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Can Games Make You Cry?
Ground Glass writes "'Can games make you cry?' is a ridiculously simple question to ask about a hideously complex issue. Worse, it's possible that the very question itself muddies the answer. Next Generation's approach is a little more thoughtful; by figuring out what questions each medium tries to answer free of the art issue, it cuts to the heart of what games can do. With the tools made clear, it then theorizes what said tools can do emotionally." From the article: "In film, you can show a character staring at a point before him and then change perspective to show what he was staring at; it is the proximity and timing of the imagery that lends significance to the second shot. In painting, you can play with the two-dimensional space and qualities of the material at hand to create similarly suggestive juxtapositions of imagery, color, symbolism, perspective, lending greater insight into the workings of the medium, the subject at hand, the painter herself, and - ultimately - the viewer and his own perspective on the world around him."
It was starfox...i was at the end boss...hardest mode...would have unlocked everything......... ...then I died. =(
Nothing like seeing a kid not be able to get past a level, and breaking into tears.
Hell, it happens with adults too. If you've played Battletoads or Ghost and Goblins you know what I mean.
When I found out EA was going to force me to install a proprietary download manager just to get some fooking expansion packs.
Aeris.
emotions? on /.? isn't this what the lifetime channel is for? maybe another merger is in the works for this week?
[an error occurred while processing this sig]
Not if you have the right game coach!. "There's no crying in Warcraft!"
Where were you when the voynix came?
ROVER! NOOOOOO! WAAAH!!!!!
Games are an art form just like films or books. These other art-forms can instill a wide range of feeling into those playing/watching/reading them. Interactive media has come a long way since it's inception a few short decades ago, and already there are games which can made you happy, excited, they can move you, or they can scare you, some even make you laugh. It stands to reason that a game can make you cry, it's just a matter of "what game", and "when".
Whoo, signature!
DesireCampbell.com
I cried when everybody raved up and down about Black and White, so I bought the thing and was so disappointed I cried.
Ok, it wasn't quite that bad. I almost cried in Starcraft when (spoiler) that bastard guy left Kerrigan behind to die. Especially since my base was in absolutely no danger whatsoever of being overrun at that point.
I read the internet for the articles.
when i was playing final fantasy x-2 and realized that they turned Brother into a retard
They used to. But I'm over my grief.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
Can games make you cry? Duh! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bvv7MBZk_f4
PC games series that are adapted to consoles (at the expense of gameplay) make me cry. Deus Ex II for an instance, that made me cry.
GAAH! MY PRINTER IS ON FIRE!!! PUT IT OUT! PUT IT OUT!
FF VI (Japan)/ III (US) makes me cry every time! It is such a great game!
The Final Fantasy series has made me shed tears (however mildly) on a number of occasions. I am a 24 year old male.
It's difficult to pinpoint what it is, until you turn the sound off. It's the music. I can watch (FF7+10 spoilers) Aerith die and Cloud's reaction, Tidus fading away as Yuna tries to hug him and falls through (end spoilers) without the sound on and barely batter an eyelid. Put the sad music in there and I'm blubbing like a girl. The emotions are there with or without, but the music is like a magnifying glass.
King's Quest IV - That damned crying ghost baby at the zombie house thingy place.
(hey, I was just a kid then...)
That game was so bad it made me cry.
I'd go as far to say most games evoke emotions...
Usually it begins as dismay when the installer crashes.
Followed by confusion when the developers message boards are bursting at the seams with people complaining about the same handfull of issus. Of course the front, and support pages mention nothing.
Perhaps a bit of joy that I find some obscure board that the workaround usually involves using virtual drive software to get around the copy protection.
Sadness when I find that my CD rom drive doesn't support the features needed by the emulation software to rip the image with the copy protection.
The tears start flowing when I break down and download a no-cd crack only to find that it also installs a keylogger/spy app.
Followed by anger when what game there is, sucks.
Platform advocacy is like choosing a favorite severely developmentally disabled child.
Rather, what Bowen might have asked is how innately bound any emotion is to the current fabric of videogames (that is, whether it has anything to do with what the medium is trying to accomplish)
A much worse question, since insofar as gaming is a "medium" at all it is not a unified one with a single purpose or style.
As far as "emotional maturity" in games goes, we'll see more of it once the game design process becomes more about game design and less about physics and graphics and character/world modelling and all the many other things that take so much time and money at the moment.
Wow, that rocket sure did land close to you Dogmeat. Dogmeat? NOOOOOOOOOO! DAMN YOU GIANT GREEN MUTANTS!
The Simpsons have made me cry repeatedly. At the end of the Saturdays of Thunder episode, when Homer and Bart have that "father-son" moment to the tune of You are the wind beneath my wings, it gets me nearly every time.
I cried when Floyd died for me.
2. Exellent article on the subject
Ask the owner of Grithiffths Games Megamart http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuNISaThemA
1.- Final Fantasy III on the SuperNES (a.k.a. FF VI): When my Super NES started to sing the opera. That came out of nowhere and pulled a string of my heart.
2.- "Aeris! No!" or something like that...
3.- When it is revealed you've been playing with a girly, DiCaprio-impersonator instead of the "real" Snake on MGS2. Oh, wait... those weren't tears, it was pure anger.
IIRC, Chris Crawford raised this exact question about 15-20 years ago. I find the question interesting since I don't believe in my ~30 years of playing computer games I've ever had one move me to tears. I've had movies do it, books do it, speeches do it, songs do it, and (sad to say) really-well-done-and-emotionally-manipulative TV commercials do it. But never a game.
..bruce..
Hmm.
Bruce F. Webster (brucefwebster.com)
Only time I got truly emotional over a game was in FFVII when Arith died. I turned off the game and refused to play it for two weeks. After a while, I decided it was time to kill the bastard that killed her. So yeah... games can make you cry. Too bad character development and a story is probably required to make it happen.
Oops, forgot that games don't need stories and stories don't matter anyway.
with Need for Speed: Most wanted, and the power went out... I cried
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
The only game that ever came close to making me cry was the alternate ending in Riven, where you trap Gehn but fail to rescue Catherine. See http://members.aol.com/jamesstep2/hints/endings/en dings2.html
this part will prolly never get read, so the subject line says it all.
'Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan!' gave me a lump in my throat, on the level when I had to help the dead guy haunt is grieving girlfriend.
I cried at the end, when the boy finds the girl on the beach. But I'm kind of a puss.
I was crying by the time I finished the first level in Daikatana.
I cry whenever I think of all the years Blizzard wasted developing World of Worldcraft when they could have been developing a Starcraft sequel like they should have.
What is your frick'n problem Blizzard!!!??? Make a Starcraft 2 already!!!!!
Michael "TheZorch" Haney
thezorch@gmail.com
http://thezorch.googlepages.com/home
"Creator, please look after the children."
Anybody who didn't shed a tear when Aeris gets killed in FF7 simply isn't human.
And the sheer difficulty of the NES Ninja Gaiden and R-type games brought many a tear to my eyes and busted controller to my hand.
I don't think I've ever had an emotional experience with a game, except maybe BF2. Then it's just the anger that comes out. Come to think of it, all first person shooters do that to me when I die. Some where, floating around the Internet, there's a group picture of me at Lanwar 10, about to shatter my $80 gaming mouse I had years ago. I think I lost a few keyboards at that LAN too....
