught up with them last year and they wouldn’t confirm anything. They said that they wanted people to get their own interpretations out of the game. Which is what I did and why I enjoyed it.
I enjoyed the Mass Effect 3 ending except for everything coming down to what amounted to a button press to choose the end. Same problem I had with Deus Ex Human Revolution now that I think of it.
The only real problem I have with ME3’s ending is that ME4 will have to make one of the choices canonical and build the story from there, that or retcon the entire ending of 3 as Shep hallucinating from reaper influence or something.
To be fair, that was exactly the same with Deus Ex 1 as well. All came down to a button.
Pretty sure it isn’t a retconn.
Well, you’re welcome to your opinion, but I would contend that ME3’s ending screwed the pooch and destroyed what could have been held up as “the game series” by which others should be measured. Unfortunately it had to be “arty” and just crapped on the whole thing. Even the alternate endings didn’t do anything except spell out things that I’d already determined (and retcon “oh, whoops, we didn’t think that would be interpreted that way” stupidities).
ME1 I finished with devastation followed by relief and ME2 had me yelling and cheering at my television. ME3 left me wondering why I was watching a story combining Battlestar Galactica and Deus Ex: Human Revolution.
Other notable mentions:
Red Dead Redemption (just amazing)
Baldur’s Gate series (giving excellent closure to an excellent series)
Just Cause 2 (For sheer ridiculousness)
Saints Row 3 (Bonnie Tyler Holding Out For A Hero Epic ending)
Ocarina Of Time, I remember feeling so happy and fulfilled when I finished it. A feeling which hasn’t been replicated by many games since.
Probably Ghostbusters on the NES.
Very fulfilling.
Nah, the bad ending to Friday the 13th is better. Particularly the AVGN interpretation.
I particularly enjoyed telefragging Shub-Niggurath to finish Quake.
(And the ending to Braid was excellent.)
[Beating FTL for the first time is immensely satisfying too. Highly recommended.]
I was enjoying the Last of Us a fair amount.
That ending propelled it from “really good” to “great”
Also, the Bioshock Infinite ending was incredibly interesting.
+1 for The Last of Us. The game that really made me feel that games have well and truly ‘grown up’ story-wise. Very powerful stuff.
MGS1
Red Dead Redemption
The walking dead – oh the tears.
Journey
biggest let down, Resistance 3.
Man, Red Dead Redemption…
Definitely worth plunging on ahead until you get that ‘REDEMPTION’ slapped over your screen, but damn if that wasn’t bittersweet.
I didn’t even WANT to go about cleaning up my unfinished collection/achievement things after that point. 😛
Bittersweet. Exactly. What a fantastic western.
***SPOILERS FOR A 5 YEAR OLD GAME***
Betrayal, revenge, continuing the cycle of violence and trying to find justification for it. Killing the man who killed your father should make everything feel finished and fulfilling. But it was just kind of empty. The realisation that revenge isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
Definitely bittersweet, all my feels were taken out on hordes of zombies following the DLC.
Another World was the first game ending that made me feel emotions.
Donkey Kong Country was like finishing a great book, just wanted to read it again.
last of us. Of course. Like it or hate it, very, very strong ending to a great story.
I was just about to post Another World. Excellent ending.
Totally. So sad.
The ending to Halo: Reach is great for the same reason why Egoraptor explains the fight with Vile is great in his Megaman X review. It happens directly to you, the player. It doesn’t end until you actually die. Most games would be scripted as they can’t even trust the player to die.
MGS3 had a great ending, as the truth finally seeks in to show how a soldier can truly sacrifice themselves.
and tomorrow where going to be asked what’s our favourite videogame introduction.
FITHOS LUSEC WECOS VINOSEC
ily
Again.
Hi! My name’s Guybrush Threepwood, and I want to be a pirate!
Max payne 2.
Which ending 😉
But yes, totally agree! Absolutely FANTASTIC narrative and ending
Probably the ending to MGS4 (epic fight hand to hand), closely followed by MGS3 (or possibly the other way around!!!)
was really impressed with the ending of The Last of Us also.
