In spite of all their differences from other forms of media, they still often adhere to the same narrative rules and tropes. Things like the Hero’s Journey and three-act structure still factor in.
When a story introduces a villain, it’s expected that they’ll cause some mayhem, make things troublesome for the heroes, then get their comeuppance at the end in a satisfying way.
That’s not always the case, though. Sometimes, the heroes lose big time. And sometimes they do so in a rather decisive way.
Video games have had their fair share of stories where they end with the heroes taking an L. If the game is part of a franchise, this defeat may be temporary, but it’s fair to say that video games have followed the traditions set forth by movies and television in some important ways.
The following list contains end game spoilers for each title. Be warned before you proceed.
10 Life Is Strange
A Tragic Love Story
The old phrase “you can’t win for trying” applies perfectly to the first season of Life is Strange.
This outstanding adventure game is one of my most beloved games of all time, as it was one that I played together with my best friend. To this day, the tangible, emotional hold it has had on me ever since has never ceased.
As you reach the climax of Life is Strange, you’ll discover that through all of its bittersweet explorations of teen angst and romance, you really can’t find an ending where Max and Chloe don’t lose.
In one ending, Chloe ends up dead due to time travel shenanigans. In the other, Chloe survives, but the town of Arcadia Bay is completely destroyed.
9 The Walking Dead
It Hurts Every Time
No matter how many times I play through Telltale’s The Walking Dead, I keep hoping that it will end differently. I keep hoping that maybe Lee Everett will find a way to avoid the bite and survive to raise young Clementine.
Needless to say, it doesn’t.
No matter what choices you make, no matter how careful you are, Lee is destined to die and leave Clementine alone. The devastation that this game has caused me emotionally can always be traced back to that final scene with Lee and Clementine.
It’s not just Lee, either. Every character in this game ultimately loses in the end. They either die or are split off from the group, leaving things completely open for what season two would offer.
8 The Last Of Us Part 2
This Is The Worst
While The Last of Us Part 1 ends on a bit of a sour note, it’s impossible to compare it to the ending of the sequel. If things are rough at the end of the first game, The Last of Us Part 2 takes that and amplifies it by ten.
By the end of the game, Ellie has seen her father figure murdered, her friends killed, and is living in complete isolation away from the people who love her the most.
Ellie’s decision to leave the simple, quiet farm life with Dina offered to her in pursuit of revenge seals her fate. She’s left a shell of the woman she was, and in her isolation, can’t even play her guitar anymore.
It’s probably really difficult to end a zombie apocalypse story with a happy ending, but The Last of Us Part 2 puts Ellie through the paces. By the end, she has lost everything and is just as miserable as Joel was during the first game.
7 Star Wars Knights Of The Old Republic 2: The Sith Lords
No Win Scenario
The Knights of the Old Republic series allows you to choose your path to either the light or the dark side of the Force, and that brings with it its own unique way to approach a game with multiple endings.
With the 2004 sequel, The Sith Lords, developer Obsidian faced a time crunch and a staggering one-year development cycle. What they accomplished in a year was incredible, but the way it ends is even more remarkable.
There are ultimately two endings for The Sith Lords, and neither are very good for the Jedi Exile.
In the Dark Side ending, you remain on Malachor V as the Dark Lord of the Sith. All your friends are either dead or have joined the Dark Side with you. With the Light Side ending, the Jedi Exile abandons everything, including friends and close allies, to descend into the unknown regions searching for Revan.
Not a great day for the Jedi, honestly.
6 Conker’s Bad Fur Day
The Grass Is Always Greener
Conker’s Bad Fur Day spends the majority of its runtime making crude jokes and parodying pop culture moments of the era, but actually ends with one of the most surprising conclusions to a game I’ve ever played.
Conker ultimately gets nothing of value, and winds up more miserable than he was at the start of the game, if that’s even possible.
After being crowned king and losing nearly all his friends, including his girlfriend Berri, Conker finds himself in the worst possible situation he could have ever dreamed of.
He’s feared as a king, but has nothing to show for it. None of it matters to him, and in spite of outward appearances, he has ultimately lost everything he cared about over the course of the game.
5 Resident Evil 3
The End Of Raccoon City
It can be argued that the heroes of Resident Evil often lose more than they win, as the world is ultimately in a state of constant peril. But Resident Evil 3 does so to a rather extreme level.
The game’s final moments feel like a blockbuster action movie. Jill Valentine manages to defeat the ever-persistent Nemesis, all while making a fiery escape.
In the end, Jill is left to witness the apocalyptic end of Raccoon City. Additionally, all of Jill’s friends from S.T.A.R.S. are either dead or unaccounted for.
In the years following this, Jill’s ability to move on from this trauma was tested greatly. It’s safe to say that despite defeating Nemesis, this was the worst night of Jill’s life.
4 Max Payne
They Were All Dead
Max Payne is one of my favorite games of all time. The darkly comedic, neo-noir masterpiece has been an annual playthrough for me for the past two decades.
Max’s journey through the dark, seedy criminal underbelly is one where he doesn’t get a lot of victories, to be honest. Like any good noir hero, he’s kicked around for almost the entirety of the experience.
But it’s the game’s final hours, as Max ascends Aesir Headquarters to confront Nicole Horn, where he truly hits rock bottom.
After killing Nicole and avenging his wife, Max is apprehended by the police and his career in the NYPD rendered obsolete.
Worse yet, Max’s reputation and character are completely assassinated. Despite his heroic efforts, he is labeled a villain and murderer.
3 Red Dead Redemption
It’s Nice To See You, John
If you’re a hero in the Old West, chances are that you’re operating on borrowed time. These stories don’t tend to end well for the protagonists.
With Red Dead Redemption, Rockstar Games adhered to that philosophy with a keen eye.
John Marston spends the entirety of Red Dead Redemption doing the right thing, all of which is built around hunting down former members of the Van der Linde Gang to save his wife and son.
Despite being strong-armed and extorted by US government agents, John does everything in his power to remain good in a world where that is not so easy.
In the end, John’s commitment to heroism is what leads to his undoing in this harsh world. It’s still easily one of the most devastating video game endings of all time.
2 Half-Life 2
Unforseen Consequences
Gordon Freeman is one of the most unlucky heroes in video games. He just can’t catch a break.
First he has the worst day of work ever, then he has to navigate an alien occupation of Earth twenty years later. And in the final hours of Half-Life 2, Gordon’s day goes from bad to worse.
Any negotiations to facilitate peace between Earth and the Combine are a non-starter, Alyx is trapped in a state of peril, and Gordon is put back into stasis.
The Combine ultimately gets the biggest win of any villain in the franchise to this point. No one is going home happy, and until Half-Life 3 finally decides to show up, we’ll never get a satisfactory conclusion to this story arc.
Who Am I, Really?
I don’t think there’s a game that is as fascinating or unique as Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. This postmodern masterpiece has influenced me and countless others for decades now, and the game’s story is a crucial part of that.
Snake and Raiden’s journey through the Big Shell is fraught with betrayal and mystery, all of which come to a head in the game’s closing moments.
While Raiden manages to overcome a lot of the demons that have haunted him, he and Snake find themselves at the mercy of the Patriots. Despite their horrific actions in trying to control the populace it lords over, they ultimately get away with it.
Future games would deal with this, but in Sons of Liberty, the Patriots are ultimately the clear winners. The public is none the wiser, and efforts to expose them feel like a Herculean task by the end of the game.
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Author: 360 Technology Group
