Game plots that went insane

[immortalfrieza]

yes, asscreed has a questionable plot, but all the points that have been risen so far have been clearly explained throughout the games.

This could be said about all the so called "insane" plots in this thread. It's pretty rare that a plot in anything genuinely doesn't make sense. Whenever people complain about a plot not making sense it tends to almost always be because the writers made the mistake of respecting the viewer's intelligence and didn't spoon feed it to the viewers in the most blatantly obvious manner possible.

 

[Mister Chippy]

MGS2

Edit: Seems I was beaten to this:

Metal Gear Solid 2

Spoiler

When the game started to "crash" on you and there was a lot of fourth wall breaking. It was really fun and I can see why so many people like the series.

Plus the ending after the credits...

Spoiler

But they were already dead...

 

[SKBPinkie]

Bioshock Infinite.

The main problem I have with stuff like "infinite worlds" is that even within their own canon, stories that use concepts like time travel / infinite worlds are so goddamn contradictory and paradoxical that I cannot take any of them seriously. Any time a TV show, movie, game, etc. introduces those words, I instantly assume the story is not something worth getting into. And I'm usually right, cause they can be broken almost instantly using something like the grandfather paradox.

And it's especially a shame in the case of Infinite. Unlike the other games that people are posting here, BI doesn't even have anything redeeming in terms of gameplay.

 

[Quazimofo]

Bayonetta. The climax is probably my second favorite in video games next to Kingdom Hearts 2. that is also the point at which things go from off the rails to totally off the rails bonkers in a good way.

Spoiler

It's a bit annoying though trying to maneuver god around the planets. Sometimes it goes off without a hitch, sometimes I crash into the planets after the asteroid belt a dozen times. Still, that's gotta be one of the best ways to end a game on I've ever seen. It's a bit like the climax to Saint's Row the Third in terms of sheer ridiculousness and that feeling of awesomeness mixed with laughter at sheer WTF factor. Wish more games would be like that.

Saint's Row the Third took the kinda dark and serious plot of the previous games and beat it to death with a dildo bat before you got 10 seconds into the introductory cut-scene. And then it got crazy. God I love that game so much.
It's also kinda funny how the dildo bat became the symbolic weapon of the game despite being completely optional and honestly kinda crappy. I never used it throughout my multiple playthroughs, but damn if mere mention of it doesn't capture the spirit of that game so perfectly.

As for other games... well I'm pretty easily entertained so I guess I tend not to notice things going completely bonkers unless it is in a particularly entertaining fashion, like saint's row 3.

 

[saxxon.de]

Since I just got around to play it, I'll have to go with The Stanley Parable. And there's nothing more to say, really. It's just batshit crazy nearly all the time.

 

[CelestDaer]

How can ANYONE loath XII? It's my favorite one! D:

I got as far as Fran and Balthier showing up before the ridiculousness of the battle system got so mind numbingly boring that I had to stop playing. The plot wasn't giving me any hope, either.
FF9 was a game that I really enjoyed because it's more the characters reacting to other influences, up until the final dungeon. It took me... 6 or seven playthroughs to realize the scene with

Spoiler

Garnet and her mom climbing into a boat at the destruction of Madain Sari were Zidane's memories, not Kuja's

I mean, yes, I understand where people are coming from with the strangeness past Terra, but it seemed pretty straight forward to me. Especially if you look at the whole of Memoria as the characters diving into their own minds.
I tried to play FF8 a handful of times for years, and never got past finding the second Garden, until I decided to get a trainer and just blast my way through the game for the story, and oh, man, is it terribad...

Spoiler

See, here's the thing, it doesn't matter what the story is, by going forward and fighting Edea, Squall and co create a stable time loop that might as well end up with Square saying, "If you hadn't played the game, this wouldn't have happened." Which is both incredibly ballsy and massively cheap at the same time.

The game that always went off the rails toward the end for me was Xenogears.

Spoiler

God is the heart of a space ship from a distant planet? Fei and Elly are reincarnations of themselves? One of Fei's previous selves is still alive and running around in the world? His desire to beat everything to a bloody mist has separated itself from his body? Why didn't we get to play the Soylent Factory, instead of getting it told to us through a horribly long narration? Miang was directing Fei to fight Deus?

And we're supposed to make sense of this?
Edit:

Xenogears goes from dark, mature storytelling to pure batshit as soon as you reach disk 2...