Portal 1 & 2, probably.
I’ll be glad when we finally finish Halo ODST. Fuck that dark game.
…uh, what? ODST is dark?
Yes. It’s a very dark game, minimal lights, and the lighting is very poor so it doesn’t spread around the world. Perhaps it’s because I’ve installed the game – someone running off disc said they never got that problem.
Too dark? If anything it needs to be even MORE dark!
Are you using the nightvision helmet?
Yes. There’s literally problems with the lighting in the graphics engine. Like a streetlamp will illuminate maybe 2m radius on the ground, that’s it. Everything is dark as fuck. Nightvision thing isn’t even night vision by the way, it just lights up the edges of everything, meaning it’s hard to judge depth. My install must be screwed.
I installed the game and I didn’t notice any problems.
I actually like the nightvision in the game. Nightvision usually has a problem in games in which the game isn’t dark enough to be used that often, or it’s too useful to the point that any light source makes you blind.
It also gives it a Deus Ex cyberpunk feel to it.
Honestly it’s probably my favourite Halo campaign and I’m always up to play it. A shame that nobody else wants to play the game anymore >:
I think we even had this discussion in a TAY with @stickman many months ago, and I hadn’t noticed any extreme darkness either. I’m REALLY thinking there’s something wrong with either xbox, TV, game CD, or… god I don’t know.
I agree the game was very dark, like next to the corridors in ODST, Dark Souls is brightly lit!
So we both have a ‘glitch’? I dunno. To me, the game is so dark that it’s pretty much either inherently broken or has to be a glitch. It’s not brightness, it’s an actual absence of light lol.
You might want to check my comment to stickman below as well, may not be the problem but you never know
Curious question, do you happen to be using a Panasonic LCD TV?
I was running one of those as my console gaming display for a few months until I noticed it’s tendency to try and dynamically darkify the darkosity for extra darkitude which had a serious tendency to make games where darkness was a feature look like they had stupidly low contrast. As in anything beyond a certain RGB value and taking up a certain percentage of the screen space was rendered as pure black so you could have a corridor with shadows and a decent amount of light, turn ever so slightly away from the light and because of that darkplification bullshit, it detected the light level in the scene was below the threshold and the very same floor textures that were light concrete grey are now dark gunmetal and the light shadows are now blacker than a coal miner’s arse. I seem to recall ODST was one of the many games that were a fuck of a lot more playable once I swapped my bedroom & lounge room TVs.
Even if you don’t have a Panasonic, it might be worth testing to see if your TV does something similar, it’s probably not unique to Panasonic. Find a place where light leads into darkness (literally rather than figuratively), point at the light area and slowly turn towards the dark watching the floor or wall textures & see if they suddenly darken.
Panasonic LCD, LG LCD, havent tested on the Pana plasma. They were using game mode which turns off such dynamic settings. Kinda sounds like localised backlight dimming in your example.
But, cheers for the info, I will definitely play with all settings on the plasma when I play it next. I have a feeling that Halo ODST doesn’t output the full RGB spectrum, limited only, which would explain these problems somewhat.
To be honest, I never noticed a difference in the game mode on my Panasonic, it sill seemed to do the same crap. I’ve not used an LG though so I don’t know if they do the same thing, my other one is a Toshiba and definitely doesn’t do it
So hard picking favourites….
I really liked the ending to Infamous 1, whether you went “good” or “evil” Karma, loved the twist.
Red Dead Redemption was great, I couldn’t stop thinking about it for a long time.
The Last of Us of course.
Journey
The Last Of Us
Metal Gear Solid 3
Duke Nukem Forever.
Not for the actual content of the ending, just the fact that it was over.
Spec Ops the Line (obvious spoilers below)
You start the game as a gung-ho soldier and end up questioning all the things you have done to get to the end of the game. It made me even question why I was evening finishing this game. It was a great commentary on current shooter/war games. It’s 8 bucks on steam at the moment, go get it.