As someone who just completed Planescape: Torment for the first time about an hour ago, I can say YES.
PS. Best. Game. Evar.
Belief is the currency of delusion.
I think story-based games are basically movies that give you illusion of control over what happens.
I think that illusion sort of breaks your identifiability with the character, there sort of an ambiguity for me between me as the character and me as the guy playing the character and i sort of find it easier to identify with a character that's not supposed to be me.
Examples for games that i can think of right now that stirred emotions for me are:
Fallout - I remember the end especially, when the hero saves the vault for the second time he is told he can never return to his home because he changed too much and would be a bad influence on the vault dwellers.
Homeworld - I love it how they added a whole spiritual side to what could have been just a space strategy game, and the music in the second one really contributed to the atmosphere.
Planescape Torment - The whole "What can change the nature of a man?" theme, search for identity.
There is a place for games that concentrate on skill developmenet.
But i think that as a form of art, a story-based game that doesn't stir emotion in you is missing its purpose.
You got my mod point for reminding me of the many many times I realized I would have to fight the wizard alone...
This is only a non-trivial question for suitably restrictive definitions of "game". If interactive visual novels count, there's an entire genre in this medium dedicated to doing just that, and really quite successfully in the case of the better examples, I might add. Although few Westerners are even aware that such things exist. (For the curious, Ever 17 or Kana ~Imouto are good places to start, being the best of those with commercial English translations.)
Once we get past this 1920-film era of video games, I'm sure we'll have some more emo.
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
Dupre's actions in the crematorium were heartbreaking.
I seem to remember crying at the end of Sonic Adventure 2. You know, heroic sacrifice, character finally finds meaning, etc. That, combined with "Live and Learn"... Actually, "Live and Learn" can make me cry on its own. I'm a sap.
I almost started bawling at a game last night. I finally got the magic hammer in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (I was too young to nab the game on its first run, so sue me) and I got to the guy in t he dark world with flute, and if I hadn't been dehyrated I would have cried. It was so sad... All he did was seek the Golden Power! He wasn't a bad guy! And yet he got turned into a tree... It was just so heart wrenching. I mean, forget the princess, let's save this guy from the dark world!
Then again, I cry at the drop of a hat, so perhaps I'm not a good example.
The only time a video game has ever brought tears to my eyes was one of the Call of Duty or Allied Assault games depicting the D-Day landing. I'll admit I shed a tear for the folks who had to live through the real thing.
Anything can make you cry as long as it's inspired and effective in conveying the scenario. In a game you can get attached to characters as you nurture them to maximum power in the game and direct them along their journey with your own effort, so if they die, you know the hardships they've been through, etc. Why ask this question about a game specifically? Anything with a story or even just a picture with no words that strikes a chord with you can make you cry. Anything can evoke human emotion. It all depends how it is perceived and its context.
Twinstiq, game news
I think that, contrary to many stereotypes and expectations, serious gamers (specifically, males, as I've no real experience with female gamers cause I haven't personally met any) actually put forth a lot into their gaming. While society in the US has a big "boys don't cry" thing going on, there are "powerful circumstances" in which it's perfectly "okay" for men to shed tears. For example, the average joe at home wouldn't think less of a man for shedding tears at the loss of the championship game in some sport. Nor do I think they'd misunderstand the tears brought about by a colossal failure of a science experiment, or engineering project. Or the death of a loved one. I think serious gamers fall into this category. For us gamers, it isn't simply about playing- it's about immersion. That immersion involves us putting a great deal of concentration and feeling into our effort, so that we get a real sense of reward or accomplishment for completing the adjectives. When a game really captures your immersion and attention, it can really provoke emotional responses in your imagination, beyond simply that of a natural competition (i.e. being upset because you are losing is different from being upset because the character you are identifying strongly with is suffering from adverse circumstances). Many gamers I know understand this, and accept it. For example, when all of my friends and I played through Xenogears, there were several moments that brought our hearts to our throats and made our eyes burn. That entire game is one emotional rollercoaster after another. None of us thought less of each other or any other for being choked up by Xenogears, because we understood that involving ourselves deep into the game had a much stronger meaning than simply playing a game for the joy of completing something. Why shouldn't games make us cry? This is one of the few places that males are allowed to actually express their emotion to other guys, without fear of reproach (assuming the other guys understand the nature of serious gaming). I think most of the serious male gamers I know are very glad of such opportunities, rather than constantly suppressing how we feel about a given situation.
Keeper of the Wang
If a movie can make you cry, and your game has a NON interactive movie in it, then of course, it's trivial (from a film-maker's perspective).
If the game has a fully interactive movie in it, then it is still possible, but it isn't the game making you cry so much as your choices and the reactions elicited from the game's responses that make you cry.
Finally if the game is fully interactive and fully immersive (insofar as 2D video technology and controllers allow), then it is quite possible that a game that creates scenes in which you make choices you will cry over.
GPL Deconstructed
I've always heard that it was common for people to cry when Floyd is killed in Planetfall.
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
Then I whack them on the head with the net for a while and I feel better.
Warning: Apple/Nintendo fangirl. Likes her electronics cute & cuddly. May be rabid.
The 1998 Interactive Fiction Competition winner, Photopia, packs a powerful punch.
http://www.ifcomp.org/comp06/history.html
Suikoden II is the best game I've seen for eliciting an emotional response from the player. It doesn't do it with angst-ridden pretty boys or tragic love stories, either; it shows the cost of war (especially on young people) in a straight-forward and powerful way.
I almost cried during Ace Combat 04 and 5. I don't think I've ever truly cried over a video game, but those got me the closest of all. Beautiful games, beautiful music, amazing storylines and gameplay that just doesn't get old. Ace Combat Zero didn't quite do it for me, though.
And honestly, people, since the subject's been brought up so much, Aeris was a ditzy flower girl who happened to be a good healer. I didn't like her at all and didn't miss her when she bit the dust.
Screw the rules, I have green hair!
Toru Iwatani (sp?) posed this very same question 20 years ago. In fact, I believe he specifically went on to investigate this, although I don't have a link. He was very interested in the range of emotions possible through computer games.
In the past I thought a 3D virtual suicide simulator would be pretty cool. Perhaps it could even be used in therapy (like fear of heights VR therapy). Could you capture the anxiety up to and including the very end? I got the idea from while rewatching the classic flick "Brainstorm" about 15 years ago, but Macromedia was just getting started and I didn't really have the creativity (or motivation) to pull it together.
I'd like to see a future of gaming where other emotions beyond rage and bloodlust and happy-laughter are explored.
https://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
I bought a copy of Quake 2 for my PC and went to install it. I think with all the settings turned down I was getting about 5 fps. I went back to the pc store and was bawling as I forked over a couple hundred dollars for extra RAM and a new video card.
The only game I've shed a tear to is Homeworld, and the moment when you get back to Kharak and it is being obliterated...
...having said that, I think it was more due to the music and the perfect choice of them using "Adagio for Strings" to convey a such a sense of loss. So every time I hear the track, I start welling up and always think back to that moment!
Are you local? There's nothing for you here!
There's one movie I can think of that can just about make me cry on demand... I don't remember what it was called, but it was in the DC Jewish Film festival a few years back. It was about an Israeli Taxi driver whose son recently committed suicide. Very short, very simple, and actually kinda boring until it hits you at the end.
