"True" Endings and Gated Content

[KarmaTheAlligator]

I don't mind multiple endings as long as there aren't some dickish requirements that you need to know in advance to even fulfil.

As for working harder to get the best ending, it's not always the case. Disgaea 2, for example, has you working much harder to get the bad and worst endings, while for the normal one, you really don't need to do much (or it's very easy to meet the conditions anyway).

 

[Amaror]

I actually enjoy them and i don't find them hard to reach. That being said i only play western rpgs which tend to have better requirements.
In Mass Effect 2 for example, it never occured to me to NOT get every single possible upgrade before the last mission, since i am a completionist. And the people you need to choose to let everyone survive are just logical.
I didn't even know that people can die on that mission ^^.

 

[krazykidd]

Why do people feel the need to get the " true" ending? I'm sure the regular ending(s) isn't bad , just to get the best one you need to put some effort . If you don't want to don't do it. I like little extra challenge in my games.

That being said, with youtube , these things are obsolete other than for braging rights.

 

[BQE]

I appreciate all the input and ideas in this thread folks, I'll try and reply to as much as I can.

The moment I read the title I just knew Agarest would pop up in the OP. You can grind to your heart's content in "quest" marked areas, the turn counter will not go up after the battles in those areas; only after battles and events on the overworld map.

Vegosiux, you know me better than I know myself. We must enjoy more words together.

I suppose I don't mind, I can always youtube the ending if I really want to.

However, the game needs to be good enough for me to warrant to dig through for the ending. Take Nier for example. Sure sure, I hear the ending is great, and subsequently the other 3. But it's so damn boring and repetitive I never got past the whole desert city part.

The trouble with this option is that, from what I've seen, not all the dialogue is captured in these youtube replays. However, if worse comes to worst, I won't hesitate to look it up.

It bothers me too, especially Persona 4.
You have talked to everyone, now go home.

Hmm, one minute, I'll go to Junes *activates elevator*
There is nothing more to do here, go home
Oh, okay then *goes home, gets normal ending*

Turns out, despite the game telling you to go home and that there was nothing in Junes, I had to prompt it again to get the message to go to the food court and lock me into the True Ending, thanks for fucking me out of the true ending the first time round game, the worst part is, its completely uncalled for, why couldn't it just say "would you like to go to the food court" first? Why would I go back after the game tells me to fuck off home? Its just as bad as the annoying hospital scene, it wouldn't be so bad if you didn't have to flick through a literal 30 minutes of dialogue again because you might have accidentally slipped up and made a wrong choice.

The Accomplice ending in fucking Persona 4 Golden was better done, at least that was a simple Yes/No question, no cryptic hidden bullshit that would waste time if the game deemed it incorrect.

I love multiple endings, but having a "true" ending makes the other endings feel shallow and unnecessary. Persona 3 had such a choice near the end and it was a simple Yes/No as well, the game tells you what each decision will entail.

Devil Survivor didn't have a true ending, it had 5 ending routes that had radically different outcomes, making the endings carry more weight, each one felt conclusive (except Yuzu's, but you are told the consequences and you are given a chance to make up for it in Overclocked)

Tizzy, thank you for encapsulating the emotional response to these situations so poignantly. I honestly couldn't of expressed it better. I did the same exact thing as you did after the Aeon dungeon and was defeated the same way. There is simply satisfactory explaination for something so arbitrary. You capture my ideas very well and I wholeheartedly agree with your sentiments.

As long as the getting the true/good ending can be achieved through logical thought, I'm all for it. Gives the game some replayability, (as long as the base game is good enough to be replayed in itself, of course) and there's always the chance you'll be smart enough to get it the first time. Of course, if it's something that doesn't make sense or goes completely against the game's rules for the entire rest of the game, I call bullshit. If the game itself (and not one of the characters in the game) misleads you into not getting it that's also bullshit.

I don't mind multiple endings as long as there aren't some dickish requirements that you need to know in advance to even fulfil.

As for working harder to get the best ending, it's not always the case. Disgaea 2, for example, has you working much harder to get the bad and worst endings, while for the normal one, you really don't need to do much (or it's very easy to meet the conditions anyway).

You two hit the point as well. When serious parts of the game are hidden behind bizarre and perplexing methods of unlocking them, it doesn't do well for anyone involved. Most are oft frustrated with needless complications that bar content.

 

[Yopaz]

I kinda like it when it's something that requires skills rather than some arbitrary moral syste. Clearing a game in less than 500 battles sounds like the kind I would like since it would force me to focus on how to beat stronger enemies rather than simply racking up levels and equipment (which is something I enjoy doing, but I also love the challenge of being underpowered).

I hate them when it's something like befriending this or that guy though.

 

[Elijin]

I can't abide this argument either. I can't see the reasoning in gating content like this, particularly if you're going to have 'levels' of successful endings rather than simply different outcomes. I feel that this is a method to artificially add playtime to a game I may not have the desire to play again.

