At this point, it's hard to deny that video games are art — and, like any medium, games have the ability to move, horrify, or even haunt players long after the credits roll. Get ready to relive some of the most traumatic — and thought-provoking — video game endings.
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00:00At this point, it's hard to deny that video games are art, and like any medium, games
00:05have the ability to move, horrify, or even haunt players long after the credits roll.
00:11Get ready to relive some of the most traumatic and thought-provoking video game endings.
00:16Bloodborne is a game that revels in tragedy and gruesomeness.
00:19Throughout the story, the player is confronted by a huge variety of horrifying enemies.
00:24Not only is Bloodborne totally okay with making players as uncomfortable as possible, but
00:28the player actively seeks to do so.
00:30So it's only fitting that a game of this nature would have a suitably horrifying ending, or
00:35three endings in the case of Bloodborne.
00:37One ending isn't all that scary, but the other two absolutely are.
00:41Whatever happens, you may think it all a mere bad dream."
00:47Both of the more terrifying endings require the player to reject an offer for the old
00:51hunter Gehrman to kill the protagonist.
00:53After defeating Gehrman, the player is confronted by the Moon Presence, one of the extra-dimensional
00:58Great Ones.
00:59The first of the scarier endings sees the Presence overwhelm the hunter with its power,
01:04forcing the protagonist to take Gehrman's place.
01:06This begins a cycle all over again, dooming the hunter to lead others like them into the
01:10same horrors, the same abyss of nightmares that the player just fought through.
01:15The other ending only occurs if the hunter consumes three umbilical cord pieces found
01:19throughout the game, which will allow the player to fight the Moon Presence.
01:22After this, a cutscene is shown of the hunter having transformed into a writhing, helpless
01:27slug, an infant Great One.
01:29This is the closest thing Bloodborne has to a good ending, considering its implication
01:33that the hunter may now be able to finally end the hunt.
01:36If that isn't equal parts disgusting, terrifying, and strangely uplifting, nothing is.
01:43Dead Space is considered one of the all-time great horror games for a reason.
01:46The Ishimura Space Station is one of the most terrifying settings in gaming.
01:50The game is full of viscerally horrifying encounters and perfectly timed jump scares
01:54that keep players on edge through almost the entire story.
01:57The ending does not let up on the gas pedal of terrors for one second, either.
02:01The original ending sees Isaac escaping the Ishimura, only to be attacked by a hallucination
02:06of his dead girlfriend, Nicole, on his ship.
02:08But even more upsetting is the remake's alternate ending, available only to players who complete
02:13a New Game Plus playthrough.
02:14Here, instead of being attacked by Nicole, Isaac has covered his escape shuttle in the
02:18strange language encountered throughout the game, and calmly talks to his hallucination
02:23of her about building something.
02:25In either ending, the message is the same.
02:27There will never be an escape for Isaac.
02:29He will always be followed by what happened on the Ishimura.
02:32Many of us humans always feel haunted by the horrors of our past.
02:35Isaac is no different, but he also has to deal with actual space monsters.
02:41Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order is definitely not a horror game, at least not until you
02:44get to the very end.
02:46Players spend the entire game powering up Cal Kestis, learning new Force techniques,
02:51becoming a better lightsaber combatant, and training as a Jedi.
02:55Players watch him grow as a person, becoming not just a real Jedi, but the ideal of what
02:59a Jedi can be.
03:01As Cal battles his way through Fortress Inquisitorius, players begin to feel incredibly powerful,
03:06almost unstoppable.
03:08Defeating the deadly Trilla in a duel is an incredible high, the culmination of all the
03:12skills and knowledge built throughout the game.
03:14Then suddenly, Trilla becomes so afraid that she can't even move.
03:18That's when you hear the iconic breathing of Darth Vader.
03:20You have failed me, Inquisitor.
03:24Avengers!
03:27Despite how powerful Cal has become over the last several hours of play, the game leaves
03:31you with only one option — to flee in the face of Vader's power.
03:35Short of the Rogue One hallway scene, this is Darth Vader at his best.
03:39He's so overwhelmingly powerful that it's terrifying.
03:42No matter what Cal does, he knows there's no chance of survival in a duel against the
03:45Sith Lord.
03:47Doki Doki Literature Club is absolutely a horror game, but it disguises itself as an
03:52innocent visual novel dating sim.
03:54The game has become somewhat infamous for catching uninformed players off-guard with
03:58not only how dark it gets, but how suddenly it makes the transition from cute dating sim
04:03to disturbing meta-horror story.
04:05This shift sets players on edge for the entire rest of the game, wondering what dark, depraved
04:10twist might come next.
04:12Eventually, the game seemingly starts to break and glitch.
04:15These are not bugs, but they're manipulations of Monica, one of the game's characters.
04:20She becomes self-aware.
04:21She knows she is in a game, and she has started toying with the game and the person playing
04:26it, you.
04:27From here, Doki Doki Literature Club has several endings, but by far the scariest and most
04:31depressing, it's the one in which Monica decides all of her efforts are pointless and tells
04:36you no happiness can be found in the game.
04:38She then deletes the entire save file.
04:41From her perspective, she was just a side character in the game, much as we can often
04:45feel directionless characters in our own lives.
04:49The Forest starts as one of those classic, stranded-in-the-wilderness survival horror
04:52games, but quickly morphs into something far darker.
04:56As the main character, Eric, tries to save his kidnapped son following a plane crash
05:00that left them both stranded, he stumbles into a world far stranger than he could have
05:04imagined.
05:05Surrounded by bizarre and gross-looking humanoid creatures, he finds himself slowly uncovering
05:09the secrets of the peninsula he crashed on.