:>
OK, I gotta stop typing now, starting to tear up already... It was that powerful
The ending of that ... more of a happy tears thing, but it was so cute. "This little light of mine ... I'm gonna let it shine ..."
Also the flashback in the sensorium in Torment. And that was just text.
Serpent Isle was trying to be a tearjerker in the scene where Dupre dies, but since most of my party had died and been resurrected dozens of times before, it's just too hard to get attached. That and LB really just can't write drama (as U9 showed us)
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
AGRO!
Celes, trying to commit suicide by throwing herself off a cliff if you fail to save Cid in the first bit after Kefka's apocalypse.
Aeris got more of a, "What? That's f---ing b---s---!" when I saw it.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
I know we arn't supposed to feed the trolls, but a "horrible game" doesn't usually sell 9.87 million copies (second best selling PS1 game of all time, second only to Grand Turismo)
go wank it to master chief (6.6 million copies) or whatever it is you do
The cost of games makes my wallet cry.
Although not quite a "crying" moment, I will always remember the first time playing Homeworld. I went into the game blind, not knowing anything about the plot or story line. I have to say I was quite moved and impressed when we made the first hyperspace jump *back* to our original homeworld only to find it unexpectedly totally annihilated, and discovering what the real plot of the game would be.
German kids are especially susceptible to crying from video games!
the ending of Earthbound made my sister and me cry.
Both the Cinema displays and the music.... Yuzo Koshiro at his best and the people from Falcom with a great storyline... Enough said (grabs a tissue)
Huh?
Oh these? Well you know, if you stare at the screen without blinking your eyes, after a while the tears come. Happens a lot in Quake, son.
Mom says you have to take me to school now.
It's morning already?!?
Mom! Dad's been playing all night again!!
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
Does it count when i see a bad game being overpriced?
:(
man does this make me cry, specially if i bought the damn game
for the SNES. The story was hands-down the best video game storyline ever. The music and the way you were broung in to believing you were Cecil.(I even changed his name to mine :)
There are times I wish I lived back in that time.... in that world.......
The frogs and the bugs! God I can't take it anymore!
Face it, video games are nothing more than a way for severely socially alienated nerds to pass the time (and waste their lives).
Just drop it with the "art" crap already, it's bullshit.
However the Planescape: Torment story is so well-written that you do get drawn emotionally into the game.
Someone once said that "fiction is lies told about others that tell the truth about ourselves." Anything with decent story-telling causes many to provide the "willing suspension of disbelief" needed for good stories that cause us to care about the characters.
Add the interactive aspect of games, and the situation is magnified. At one point, Homeworld gives the player an enemy race that the story later shows to have been an offshoot of the player's race that went collectively crazy. I myself found that to be an affecting image. (For that matter, I actually found myself saying "Break out the #10 can of whoop-ass!" out loud when I was having to rescue a neutral-but-friendly force from attack.)
So, I'd say that, regardless of the medium, it should not be a big suprise that something that involves so much of your attention also acquires some emotional capital as well.
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
you have to play both games though to know what this guy is goin through losing his wife and baby in the first game and then having his main squeeze die in his arms at the end of the second. Followed immediately in the credits by great song 'Late Goodbye' by Poets of the Fall. Not what i'd call 'crying' but I'll admit I got alittle misty :)
nothing more.. just.. Daikatana?
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
That's enough to make anyone cry, when you have to pause a game, you can't save it, and you lose power, or your kid sister fucks it up, or something, and you lose a night of magically great strategy and level-beating prowess!
stuff |
Can Games Make You Cry? Uhhh... yeah, have you tried playing Star Wars Galaxies?
"There is no spoon." - The Matrix
the question 'can games make you cry' is about equivalent to asking
the question 'can books make you cry' -- how about wood chips.
perhaps the content which we have paid people so much to create,
can trigger certain responses -- if we're susceptible to them.
But then, I was only fourteen... I hadn't discovered Vaughan Williams then. (Though I knew some works by his famous nephew, John...)
"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free." -- Goethe
I still get a bit teary eyed when I hear "Eyes on Me" by Faye Wong.
Yes. But, then, I usually remember to blink.
That came as close as anything ever would. Very emotional ending (showdown with The Boss).
VOTE!
Katamari Damacy
Badass Resumes
Would it have been that hard to write "SPOILER WARNING" somewhere on your post??
Some of us are still working our way through the WC...
NOOOO!!! That poor princess, somewhere locked away, probably struggling for her life. Why must Bowser torment me with his series of seven fake castles!?
I would argue the answer to be "no", in order for a game to make you cry the player would have to make the decision to control his/her character in a way that makes them cry. It seems to me that people play video games for fun, and very few people are intrinsically masochistic. Consequently, I would say this is reason why video games are not an art form.
Though, furthermore, it would seem this same argument could be applied to other traditional art forms, painting for instance, where by the viewer has to make the decision to relate the painting in such a way that invokes tears. But this process of relating to the painting seems far more subconscious to me than the motor skills involved in a video game.
"This room is an illusion and is a trap devised by Satan."
I cried.
Of course...
http://www.painstation.de/
Maybe I should have read the article....maybe even the summary...
Mad Dog McCree or Gigli.
Does this include a shelf falling, and a game landing on your crotch? If so, that game would have to be Soul Calibur 2. Man, I cried like a baby for about... 5 minutes.
I (accidentally) deleted my brothers Dragon Warrior 4 character when he was near the end of the game and that made him cry. Does that count?
...the first time I played Quake with the headphones on and the lights turned off....I shit my pants when one of those wolverine-type monsters came around the corner.
"I have as much authority as the pope, I just
don't have as many people who believe it" - George Carlin
When I was young and stupid, the endings of Illusion of Gaia and Link's Awakening both got me choked up. In my early 20s, I haven't cried at anything in a good long while, but the rare game like Shadow of the Colossus can still resonate with me on the same level as a sad part of a movie or book.
...anything can make me cry if it's the right time of the months. Video games with gore. Chocolate. Being out of chocolate. YOU. Not getting any. Not getting hugged. Movies. Video games with cute lil' critters...being bludgeoned to death by big bad guys with machetes....
It's a girl!
If only I had mod points. It's so true. Even more so because the nonchalance of the one-line eulogy. Sure, the feeling passes, but its trace lingers on in the depths of your little @-shaped soul.
I miss the simulated lesbian sex.
"I have as much authority as the pope, I just
don't have as many people who believe it" - George Carlin
All your base are belong to us! ... ...
Gentlemen, make your time!
For great justice!
Sorry (sob) I just can't go on!
I cried. Then I chucked my controller at the screen.
--b
Delphine Software's Another World (Out Of This World in the US I believe). The end where your friend puts your dead body on the bird, and you both fly off into the sunset. I bawled at that a lot when I was a kid. Chilling admission there.
That's a good point. Such an event is emotional because you can't control it. That's why people become angry or sad when such things happen in other mediums. You are sad or angry because it 'happened' and you aren't in the frame of mind to think that it can be changed. In a game, you're always thinking about how to 'win'. If something bad happens (like one of your teammates dies) you aren't as effected by it because you are not 'in' the scene like you would be if it was a movie. You are, in a way, 'outside' the scene as an omnipotent observer with the ability to affect the world. Like a god. You have great power over the game's 'world'. You can try and help the characters, and if it doesn't work you can always try again. In a non-interactive medium you cannot do that. You expect that you're able to find some way out of the level with everyone alive. You expect that you'll be able to 'save the world'. In a non-interactive story, you don't expect that, so you don't think in such a way, but in a game you cannot take such consequences as seriously.
