I recently finished Pillars of the earth, an adventure game based off the novel by Ken Follet. It was an enjoyable game which i highly recomend. I was on Steam just now, writing a review and reading some when i found an interesting negative review which criticized the game on the basis that it is very slow-paced with very long episodes, meaning it would take a long time to replay for a different ending. It got me to think about how people play games with multiple endings. I usually only play through games like that once as i tend to get invested in the ending i get the first time. I've tried replays of various games to do the opposite route of what i did the first time, but i tend to loose interest in them. What about you?
Poll: Do you replay games with multiple endings to see all the endings?
- Thread starter CyanCat47_v1legacy
- Start date
It depends if there is an appropriate reward for getting all the endings on one save file. Series like Zero Escape and NieR has it so when you reach the end credits the first time it doesn't mean anything, you have to go through all the endings for the full story.
Then there's RPGs by BioWare, Bethesda, FromSoftware, CD Projekt RED where you really just play through the entire game a second time but instead make the opposite choices as you did before.
Usually I replay them just because they're fun and I might as well do that, not because I want to see how the story changes because there's never a chapter select and you have to go back to the very beginning. Since there's so much time you have to invest in the second playthrough and you only might get something substantial I'll just watch the different outcomes on YouTube.
Then there's RPGs by BioWare, Bethesda, FromSoftware, CD Projekt RED where you really just play through the entire game a second time but instead make the opposite choices as you did before.
Usually I replay them just because they're fun and I might as well do that, not because I want to see how the story changes because there's never a chapter select and you have to go back to the very beginning. Since there's so much time you have to invest in the second playthrough and you only might get something substantial I'll just watch the different outcomes on YouTube.
Yes, I will replay a game if I enjoyed the game well enough the first time. No, if I felt it was mediocre or was bored with it. Though I am biased against developer written story lines currently, so It is hard for me not to be bored though so it has been a while since I have played a game that was not all about hardcore PvP that I was not extremely bored with. I would rather a game have the players create the content at this point and the stories in the game be about actual Player battles at this point.
Depends how much I enjoyed the game and how the endings are set up. I got like 20 of the enings for Nier Automata before doing ending E(and deleting my save file) because the chapter select made it easy to go back and get them).
Granted, a lot of games pull the "press button A for ending A, Press button B for ending B, etc..." crap and I'll probably reload a save just to see how the other ending is.
A game like Witcher 3 is a bit more difficult considering the ending is based on decisions you've made throughout the playthrough(though next time, I plan to go see the Emporer once I have Ciri to unlock the other ending).
Granted, a lot of games pull the "press button A for ending A, Press button B for ending B, etc..." crap and I'll probably reload a save just to see how the other ending is.
A game like Witcher 3 is a bit more difficult considering the ending is based on decisions you've made throughout the playthrough(though next time, I plan to go see the Emporer once I have Ciri to unlock the other ending).
The only game I can remember where I strived for the multiple endings was Silent Hill 2. And that's because it didn't have any typically good or bad endings -- they were all just a different outcome with their own pros and cons.
It'd need to be a pretty divergent path to the ending to get a replay from me. I'm not particularly a fan of the whole branching/multiple storyline stuff though, as its stretching writing that is usually thin even more, and there's almost always the obvious canon ending.
I usually try to get what I think is the best path to an ending on the first run, so any repeats would end up with me making choices I don't want to make just for the sake of variety. The only time I ever really replay choice-dependent games is when there's a NG+ tied into it to lesson the grind.
This has backfired on me though in Mass Effect's case. I had the perfect run on my first run of the game that I've never been able to reproduce after 4 or 5 replays, and those runs felt worse in comparison, not different.
This has backfired on me though in Mass Effect's case. I had the perfect run on my first run of the game that I've never been able to reproduce after 4 or 5 replays, and those runs felt worse in comparison, not different.
First play-through I always go with my true self and those choices usually lead to a good ending.
If the game is good enough, and I'm in a mood, or a fancy strikes me, I could replay it for an opposite/evil ending.
Choice is always good.
If the game is good enough, and I'm in a mood, or a fancy strikes me, I could replay it for an opposite/evil ending.
Choice is always good.