05:12Eventually, Eric is left with a haunting choice.
05:14Save his son, Timmy, or allow him to die.
05:17Without getting into the lore, choosing the latter will instead save hundreds of people
05:21aboard a passing airliner from the same fate that befell Eric and Timmy.
05:25It cuts right to the heart of what it means to do anything for your family, and asks us,
05:29as players, to figure out what cost is worth paying to save your own child.
05:33Things get even more morally gray in subsequent cutscenes that play out if you choose to save
05:37Timmy.
05:38Here, Timmy begins to show signs that he's becoming one of the creatures Eric's been
05:41fighting.
05:42"...Is he okay?"
05:51There is no right choice here.
05:53There is no good ending.
05:54Do you save hundreds, or save your son?
05:57Do you save your son, only to risk him becoming a monster?
06:00The Forest leaves players with only bad feelings.
06:03The ending of Transistor presents players with a very different type of horror than
06:07the previous games on this list, but it's no less potent.
06:10Throughout the story of Transistor, players never really get a great sense of what the
06:13main character, Red, is fighting for.
06:16We know she wants to get her voice back after having it taken from her at the start of the
06:19game, and she wants to stop the robotic force called the Process from destroying her city.
06:24It's obvious, however, that there's more underneath the surface.
06:27The first man the Transistor sword absorbed, who had been your guide from inside the weapon
06:31the whole game, was the man Red loved.
06:33She wanted to restore the city in order to bring him back, but she can't.
06:37He is trapped inside the sword.
06:39In the end, the player is helpless as Red takes the sword and stabs herself with it,
06:43trapping herself inside the virtual world of the Transistor in order to be with him.
06:48Players are as helpless as she feels, despite everything she's done.
06:51This is the one thing she truly wants, and she can't have it any other way.
06:55Still, in a bittersweet way, she reunites with her love in the end.
06:58"...Hi."
06:59"...Hey."
07:00Portal is considered by many to be among the best games ever made.
07:07Its story, mechanics, and even its soundtrack are all considered among some of the most
07:11memorable in gaming.
07:12Its ending is no exception to that greatness.
07:15Chell, having defeated the mad AI GLaDOS and her many puzzles and tests, is finally free.
07:20Chell finally sees the light of day upon being thrown from the Aperture Science Facility
07:24by an explosion.
07:26Everything looks peaceful.
07:27The sky is blue, birds are chirping, and suddenly, a robot comes from behind Chell and drags
07:32her back inside.
07:33"...Thank you for assuming the party air-conditioning position."
07:42It turns out that Chell didn't defeat GLaDOS.
07:44In fact, GLaDOS is happy, as she explains in her ever-so-creepy and infamous song, Still
07:49Alive.
07:50The experiments she performed on Chell were successful in achieving their purpose.
07:53To watch Chell come so close to freedom, believing it was hers, and then being literally dragged
07:58back is as shocking as it is deflating.
08:01GLaDOS even mocks Chell, giving her the cake she was promised at the beginning before snuffing
08:05out the candle on top.
08:06The whole ordeal was all just an experiment, and Chell's been reduced to a human lab rat.
08:11Of course, GLaDOS does get her comeuppance in Portal 2, when, well…
08:15"...So, how are you holding up?
08:17Because I'm a potato."
08:20But that's a whole nother story for a whole nother video.
08:25Spec Ops Align is a bold game, one that's meant to challenge the player at every turn.
08:29It's also not subtle in its messaging.
08:31The player, via main character Martin Walker, is forced to commit and observe one terrible
08:35act after another.
08:37Spec Ops Align wants you to question the morality of everything Walker sees and does in his
08:41mission.
08:42It wants you to question how we as a society treat war, both in games and in the real world.
08:47Still, players want to believe that everything Walker does is for the greater good, right
08:50up to the shocking ending.
08:52Walker finally reaches the game's villain, Joseph Conrad, hoping to stop the horrors
08:57he's inflicting on the ravaged city of Dubai.
08:59Except it turns out that Conrad is dead.
09:02He's been dead the whole time.
09:03It was all Walker, the entire game.
09:05All the horrors, all the deaths, all the unnecessary bloodshed, all the war crimes were carried
09:10out by the player character after losing touch with reality.
09:13This is the reality of war that Spec Ops wants to show the player.
09:17In each ending of the line, there are no good guys, there are no heroes, only killers, only
09:21death.
09:22There is no redemption for Walker's crimes, no matter what.
09:25How'd you survive all this?
09:27Who said I did?
09:30I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream is an adventure game from the 90s that a lot of modern gamers
09:34may have missed.
09:35It's inspired by Harlan Ellison's classic short story about an evil A.I. that ends the
09:40world and keeps a handful of humans alive for its twisted experiments.
09:43The game somewhat follows the original tale, but follows separate storylines for each character.
09:48Each section of the game sees the characters being forced to confront their flaws by A.M.,
09:52the A.I. torturing them for its own entertainment.
09:56The endings vary wildly.
09:57One sees the protagonist defeating A.M. and restarting human civilization, while others,
10:01like the source material, end with one of the player characters being turned into a
10:05blob of jelly.
10:06Really, there are no outright good endings.
10:08Even the one where you save humanity concludes with one of the characters endlessly roaming
10:12the lonely realm of cyberspace to ensure A.M. never returns, while the rest die.
10:17Even in the best ending of the game, it's made clear any sacrifice the characters made,
10:22any growth they showed, any closure they found in their lives, was never going to lead
10:26anywhere for them.
10:27At best, they won, and were personally rewarded with nothing.
10:30At worst, they fought as hard as they could and still lost.
10:34They still want to scream into the void, and they cannot.
10:37Even if they could, there will be no one left to hear.