Perhaps games need to evolve into a more 'all or nothing' mindset. Currently all games are based on the idea that you can restart at any time and try again. Maybe the game that finally causes us to evoke major emotions will be one where you can't just 'try it again'. Maybe 'the next great game' will start you on a quest to save the world, give you teammates that you grow to care about, and not let you get them back when they get killed. Imagine playing a game and getting careless and having one of your teammates killed. The emotional impact could cause you to take the consequences of your actions much more seriously. You will start to think about characters as much more human if they stay dead.
That said, it doesn't mean it's impossible for a current game to evoke such strong emotions - just harder. I was playing 'Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood' some time ago and had grown attached to my squadmates. In one level we were ambushed and one of my men couldn't get to cover fast enough and screamed out as he was riddled with bullets. My heart stuttered and, for a moment, I froze. It wasn't enough to make me cry, and it was only momentary (I reloaded the level and kept him out of harm's way), but I certainly felt a very strong, very real emotional shock.
Can a game make you cry? Yes. They can, and they will.
Whoo, signature!
DesireCampbell.com
This may not be a new question, but I think the answer is becoming a more solid "yes" all the time.
I think Myst was the first game that had a profound emotional impact on me. Not much since, actually...
FIXME: Add a sig here
Katamari Damacy because I laughed so much I started crying. Rez because it was so wonderful. Prince of Persia: Sand of Time because I always did these suicidal stunts, then noticed I was out of sand tanks.
[Enter fun stuff here.]
I've cryied when I finished Loom for so many wasted hours
Ever play a steaming pile of poo called "Evergrace" for the PS2? Driv3r? Games make me cry all the time to know I spent any amount of money on a game I expected to be great that ended up sucking beyond belief...
This sig isn't original enough, it's time to come up with something witty...
Metal Gear Solid 3... right at the end, the scene in the field of flowers. That brought me to tears. ..Lemmings. Beating the final level of Mayhem.
Aeris. Already mentioned, but my childhood memory is scarred with that moment.
Kingdom Hearts. I'm a sentimental soul at heart. Even if the music did ruin that last scene a tiny bit.
Kids cry all the time when their parents won't buy them the newest popular game!
First post! (just in case I am...)
but crashing while saving comes pretty close.
Still, a good story within a game can come close. The two I remember are Planetscape Torment and Fallout. PsT during the scene where each of the characters sacrifices themselves for you, admittedly a scripted movie part of the game that you can't change, but i still get torn between laughter and sadness hearing Nodrom say "Chance of success: slight"
The closest I've ever gotten during an actual game part is watching Dogmeat die in Fallout. Sad, then annoyed I didn't save him, then sad again when I realized I'd have to leave him behind simply because he *couldn't* survive at the higher levels. He's one of the very few characters in any game I've ever felt emotions for.
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
The most emotional ending I've seen was the one after completing Grim Fandango, but no, it was pretty far from crying though. :-p
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
See this!
I think the only game that ever made me tear up was Beyond Good and Evil.
(Please let the sequel rumors be true!!)
"Why would God give us a waist if we wasn't supposed to rest our pants on it?" - Rev. Roy McDaniels
Many good RPGs have this effect on me. It's easier in cut scenes, but I guess those would count more as movies. Anyway, although much rarer it has already happened to me at in game content.
By the way, one scene I think I should have cried was Aeris death in FFVII. The problem there was that the game mechanics contradicted the whole "death is once and for all" thing, so the suspension of disbelief didn't happen. All I could think about was "why aren't they using a Phoenix Down in her?". Same happened in FFVI with the death of that knight I don't remember the name. BTW, when I see a DC Comics or Marvel character die these days, my reaction is to start laughing...
Rule of thumb: if you wanna a sad death scene to work in your game (or fiction work, or whatever), do not allow your characters to "ressurrect" by any mean other than a game reload. Death, to be taken seriously, must be a serious business.
Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.
Any recommendations on titles?
So true! I cried at the end of Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door because all the characters were so happy at the end AND cried at the end of FF X because the characters were sad.
"Equal bytes for women!"
Woo-hoo! Another woman! I'm adding you to my friends list!
The number one cause of crying? Men!
It's a girl!
Actually I have cried many times over games: Temple of Elemental Evil, Pool of Radiance, MOO3, and countless others have made me cry a river for the money I just wasted on those coasters.
Programming: Its not just a job - its an indenture.
Am I the only one who found the Infocom game "A Mind Forever Voyaging" highly emotional? I'm not sure that I cried, but it certainly made me feel like wanting to. It was, of course, a text adventure from Infocom with no graphics whatsoever, which I played on an IBM XT. It was definitely made more emotional because of the interactivity.
There's also been plenty of tears shed in MMORPGs like Puzzle Pirates and kin, as alliances are created and destroyed. In that case, I suppose it's the other players making the folks emotional, with the game merely the conduit.
E pluribus unum
of course games can make you cry (not just the gameplay, the movies and fmv's too) - though it's like any movie or book, if you didn't cry during the most emotional part of the most emotional movie you've ever seen, you probably wont cry during the emotional parts of games
SPOILER(S) WARNING: if you havent yet played final fantasy 7, 8, or 10 and plan to do so eventually, you might not wanna read the rest... (just so people dont get pissed at me for spoiling it for em)
final fantasy 7: still to this day I haven't yet defeated Emerald or Ruby WEAPON(s) (then again, I it's gotta have been at least 2 or 3 years since i played it last)
final fantasy 8: when Squall and Rinoa get to the cockpit of the Ragnarok, and she wants him to hold her in the little time they have left together before they make ground-fall, since the Esthar govt will imprison her for her unwanted newly aquired witch powers
final fantasy 10: in the Al Bhed desert base when Rikku reveals to the clueless Tidus that if Yuna gets the Final Summoning and defeats Sin, the summoning will kill her too, and he says (something like) "Damnit - I kept telling her 'You can beat Sin Yuna! We'll get the Final summoning and kill it!' - I was such an idiot! I kept telling her that, and didn't even know she would die!"
not to mention when the party is on the cliff edge peak of Mt Gagazete to Zanarkand and Yuna drops her recording sphere of her last goodbyes for the rest to find after the final summoning would have killed her, and Tidus picks it up and watchs it
oh, and did I mention when Tidus and Yuna have to part in the end on the deck of the airship when he begins to fade away and hugs her while fading away
what about the very last endgame movie when Yuna is out on the dock in Luca before her speech still whistling because Tidus told her if she whistled he would come for her...
personally, the number of emotional scenes in ff10 alone is more than any recent Hollywood boxoffice movie or recent "emotional drama intensive" tv series that non-gamers will most likely never see the likes of on tv or movies...
Kill of 2 level 80+ hard core sorceress' in about an hour... suicide time. Damn lightning enchanted stygians!!!!
MISSING - Sig file. 2 years old black and white and very funny. If found please email me.
