Weekend Question: What's the last game that made you cry?

[PCG Jody]

I ask the PCG staff a regular Weekend Question and post the answers on the site. If you'd like to throw in an answer here, I'll squeeze the best into the finished article!

This week the question is: What's the last game that made you cry?

A couple of years ago, we asked if a game had ever made you cry. Since then the art of extracting player tears via digital means has been refined even further. Maybe sad cowboys do it for you, or sad high schoolers, or sad parents, or sad ladies who have extremely large swords. (The swords are also sad.) We've got plenty of different varieties of moping here in videogame land. Which one has hit you in the tear ducts most recently?

 

[Brian Boru]

Well, Far Cry, duh!

Honorable mention: Crysis.

Don't bother, I'll see myself out…

ETA: @DXCHASE's reply reminded me: after the second forced capture in Far Cry 5, I discovered there were 7 or 10 more ahead. I quit there and then for months until a mod fixed it, definitely the most frustrating experience with a game—heightened by the fact I was enjoying it a lot. *sob*

 

[Colif]

Journey maybe?

could be tears of Joy

 

[Frindis]

Metro Exodus. The camaraderie in that game is portrayed excellent and it did make me shed a tear or two after the end credits rolled.

 

[mainer]

I don't cry much, even outside of my gaming life. I find that very few games have the emotional strength of story and characters that can elicit that emotion of sadness, to the point of my eyes actually dripping tears. Going through my gaming libraries, the one game that always makes me shed a tear, is a choice in Mass Effect 1, when you have to make that decision to either sacrifice either Kaiden or Ashley on Virmire. I've never played a game series since that had me so emotionally involved with characters/companions. I always shed at least one tear with that decision.

 

[DXCHASE]

I only cry for a game when my saves get corrupted. That happened to my Doom Eternal game through the Bethesda Launcher. Was at the end of the 1st dlc pack and my whole file corrupted. So turned off i didnt bother with the 2nd one.

 

[McStabStab]

I never have really cried during a game. The only time I came close was during some of the end cutscenes of Death Stranding. As a father of two young boys the paternal nature of that game struck an emotional chord with me.

 

[ZedClampet]

I went through my library and honestly don't think a game has ever made me cry. I guess the most emotionally heavy game I've played is probably To The Moon. Outside of gaming, the only art forms that might bring that level of emotion to me are music and possibly books with happy endings. Sad stories only irritate me, to be honest, and I usually avoid them. Why would I want to be sad?

 

[Zloth]

I had a few tears at the end of Witcher 3. I got the ending where Ciri goes off to become the Empress. Best ending, IMHO. The world needs her ruling more than it needs her killing off beasties.

Sad is happy for deep people, @ZedClampet

View: https://youtu.be/DgN1S5266NA?t=46

 

[Sarafan]

Maybe I didn't cry, but definitely felt moved when watching (or reading to be precise) the ending of Pillars of Eternity 2 last year. I won't spoil it here, so no worries. I'll only say that it was shocking we couldn't avoid the inevitable and our choices resulted in how vast will be the damages. It's not only the text that made me moved. The whole atmosphere, which includes the music, the style of the gameplay and the pace of action affected the way I felt. The game wasn't a huge sales success, but if someone likes RPGs, it's a must buy in my opinion. It's considered as Obsidian's magnum opus.

 

[ZedClampet]

I finally thought of a game that was very sad to me that I missed while skimming through my games: Leaving Lyndow. It's about a young woman coming of age and preparing to leave her village and family. She won't be coming back for a long time, if ever. It just reminded me of the importance of family and community and how so many young people, including myself back in the day, don't realize what they have until they leave home and continue to mature. It made me think, of course, of my own children leaving and how these years with them will always feel like the best years of my life.

I don't know whether I actually teared up during this or not, but it wouldn't surprise me. It was very powerful.

 

[mainer]

Maybe I didn't cry, but definitely felt moved when watching (or reading to be precise) the ending of Pillars of Eternity 2 last year. I won't spoil it here, so no worries. I'll only say that it was shocking we couldn't avoid the inevitable and our choices resulted in how vast will be the damages. It's not only the text that made me moved. The whole atmosphere, which includes the music, the style of the gameplay and the pace of action affected the way I felt. The game wasn't a huge sales success, but if someone likes RPGs, it's a must buy in my opinion. It's considered as Obsidian's magnum opus.

POE2 was another great game that was vastly under appreciated. There were some "things", or quest lines that were, while not under developed, just not developed as far as they could have been, but it had so many improvements over POE1 (although, admittedly, I did like the main story of POE1 better). I played through it twice, making different choices, and in both cases, there were some gut-wrenching results. I can't mention details for spoiler reasons (I know ZedClamet has yet to play it), but it's one of Obsidian's best games, far better and more in depth than the more recent Outer Worlds. Sorry, OP, I'm a bit off topic here, but felt the need to comment.

 

[Krud]

I think the last time may have been the very end of the last episode of Season One of The Walking Dead by Telltale.

Honorable Mention goes to the first season of "Life Is Strange," which was arguably more upsetting overall but it didn't affect me more than maybe getting a little choked up.

 

[Lexis]

Telltales The Walking Dead and 4 Gone Home

 

[Frag Maniac]

I'm not generally one to shed a lot of tears while playing, and have even been known to get a chuckle out of many horror game enemies. For example in RE Village, when Lady Dimitrescu throws a fit of rage over your having wiped out her entire blood line by killing all 3 of her daughters, I like to do this little parody of the doll Angie and snicker in an evil witch voice that "Yes, it was me, he, he, he, he!"

Then I thought of a game I played, a very unique one, called Spec Ops The Line, and though we whom aren't easily tear prone may not cry playing it, the game does have some very gut wrenching scenes. They intentionally designed it to make the player think about what it feels like to be guilty of collateral damage. It's a scenario where lines are blurred as far as who is friend or foe, and you're caught in the middle of it. Even the voice acting of Walker changes as you progress through the game, becoming more edgy as he struggles with self doubts.

There are many such question your conscience and moral judgement scenes in the game, but none struck me more than a scene where Walker finds a cache of white phosphorous, and decides to use it on what he is sure must be the enemy, only to find they are troops trying to protect civilians. Cognitive Dissonance abounds in this game, it's an underlying theme.

The white phosphorous scene covers only about the1st 4 min of the video.