I think that Metro: 2033, and Metro: Last Light do a great job creating an atmosphere of a world were humanity struggles on the brink of extinction. It’s “heartbreaking”, because, as I play, I can’t help thinking that if I had to really live in this world, I would have put a bullet in my brain rather than live in this grim setting.
I am an old fashioned guy, I still have the “instinct” to protect women and children from harm. Sometimes this gets tripped on “false positive” settings in a computer game. With that in mind, there are two game scenes I would like to share:
Fallout: New Vegas- In Camp McCarron (which is an old airport being used as a barracks/fort) there is a female soldier sitting on a row of benches inside the air terminal area. She has a quest for the player to go find her fiancée (he’s dead, Jim). The game modelers gave her such a sad facial expression it never fails to bum me out just from looking at it.
Star Wars: The Old Republic (MMO)- On the Sith side, on the planet of Balmora, some research director gives you a quest to kill his cheating wife (she is also guilty of literally sleeping with the enemy: a known Republic Agent). Just when she realizes why you are really escorting her through the zone, she gives, what is to me, such a desperate plea for mercy. Sometimes being bad sucks.
In Dead Money for New Vegas, you realize that Christine was likely Veronica’s girlfriend but are powerless to reunite them, much less tell either one that you’ve found the other.
For me, that was less heartbreaking than frustrating, since there was no good reason, beyond the way the game set up DLCs.
It would have been heartbreaking if it was because Christine couldn’t leave the Sierra Madre for some in-universe reason…or if she refused to let Veronica see her after what was done to her at the Big Empty…but as it is, I was just just annoyed with Obsidian/Bethesda for arbitrarily preventing it. (Then again, my game glitched to high heaven, and I had to use console commands to finish DM, so maybe they did address it.)
However, the way Christine was mutilated did make my heart break for her.
A lot of really good ones have already been mentioned. The ending of The Walking Dead Season 1 was definitely one of the most emotional moments for me.
That’s a really good one. I even remember being disgusted when I first played that part. It’s definitely not one that people commonly hold up as a big moment in gaming, but it was definitely moving.
I would also add the part where the Flute Boy gives you the flute. That always got to me. I was glad to see him safe and sound in the ending.
Also, one from Final Fantasy VI only recently hit me. Only on my latest playthrough did I realize that one of the magicites obtained in the Magitek factory is Maduin. And that Maduin is Terra’s father. She finally meets her father, only to see him being tortured in a glass tube for thirty seconds before he sacrifices his life to help save her. Heartbreaking.
Let’s not forget Locke and Rachel. She saves his life but gets amnesia, he leaves town to help her, she dies moments after remembering him, he finds the Phoenix magicite but it’s only strong enough to bring her back for a few seconds to say goodbye. Damn, FFVI had a lot of really emotional moments.
In Ico when you discover that the shadow creatures you’ve been fighting off throughout the game are the souls of children who were “buried alive” in the stone cells as sacrifices.
Mass Effect has a few, depending on what choices you make and things. In my run through, I couldn’t join the Geth and Quarians together, so had to choose one. I chose Geth, but it was a tough choice, and the result was heartbreaking.
Also, in Ni No Kuni for the PS3, the slow realisation that the point of your quest - to bring your dead mum back to life through her ‘double’ in another dimension - is doomed to failure because she already was that double, and that she’s not coming back, nearly made me stop playing. Excellent game, though.
No, they didn’t address it. Her decision to stay at the Sierra Madre always struck me as senseless within the context of the story. It’s plain that the only reason she stays is so that she remains segregated from the main game and does not complicate the Veronica plot line. It’s actually better, in terms of the narrative, if you play on hardcore and she gets killed.
Nevermind that bit in FFVI about Terra’s father, I didn’t quite get that right. Terra isn’t present at the Magitek Factory, so she doesn’t actually meet Maduin or see him die. Still kind of sad, though, that all she has left of him is a piece of rock.
Relatedly, Shadow of the Colossus gets a little mournful towards the end, once you realize your character really isn’t in the right and you’re not killing vicious monsters so much as magnificent creatures.
In Walking Dead Season 2 when you flashback to being in the RV with Lee. Ir’s sad for both in-game and out-game reasons, as at that point I pretty much hated everybody Clem had to put up with, and as soon as I saw Lee I realized I missed him so much and his wonderful relationship with Clementine. I had played Lee like a good dad who did his best always to be honest with her, but as gently and kindly as possible. Contrast that to the bunch of assholes that Clem had to carry on her 11-y-o shoulders in the second season.
The end of the first season is the saddest moment in any videogame I’ve played. I literally had to pause the game to just cry it out for a while.
A lot of mine are from a game series that wasn’t translated in English (Aside from one game)…
Sakura Wars… when Ayame is turned into a demon. She spends the entire chapter fighting off the demonic influence overtaking her… and you at one point basically hug her to hold her in place so she can’t go off, but are forced to leave her when the enemy attacks… You can try to shoot her, and mercy kill her but no matter what she turns bad.
In the third game in that series the entire party is seperated in the final dungeon and room by room you’re reunited with your team except for the one the main character is in a relationship with (there’s dating sim elements so this can be a different person each time)… you keep not running into her, till eventually you find her empty, crushed pod… and you go through the first round against the boss thinking she’s dead.
For a more mainstream example the end of Zelda Link’s Awakening… where you see the island vanish (and either get Subliminal Marin in the final shot, or full on Marin).
Also all those Final Fantasy ones… those are good too!
Also from Walking Dead Season 2: Kenny imploring Clementine to take the infant and hole up in Wellington. I wouldn’t say it redeems all of his appalling behavior in Season 2, buy it was unexpected and touching.
Not exactly heartbreaking, but the dark side ending of Jedi Knight was surprisingly well done. Kyle murdered his friend and partner, Jan, then toppled the big bad and took his place. He casually orders the deaths of a group of rebels, then takes out an old holocube video of his father saying how proud he is. He drops the holocube and crushes it under his boot.
I’m surprised nobody mentionned Lugo getting lynched in Spec Ops : The Line, or walking through the aftermath of the willie pete for that matter. That game kicked industriously in the feels.
Not that it was a surprise,but LOTRO has flashbacks to the final days of Moria. It’s even worse because you play as ultra badasses, dropping orcs by the dozens.
But the whole time you know you are doomed, and just can’t win.
I did that once…ONCE…because I was playing just 3 without loading my saves from 1 and 2 just for shits and giggles.
I saw the result and immediately, audibly said “NO!” and then loaded my last save which was about 5 missions in the past because I was not about to let that happen.