Ha! Agreed totally. I cry too easily, probably... I read the title of this thread and was like... "Crying at a video game? Sure... all the time!" lol
:) heh (By the way, my boyfriend goofed on me after I told him that story... that bastard! lol)
The first memory I have have of crying at a game when I was a kid and I played a game called Bird Mother on the Commodore 64. (I was just telling my boyfriend this story last week.) You played a mama bird and you had to keep your eggs safe. The eggs hatch and you have to get food for the babies. The babies begin to leave the nest and learn to fly and you have to nudge them up to help them fly or they hit the ground. A farmer has it in for you and the baby birds. All in all, I would cry when a baby bird would die, when the mama bird would die or even when the babies all left the next. Empty nest syndrome! lol I'm just too damned emotional!
"Never give up, for that is just the time and place when the tide will change." -Harriet Beecher Stowe ^_^
Rez is just about the only game ive ever played that brought me near to tears. Every time I get in to the atmosphere of Earth on the last level the synesthesia gets just so damn incredible it takes significant effort to stop some tears falling. (The only predictable way of getting that much game joy, bar watching the Halo3 advert. Dont ask me why. Im not a big Halo fan, probably wont even play Halo3. The mixture of epic music and visuals of that advert just get me every time.)
Other than that ive felt a little sad and/or content at a games completion just because theres no where left to go with that particular game. Thats about it.
Though I am one of the apparent minority that do not consider games an art form so I doubt games will ever have the power to bring about tears. As the article says
'Only in a situation where the player has no control, as in a cutscene, would there be room for such outrage.'
Even my Rez example was not strictly gameplay, im barely playing the game at all as those moments come across me. I just absorb the visuals and music. The moment the level finishes, the bosses turn up and you have to start concentrating on gameplay again, all that emotion vanishes.
I cried when I pre-ordered and payed 50$ for Fable, and had it beat before the end of the night!
The first Brothers In Arms game had me in tears after the opening mission. For those who haven't played it, basically it starts you eight days into the Normandy invasion, in the middle of an intense firefight which ends with your position being overrun by Axis armor and your squadmates all killed in front of you. You can run around and shoot, but no matter what you do the ending is the same. The next mission is your standard WWII FPS opener, with the D-Day jump, and the game progresses linearly.
I don't cry easily, but I think what happened was that I was just totally unprepared for the level of intensity of that mission. There was no buildup that allowed me to become jaded and used to the violence. I've played many a FPS, and I don't recall ever reacting that way to in-game violence. For what it's worth, perhaps I have a bit of PTSD from the opening scene of Saving Private Ryan. I saw it in the theater when it came out, and I wasn't right for some days afterward. The rest of the movie was OK, but that opening scene really drew me in to the horror and complete randomness of battlefield death. You can be the most incredible soldier of all time, but if you just happen to be on the landing craft that all the mg-42s are trained on, it sucks to be you.
I was in my late teens/early twenties when that movie came out... I think maybe I identified with the kids dying on that beach because I was the same age. My reaction probably represents an internalization of the fact that I am not, after all, immortal. I don't think most people really grasp mortality until at least that age.
I wish politicians would understand how horrible war is. It's necessary sometimes, but it really should be a last resort, after everything else has failed.
Sorry if I bummed anyone out.
Meh.
A host is a host from coast to coast...
Unless it's down, or slow, or fails to POST!
i cried while playing "shadow of the colossus", while/after i killed my first giant. i still feel the sadness coming up when i think about it.
in this case, it is all in the gameplay. the emotions come (for me) from the shift of the impression of a colossus from a worthy and strong adversary in the beginning to a helpless victim of a cold-blooded murder in the end.
at the moment, i am writing a lenghty article about "shadow..." which i will post somewhere on the web, where i try to discuss it's emotional functioning.
Regardless of the medium, a story can compel powerful emotions. Video games, books, movies, you name it. Their contents can make you laugh and cry. As for video games, I have frequently found myself moved by the plight of the characters in various Final Fantasy games. (For example, most people I know cried when Aeris died.) Same goes for many other adventure and role-playing games and it depends a lot on how much the story takes the time to get you acquainted with the characters. It matters little if they are 20x30 pixels, as long as there is something common for you to associate with, then you can and likely will become emotionally attached.
Join Tor today!
Just thinking of that game years ago...brings tears to my eyes. Those terrible mean words..."All your base are belong to us". The emotional pain...enough to make anyone cry.
Man is the lowest-cost, 150-pound, nonlinear, all-purpose computer system which can be mass-produced by unskilled labor.
I dare anyone to play this game and have it not ellicit a strong, sad emotion. Cried a lot on this one.
http://wurb.com/if/game/255
I agree. It's easy to treat your avatar with detachment because you can't identify with him (who *cares* about Sonic or Link?) but when the game is truly first-person, walking through the remnants of someone else's troubled life, it enables a much closer connection. Myst is the first (only?) game that's brought me to tears.
Then again, I haven't played Ico or Shadow of the Colossus yet.
Kevin Fox
Heh... I'm right there with you. :D I'll cry at anything if I'm in the right mood.
Guys, I applaud you for being symmetrical down to the clothes, but come on. I don't come to Slashdot to hear the same thing three hundred times. Why not make one thread of it rather then all posting your own "unique" way of saying it in new topics.
Yes Final Fantasy VII may have made you cry but one game in 500 making you cry doesn't prove the theory. The question is can they make you cry, not which one.
And even worse, thanks for NOT reading the article, he clearly discusses Aeris' death and why he doesn't feel it really matches the standards he sets.
However at the same the question is "duh". Games can be beauty and are portrayed with stories, how can they not be impactful. It's the same as reading books, or watching movies, but even more involved. I would be willing to say games can have a large impact on our emotions. It's not just crying.
Rage, and fear came to me early, through a game called System Shock. Shock and despair in Chrono Trigger (the major character dying? not saying who). Happiness and Joy comes from many games.
So why focus on Crying, it's obvious games while interactive are just as story driven as any industry. It's true stories are not required (see madden or other sports games) but at the same time for a book or a movie you don't need a story. (See Comedy, books of stats, and a few movies that just show images rather then tell stories)
But if you want to know can games make you cry, ask any serious gamer. One who tries all types of games, they'll tell you, yes. For me it was Final Fantasy VI, tears of sadness when Cid died in the world of ruin, tears of joy when you find all your friends, tears during the opera scene (truely great).
There's others too of course, but that's one of the major ones. Chrono Trigger's reunion. The FFIV where rosa rejoins the group. Legend of Zelda Ocerina of Time was wonderful. Shadows of Colussus. Metal Gear Solid (more of tears of rage when I realized what had happened to Meryl).
So yeah the answer is yes. It's true almost all these things are non interactive but that's the point. If you really want to see if something interactive can make you cry that's fine, there's a couple games when a friend dies in a battle, but at the same time it's either extremely scripted so it's like a cutscene or it's a chance happening and a random guy dies you have little connection to.
If you want an example of interactive versions look into things like Knights of the Old Republic. However it's uneffective in getting people to tear up because they always seem to give an obvious way out, and the fact is you probably arn't going to get people killed unless you're trying to go down the evil path, and if you're evil you're not going to be crying, you're going to be cheering the death.
So the long story is yes, games are emotional and can move people to tears, however we are not yet at the point where a game can have a true moment of sorrow with out it being completely planned out to drive the maximum impact to the player. This is not because of bad game design but because we have yet to have true "freedom" even in open-world games.
Woot! Another /. girl! You're also friended! We need to get a group going, unite the /. girls because the guys just don't understand. They'll laugh at the idea of crying at video games, but dying baby birdies you're trying to save is sad!
