IT WAS ALL A DREAM!

[Drathnoxis]

I've just played like 2 games in a row that both ended with this trope. They even both had the same guilt fever dream take on it. I'm getting kind of sick of games presenting all these interesting mysteries and when it comes time to start giving out some answers just going: NONE OF IT WAS REAAAAL!! O.O

Like, I don't understand why developers keep thinking it's a clever or interesting twist to throw in a story. Heck, this trope has been mocked as far back as Super Mario Bros. 2! It wasn't any good back then either. It's not clever, it's just a cheap way of getting out of having to actually think of a good explanation for what's been going on, and robbing the events of the game of all weight in the process.

So what do you think of the All Just A Dream trope? Why do writers continually use it as if it were clever and original? Are there any games where you thought it actually worked well?

I'm just talking about games where it being a dream is a twist near the end. Games that are upfront about being dreams, like Yume Nikki, are a different story. Though I suppose we could discuss those as well.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Well come on, fess up fam...what they two games? Don't leave us hanging!

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Was one of them Super Mario Bros. 2?

 

[Drathnoxis]

Well come on, fess up fam...what they two games? Don't leave us hanging!

Well, I didn't really want to post them, cause endgame spoilers, but here you go.

Spoiler: CLICK AT YOUR OWN RISK!

STAY and The Sexy Brutale

Was one of them Super Mario Bros. 2?

Haha no.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Spoiler: CLICK AT YOUR OWN RISK!

STAY and The Sexy Brutale

Ohhh, yeah, one of those I completed, the other isn't on the interesr radar anyway. Though that trope is often too easily a lazy handwave, I didn't mind it so much in that particular case. There was still a redemption thing going on that needed to be resolved, so it wasn't like it rendered anything you did meaningless. Just wasn't physical change in the meatspace world. It's sort of entwined instead of thrown in at the end.

 

[meiam]

I'm guessing it's mostly the results of poor written writing themselves in corner and not waiting to rewrite most of there draft or if part of the game is already made and would require too much work to be redone.

 

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

There was one case where it was kind of done right. Eternal Sonata [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_Sonata] was billed as the Dying dream of Choplin. It isn't a spoiler that this happens. It's just what he fever dreams on his death bed.

Any other time, the concept is just unsatisfying. I don't get what the pay off of "Nothing mattered" is supposed to be?

 

[Dalisclock]

Yeah, most of the time it feels like a Lazy way to avoid having any consequences for what happened. Bloodborne might be the exception because Nightmare Yarhem that the game takes place in is implied to be just as real as the rest of the world but in it's own weird pocket dimension.

I'm trying to decide if Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice falls into this since it's implied a substantial part of the game is all in Senua's mentally ill mind.

 

[Specter Von Baren]

Very rarely do I like this at all, most of the time I absolutely hate it.

Spoiler: This is going to get old fast using spoilers for EVERYTHING

In your case for The Sexy Brutale, it feels like it was done deliberately as a plot choice but at the same time I think the story would have been better served to just say "Because magic!" because the ending feels really hollow, even IF that is exactly what the game wants you to feel! I signed up for saving people, not having to deal with being unable to save people because they've all actually been dead for decades.

There are other examples of course, I feel like I actually like how Drawn To Life had this kind of ending simply because the game is building you up to this and the dream characters are actually aware that this is what's going to happen and the big plot point at the end is them deciding that the dreamer needs to wake up even if it means they won't exist anymore. The Whispered World also felt like the ending was deliberate.

But again, most of the time I too absolutely despise this plot gimmick, it's right up there with "The Magic Goes Away" endings where all the cool stuff about a world gets removed so that the world can become like our own, if I wanted to interact with the real world I'd go outside, yeah?

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

The only time I remember that trope working was Silent Hill 3, when towards the end you meet some Cult big-wig guy and Heather is all 'What's with all the monsters around here?' and he's all 'Oh! They look like monsters to you?' and she gasps and its like Wow, okay. That's an interesting take. Its not all be a fake dream, but the monsters we've been killing were never monsters, but people, and we only saw them as monsters.
Not the exact same, but perhaps the best version.

 

[Hawki]

Well come on, fess up fam...what they two games? Don't leave us hanging!

Asks about leaving us hanging in regards to an avatar with a pony that's hanging.

Low blow man.

