Last game you played that had a happy ending

[Johnny Novgorod]

Simple question but specifically 1) narrative-driven games for an 2) adult audience and with 3) only one possible ending. Because recently it feels like every game either has a depressing ending where you die or nothing you do matters or there's an ambiguous question mark and at best ends on an angry or bittersweet "the fight goes on/the real enemy is yet ahead" note.

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

Hmmm....maybe South Park the Fractured But Whole? Yeah most games have 'bad' endings because a bad ending is unsatisfying and makes the player want a sequel, ie spend money to make the ending happy.

'And they lived happily ever after' writes you into a corner where you can't make any more money.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Spider-Man?

I mean, sure some people die, but the ultimate ending is that overall everything worked out for the best. The day was saved.

I'd even say God of War '18 has a happy ending, or an ending that puts the main characters in a much better place then they were at the beginning, no matter what's being teased for the sequels.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Yeah most games have 'bad' endings because a bad ending is unsatisfying and makes the player want a sequel, ie spend money to make the ending happy.

'And they lived happily ever after' writes you into a corner where you can't make any more money.

Which games are those?


A good ending or a bad ending makes no difference; if a game is popular it gets a sequel. A main character could be dead (bad ending), and they'll either bring them back to life, make it a prequel, or just choose a side/entirely new character as the protagonist. And if it's a good ending, something else bad will happen to bring the hero back into action.


At worst bad/depressing endings are just developers wanting to come across as profound, but I can't think of any game that had a bad ending just to bait people into buying the sequel.

 

[Yoshi178]

Spider-Man?

I mean, sure some people die, but the ultimate ending is that overall everything worked out for the best. The day was saved.

The day wasn't saved for the people that died. :3

 

[Casual Shinji]

Spider-Man?

I mean, sure some people die, but the ultimate ending is that overall everything worked out for the best. The day was saved.

The day wasn't saved for the people that died. :3

Yeah, but you need some death otherwise the stakes are meaningless, and you end up with a Marvel movie.

 

[Saelune]

I think limiting it to single-ending games is your flaw here. Lots of games have multiple endings where there is clearly a good happy ending, but also lets you have bad endings, usually cause you didn't do all the things or just to let you be a jerk in the game.

 

[Hawki]

The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks

Though granted that might not count as adult, and you can technically get three variations of the same ending, so apart from that, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (which I played in 2017).

 

[Majestic Manatee_v1legacy]

Horizon zero Dawn. Spiderman. Pyre. Dark Souls 3. God of War. Resident Evil 7. Red Dead Redemption 2. The last guardian. To name a few off the top of my head. I question your sampling methods and tendencies towards confirmation bias here.

 

[jademunky]

Battletech

Just finished it last week. Optimistic ending, good guys come to power, bad guys receive the punishment they deserve, you get a sweet 100-ton Battlemech.

Also, obviously Renowned Explorers International Society (because you are proclaimed "The MOST renowned")

But yeah, most games I play have either sad endings at best (Banner Saga), confusing endings (Dead Cells), or genuinely horrifying endings (Total War: Warhammer II)

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Horizon zero Dawn. Spiderman. Pyre. Dark Souls 3. God of War. Resident Evil 7. Red Dead Redemption 2. The last guardian. To name a few off the top of my head. I question your sampling methods and tendencies towards confirmation bias here.

You question my sampling methods, I question your very definition of 'happy ending' if your examples include Dark Souls 3, Resident Evil 7, The Last Guardian and Red Dead Redemption 2. Dark Souls (any Dark Souls) is too obfuscating that it transcends 'good' or 'bad'; the world's miserable and your 'happy' ending is that it stays miserable rather than just die altogether. RE7 again is another miserable experience where survival alone doesn't make for 'happy', specially when the game drops "Umbrella" as its final breath. Ico games are bittersweet at best, and you haven't played RDR2 (or 1) if you call that a 'happy' ending.

 

[sXeth]

Subnautica:

Spoiler

You cure the plague, disable the alien quarantine as a result. And escape the planet. Sure, everyone else died, but that was the opening of the game, not the ending.

Wolfenstein - New Colossus:

Spoiler

While the Nazis do retain control. Deathshead and Frau Angel are both dead, seeming that the newfound Resistance is by and large lacking true opposition (and Hitler's busy being senile dying up on the moon). BJ's fully been resuurected and cured and turned into a super soldier.

Destiny 2 (before Forsaken):

Spoiler

Ghaul gets incinerated by the now awakened Traveller, everyone forms up. the humans have a voice among the Vanguard, and they even rebuild the Tower instantly somehow. Like prettymuch all of Destiny's stories, this has no apparent relevance at all to any future ones (the revived Traveller has since done nothing as multiple extinction level threats arose, and Suraya (the human) hasn't had a part in anything since, despite being an obvious choice to replace Cayde-6 after his death in Forsaken), but it did end on a happy note.

Mario Odyssey (well duh, its a Mario game)

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

Metroid 2: Samus Returns... sort of? Kicked Ridley's ass again, killed all the Metroids except the baby that imprinted on you, started an ecological crisis that eventually unleashes a much more dangerous parasite on the universe... oh well, we don't have to worry about that for 2 more games. Live in the moment.

EDIT: Oops, didn't see the 'adult'. If Metroid isn't 'adult' enough, then Starcraft 2 has perhaps the best possible ending given what had come before. Even the DLC has a triumphant, if not exactly cheery ending.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Horizon zero Dawn. Spiderman. Pyre. Dark Souls 3. God of War. Resident Evil 7. Red Dead Redemption 2. The last guardian. To name a few off the top of my head. I question your sampling methods and tendencies towards confirmation bias here.

Um...What?

Dark Souls 3 definitely doesn't have a happy ending. Neither does Resident Evil 7.

I haven't finished Red Dead 2, so I can't comment, but based on Red Dead 1, I'm really not expecting a happy ending.

I wouldn't say God of War 4's ending is happy either.

Spider-Man definitely has a bittersweet ending.

 

[Asita]

Well I just finished Okami for the first time a few weeks ago. Pretty unambiguously happy ending, barring some sadness that it's over and the separations that happen. Before that...Tales from the Borderlands (almost Disney levels of happy ending there). Before that, Subnautica, Ori and the Blind Forest then...it gets hazy before that, but I want to say Undertale (Yes, I know, multiple endings, but I refuse to touch the genocide route) or Golden Sun: Dark Dawn.

 

[MrCalavera_v1legacy]

Hmmm....maybe South Park the Fractured But Whole? Yeah most games have 'bad' endings because a bad ending is unsatisfying and makes the player want a sequel, ie spend money to make the ending happy.

'And they lived happily ever after' writes you into a corner where you can't make any more money.

That's not how that works. If a game has a good ending and sells, you bet publisher will push for a sequel. Same for bad.

OT: I'm currently replaying Vice City, and that game has the happiest ending a crook could wish for.

 

[MrCalavera_v1legacy]

Horizon zero Dawn. Spiderman. Pyre. Dark Souls 3. God of War. Resident Evil 7. Red Dead Redemption 2. The last guardian. To name a few off the top of my head. I question your sampling methods and tendencies towards confirmation bias here.

Doesn't DS3 has one of the bleakest endings ever?

 

[Dalisclock]

Subnautica:

If you discount the Stinger, which states

Spoiler

You made it back alive, but you're stuck in space until you pay your bill. The Billion Credit bill based on all the resources you used on the planet to survive and build the rocket, because apparently the Corporation owns everything on the planet, including anything you brought back with you so stuffing your cargo space with ton of diamonds probably wouldn't matter

Which is either dark humor or a kick in the teeth depending how you look at it.

 

[Dalisclock]

Horizon zero Dawn. Spiderman. Pyre. Dark Souls 3. God of War. Resident Evil 7. Red Dead Redemption 2. The last guardian. To name a few off the top of my head. I question your sampling methods and tendencies towards confirmation bias here.

Doesn't DS3 has one of the bleakest endings ever?

I was gonna ask the same Question. Do any of the souls games have a "Happy" ending? Even the "Yharnam Sunrise" ending in BloodBorne

Spoiler

Leaves Gerhman to Suffer in the dream forever and there's no indication that the world you woke up into is safe

I think the last game I played that had a happy ending was Tacoma since

Spoiler

The entire Crew survived and evacuated to safety, even if in a sort of Exile and it's implied the people who engineered the accident will be brought to some sort of justice in the end, since you have plenty of evidence in your possession of what actually happened

 

[Marik2]

Pokemon