It's a girl!
And you. You're also friended! Somehow I just managed to depress myself into nearly crying reading the comics. Okay, so it was some past strips in which Luann's love, Aaron, is moving and they'll be parted, and I'm hell a depressed over my love leaving me over a miscommunication that's becoming clearer by the day, but still. Have you ever cried during something you reeeeeeeeaaaaally shouldn't have cried for?
It's a girl!
Sure they can.. depending on how hard it is thrown at you, if the console/pc is still attached, and where it hits you...
"a ridiculously simple question to ask about a hideously complex issue" Of course games can make you cry. Life, movies, inanimate objects, anything can make you cry. I once broke down over a plate of shrimp because it was one of my fathers favorite foods. (He passed away about 2 years prior) Making this issue "hideously complex" is unnecessary.
*spoilers* In 1, you have Lisa realizing that she's actually dead, and as she does turning into a grotesque creature, screaming for Harry's help, who runs while she dies. That gets me every time, especially when she starts crying blood.
In 2, you have the video scene- a tormented soul who is looking for his dead wife after he gets a letter from her, only to find he euthanized her- Gets me every time. That, and him finally coming to terms with Pyramid Head.
In 3, Heather walks in to see her dad, Harry, dead. If you liked the first, that's just a bitch to take.
4 didn't have any sad stuff. It was just a brainfuck.
*/spoilers* But yeah, silent hill has gotten me a bit choked up on a few occasions. Especially 2.
I harken back to the Infocom text adventure "Planetfall", which made me cry during one scene, and still saddens me to this day to think about. (Although the games author, Steve Meretzsky, has apparantly heard this so often that my complimenting him on it at a recent GDC got me a "not again" eyeroll.)
The setup is this (and since the game is decades old, I won't bother with a spoiler warning): You've crash landed on a planet, seemingly abandoned by it's population, and a little childlike robot named Floyd is discovered who helps you solve some puzzles. After going through most of the game with Floyd, he sacrifices himself to help you solve a puzzle, and thus win the game, but his death scene brings on the waterworks.
What makes the death of Floyd particularly effective is that the player has spent so much time learning about Floyd as a character. Sure, anyone could just view him as another object in the game to be prodded and poked as simply another tool in puzzle solving, but Floyd is hardly two-dimensional, and replying to his queries for a game of Hucka-Bucka-Beanstalk, or attempting to hug or kiss him, result in actions that, even for a text adventure, feel real.
Floyd personifies the key to emotional involvement in a game: Involve a player in something so that the player's interaction witht that thing is inately tied to joy or fun, then take that thing away. If said thing is just a thing, the player will be angered. If the thing has a personality, or is somehow anthropomorphized, the player will be saddened, the degree to which is determined by how involved the player was beforehand.
It's not enough to just have a camera angle or a clever shader or a "sadness inducing" plot point. To really make the player cry, they have to be emotionally invested for a while, and then have that investment taken away from them in a manner internally consistant to the game universe. This will bring up the waterworks every time.
The gulf between what we had hoped for and what we actually got nearly brought tears to my eyes, it put me of gaming for months.
You don't need a lab to make mud.
Memory Card Error.
There was this time when I was at the threshold of a Black Mesa parking garage. My good buddy Barney, the Black Mesa security guard, was helping me get through this dimension shift snafu. Anyway there was a huge Garg monster on the other side of the door that couldn't be killed. Barney says to me "Let's get him!" and runs out the door at this behemoth pistol blazing. I shouted "Nooooo! Barney!" and in a flash he was a pile of ash. I was choked up bad. Poor little guy. It took me a while to get over his death and heal. I think it was at the point that I had five more Barneys following me around that I felt better. :p
All glory to the Hypnotoad!
I could only beat that game on 2 player mode otherwise I would get raped. Those were the days when red didn't verse blue. Instead they worked as a team.
Can I bum a sig?
I was a huge Marathon fan. We had a lot of Marathon LAN parties back in the day. I screamed bloody murder when MIcrosoft bought Bungie. But I played the single player Halo when the Xbox was first released anyway. I remember being on the island, looking for the crashed dropship. At the crash site there were a bunch of boxes strewn about. I went closer to investigate. One of the boxes had writing on it... SPNKR Those letters brought tears to my eyes.
End of Final Fantasy VII.
"When I want your opinion, I'll give it to you." --leonstryker
I'm only an honorary girl, not a real one, but I generally don't cry. I came close in Deus Ex, when, due to my choices, Paul died. Even thinking about it now brings a tear to my eye.
When Zeratul sacrificed himself in StarCraft, I was choked up. I was impressed that I could be moved to tears by watching an alien bite it.
A w00t backatcha! ^_^ No doubt that dying baby birdies is about as sad as it comes in video games or in ANY arena, for that matter! ;)
;) heh
Slashdot chix0rs unite!
"Never give up, for that is just the time and place when the tide will change." -Harriet Beecher Stowe ^_^
OK, get this:
...whimper...
Super mario bros 1 (original NES)... I've finally gotten to level 8-4... the final level... only time in my life I've ever been there... and the TV dies! Yes, as I'm playing the screen goes black and I can hear myself getting killed by stuff I can't see.
Sure, her death is just a movie, but I'd argue the game is "just" a book.
As a traditional, FF7's lack of non-linearity allowed people to put more effort into making the characters better developed and more human: Aeris says almost the same dialogue no matter how you play the game, allowing the characters to develop in the same way a character in a novel does. Since the feelings of sadness in a novel are non-surprising, the novel-game's ability should not be surprising. The writer, I think, highlights the need for an illusion of control: we don't like to know we're in a game no more than we like knowing we're in a movie.
The problem with presenting anything as prerendered in a game, I'd argue is the "OMFG MOVIE!!!" effect where the movies seem disconnected from the game itself since we can clearly tell that (1) we're about to enter a movie and (2) the characters look very different than when I'm controlling them. I'd argue that FF7 got it the most right of any game to date, since 80%-90% of the movies seamlessly transition from the game scene to the movie and some even render the ingame characters in the movie itself rather than using a prerenderd version of Cloud. But it's clearly not "just" a movie, since were I to watch the video on its own, without the context of the game, I wouldn't feel anything.
Interesting note: Did anyone feel sadness when Cid (Cele's father and caretaker) dies in FF6 (FF3 US)? How did it feel to realize it was an event you had complete control over?
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
When playing Ultima IV in 1984, sacrifice was the most difficult virtue for me to master in the game. Once I completed the game the first time, I began to understand the virtues more and I eventually adopted them as my personal morality system. When I completed Ultima IX: Ascension, I openly cried. Not only did my character sacrifice himself for Britannia so it could continue in it's ideal universe, but the game, the series, the company and the creator were done, over, finito. There would be no more Ultima and no more Avatar.
Movies, TV shows, books and games that deal with a person having to sacrifice part or all of themselves connect with me. I think as I've gotten older and become a parent, I value life more and I value others' lives above my own. These stories make me question myself, "Could I make such a sacrifice?"
More currently World of Warcraft has a quest that almost makes me cry. It's about a paladin (Morgan Ladimore) who failed to protect his family and went mad (and evil) over the loss. You basically redeem his soul. Again it's one of those questions to myself, "Would I react similarly if I lost my family?" Since I've always identified with the paladin in every game that had one, it was especially traumatic that a paladin would give over to evil in a time of grief.