Ahhh too many! Shadow of the colossus… FF 8/9… Ocarina of Time… Silent Hill 2… lots of great ending sequences for various reasons. For all it’s faults, Ni No Kuni still had an incredibly touching ending too.
OH! And the end fight to Wind Waker was such a great experience, loved the drama of the setting and the events surrounding it, felt so great.
OHOH! Full Throttle! What an ending sequence, my gosh
Metal Gear Solid 4, by far.
After growing up with Snake and it being so close to me, I literally balled with tears with that ending. It seemed so final!
Anyone who has finished would know what I’m talking about.
Amen to that, I got all soppy. That MGS music, good lord its a tear jerker.
Last Of Us, naturally.
One ending I HATED was Bioshock Infinite. Was so predictable and just bleh, felt like a cop out almost.
I have fond memories of the endings of Grim Fandango, The Neverhood, and FFVII.
Unlike movies, though, I can’t think of any games that I would say you absolutely had to make it through to see the ending.
Prince of Persia : The Two Thrones.
it was just the perfect ending for the Sands of Time trilogy.
Final Fantasy IX. From the moment Zidane stays behind, through to the last tear jerker of an FMV it is by far my favorite ending. Especially with the moment before the FMV, just perfect execution.
For reference
http://youtu.be/LjN7sn-Vs7U?t=36m53s
I knowwwww! :’)
I feel like that was the last of the truly great Final Fantasy endings…
Mass Effect 2 and Bioshock Infinite, both those games really sucked me in and had incredibly memorably and enjoyable endings to boot.
Red Dead Redemption, Spec Ops: The Line, Halo: CE & 3… Last of Us: Left Behind was beautiful. As was Walking Dead S1.
It’s strange that so many games I remember as having great endings are let down by the last bit of actual gameplay… Bioshock – great game, great ending except for the incongruous boss battle. Last of Us – great game, great ending, horrible last level.
It’s sad that I’m really bad at remembering game endings. I do know that, even though it sounds odd, I liked the “bad” ending for Shadow Hearts. It was rather bitter sweet. I also liked the good ending of Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter and Breath of Fire III’s good ending.
Shadow of the Colossus is springing to mind right now. I think a big part of what made it great for me was that some other characters finally show up but rather than using that as a chance for exposition they just continue on with the story. They could have easily had someone just stand there and tell you every detail but instead they kept it all subtle.
Now I think about it that was sort of what I was hoping for in Mass Effect 3. The Reapers being shown to have reason and lore behind them, but the player being left not knowing the how or why behind what they were doing.
Can’t remember. Too many. Reading other posts and with most agree, and others haven’t played.
Uncharted 2
Your right I did miss that ass 🙁
I’m really enjoying the way ancients explode at the end of a Dota match.
Either it’s a sign of a hard fought victory, a glorious stomp, begrudging defeat or freedom from the horrible, horrible people you’ve been matched up with for the last 45 minutes. All of those options are quite nice.
bravely default
bioshock
To The Moon…. It gave me a sads, big time.
and The Last of Us, naturally.
The Last of Us. It was just perfect in every single way.
Mass Effect 3: Citadel. The game had its faults (not so much the ending but the pacing, for me) but citadel was such an awesome DLC with so many nods to past events, it redeemed the core game.
Also, San Andreas’s last act was pretty epic; BioShock really got me, and MGS3
Persona 4 – Especially with the new Golden additions to the ending, no other ending has made me feel happier and complete after an already phenomenal experience.
Chrono Trigger – With 13 very unique endings depending on when you choose to face the final boss. Chrono Trigger is another game that I loved and whose resolution(s) made me incredibly happy.
Links Awakening gave me the feels.
Also, Halo 4. (Actually the last few levels leading up to and including the cinematic of the original Halo, come to think of it.)
Enslaved had a weird, but very memorable ending. It was kinda creepy too!