For a while, when I played games with a binary or even trinary ending, I would usually try to find a save point which I could go back to in order to do whatever to trigger a different ending. If the game was really fun, I would be willing to start from the beginning if necessary. These day, my gaming time is rather infrequent, so I don't really have the time to do that, though I have a few games onhand that I hope to go back to at some point to try. Dishonored 2, for instance, I'd like to see the high chaos ending, and then also play through as Corvo, since I did Emily the first time though.
Seems like a waste of time, to be honest. If I'm curious about alternate endings, which isn't always the case, I just watch the different endings on youtube, it's not like the game will be much different a second time around to justify X hours spent on something I already finished.
Pretty much this. I don't think I've ever actually played a game that had multiple endings but didn't sort them as "bad ending(s), ok ending(s), good ending, best ending", so to me getting the best ending is my 'win' condition for the game. When I replay them, I always aim for the same optimal outcome.Johnny Novgorod said:
One game I'm reminded had a really cool approach to this was Chrono Trigger. Once you finished the game(after getting one of 4 not terribly different endings depending on certain choices you made near the end), you could start new game plus. Levels and anything that wasn't a key item carried over. However, you could access the final boss this time almost from the start and depending on what point in the game you went and beat the final boss, the ending would be different(I believe there were 10 or so different endings, including one where you save the world but mankind is replaced as as the dominate species because you beat the game before dealing with a certain plot point in the past).
Radiant Historia also had a system where there were a bunch of different endings(more like non-standard game overs) along the two timelines, triggered by doing certain things in certain places. You're bound to see some by accident just because some are triggered by choosing what really seems like the right choice at the moment and turns out to not be(telling someone to relax, only for them to throw themselves into an unwinnable, fatal battle as a result), while others require you to mess around with the timeline to prevent it. Luckily you could leap around in both timelines pretty easily and getting one of the endings did not preclude you from going back to try again.
The games time travel mechanics may have been all over the place, but it was entertaining.
Radiant Historia also had a system where there were a bunch of different endings(more like non-standard game overs) along the two timelines, triggered by doing certain things in certain places. You're bound to see some by accident just because some are triggered by choosing what really seems like the right choice at the moment and turns out to not be(telling someone to relax, only for them to throw themselves into an unwinnable, fatal battle as a result), while others require you to mess around with the timeline to prevent it. Luckily you could leap around in both timelines pretty easily and getting one of the endings did not preclude you from going back to try again.
The games time travel mechanics may have been all over the place, but it was entertaining.
All depends. The variance of the endings, sometimes it is better to do it yourself, sometimes youtube is better. The amount of effort it takes. Sure, in theory I want to do different playthroughs of Mass Effect...but do I really want to put in the hours?
And just the nature of the game. I mean, I have gotten multiple different Dead Rising endings, but that game lends itself to that more than other games.
And just the nature of the game. I mean, I have gotten multiple different Dead Rising endings, but that game lends itself to that more than other games.
I did all four ME3 endings to see the different colours. Red was the best with green a close second. Blue didn't have the emotional impact of the other two colours.
I pushed all the buttons at the end of Human Revolution. They all gave generic stock footage and a voiceover.
But okay, in the spirit of the question, the majority of games with multiple endings are the larger RPGs and I have replayed them. I've completed most pre-EA BioWare games multiple times, done that as good/evil, female/male, etc. Some of them can have quite different endings. For example, ascending to Godhood in BG2, or staying with your lover gets some great lines of dialogue and the characters' fates can vary quite a lot. Jade Empire had a huge tonal shift depending on Closed Fist/Open Palm and whether the player romanced Silk Fox. Not to mention the NPCs that didn't make it in the "evil" ending. I did play ME3 once with a modded ME2 save wherein all teammates died on the suicide mission.
I've done BioShock harvesting and saving the Little Sisters. I did all endings in the original Deus Ex. I did high and low chaos Dishonored runs. I've done multiple Alpha Protocol runs over the years. I've linked and usurped the first flame. I did two playthrus of The Witcher to side with each faction, the humans and the Scoia'tael (really, really interesting to interact with Alvin and later, Jacques de Aldersberg, brilliantly well done). I've done all the Mass Effect and Dragon Age: Origins combinations, all Fallout: NV factions (except Legion) and all Fallout 4 endings (I reloaded to the point where you have to choose and replayed the endgame from there).