Can games make us cry? Absolutely if they provide the environment, a sense of connection to the characters or connect with us personally.
It's hard to make a game that truly uses the medium to create powerful emotional scenes. Take one example, the death of Aeris in Final Fantasy VII. Most people acknowledge that it was a powerful scene, and with good reason. In some sense, you'd grown to know her character throughout the game, and so seeing her die was an emotional moment. Still, how does that use the nature of the medium? If I'm watching a good movie, I'll have the same reaction. If anything, the Mines of Moria scene in Fellowship of the Ring was more powerful. Might it be possible to use the interactivity of a game to create a branching path, with powerful and resonant consequences, no matter which way you choose?
I'm not saying this because Final Fantasy VII was so heavily FMV-based, either. In fact, it would be possible to create a game which was 95% FMV, but still used the interactivity present in a game to create emotional impact. The difference lies in the fact that FFVII had very little in the way of hard moral decisions. What if it were possible to save Aeris, but it ultimately meant the destruction of hundreds of other, innocent lives? Imagine this:
You're given two options. One, you can use some kind of evil materia you've picked up earlier in the game. It summons the life out of hundreds of others, and uses it to channel some sort of force which turns Sephiroth's blade aside, and drives him away. Cut to a scene of a small child desparately crying for his mother and father, who have died simply so your friend can live. Pull back and see the devastation - hundreds have died so that you could save Aeris, you selfish bastard. She stays with you, but never sees you in the same way. Or, choose option two: Cloud enters and watches Sephiroth kill Aeris, knowing that he (and you) could have done something, but that the end couldn't ever justify the means. Neither one is satisfying, but the choice defines who Cloud is, and what he's willing to do for his cause and his friends.
It's difficult to create a game which can allow you to make weighty moral decisions, but the result of a game which does this well is nothing short of incredible. Consider Planescape: Torment, or, to a lesser extent, the Knights of the Old Republic and Fallout games. They're all truly role-playing games; you can create your own character, with your own moral code. If you're out to save the world, might that justify shaking down peasants when you need the cash to buy that +57 Super Armor? After all, if you die, then they're doomed; better that they be short some cash rather than souls trapped in the Ultimate Doom Machine. On the other hand, aren't you fighting for these people? Heck, maybe you're just power-mad and psychotic, looking to take control of the Ultimate Doom Machine for yourself.
To me, a really emotional game would allow me to step into someone's shoes and make these decisions. In the real world, if I were to be some kind of super-powered hero, I'd have to make hard choices. A game which wants to make a strong emotional impact should force you to make hard choices as well; if the game makes your choices for you, then it can only ever operate on the emotional level of a movie. That's not a bad thing, but as a game, it's possible to use the nature of the medium to go further.
That's it. I'm no longer part of Team Sanity.
Sure games can make you cry! Consider the EverQuest rollback! Woot, I camped the Ancient Cyclops for 14 hours straight and finally got my Ring of the Ancients! Hmm server crashed. WTH? Where'd my Ring go? Arrrrrg!
Or the I did the stupid quest for 3 months, did the turn in, and the NPC took my items and split cry.
At least the I had my epic turn ins in a no rent bag and logged out cry is gone.
/\/\icro/\/\uncher
When Agro fell off the bridge, sacrificing himself for me, I nearly welled up.
09
UNITE!
It's a girl!
I remember my sister and I playing Contra when it first came out.. We were at the very last level, when you're inside that hellacious alien and you need to destroy its insides.. Unfortunately, I died.. She kept on, and beat the shit out of that fuckin Alien.. but alas, when the helecopter flew away, with Player 1 aboard, I wondered where my character was.. how come he wasn't on the plane with player 1?? i realized my sister left my dead body inside that alien.. i was bawling :`(
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
You killed Paul! You bastard! :(
It's a girl!
Tangential to the discussion of whether events in a FMV sequence count as the game is the point that negative actions can't affect us as powerfully in games as in other media due to the ease of saving and reloading your game. If your teammate dies, or you choose the wrong dialog option and alienate your true love, fixing it is just a short Esc->Load away. The obvious exceptions are the afore-mentioned FMV or non-interactive scenes, where the event is a fixed part of the game's storyline. The larger problem, in my mind, is that people continually try to draw parallels between gaming and movies, or books, or other forms of entertainment, when they should be judged on their own merits. When you go to Six Flags, you don't consider how good of a story the Screaming Eagle rollercoaster has, or whether the Iron Wolf coaster can make you cry. Those kinds of questions are irrelevant, nonsensical even. Games need to be judged on an entertainment scale, which could do with a bit of evolution with regards to shades of meaning. Is it engrossing? Exciting? Enticing? Fulfilling? The continual comparison to other forms of media on their own terms can only be detrimental to games.
Due to circumstances beyond my control, I am master of my fate and captain of my soul.
FF6: lockes memories over rachel ;(, ending them (cause it was over) :(((((( OMG that really gets ya ;)
FF7: cloud puts aerith into the water after shes dead
ICO and Shadow of the Colossus. Ueda's games are on a completely different level, emotionally, than any other game I've ever played. They're so beautiful.
-Moses
...has never played Nethack.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
I doubt there is anyone emotionless enough not to cry at the end of that game.
Save Sam and Max!
You know, I never even got past the 4th level in G&G. Then lo and behold, MAME comes around and I finally finished the damn game. And even then, it was hard, as the last boss requires a certain weapon, and I saved the game AFTER the spawn point of the weapon.
As a kid, I didn't cry in that kind of situation, I was usually proud that I had made it farther than anyone else I had seen.
I only cry now at that situation, just because I value my time more than when I was 8. (Now: The game breaks my no-hitter at the last batter of the 8th? G$@ F@$*#*$ S*@*!)
0- Eamonman Proud member of DNRC
A friend of mine showcased the brandnew port of scummvm to the Nintendo DS port of linux.
I had some tears running down my face, just because it was so cool to see Guybrush asking how to become a pirate, on that little screen on that fully hacked hardware...
I don't like your subject line: "I'm a GIRL. Therefore..." because there are women who react differently to or are less affected by 'right time of the months'
Please limit those kinds of statements to yourself and females who react the same way, it makes idiots think that all women are the same.
Both of these games managed to get me pretty emotional, though I can't say I've been driven to tears, Oblivion in a more "I feel helpless" way than Morrowind. Oblivion isn't about you, while Morrowind is.
In Morrowind, there are many instances (to which I won't go into) where you may feel that "surge" of rage, because the entire game's essentially about you, you can do something about it. You feel much more powerful against these problems (with the exception that you, and many people whine about getting killed by mud crabs, but that's anger at the game mechanics, not the storyline.)
In Oblivion, there were two instances that really frustrated me, or rather, frustrated me as I "got into" my character's role. The first and most obvious (insert major spoiler warning, as I can't explain them accurately without releasing it) is the ending. As Mehrunes Dagon attacks the Imperial City, Martin is forced to give up his life to defeat him. However, through the storyline you can become good friends with him, and seeing him die (even for the good of eveyone) isn't easy. Also, after he is dead, what becomes of the Empire? An Empire needs an Emperor, and this is left open ended.