 

[Specter Von Baren]

Well come on, fess up fam...what they two games? Don't leave us hanging!

Asks about leaving us hanging in regards to an avatar with a pony that's hanging.

Low blow man.

Why did I do this...

 

[Squilookle]

I'll give Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz a pass for toying with it back when it wasn't overdone, but yeah, these days it's a total cop out.

This is why I liked Driver San Francisco. You spend most of that game in a coma, but the game has the decency to let you know you're in a coma upfront. And that gives it big brownie points in my book.

 

[Pseudonym]

I've seen three friends play through

Spoiler

The Sexy Brutale

and watching at it a second and third time I can say that it does at least had it planned out all along and that the game feels somewhat like a dream too. So thematically and plotwise it works reasonably well.

As for your question in general. Any big reveal or turnaround in a story is risky. If done right it can recontextualize the actions of the protagonist in an interesting way. If done poorly it merely shows you that everything before it might as well not have been a part of the story. Some stories have the good sense to not make it part of the story for that reason, The Matrix frontloades the idea that all of Neo's life was just an elaborate illusion crafted by robots and is a better story for it. The problem with the 'it's all a dream' is that it easily explains away everything in a completely blanket way. That makes it even harder to do right so the angle of a guilt-based feverdream actually does at least provide some structure to the story and the big reveal.

 

[wizzy555]

I haven't seen the "it was all a dream" drop in quite a while. I want to say it was over done in the 80s and 90s and fell into terrible disrepute. The closest thing to a non-ironic usage recently is probably inception.

I don't mind it if the point of the dream leads to character development. It also depends if it's a one off episode or all the drama hinges on it.

 

[jademunky]

Very rarely do I like this at all, most of the time I absolutely hate it.

Spoiler: This is going to get old fast using spoilers for EVERYTHING

In your case for The Sexy Brutale, it feels like it was done deliberately as a plot choice but at the same time I think the story would have been better served to just say "Because magic!" because the ending feels really hollow, even IF that is exactly what the game wants you to feel! I signed up for saving people, not having to deal with being unable to save people because they've all actually been dead for decades.

There are other examples of course, I feel like I actually like how Drawn To Life had this kind of ending simply because the game is building you up to this and the dream characters are actually aware that this is what's going to happen and the big plot point at the end is them deciding that the dreamer needs to wake up even if it means they won't exist anymore. The Whispered World also felt like the ending was deliberate.

But again, most of the time I too absolutely despise this plot gimmick, it's right up there with "The Magic Goes Away" endings where all the cool stuff about a world gets removed so that the world can become like our own, if I wanted to interact with the real world I'd go outside, yeah?

See now, I think it depends on the mood you are in.

Spoiler

I also signed up for saving people and was feeling pretty pleased with myself when that gut-punch "Ha ha, you can't actually save anyone, they are all dead and it is your fault, now you have to come to terms with that." came along. Yeah it upset me at the time but after considering, it was the only emotionally satisfying way that game could've ended.

Seriously, when you think about it, how else could it have ended? With all the cast standing outside the mansion saying "so, our priest-buddy is actually a time-travel-wizard...... so that's a thing."

 

[Bad Jim]

I'm trying to decide if Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice falls into this since it's implied a substantial part of the game is all in Senua's mentally ill mind.

That's a game I own but haven't played yet, to my shame. But I already know up front that Senua is mentally ill and it logically follows that I'll see a lot of stuff that isn't canonically real. I don't think that's quite the same thing. "It was all a dream" is when you get fobbed off with a complete Deus Ex Machina that provides only the most superficial resolution.

 

[Drathnoxis]

Why did I do this...

Dang, I need to use that as my avatar for a while!

Edit: or I would, but the Escapist REALLY hates it and won't let me change my avatar. None of my usual tricks for stubborn avatars are working so I think the avatar uploading is just kind of broken right now.

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

Asks about leaving us hanging in regards to an avatar with a pony that's hanging.

Low blow man.

I hadn't noticed the rope till now. It looked like a joyous sort of creature having some kind of fun. It's still having fun though, right?

 

[Drathnoxis]

Asks about leaving us hanging in regards to an avatar with a pony that's hanging.

Low blow man.

I hadn't noticed the rope till now. It looked like a joyous sort of creature having some kind of fun. It's still having fun though, right?

Always