306: Disney-Colored Death

[Haenf]

I thought Dragon Age 2 did this quite well in the quest 'All That Remains'.

Spoiler

Throughout the quest, it seems like it's set up for you to arrive in the nick of time and save the day, but you're always too late to save your mother who dies in your arms. Even playing through after that first time, I wondered if there was anything I could do differently and I still got a lump in my throat when I realised there's literally nothing you can do to change events.

 

[mattaui]

I have to admit, Up made me care about the protagonist and his wife faster than any movie I've seen in a while; I bought the soundtrack to the movie, and every time I hear the music from the "Married Life" montage, I admit that I feel the tears coming on.

<youtube=GroDErHIM_0>

If I can find a game that can move someone that quickly, I'm all for it.

Oh god you horrible, horrible person! Why'd you have to make me watch that again... *blubbers*

Yeah, as much as I want to watch that clip, I don't want to start tearing up here at work. I first watched UP! over at a friend's house (and we're all 30+) and the room got really quiet, except for my friend's kids (5 and 8) just weren't quite of the age where that would resonate with them yet.

 

[PunkRex]

My brother said he felt the need for revenge when the main characters girlfriend gets shot in "The Darkness". I remember the scene, I actually felt that taking (most) control away from the played really helped it. It made you feel helpless. You have got to understand my brothers like a cyborg, hes so un-feeling its kind of funny so this was a big deal when he said it.

 

[Catchy Slogan]

If I can find a game that can move someone that quickly, I'm all for it.

How about Eternally Us? It's only about 20 mins long, but still good.

I'll post a lets play of the full game if you want to see it.

 

[bdcjacko]

I cried a bit just reading the paragraph about Up. It is truly a beautiful film. If I was to ever make a video game, I now know the ending I would use.

 

[Alex Spencer]

Taking Pixar as an example, I think all they can teach us in the gaming world, really, is that coming up with some new shit and doing it really well is enough to achieve greatness. But I think the conclusion there is that we need a team who can come up with new ways to express emotion in a way that only games can. Some have come close. But I just don't think its possible for gaming to be able to silence an entire theater audience full of people.

I'm so close to agreeing with you, it was hard to have anything to say that wasn't just nit-picking. But, I dunno, I'm not sure (beyond technical stuff), Pixar do anything *new*, per se. Their films are very very well told and shown stories, but they're quite traditional. What Pixar know brilliantly is that basic theory stuff, all the 'language' of films. Take the way Up pulls on you by just showing a couple of mementoes from Carl & Ellie's life, and playing a bit of their theme, which were so briefly set up in that opening... That's just really sharp, efficient storytelling. But it's not inventive, as such.

As they say, it's not Disney unless a character dies in a heart-wrenching, usually horrifying way.
Seriously though, how were we not traumatized as children?

Because it felt natural, and was put across for a child to understand without padding the view. It helps that Disney films also end with the protagonist living happily ever after. Able to move on from the pain.

Yes! Exactly this. It's such a beautiful lesson, and something that I think probably helped me. Even now. I can mentally place loss in that kind of narrative, and it's soothing.

I've never seen lion king or bambi but your descriptions made me sad...So that really says something...I may watch them even though I've had them spoiled...

I'm so sorry, Baldry! But... having Bambi spoilt? Woah, that's kind of impressive!
(I really recommend watching both, btw. They're both brilliant films, in their way. Up's totally my fave, though.)

 

[Alex Spencer]

Dastardly: yeah, that's totally it. This is kind of the point I was making in that last post to Tin Man. Pixar are total craftsmen. They know all the rules and all the reactions and while the closest we have to that is Valve's intensive playtesting and apparent intuition, that's only mechanical stuff (and it's still not perfect).

I guess Craddoke was joking, but yeah, Joss Whedon totally does that. Leaves room for you to react (and, in some cases, then prods at you a bit for reacting so predictably).

In fact! The narrative obstacle that would be best set for games would be a whodunnit. Something that can be solved by the player, without artificial boundaries, but with red herrings and genuine subtle clues. Hmm.

...Wow, really didn't expect the afterbirth of this article to be so fascinatingly stimulating. You guys!

 

[Charli]

Mmm death is a part of life, and I don't think children should be shielded from it, it can be traumatic, but it can also inspire kids not to take life for granted. I love that Disney movies did this and detest the regulation on the mention or implication of death on most kids programming.

 

[Jamous]

I have to admit, Up made me care about the protagonist and his wife faster than any movie I've seen in a while; I bought the soundtrack to the movie, and every time I hear the music from the "Married Life" montage, I admit that I feel the tears coming on.

<youtube=GroDErHIM_0>

If I can find a game that can move someone that quickly, I'm all for it.

Wow, that's damn impressive. Also; saddening.
I'd really REALLY like to play a game that can make some emotional connections that fast.

 

[LKArtillery]

Mother 3.

That's all.

 

[Craorach]

The opening of Up is probably much worse for adults than it is for children.

My ten year old step son wouldn't really understand the sequence where they are breaking open their savings for day to day things that they need.

As a married adult the idea of being forced to leave the dreams we have together to late is something that we live with day to day. I doubt very much you'd find a long term couple out there that hasn't, at one point or another, been forced to put aside something they wanted due to finances.

