9/5/2008 - Lame Video Game Endings

When you complete a video game, especially a hard one, you expect to be rewarded with a decent ending. You want a kind of ending that makes you say to yourself that it was all worth it -- the bottomless pits, the cheap deaths, the game-overs and the continues. Sometimes countless hours of playing result in nothing more than frustration. If you are able to overcome those obstacles only to get some congratulatory text that has misprints, then it makes you feel like your time has been wasted. Not all great games have great endings, however. Super Mario Bros. had a pretty lame ending compared to today's standards, but you forgive it because the game itself is so great and you understand the limits of the programming back then. Now with full-motion video CGI cutscenes and loads of disc space, there is no excuse. I wouldn't go overboard like the Metal Gear Solid games, but something around 10 minutes would probably be enough. And it has to be epic!

It's sort of gamble to get a game and not know whether or not it has a good ending. No video game magazine would publish game endings, after all. So it's a great public service that this series of videos feature notoriously lame video game endings. The fact that some of these games are very bad only makes you more glad you've already seen their endings first, instead of torturing yourself by playing through the games only to be disappointed.