How Can Videogames Make Us Cry?

[videonerd250]

Agro! ;_;

 

[Morgan3rd]

HL2 Ep2 Ending... yeah I shed quite a few tears... Just the complete sense of powerlessness and hopelessness... God I have to play that again...

 

[Ultra_Caboose]

I've cried from games before. The opera scene in FF6 brought tears to my eyes during Celes' aria, Aeris' passing left me sobbing. Metal Gear Solid 3 and 4's endings, and the memory scenes in Lost Odyssey have had me close to tears.
I don't see why some people don't believe games can't make you cry. Movies make people cry, and they're just as artificial as a game. The right story lends to emotional attachment to characters, which I think can exceed emotional attachment in a movie if done right. The story and the characters, the music, everything working in the perfect way can bring out the tearful emotional response.

 

[solidstatemind]

Are you so jaded at such a young age that you can't be sucked into a story- can't become emotionally committed to the point where you are moved to the deepest levels of sorrow? If you can't, then I frankly pity you: you're life is going to be pretty emotionally empty. If you can't experience the lows in life, you will never appreciate the highs. (Sorry to sound so sanctimonious, but it's true.)

call me a 'sap' if you want. I call myself 'human'.

I can't believe it. Someone seriously just said this. Hey, you know what? You can go fall off a bridge. And land on something really soft and be escorted safely away from said bridge back to your home.

Just because I went, "pffft," when Aeris died, it doesn't mean that I felt nothing seeing my brothers teary eyed saying "I do" at their respective weddings. It doesn't mean that I didn't cry tears of joy when the doctors said my mother's cancer was going away. It doesn't mean that I didn't completely break down and bawl like a baby (something I didn't even do when I was a baby) when she passed away.

"If you can't experience the lows in life, you will never appreciate the highs." Sure, I can agree with that. I'm just saying that I don't really count Aeris dying as a real "low" in my life.

Now, if you had just said, "you guys who can't become emotionally committed to these games are really missing out, man. Crying at video games is flipping beautiful," without the "I pity you. Your life is pretty emotionally empty," part, then this would be a different conversation.

With that said, I don't think we should be worrying about making people cry at their video games so much as just focusing on creating well-written, compelling stories. Like Silent Hill 2. I didn't cry, but I did say to myself for the first time in response to a video game, "Wow. That was actually really well done!" Games reached a new level for me after that. That's what I'd like to experience more of.

Welcome to the Escapist. One warning: we expect a higher level of discussion here.

To wit: Wow. Center of the Universe, are we? For your information, I wasn't necessarily singling you out: if I were- pro-tip here- I would've quoted your post specifically. If you were to read through the thread, I'm sure you would see what I saw: there is clearly a subset of posters who were quite derisive about people who might actually be moved by video games. I was generally addressing them. You are the person who chose to apply my argument to specifically to your post.

While you make a good point about Aeris dying not necessarily being a low point in your life, the truth is when I made that statement, I wasn't necessarily speaking specifically of video games; again, YOU chose to interpret it as being specific to video games. Instead, I was speaking more about being emotionally open to experiences, any experience (including video games), rather than being these cookie-cutter, uber-jaded, 'too cool for the room' personas that teens and immature people seem to like to assume. I guess because it makes them seem 'tough'.

Perhaps the confusion is in how we view the media: to me, video games are just as valid and engaging an entertainment as movies and books, and there have been a few (hell, more than a few-- I'm a big teddy-bear) movies and books that have moved me to tears, but apparently, to many people, games are still just for "kids", and so how can they have any emotional impact whatsoever?

One last pro-tip for you: telling somebody to go "fall off a bridge" will only make you appear to be petty and immature, and serve to undermine the entirety of the rest of your argument, regardless of how rational and intelligent it may be. And sorry, even following it up with a snarky, mildly clever twist doesn't make it any less Ad Hominem.

 

[Omegatronacles]

You didn't know that? I thought anybody who ever played FF7 knew that

Yes, I did know that, I was being sarcastic.

Which is why my very next line started with "Seriously though"

 

[nick n stuff]

i have cried at games but only when bad shit occurs. corrupted HD, frustrating glitch, the dreaded protect/escort mission (nearly brings me to tears. never get too attached to characters so i can't cry over that kind of thing though.

 

[Totenkopf]

Through the fact that people can develop an emotional relationship towards fictional characters/events?

 

[Comic Sans]

MGS3 and 4 have already been stated better than I can. The ending in 4 seriously had me in tears. Not sobbing, mind you, but there were some tears. Especially when

Spoiler

Big Boss stood up, despite being ravaged by FOXDIE, and saluted The Boss' grave, with flashbacks to MGS3, before finally being unable to stand anymore. His final moment, sitting on her grave with the cigar, was the final straw for my tear ducts.

MGS3's ending has made even bystanders watching me watch the ending almost cry. My 14 (at the time) year old sister was watching me finish a playthrough, and saw the ending. That's all she got out of the game. The final fight with The Boss and the ending. After it was all over, she had tears in her eyes. If that doesn't make a good, emotional ending, I don't know what does.

And fuck you all for making me be the first to mention Ico in 4 pages (unless I missed it). That shit was fucking SAD. I won't even say what it was, not even in spoilers. Play the game, and unless you have no heart at all YOU. WILL. CRY. LIKE A BABY. It is seriously one of the saddest things I have ever seen in a movie/game/book.

 

[Nu-Hir]

It seems that I'm in the minority, but I hated FFVII and the only emotion I felt at the end of disc 1 was intense hatred and the need to Falcon PUNCH Sephiroth in the crotch. I didn't get all teary eyed, even though Aeris was the best healer in the game, since everyone could heal if I wanted them to.

Draco and Maria (FFVI Opera) always holds a special spot in my heart, as does:

Spoiler: Chrono Trigger

When Chrono dies then is resurrected"

A few spots in Blue Dragon, I think the ending to FF Tactics gave me rage tears, and I'm going to stop here before I get my man card revoked.