I would love to see video games which could manage to visit these themes.

Heavy Rain did a good job with some of them, dealing with the loss of a child and what it can do to the surviving family. Some of the scenes in which the father is desperately looking for his child and the choices he has to make are truely moving. However, I have a hard job really calling it a game... its an interactive movie.

The trailer for Dead Island is amazing at this and I hope the game itself manages to act on this.

I think it is getting easier for video game companies to tug at our heartstrings as gamers get older. As teenagers and even younger adults we didn't have the ties in the world that would cause some of this stuff to affect us the way it would now, as many of us have partners, familes, jobs and aspirations.

 

[Namewithheld]

This just shows how goddamn old I am, but the closest I've come to crying for video games was the middle of the Fortress of Regrets from Planescape Torment.

It captures an intense feeling of hopelessness as you and your companions are drawn apart and you only see what happens to them from a distance, unable to act.

I *actually* cried at right before the end, though, when the final battle happens.

But they were tears of joy, and if you played you'd know why.

Up still makes me cry.

 

[Z(ombie)fan]

Mother 3.

That's all.

also,

Mother 2

Mother 3 was sad and displayed grief and all that, but what about earthbound?

I want to call attention to a moment that may not have even been intentionally sad.

alright so, jeff hasn't seen his dad in 10 years.

as he goes find a way save his friends who contacted him psychically, he meets his dad. neither no what to say, they are kind of just acknowledging eachother. they then go on and do what they were going to anyway.

who here can sympathize? I can,thats how I know my parents, replace a decade with a month or five, and as a result its the single most memorable part of ANY game to me. but even it had to rival the rest of earthbound.

we have had our bambi, it came out the same year as their lion king.

 

[Notere]

The only real answer I have to this is, as several have said in front of me, Half-Life 2: Episode 2. It's almost not even the voice acting and the build-up. It's the extremely terse, time-sensitive conversing between the characters. No refutals, no speeches, no quips. It's desperate and final.

Otherwise? I can't hear the end credits music from Final Fantasy 6 without getting smacked in the brain by the memory of Shadow, my favorite flipping character. There's actually no less than three of those moments in that game. If I think, it's more like seven. Recently? Virmire in Mass Effect. Thank God there's not a time limit on speech choices is all I've got to say about that.

 

[Puzzlenaut]

The Lion King was pretty much the only time I ever cried in a film, even as a kid.

That was such a powerful scene.

 

[Whytewulf]

I have to admit, Up made me care about the protagonist and his wife faster than any movie I've seen in a while; I bought the soundtrack to the movie, and every time I hear the music from the "Married Life" montage, I admit that I feel the tears coming on.

<youtube=GroDErHIM_0>

If I can find a game that can move someone that quickly, I'm all for it.

Oh god you horrible, horrible person! Why'd you have to make me watch that again... *blubbers*

I should have refused to watch that.. DANG IT!...

Ehem..


Anyways.. great article.. and ya.. Disney..is Disney for a reason.. Good stuff.. Games seem to need to have less of such drama, but I think they can do it.. But someone say "was that fun". The definition of fun, may need to change in their mind about the game.

 

[Thespian]

From Bambi to Up, Disney films have hardly pulled their punches when it comes to showing death to a young audience in their films. What can videogames learn from their example?

This was, at it's core, an interesting article, but the Lion King was more or less 100% plagiarized from Kimba the White Lion, (seriously, it's ridonkulous - Matthew Broderick even said so :O) including the surprisingly blunt death scenes...

Even so, very nicely written article. Interesting points.

 

[Alex Spencer]

This was, at it's core, an interesting article, but the Lion King was more or less 100% plagiarized from Kimba the White Lion, (seriously, it's ridonkulous - Matthew Broderick even said so :O) including the surprisingly blunt death scenes...

Yeah, I'd wondered about this. I've never seen Kimba, but I've heard tell. Is it worth watching? Does the Mufasa/equivalent death work in the same way?

 

[Thespian]

-snip-

Kimba was an anime TV series, from which key moments are very (VERY) similar to the lion king, and I think it's certainly worth watching - It is essentially a Lion King cartoon series. Kimba ends up trying to eat bugs and whatnot to get along with his herbivore friends.
The Mufasa death thing shows Kimba's father dying in a stampede, but betrayed by his Aunt, not his Uncle, so yes the death is almost the exact same. Not that Disney didn't replicate it well, but it's interesting to know the roots.

 

[lowkey_jotunn]

I have to admit, Up made me care about the protagonist and his wife faster than any movie I've seen in a while; I bought the soundtrack to the movie, and every time I hear the music from the "Married Life" montage, I admit that I feel the tears coming on.

<youtube=GroDErHIM_0>

If I can find a game that can move someone that quickly, I'm all for it.

And this is what makes Pixar so damn good. Up is ostensibly a kids movie, but starts with a montage that will make grown men cry big manly tears, and turn women into absolute blubbering wrecks. I've seen it happen. Even now, knowing exactly what is going to play out, I feel it welling up.

To be able to evoke that kind of emotion, without a single spoken word, is beyond impressive.

Were a video game able to capture that level of engagement .... damn ...