The one storyline in the game with possibly more drama than that is the Dark Brotherhood storyline. As an assassin for them, you take orders from your superiors without question - but what if that order is to kill all of your "family members" for a "cleansing"? It left be feeling angry and confused - why couldn't we just root out the one offender that deserved death, instead of killing all my comrades?
Though the Dark Brotherhood storyline goes much further, and deals with even more betrayal (leaving you ultimately helpless) and furthers the point that because you are helpless, Oblivion sparks a different kind of emotion than its earlier counterpart.
... when their tamagotchis died? I would consider that a game and one that you control the outcome and not something pre-rendered and pre-determined.
HD Trailers
Oh shut up and have a sense of humor.
It's a girl!
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
Well, since everyone seems to name titles, I need to mention Mafia, which had a very dramatic story. I admit it, it made me drop a tear at the end. Apart from that game, I can't think of another game which made me feel strong emotions (other than stress, which I don't consider as an emotion).
I too was touched by that, but I later found out that supposedly, if you play the game through at the hardest difficulty, Mona lives.
I'm happy believing this.
Belief is the currency of delusion.
By American standards, games might generate of few meloncholy moments. But only if your current emotional state is receptive to sad thoughts. Most western games are all about fear, animated violence, and unreal situations so a gamer can barely identify with the hero of the game. This is what the majority of the American public wants, escape and the adrenalin rush that comes from a 'fight or flight' response.
r .php is more for adults and it explores real emotional situations dealing with life and death. Unless your a stone, I guaren-damn-tee you there will be at least a big lump in your throat. Most reviewers report plenty of water works.
Japanese games on the other hand are more realized to be a meduim to communicate adult concepts. The game Kana: Little Sister http://forevergeek.com/articles/kana_little_siste
Go on - read the reviews. That game is one a million. A true gem.
There is nothing wrong with using computer games to tell stories!
Yes, Aeris' death was inevitable; yes, the backstory would come out regardless of how you chose to "interact." I don't care. It's the story. Tell me your story, Squaresoft; I want to play along.
Unstructured worlds, in which the player can do whatever he pleases, are often held up as a platonic ideal for roleplaying games. It sounds good, but it's not what I want. What happens when you give players a whole world in which to do as they please? Look at MMOs: It just feels like mindless dungeon-crawling. Look at GTA: They give you a whole city, and it just degenerates, inevitably, into running-around killing cops for no larger purpose. That's not what will keep me interested. Keep me close to a story arc. That's why I'm here.
A good game asks players to make choices; it's true -- but it's easy to present choices: What's hard is to make those choices matter. If more people looked at games as a storytelling medium -- if more people emphasized the continuity of computer games with older media like film and the novel -- then I think we'd have more good single-player games.
The ending cutscene. Glottis. :'(
The following makes me cry: Playing 2v2 Random Team in Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne. RandomTeamN00b1: How do I harvest wood? Me: *cry*. Playing 3v3 Random Team in Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne. RandomTeamN00b1: WTF? Why didn't you heal my hero? RandomTeamN00b2: Payback for ninjaing the tome. I needed that. RandomTeamN00b1: F*(k you n00b! RandomTeamN00b2 has left the game. Me: *cry* Playing Civ 4 when it first come out. Quick Save... "Civilisation 4 has caused an application error" Me: *Cry*. Plaing Civ 4 after patches Your tank has been defeated by archers! Me: *Cry* So you see? Games can make you emotional. :D
Although seriously, a game event that did cause a lump in my throat was when our WoW guild broke up. Everyone got online to bid each other farewell. Some of the emotes were suprisingly poigant.
install Windows games in Linux has made me cry.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
something about Chrono trigger made me sad (I can't remember what).
Also, I was very sad at the end of Psychonaughts, but that was because there was nothing left to play.
Try playing it at 60hz refresh rate, maximum brightness, for a few hours..
"Legend of Dragoon," "Brave Fencer Musashi," and "Chrono Trigger," have tremendous emotional value to me. Thinking about them brings back the nostalgia of my childhood, but not to the point of crying.
...the last Infotron with my head makes me cry!
The original website is down for maintainence at the moment so I can't see the video, but I guess it's one of those flash shock/surprise one right? Well, get this; most kids like this sort of thing.
Kids like funfair rides/ghost trains. They like scary stories. They like to go boo! They like like dinosaurs. This is no big deal and I seriously doubt that it has done any harm. It's all a part of growing up. Sure, you can wrap them in cotton-wool and spend your whole life trying to keep a smile on their faces. Then they hit the real world and are completely unprepared for the surprises that it brings.
This game, when you come to the end would maybe make me cry, I can't remember if I actually did, but it was very emotional. The whole plot, setting and all the struggle, ending in beautiful and engaging music in the ending.. Very emotional. There's just so much soul in this simple game, and unnerving animations, it is almost believable.
;*)
Other games: Ultima Underworld I & II. I bet it can make you cry too. Very nice story / setting here too, fantastic & moody music and a lot of struggle / investment in your character.. Same thing here: a lot of soul
But it's not easy to cry during actual gameplay since you can always restore / enter the code and start over.. Easier to shout and smash the keyboard though for having to do it for the 20th time...
Several points, but mainly when the Lighthouse gets destroyed and the kids are kidnapped. Also, when Jade finally finds Pey'j on the moon and he's dead.
Tales Of Symphonia:
One of the few games that had a storyline worth paying attention to.
When mad at one, try running a mile in their shoes. That way, not only do you have their shoes, but you are a mile away.
that is utter crap, coming from the "mommy i cant stop myself crying" department !!!
being a Man is not a de-facto state, it's a continuous battle.. and you have to prove yourself every single second
"There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Losing game progress in any number of ways:
and btw .. there is a very old saying - "God counts women's tears" ... very smart and soul-deep one.
but i'm pretty sure God counts men's tears too... just to know how many times he has to kick theyr sorry asses
stand your ground and take it like a man dude! .. there are already enough tears in this world and enough ppl to shed them
"There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
I was 8 years old and it was Christmas day. But the pictures on the cover looked so *good*...
Personally, I dont think crying over a video game is as silly as it may sound. If you do start to cry over a video game, people would usually say chill man, its just a game. But, when you play a video game, youre in a totally diffrent world. One of relaxation and soothness. Havent you ever noticed when you play video games your usually totally oblivious to everything else going on? Stress seems to go away in general.
If this world was, "interupted", the effects could be more drastic than usual. If you poured so much concentration into one thing and kept failing at it, it would make you unhappy.
Take for example you were playing Starfox, and you have been playing for hours and you have wasted so much time and effort trying to beat this game and you just kept failing, wouldnt that make you feel bad? I know from experiences ive had as a child that i would be upset if i couldnt beat Galaxia, and sometimes i would actually cry. Its not just the video game, this probably would happen if the situation was diffrent, say, trying to build something such as a window. If you kept failing, and put so much effort in it, it would make you unhappy, and the more you tried the worse your attitude would become.
Im Coming To Take Your Town
I think that most people would cry if a real big bad guy with a machete bludgeoned them to death...at least, until the "death" part.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
the ending of mgs3
where the boss is on the ground....then u have to shoot her yourself...then all the flowers turn red (i didnt want to shoot....i waited too long and the game did it automatically *shakes fist*)
Spending 5 minutes waiting for games to load only to get
R Tape Loading Error 0:1
at the very end nearly drove me to tears.
R Tape loading error, 0:1