Bioshock Infinite had a great ending – though it’s existence probably means that if there’s ever a Half Life 3 they probably won’t entertain my theory that G-Man is actually Gordon Freeman!
I like the ending of Splinter Cell Conviction because the show you a snippet of that scene out of context through various points in the game and as you go along it becomes increasingly likely that you’re the cause of the carnage Sam is being walked through
also the endings to the first two Ass Creeds were great, the second especially was mind boggling!
Yeah – Enslaved ending was definitely memorable. I really liked it.
The last of us I would like to think I would damn the world to save a person I’ve just traveled halfway across the country fighting off infected people and bandits what forms a better bond then that
Another game would be ff13 was happy to finish that game just so I never had the need to play it again lol
Walking Dead, season 1.
I cried. I cried so hard. No medium, visual or otherwise, has made me cry as much as that ending.
Fuck that ending.
Total Annihilation: Core Contingency – The Core ending, just that whole depiction of a lone Commander standing there triumphant over his enemies, only that it costs every living being in the galaxy to do it.
Ace Combat 5 – Unsung War and Ace combat 4 – Two of my all time favourite games.
Grim Fandango would have to rank up there in the top 5 ever for me.
Halo Reach was definitely awesome, seeing just how long you can survive against a literally endless wave of enemies was a hell of a good way to see out a game where the ending was known as soon as the title was revealed. It also gives a nice emotional resonance of “You’ll take this world over my dead body”.
Red Dead Redemption had one of the more impactful endings of the last few years.
Similarly I’d put GTA4 and its expansions as high points in the series (better than 5 by a good margin), The Lost & Damned in particular.
Mark Of The Ninja had what must be one of the most stylish endings I’ve seen
Skyward Sword, Ocarina of Time, MGS1/4, FF7/8.
Zelda 3. The music for that entire ending (“cinematic” and credits) still gives me goosebumps. Awesome stuff.
“…and the Master Sword sleeps again….FOREVER!” **
**Please note, forever may not actually mean forever.
Tomb Raider. Dual wielding right at the end was beautiful. In all seriousness though, the end to Half Life Tw– oh wait.
Portal 2’s was simply brilliant.
The Last of Us, of course. As neatly wrapped up and beautiful as the ending to Breaking Bad.
Journey, especially your first ‘journey’ with a random player you had stuck with through thick and thin.
Day of the Tentacle. When they raised the American Flag, it brought a tear to my eye. And I’m not even American.
ICO. Can’t believe nobody has mentioned ICO yet! That song at the end, as the boat sails out of the crumbling castle … it’s amazing. The simple playable epilogue is equally brilliant, and if you’ve played more than once, the watermelon is just so satisfying. What a game!
Yeah Ico was brilliant. Might fire it up tonight. Wait, the Giro is on. No I won’t. 🙂
My girl (at the time) who hated games watched me play this game for hours on the weekend i bought it. By the end of the weekend I reached the end and she actually had tears after the post-credit second ending, Best.
Millenium 2.2. Just sat there staring at what was then a pretty good bit of computer art and felt utter satisfaction as the MIDI music stirred my soul….
Journey. Despair followed by the most absurd joy and then… fade to white.
Max Payne 2. 1 was good. 2 was perfect.
Assassin’s Creed: Revelations. Just finished Ezio’s story brilliantly.
Shadow of the Colossus. Wow. 🙂
Some wouldn’t call it a game, but the ending to “To the Moon” was my favourite by far.
Second favourite ending would have to be that of Final Fantasy IX
Third would be Bastion
Fourth would be Persona 4
Fifth would be Mass Effect 2.
Final Fantasy VII:Crisis Core, the ending is so sad, brought me to tears, and the music matches it perfectly.
Without a doubt
Brothers: A tale of two sons
Diablo 2 (classic, not expansion)! Dat twist…
How has nobody mentioned Half-Life 2? Especially the ending of Episode 2 when **Eli Vance is killed right in front of you and Alyx** I was like “WTF?!?!! NOOOOOOOO!” :’-(