I'll give an example of a game I beat multiple times: Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. Such was my adoration for this game I immediately played it again to unlock the patriot gun, and again with the patriot gun and supercamo. Extra content such as this, or enhanced difficulties like Devil May Cry are acceptable. They don't hide significant content behind inane requirements. You aren't guilted into playing the game again (especially if it means trudging through tired content or battles)to see what should be seen in a normal playthrough.

So you dont want your actions and decisions to impact the way the game folds out around you? Isnt that the exact reason ME3 got shat on around these parts?

 

[Fenra]

In P4's case I absolutely botched the hospital sequence several times. Was it necessary though?
Is it actually constructive for the game to fail you with a bad ending if you don't choose the correct chat options? Persona 4 is a great game, it also had quite a bit of arbitrary dialogue choices that didn't even impact conversation at times. I just can't concede the hospital sequence being improved by the decision to address the sequence as it was.

felt much the same way about the hospital scene in persona 4, while it was good to make you think and not act on impulse, especially after what had just happened in game, to navigate a 5-6 point conversation with so many options, ended up using a guide, which is my personal indicator of it done messily. Dont get me wrong love persona 4 but that moment is one of its weaker parts

As for me, I don't mind differing endings and gated content so long as its made clear that there are multiple ways this could go. Bad endings arn't necessarily "bad" endings if they are a reaction to your gameplay, act like a bad guy, get the "bad" ending, a reaction to player choice and those I'm fine with, ones that "fail" you on account of not getting some unknown system or underlying mechanic wrong, not so much

 

[Arafiro]

felt much the same way about the hospital scene in persona 4, while it was good to make you think and not act on impulse, especially after what had just happened in game, to navigate a 5-6 point conversation with so many options, ended up using a guide, which is my personal indicator of it done messily. Dont get me wrong love persona 4 but that moment is one of its weaker parts

I read somewhere that in Japanese the conversation options make way more sense, and it's quite a simple matter to initiate the normal ending route. Don't know if that's true, though.

 

[Fenra]

felt much the same way about the hospital scene in persona 4, while it was good to make you think and not act on impulse, especially after what had just happened in game, to navigate a 5-6 point conversation with so many options, ended up using a guide, which is my personal indicator of it done messily. Dont get me wrong love persona 4 but that moment is one of its weaker parts

I read somewhere that in Japanese the conversation options make way more sense, and it's quite a simple matter to initiate the normal ending route. Don't know if that's true, though.

If that's true then that would make sense and would take that comment back for the most part with the addition of making sure regioning and translating games are done carefully to avoid that kind of issue.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

I like games where the ending is ambiguous and up to how you play it. While there may be an accepted "canon" ending, to me the ending you felt fit most with how you play and your story is the true "canon" ending. After all its your game, and therefore your world, the dev's just define the underlying mechanics of events and physics and things like that. OF course no game is so persistent and open-ended that you get to end it truly how you want, but we're not there yet.
Besides if you don't enjoy a game's idea that your actions have consequence there's plenty of games out there that are linear and hold your hand throughout the whole game.

 

[Mikeyfell]

I don't mind.

I sort of take it as red that I'll need to use a guide to get the true ending for any given JRPG's I play (Agrest being one of the toughest, But it is a strategy RPG so playing smart can seriously cut down on the amount of grinding you have to do)

I do wish it was at least conceivable to get the true end without a guide.
So far I haven't been able to get any true ends without following some guide to the letter.
But hey... that's what GamfFAQ's and Wiki's are for

 

[Dalisclock]

I actually enjoy them and i don't find them hard to reach. That being said i only play western rpgs which tend to have better requirements.
In Mass Effect 2 for example, it never occured to me to NOT get every single possible upgrade before the last mission, since i am a completionist. And the people you need to choose to let everyone survive are just logical.
I didn't even know that people can die on that mission ^^.

The trick with ME2 two was that you are on an invisible time limit once your crew gets kidnapped. If you wait long enough, most of your crew will be dead by the time you do the suicide mission.

Which I did not know until I got there and I was still trying to upgrade all the equipment and finish all the loyalty missions.

 

[Saltyk]

Not sure if someone brought it up, but sometimes the True Ending is not the good ending. For example, the game Shadow Hearts has two endings. There isn't much difference between them, except for one thing. In the Bad Ending, the female lead, Alice falls asleep and dies on the train with the main character, Yuri. And that is the canon ending in the series. Yuri appears in the sequel and part of his backstory is that Alice died at the end of the first game.

On the whole, I don't mind multiple endings. Star Ocean: The Second Story has several hundred endings. I've only seen a few of them as it's a long game to beat several times over. Most of the various endings are simply that two of the characters end up living or traveling together either as lovers or best friends, mind you. Some of them do have variations, though. I think there are three different endings for Claude and Rena, for example. The fact that I haven't seen all the endings doesn't bother me, though.

I'm generally more bothered by impossibly hard requirements. For example, not opening certain unmarked chests that don't contain anything special in them in order to get the most powerful spear in FFXII. Beating Suikoden 2 in under 12 hours to see a special scene between some characters (this game can take 60 hours and has 108 characters to recruit and does not pause the timer at any time. Those are the things that bother me.

