Re: Does a game have to fail to have an ending?
Posted: 2009-03-04 05:56pm
I don't generally despise cliffhangers as a rule, but what seems to kill me about them is that in every one of the cliffhangers I've seen, they seem to be "tacked on" at the very end rather than built up to. I'll pick out my top three: in Halo 1, I never would've guessed there would have been a sequel planned if it wasn't for the main character's word. The same goes with Gears of War; I never would have guessed they planned to make a sequel if I hadn't heard a voiceover by some character we've never seen or really heard of in the last thirty seconds. Bloodrayne (both 1 and 2) are also prime examples of how not to end a game, although then again they're also prime examples of how not to make a game.
"I just beat the demon from hell. The world's safe."
"Oh by the way we just discovered something even worse that we hadn't known about before. You're needed to defeat it."
One game later...
"Yay, I just defeated the eviller thing. We've won."
"Wait! There are other eviller things out there that I never mentioned before!"
A picture here is worth a thousand words, so I'll post one to express how I felt about that ending:

"I just beat the demon from hell. The world's safe."
"Oh by the way we just discovered something even worse that we hadn't known about before. You're needed to defeat it."
One game later...
"Yay, I just defeated the eviller thing. We've won."
"Wait! There are other eviller things out there that I never mentioned before!"
A picture here is worth a thousand words, so I'll post one to express how I felt about that ending:
