Best/Worst Game Twists (Spoilers Aplenty)

[rob_simple]

After the Sixth Sense came out in the late 90's, shit storytellers the world over rejoiced in this apparently new discovery that you can conclude your rubbish story with any old nonsense --no matter how contrived-- as long as it's completely unexpected and most people will go 'that's brilliant'.

Games are no exception to this, and given that they're already host to some of the worst storytelling across any medium as it is (and some of the best) I thought it'd be nice to see what you all think constitutes a good twist and what makes you go 'oh, come on...'

Good

Spoiler: Legacy of Kain

I always liked the overly-dramatic story for this series, and the twist in Soul Reaver 2 that Kain raised Raziel and his brothers from the bodies of a clan of vampire hunters came as a genuine surprise. The time traveling fight that followed was a bit dumb, mind you.

Bad

Spoiler: Borderlands

This game gets a lot of criticism but I still consider it one of my favourites. That being said, the revelation that the Vault you spent the entire game reaching did exist but actually had a world-eating monster inside it was dumb as spit.

 

[endtherapture]

Worst: Mass Effect 3.

Spoiler

Worst. Twist. Ever. It was so awful. Enough has been said.

Best: KoTOR

Spoiler

You are Revan!!! So much foreshadowing but completely unexpected on your first playthrough. I loved it.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

The only twist that ever completely caught me by surprise was in Dead Space:

Spoiler

Finding out that Kendra (was that her name?) was a sleeper agent. Oh, made me so mad

Bad? I can't think of any bad plot twists. I can give you a list of things that SHOULD have had plot twists, or would have benefited from them, but instead just fell on their face or ignored it completely. Does that count?

 

[rob_simple]

The only twist that ever completely caught me by surprise was in Dead Space:

Spoiler

Finding out that Kendra (was that her name?) was a sleeper agent. Oh, made me so mad

Bad? I can't think of any bad plot twists. I can give you a list of things that SHOULD have had plot twists, or would have benefited from them, but instead just fell on their face or ignored it completely. Does that count?

Sure, it's always interesting to hear how other people think a story should have went.

 

[Solo-Wing]

well the worst I can think of is not from a game but a movie.
Knowing.

Spoiler

Aliens. The powers that allowed the random humans to tell the future and are behind the list of numbers were... Aliens. What. The. fuck. As soon as I saw the ship descending through the clouds I turned the movie off and never touched it again.

And the best? Hmmm... I actually can`t think of any good ones. But the worst game one is probaly in Shadow the Hedgehog.

Spoiler

Black dooms blood is in Shadow? What? Uh... Okay?

 

[The Wykydtron]

Worst twist ever? MGS2 Vamp is still alive! Again! Fuck you Vamp. Your Diabolus Ex Machina bullshit is not welcome around these parts...

Best twists: The whole of Persona 4 XD

Also Mass Effect 1's twist was amazing.

 

[MisterShine]

Best: KoTOR

Spoiler

You are Revan!!! So much foreshadowing but completely unexpected on your first playthrough. I loved it.

This is especially awesome if...

Spoiler

You are playing as a girl, and assume that Revan is male. They NEVER USE A PRONOUN!! I fell off my couch

Other than the aforementioned, System Shock 2 is perhaps my favorite, while my least favorite is Heavy Rain -

Spoiler

Shelby as the killer? With all the bullshit meant to lead you to suspect other characters and to throw it off Shelby, NONE of which makes any god damn sense in the story. Such bullshit ending

 

[Austin Howe]

Worst twist ever? MGS2 Vamp is still alive! Again! Fuck you Vamp. Your Diabolus Ex Machina bullshit is not welcome around these parts...

I've said it once, and I'll say it again: This does not qualify. The game had clearly established at this point that Vamp can survive practically anything, including wounds that would kill anyone else. They're not at all inconsistent with this plot point, you can see him walking around later in the streets of Manhattan.

Plus, this is Metal Gear! Did you hear a death speech? Me neither!

Best twist: Honestly, the one I absolutely never saw coming was FoxDie. That blew my mind.