To be honest, there's more fun to replay a game because you can experience it differently. Warrior vs Mage, Shotgun vs Sniper, Rogue Vs Ranger, that kinda thing. I wouldn't replay just to see the different endings usually, but might do so if I was replaying anyway. Where it allows, I might reload a save just before the end to watch them all, or in the Internet age, watch it on YT.
I pushed all the buttons at the end of Human Revolution. They all gave generic stock footage and a voiceover.
But okay, in the spirit of the question, the majority of games with multiple endings are the larger RPGs and I have replayed them. I've completed most pre-EA BioWare games multiple times, done that as good/evil, female/male, etc. Some of them can have quite different endings. For example, ascending to Godhood in BG2, or staying with your lover gets some great lines of dialogue and the characters' fates can vary quite a lot. Jade Empire had a huge tonal shift depending on Closed Fist/Open Palm and whether the player romanced Silk Fox. Not to mention the NPCs that didn't make it in the "evil" ending. I did play ME3 once with a modded ME2 save wherein all teammates died on the suicide mission.
I've done BioShock harvesting and saving the Little Sisters. I did all endings in the original Deus Ex. I did high and low chaos Dishonored runs. I've done multiple Alpha Protocol runs over the years. I've linked and usurped the first flame. I did two playthrus of The Witcher to side with each faction, the humans and the Scoia'tael (really, really interesting to interact with Alvin and later, Jacques de Aldersberg, brilliantly well done). I've done all the Mass Effect and Dragon Age: Origins combinations, all Fallout: NV factions (except Legion) and all Fallout 4 endings (I reloaded to the point where you have to choose and replayed the endgame from there).
To be honest, there's more fun to replay a game because you can experience it differently. Warrior vs Mage, Shotgun vs Sniper, Rogue Vs Ranger, that kinda thing. I wouldn't replay just to see the different endings usually, but might do so if I was replaying anyway. Where it allows, I might reload a save just before the end to watch them all, or in the Internet age, watch it on YT.
Now that I think about it, I do have one significant contribution to this topic I forgot above. Rewind a little over 20 years, (Super) Street Fighter II on the SNES was the greatest game in existence and obviously it had many endings. Now I had of course completed it with every character, but there was the rumour of the "Secret Ending". So the deal was that you had to complete the game on the highest difficulty without losing a single round, and the reward was the "best" ending where Chun Li was supposed to speak.
While I was very good with all characters, Ken and Guile were my main two. I can't remember with which I finally managed to do it (probably Ken), but it took a number of attempts before I managed the feat. One round lost, restart the whole thing. When I eventually did succeed in getting the "best" ending, the only difference was that after all the ending I'd already seen many times before, Chun Li did her "Yah tah" line, and that was about it.
Wait a sec.
*two mins later*
In fact, I just found it on YT [https://youtu.be/VOWiuz9MeXg?t=132].
I worked for that ending.
While I was very good with all characters, Ken and Guile were my main two. I can't remember with which I finally managed to do it (probably Ken), but it took a number of attempts before I managed the feat. One round lost, restart the whole thing. When I eventually did succeed in getting the "best" ending, the only difference was that after all the ending I'd already seen many times before, Chun Li did her "Yah tah" line, and that was about it.
Wait a sec.
*two mins later*
In fact, I just found it on YT [https://youtu.be/VOWiuz9MeXg?t=132].
I worked for that ending.
Quite rarely. Most games don't make the actual differences meaningful or interesting enough to bother.
Sometimes I do.
I remember doing that a lot in the PS1 era.
Off the top of my head: Chrono Cross, Parasite Eve 1 & 2, Resident Evil 1-3, Fear Effect, Silent Hill 1 & 3.
Haven't done that in a while since I'm an adult now and it's hard to find time to replay games, especially long ones.
I remember doing that a lot in the PS1 era.
Off the top of my head: Chrono Cross, Parasite Eve 1 & 2, Resident Evil 1-3, Fear Effect, Silent Hill 1 & 3.
Haven't done that in a while since I'm an adult now and it's hard to find time to replay games, especially long ones.
