Friday, August 7, 2015

#Blaugust Day 7: Endings

All Bette's stories have happy endings. That's because she knows when to stop. She's realized the real problem with stories -- if you keep them going long enough, they always end in death. - Sandman #6 - Neil Gaiman
I've been thinking about endings recently. About how much we dread and resist them, but how joyous and cathartic they can be when they finally come. At least they can when handled well. A bad ending can retroactively taint everything that came before and turn something you enjoyed into something to be forgotten or even actively railed against. The way something ends is the last impression it makes, and often becomes the most powerful.

So much of what separates a good ending from a bad one is timing; leaving before the welcome is overstayed. It's more complex than that of course; even a well-timed end can fall flat if badly handled, but dragging things out too long seems to be the surest way to ensure a bad end.

Also, not bringing a friend
MMOs by their nature are not good at ending. They're created with the intent of continuing on as long as possible. When they do end, it's often after a decline in studio support that leads to a sort of stumbling half-life leading up to the end. Is it any wonder that so many players, when they do finally cut ties with a game, seem to be filled with hatred for the game they presumably once enjoyed? When the end did come for them, it had taken too long and was no longer satisfying.

It falls to the players to ensure a good end in these situations, by accepting when the time has come. Don't fall into the trap of forcing yourself to keep going when a game is no longer entertaining. Be willing to accept when the time to move on has come. That way, at least the memories can still be pleasant. And you might even decide to return at a later date. After all, the other thing about endings is that the best ones always leave you wanting more.

6 comments:

  1. I agree that endings are a fundamental problem of story-driven MMOs; in fact I have written about this very issue in the past. If a game world relies too heavily on the over-arching story, it will ultimately struggle with its ending (see lotro) and yet, never ending it is not really an option either. Delivery of said story is another issue: too often MMOs have gone the 'crit players with 10k exposition'-way. It also tends to be more difficult to jump into such games half-way though as a latecomer.

    All that said, in a more philosophized sense I believe endings to be the most powerful and crucial thing towards well, the meaning of life (and 42). "Give me purpose, give me endings", maybe to clarify: http://mmogypsy.com/2014/04/no-purpose-no-nothing.html :)

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    1. I feel like LotRO ended up with the worst of both worlds; we know where the story is headed and how it will ultimately end, but the game can never actually reach that point. That's what led to the cul de sac that was Mirkwood, among other things.

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  2. Big break there between an arcade and a home console which is present in certain MMO and multiplayer modes.

    Think back. When did a video game become something you did with your hands while you were entertained by a story (and therefore had to judge an ending) from being a competition against other players moderated by a computer program?

    I think it was early text adventures on C64 for me as they compared to time pilot at alladin's castle.

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    1. Yeah, in early video games the story (what there was of it) always ended in your death. Then you put in another quarter and tried again.

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  3. More MMOs should "end" at end game. Have a strong narrative throughout the solo game, and then have the end game be the aftermath. That way you can combine the themepark with the sandbox more.

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    1. I think FFXIV takes a step in that direction in having a complete story in the base game (complete with ending credits) and then moving to a more serialized story for updates. A game that went full sandbox at that point could be interesting.

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