 

[The Wykydtron]

Worst twist ever? MGS2 Vamp is still alive! Again! Fuck you Vamp. Your Diabolus Ex Machina bullshit is not welcome around these parts...

I've said it once, and I'll say it again: This does not qualify. The game had clearly established at this point that Vamp can survive practically anything, including wounds that would kill anyone else. They're not at all inconsistent with this plot point, you can see him walking around later in the streets of Manhattan.

Plus, this is Metal Gear! Did you hear a death speech? Me neither!

Best twist: Honestly, the one I absolutely never saw coming was FoxDie. That blew my mind.

I was fine with him being unkillable (although the physics of his immortality are still rather questionable) Then he shows up and invalidates two or so hours of what precious little gameplay MGS2 has for no reason.

There's the door Vamp, get the fuck out.

 

[TheOneBearded]

Fallout: New Vegas
Turns out the Platinum Chip was way more important to its receiver than you would have thought.

 

[ThePS1Fan]

Worst

Spoiler: Super Mario Bros. 2

It was all a dream Mario was having

I can't think of a twist I liked off hand.

 

[CleverCover]

I love twists that actually make sense when you compare it to everything else said before, that if you just connect a few pieces or looked a little closer you MIGHT have known beforehand.

My favorite was KotOR.

Spoiler

Having the PC character was actually the great Revan.

Made the last battle that much more personal.

My least favorite is ME3. At least make it fit with the rest of the storyline...'sigh'

Now that I think about it...Bioware has a habit for near last second twists....Jade Empire, Dragon Age, even Obsidian got in with the twisting. I thought the

Spoiler

'Citadel being the catalyst' twist would have been enough

in ME3 but noooooo...

 

[jackpackage200]

For the worst twist it has to be Bionic Commando... just Bionic Commando. Even M. Night Shyamalan would be pissed off about how ridiculously stupid it is.

 

[Vault101]

Worst: Mass Effect 3.

Spoiler

Worst. Twist. Ever. It was so awful. Enough has been said.

Best: KoTOR

Spoiler

You are Revan!!! So much foreshadowing but completely unexpected on your first playthrough. I loved it.

ME3...it wasnt a "twist" so much as a series of events a what the fuck? series of events

 

[Vault101]

Now that I think about it...Bioware has a habit for near last second twists....Jade Empire, Dragon Age, even Obsidian got in with the twisting. I thought the

Spoiler

'Citadel being the catalyst' twist would have been enough

in ME3 but noooooo...

I thourght the catalyst was going to be shepard him/herslef...actually..pretty much the synthasis ending

 

[Zhukov]

A lot of people mentioning KotOR here.

That one never worked for me. It was well conceived and clever and all, but...

Spoiler

The nature of the player character completely undermined it.

"Really? That clueless dunce is the galaxy-threatening badass? That oblivious guy who spends the whole game blankly staring into the middle distance? The one with the approximate expressiveness of a fence post?"

"Well, there goes any interest I ever had in this Revan chap that everyone wouldn't shut up about."

As for good twists:

"Would you kindly..."

 

[burningdragoon]

Not the best or the worst but I thought NIER had a great combo of bad/amazing twist at the same time.

<spoiler=spoilthhs>
<spoiler=no really kinda big spoiler>
The twist I didn't like: turns out you and everyone are just vessels (or something) for the 'real' people of the world. I forget why it's the way it is, but it bugged me

The awesome part: In New Game+ all the big baddies you face get extra scenes where they just want to coexist but the 'good' guys were doing horrible things, and the big boss battles were actually a retaliation to other events.



That was me not doing the game justice with my words. Oh well.

 

[rutcommapat]

Best twist: Mario saves the princess. What a brilliant reversal in events!

...Oh, okay. In actuality the best twist ending in a game I've played was Bioshock.

 

[The Madman]

Thief: The Dark Project

Honestly it's not hard to figure out something is terribly terribly wrong with your 'employer' and he's probably going to backstab you in some way. What I couldn't have predicted is the how of it all.


So. Damned. Cool. Scared the bloody hell out of me first time I saw it too! System Shock 2 is another great one. Again not terribly hard to see coming but the execution and that monologue are among my favourites. Freakin SHODAN!