Sniped by a bad captcha

 

[GabeZhul]

I don't know if it counts since it was practically just the very ending/epilogue of the story, but here we go, Kingdoms of Amalur:

Spoiler

From the beginning you are treated as an anomaly in the system, a creature that has no pre-determined "fate" and thus can fuck up the predictable lives of anyone and everyone. In the end it turns out that your very existence is part of a Batman gambit by the eeeeeeeeevil god who is also chained by said fate, in trying to actually break free and take over the world... and to do that he needs you, the only person in the entire world who can kill him... and then he turns into a dragon, because why not...

Then once you defeated him your token sexy elf companion leaves you with a letter threatening you not to tell anyone of the god/dragon that his followers been talking about all this time and which you just killed, because she is part of a secret society (that only got introduced five minutes before the finale) sworn to hide this god (that you just killed) so that other people cannot fall prey to the temptation of his power (which is a non-issue, since he is DEAD), and then threatens you, saying that she will kill you if you tell anyone about him... EVEN THOUGH HE IS ALREADY DEAD!

It took me about five minutes to stop manically laughing at the sheer stupidity of this entire endgame once the credits rolled...

 

[VladG]

Well, since the obvious Fahrenheit has already been mentioned (and man, did that game start off awesome and end up a convoluted pile of crap) I have 2 more:

The Longest Journey 2. The Longest Journey is a pretty strange game to begin with but the plot was well written and made sense. The sequel starts off fairly normal (insofar as normal goes in a game where you hop between a futuristic setting and a fantasy-medieval setting) and then just goes bat shit crazy. To be fair, I don't really remember the plot (it's been like 8 years since I've played it) but it stuck with me just how crazy the game gets. And not in a good way either

And something I'm surprised hasn't been mentioned: Deus Ex Human Revolution. The game starts out great: Big city hub to explore, interesting characters and conspiracies waiting to be revealed. Aaaand then

Spoiler

you end up fighting what are essentially zombies and a fucking turret final boss right before you are offered the choice of 4 shiny red buttons to end the game with.

Bioshock Infinite.

The main problem I have with stuff like "infinite worlds" is that even within their own canon, stories that use concepts like time travel / infinite worlds are so goddamn contradictory and paradoxical that I cannot take any of them seriously. Any time a TV show, movie, game, etc. introduces those words, I instantly assume the story is not something worth getting into. And I'm usually right, cause they can be broken almost instantly using something like the grandfather paradox.

I'm guessing you haven't seen Futurama then.

 

[Littaly]

Seeing the title I immediately thought of Indigo Prophecy, not entirely surprised to see that was the game that inspired the thread ^^

Seriously, it's worth playing just to see how far it really goes. Before it goes off the rails it's an OK, decently atmospheric but pretty unremarkable supernatural thriller, but once it starts to derail, oh boy. I'm kind of glad it did, because the trainwreck is so much more interesting than the actual story.

As for other games, despite the fact that I really like (borderline love) the story in all three games, Final Fantasy VII, VIII and IX all suffer from a confusing, needlessly complicated third act. VIII is the one that people complain about the most, and it's definitely the worst offender, but I think I would have enjoyed all three of them more if they didn't feel the need to introduce all those weird, complex concepts.

 

[GabeZhul]

I tried to play FF8 a handful of times for years, and never got past finding the second Garden, until I decided to get a trainer and just blast my way through the game for the story, and oh, man, is it terribad...

Spoiler

See, here's the thing, it doesn't matter what the story is, by going forward and fighting Edea, Squall and co create a stable time loop that might as well end up with Square saying, "If you hadn't played the game, this wouldn't have happened." Which is both incredibly ballsy and massively cheap at the same time.

I have no idea where you get the "If you hadn't played the game, this wouldn't have happened." thing from. What other option you have? Don't play the game? By its very definition, if you hadn't played the game in accordance to the time loop, it would have led to a paradox. There is literally no alternative.

The game that always went off the rails toward the end for me was Xenogears.

Spoiler

God is the heart of a space ship from a distant planet? Fei and Elly are reincarnations of themselves? One of Fei's previous selves is still alive and running around in the world? His desire to beat everything to a bloody mist has separated itself from his body? Why didn't we get to play the Soylent Factory, instead of getting it told to us through a horribly long narration? Miang was directing Fei to fight Deus?

