I know it couldn't have ended any differently (or better), but the ending (at least the one I got) for Red Dead Redemption II still manages to depress me. And I got Arthur Morgan's good ending Same with John Marston in Red Dead I
I love that game's ending for the dramatic powerhouse that it is. It feels like if it were a movie, it'd be Oscarbait.
There's a lot of talk about the ending to Mass Effect 3 being changed, but I'm one of those fans who thinks the whole gosh darn game needed to be overhauled. 1. No Reaper Invasion Not only is there no Reaper invasion in the game, there are no Reapers period! Sovereign is dead, the collectors obliterated, and any means that the Reapers had to influence the Milkyway Galaxy are all gone. The Reapers in dark space are still coming, but here's the kicker. They're 600-800 years away from reaching the first relay. This change would mean that 'The Arrival' DLC for ME2 would be non-canon, but that would be for the better. 2. Story focused on tying up threads from the previous two games. While ME3 did make some attempt to tie up loose threads from the previous games, the Reaper Invasion was always something that overshadowed it. Every action, every word uttered in completing a task was all about accumulating resources to fight the Reapers. As a story beat, it was repetitive. Going through the previous story threads and fleshing them out would go a long way at making the third entry an more satisfying conclusion as a whole rather than waiting on the ending. 3. Open with Shepard's Trial I always thought it was weird that despite Shepard being capable of choosing a pro-Cerberus route in ME2 that you couldn't continue that with ME3. With the trial, the choices the player makes not only affect the story going forward, but also the story that lead up to the trial. At a certain point, the trial gets interrupted by Cerberus forces who storm the facility (Not on Earth). If your Shepard defended their decision in helping Cerberus and believed they are the best hope for Humanity going forward, than the Cerberus forces are there to extract you. If you claim you only used Cerberus to help fight the Reapers and actually ruined their plans to acquire Reaper technology then these forces are here to kill you. I haven't fully thought out how to handle the squad mates and Shepard's crew in this scenario since many would refuse to join Shepard knowing where they stand. Even as a xenophobic Shepard working with Cerberus, I'd try to throw in a Star Trek VI kind of character. Maybe a Turian who believes that Humanity would better help the Turians as enemies instead of allies and will work with Humans to ensure that will still happen. 4. Shepard's Ending And this is how you up the dramatic potential of the ending to the game. Even though Shepard won the day, hooked up with their love interest and made the galaxy a better place (From their 'point of view'), there will always be that same realization that adds a bittersweet element to Shepard's journey. They are already a casualty in this war against the Reapers. Since they are still hundreds of years out, Shepard knows that they won't live long enough to fight them and they must now live with the knowledge for the rest of their life. To add an extra layer of heavy, if Shepard romanced Liara and the two discuss starting a family (Little blue children!), how would the two feel about that? Liara will undoubtedly live long enough to see the Reaper invasion. Would Shepard want to bring children into a galaxy where they're doomed to die off by the Reapers? Or would Shepard have enough faith in their allies that they will continue the fight like so many others have done in the past? Those potential endings are already more interesting than picking a color. Shepard, despite defying the odds and rallying uncertain allies to victory against incredible odds, will never know if what they did was enough. Now that's not meant to give this series a downer ending. Heck, this scenario puts Mass Effect in a better place for sequels than the 'Let's just go to Andromeda and not worry about anything that happened' schtick the next sequel pulled.
The Last of Us Part 1. Either through game mechanics a la Silent Hill 2, or through player choice... Spoiler ...allow the player to choose between saving Ellie and condemning the human race to destruction, or giving up Ellie and possibly saving humanity. For the sequel, one ending could be declared canonical.
Some good points. I never liked the idea of the Reaper invasion coming so soon. There should have been another game building up to it with the invasion happening in ME4 or even ME5. Also totally agree about Shepard's choices in ME2 becoming meaningless in 3. If you're pro-Cerberus in ME2, then Shepard should have been allowed to continue in that role. Instead the player is railroaded into fighting Cerberus, and TIM just becomes a cartoon villain instead of the charismatic person whose policies you could get behind.
No, I hate that. I was going to post that there’s no ending that so disappointed me that I wanted it changed, but what I do hate (and with the intensity of a thousand burning suns) I are games that do exactly what you’re suggesting. Because the players choice is ultimately irrelevant. At the end of the first Legacy of Kain game, I chose to take the nobler ending that also ended Kain. But when the sequel came out, the Developers had chosen the other ending for me anyway. Ditto for Dying Light and if Ghost of Tsushima gets a sequel that features Jin, they’ll do it there too. So I’d rather play the ending that the devs feel works best for their story aka Red Dead 1 & 2.
Fair enough. I hate it the other way, which was why I dumped "The Last of Us" series. Indeed, I don't like any game mechanic that forces a certain moral path on you. Even the Pokémon games that forced you to be the Big Hero and take on Team Rocket instead of just letting you get your eight badges and let TR do what they wanted (or even join Team Rocket, that's a concept). Nothing destroys heroism (or villainy) in a game when the choice is shoved down your throat. My feelings in the matter were actually so strong that I took to taking the fastest route into Sylph and only fighting the Rockets I was forced to. I couldn't avoid the "you WILL be Mr. Big Hero whether you like it or not" game mechanic, but I trued not to benefit from it. The real irony is that normally, when given the choice, I like playing the boy scout in video games.