 

[Redd the Sock]

Well, by nature games "lock off" content for certain actions in how you have to beat a boss to move on with the game. Things just get more complicated. I mean, think of Mass Effect. I have never heard Kaiden's lines in ME2 or 3 because I saved Ashley. I haven't heard most of the romanctic options for the cast as that requires multiple playthroughs, both for different characters, but staying faithful or cheating. A lot of these things can be minor, but from the early days of rare drops in Final Fantasy 2 (4), little things got kept from us.

As for endings, it depends on how it's done. Chrono Trigger was less a denial of a true path than some "what if" scenarios really only gained through new game +, so that's not an issue. Persona 4 on the other hand is first and foremost set around a murder mystery, and the game gives you the worse ending for fingering the wrong culprit. It makes perfect sense to do so as this was the real challenge to the game, not beating shadows. Kill the innocent man, you lose. It's simple. It's annoying, as most of us really don't think that way, especially in a video game, but it is logical to pull this here.

To a certain extent, I like multiple endings like this for that reason: they reward positive actions. I save everyone by being smart or considerate, I get a better reward that the guy that leaves someone to die. I do everything the game offers, I get a better ending that the guy that only did 60% of the content (and laugh at the irony that someone might complain about being locked out of a part of a game because they chose no to partake in another.) This isn't to say it's always done right. Chrono Cross' true ending was fairly ambiguous to get, and Disgaea's is sabotaged by encouraging things that rack up ally kills. On the other hand, things like 9 hours, 9 persons, nine doors, and Virtue's last reward were unique in that bad endings were required to actually get the good one, so there can be some uniqueness to it. Even without that, it's part of what makes a true ending fulfilling. Seeing the outcome of killing Richter Belmont in symphony of the Night, makes you feel more fulfilled when you figure out how to save him.

 

[conmag9]

Depends on the type of gate.

If you have to pay to unlock it (in the style of Asura's Wrath), screw it sideways with a rusty poleaxe.

If it's the type where you never lose the chance to do it, it's not so bad. Like, even if the requirmeents take a while or are tricky, as long as it's not based on points of no return (including time, because that's RIDICULOUSLY stupid), it's acceptable and makes it more satisfying.

 

[StriderShinryu]

I love the concept of multiple endings, but I'm also not a fan of when getting the "good" ending requires doing things so silly, strict or outlandish that you basically need to follow an arbitrary checklist to get it.

My preferred way of approaching multiple endings is to make the ending really more based on the general play style of the player or on specific choices that are obvious in their nature. A game like Dragon Age, for example, does this very well. The ending of the game is basically the summation of choices you've made throughout the game and, by and large, those choices aren't out of left field blindsides. There are paths that become closed off to you, but by just thinking about the choices presented, it's usually pretty obvious in advance what sort of repercussions your choice may have. It's also often easy to jump back to a previous save in case a choice didn't turn out like you planned. You're rarely in a position where you have to start the game entirely over again just because of one mistake.

If a game is going to have multiple endings based on overly strict or strange criteria, then those endings should be the strange and funny endings instead of the mainline endings. In this case, I'm thinking of things like the alien endings in the Silent Hill series or the reptile people ending in Chrono Trigger.

 

[Savo]

Depends on how it's done, but I disagree with it more often than not. This is stretching for an example, since it's a visual novel, but I really dug how Kana: Little Sister did its multiple endings. There are six different endings for first-time players, but each one is fantastic in its own unique way. Although they are pretty similar at the core, each one reflects a different take on what could have happened at the end of the story. Even if you only played the game once, you would come away satisfied no matter what ending you got. If you play through the game six times and achieve all the endings, you are allowed to see the "true ending", but it's not necessary by any means. The true ending is pretty cool, but you don't have to see it; it's really not anymore satisfying or emotional than the other endings.

That's in stark contrast to many games, which have the Amazing Holy Platinum True Ending of Justice that ties everything up and leaves a huge smile on your face... and then those other endings the developers threw together when they needed to kill some time in between coffee breaks. With the amount of time that some video-games take, I just can't support how some games essentially self-destruct their story in the final moments if you don't get the best ending, especially in games where it isn't obvious how to achieve that ending.

Persona 4 is simultaneously an excellent and a horrible example of how to do this right. In order to get to the good ending, you have use your reasoning abilities and keep a calm head so you can reach out the truth. To get the true ending, you have to do something random at the end of the game that you have no reason or prompting to do. If you weren't born with the ability to guess exactly what the developer wants you to do, you lose an entire dungeon, an epic boss battle, and the mystery is never fully resolved.

I can appreciate how games like Mass Effect 2 or Silent Hill Shattered Memories set up their endings, since it's obvious what is being asked of the player and how your choices will impact the ending, but it's just obnoxious when games hide the key to the true ending like it's something that needs to be kept from half the player-base. "Really? I didn't know exactly what to say and where to go in advance during five minutes of this 20 hour game and now I get a thirty-second ending that resolves nothing? Gee thanks, mister developer!".