And we're supposed to make sense of this?

To be fair, Xenogears turned out as it did thanks to some insane budget issues. They practically decided to focus on the beginning of the game and the end of it and only provided a footnote version of the middle. As for the things you bring up, practically every single one of those are perfectly explained in-game, so I don't know what you are talking about. Sure, you can say they are not explained "well" thanks to said budget cuts, but they are there and far from incomprehensible.

 

[GothmogII]

Final fantasy 8 and 9. They both went batshit bonkers near the end. FF8 Arguably went bat shit bonkers near the middle, i'm still not completly sure what the fuck was going on in the game, but i still like it.

I never finished FF8, but I'd say the plot went off the rails around the time characters started bating around the phrase "time compression."

Didn't squall and rinoa go into space at some point? Or am i remembering that wrong?

Yeah, that's where the 'song' happened. Still, the Ragnarok was pretty cool, only helped by the fact it's a spaceship shaped like a freaking dragon.

Spoiler

<youtube=NoCYz6bbDu0>

 

[-Dragmire-]

Drakengard


Well, the plot's pretty messed up when you start fighting demon space babies.

The Stick of Truth also gets pretty insane but in some ways, that's to be expected.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Any time a TV show, movie, game, etc. introduces those words, I instantly assume the story is not something worth getting into. And I'm usually right, cause they can be broken almost instantly using something like the grandfather paradox.

I'm curious what you believe the point of a "story" to be.

There's an intriguing divide I'm seeing when it comes to the endings of things like Infinite. I used to ascribe it to absurd levels of pedantry, but I'm beginning to think it's more of a left brain/right brain thing.

 

[SKBPinkie]

Any time a TV show, movie, game, etc. introduces those words, I instantly assume the story is not something worth getting into. And I'm usually right, cause they can be broken almost instantly using something like the grandfather paradox.

I'm curious what you believe the point of a "story" to be.

There's an intriguing divide I'm seeing when it comes to the endings of things like Infinite. I used to ascribe it to absurd levels of pedantry, but I'm beginning to think it's more of a left brain/right brain thing.

Well, I like a certain amount of believability in stories. Even if the story is based in some sort of sci-fi / fantasy magic stuff, I'd like it to at least be consistent and logical within its own realm.

The problem with time travel (to the past) and multiverse-hopping is that they can never make sense. Even within the world of that particular story, it just cannot work and introduces several "what-if" scenarios that almost render the main story pointless. As in, the events that happened in that story are something that never happened or can be repeated for different results.

To be fair, people have different tolerances for that kinda stuff. For me, it's the two things mentioned above, and for others, it may be magic, which I don't necessarily have an issue with. So yeah, BI was pretty disappointing seeing how the game's only claim to fame, its story, was something I just couldn't care about.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Well, I like a certain amount of believability in stories. Even if the story is based in some sort of sci-fi / fantasy magic stuff, I'd like it to at least be consistent and logical within its own realm.

The problem with time travel (to the past) and multiverse-hopping is that they can never make sense. Even within the world of that particular story, it just cannot work and introduces several "what-if" scenarios that almost render the main story pointless. As in, the events that happened in that story are something that never happened or can be repeated for different results.

To be fair, people have different tolerances for that kinda stuff. For me, it's the two things mentioned above, and for others, it may be magic, which I don't necessarily have an issue with. So yeah, BI was pretty disappointing seeing how the game's only claim to fame, its story, was something I just couldn't care about.

Fair enough. It's not really an issue to me. I've run into stuff like this before...like a condemnation of, say, A Song of Ice and Fire because he didn't account for why the seasons were so strange with his geography and thus outraged climate wonks. I understand a desire for a certain degree of verisimilitude in your fiction...I too enjoy a "real" feeling story...but when you're dealing with fantasy and/or magic realism I do feel like there's a lot of wiggle room for authorial fiat provided it moves the core of the story in a positive direction. In Infinite's case, the core of the story was Booker and Elizabeth, the cycle of violence, and Booker's redemption. All the Quantum Mechanics and Columbia's social anachronisms were just window dressings for a human story. It's possible I'm just becoming a soft touch in my old age, but as long as that human story worked, I was fine hand-waving all the other stuff as it was obviously irrelevant to the outcome.

The same would be true of something like To the Moon. HOW everything is happening wasn't important to that game's emotional punch. Simply THAT it happened.