Go Ahead, Make Me Cry | Semi-Ramblomatic

Dude I cried so hard playing Silksong at multiple points, especially in the Red Memory. Oh and The Binding of Isaac made me cry but in the form of a lore recap video because I an very bad at the gane

The ending of Outer Wilds. As each member of the companions appears around the campfire and I realised they were all playing the same song as each new addition added to the melody... man, that hit me hard.

OK I've thought about it. Spoilers! .... Disco Elysium when we found that the phasmids were real

I cried at Rosalina's storybook in Mario Galaxy, when she comes to terms with her mom's passing

Well, it's not THAT Sonic game, but I do remember actually getting surprisingly sad at reaching the ending of Sonic Battle for the GBA, of all things. Not much talked about, probably because it contributed to the clusterfuck that is Sonic Chronicles. But still, the game manages to actually have a fairly lighthearted Saturday morning cartoon tone, where until the very end there isn't even that much of a crisis or adventure, Sonic and pals are literally just hanging out at their homes doing their own thing, and have stumbled across a mysterious self-learning robot buddy that's actually the main character. You spend the whole game following Emerl's story, whether from his perspective or the perspective of other characters encountering him, and watch him grow and develop from a childlike goofy robot to a rounded character who's developed personality traits and quirks influenced by various characters, just like how he pick-and-mixes their moves for your own custom fighting style. And then at the ending, spoiler alert, Eggman finally has an actual scheme in taking the limiters off the ancient superweapon, and of course it goes horribly wrong (or rather, works too well) and Emerl becomes a berserk world-destroying threat. And so he becomes the final boss as perspective and gameplay switches back to Sonic, who basically has to put Emerl down like an extremely heavily armed Old Yeller. The ending makes no bones about what happened, as the characters all have to process the death of their new friend, someone they basically all helped raise like a child, and the best they can hope for is having the remnants to remember him by as the credits roll over melancholy music. (Then Sonic Advance 3 happened, which doesn't nearly have the impact but was at least cute.) Yahtzee has said a lot about not thinking Sonic and pals really lend themselves to serious storytelling, and fair enough, especially because they completely fuck it up more often than not, but sometimes they manage to stick the landing with a reasonable Saturday morning cartoon kind of plot. Also was one of the first times I'd played a game where the ending is a flat out downer, and not just as a 'bad ending' you can avoid.

Transistor's ending made me ugly cry. I was streaming & chatting with my poor husband (bf at the time) who hadn't seen anything else of the game, just the lead up to/big climax and me weeping. One of my top games of all time, but I'm still not ready to replay it just yet.

The first I remember is MGS Twin Snakes when Meryl is downed by Sniper Wolf and is begging Snake to shoot her so that she doesn’t slow him down. The Boss in MGS3, multiple in Death Stranding 1 and 2… Kojima just gets me apparently.

Deltarune (spiritual sequel to Undertale) Fran Bow Lots of intense emotions in both, so there were real tears for both happy and sad reasons.

My grandmother descended into full-blown Alzheimer's over the course of years while living with our family. She was functionally gone for a good two years before she actually passed. And not long after that, I played Spiritfarer for the first time. Fucking Alice. I'm tearing up right now just thinking about her. Every damn time.

Despite it being an absolute Saturday morning cartoon plot, Titanfall 2 taking the built up relationship of Jack and Cooper, and pulling a rule 3 with BT’s final throw absolutely broke me with his “Trust Me”.

The Banner Saga -SPOILERS AHEAD- You spend all of this time and energy leading this beautifully drawn, tragically doomed band of fantasy norsemen on a desperate flight across their dying world, navigating tough choices the whole way, watching the leader's daughter grow into a confident, competent young woman. Before the final desperate battle to stop an implacable foe and escape a seemingly endless horde, she comes to you and asks you to let her take the critical shot, and you're given the choice to metaphorically pass the torch on to her or take the burden all on yourself, and (if you're a dad like me), you let her do it. The battle is hard fought, and in the end, she makes the shot, defeats the supposedly immortal foe, AND THEN IS BRUTALLY KILLED RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOUR EYES, and you have to watch as your protagonist mourns and buries his teenage daughter, and then is forced to carry on leading the tribe to safety with one more burden weighing him down, because this is just part 1, and there's still so much more to go

I feel like I’ll get shot for saying this but Aeris in FFVII. Such an obvious answer really, but it got me and it was my first real emotional experience with a video game. Also as a side note, Seasons After Fall. I didn’t cry but I hated it for what it was. It made me angry. Good game though, recommend. Same as Never Alone. Same premise as Seasons After Fall and same reason, but I don’t think it’s as good a game.

Steins gate and its mid- sequel 0. There’s something about visual novels as long ass games that makes the emotional investment all the greater. Seemingly there’s nothing like a Japanese vn for really kicking the shit out of their protagonist. The amount of traumatic loss and ptsd in these two games is off the chart

While I don't think I've ever done a full on cry at a gaming moment, the ending cinematics of Persona 4 Golden hit me pretty hard. I'd really enjoyed my time hanging out with these characters and hated to leave. I played it during the tail end of 2020, so that probably played a part.

thats something to put on the box, "So emotional, it even made Yahtzee cry!"

Link's awakening ending. NieR automata has several moments. The opera in FFVI. More than one moment in Chrono trigger. Maybe I open the waterworks too easily

I stood there and let Zeke shoot me for so long before I could bring myself to kill him. I really thought I'd have lots of examples to cite, but honestly, most games make me emotional in a quiet pensive stare-at-the-wall kind of way. I cry much more often when listening to the music of these games after the fact. Like Journey's 'Apotheosis'. New Home's mirror springs to mind. And after months of playing Subnautica, I was quite emotional leaving the planet. ICO, Shadow of the Colossus and The Last Guardian all got me choked up. But the only time I can really remember bringing me to tears, is strangely Portal 2. I think it's a combination of how vast and lonely the game can feel, and the genuine heart of the story, but also the quality of the game and the time f my life I first played it in. It just gives me this ineffable sense of "We'll never see the likes of those days again."

Oof. Celeste on the island caring for Cid in FF6. That would be the first time I remember crying at a video game.

FFX when after everything that happens the MC finds out he's a dream and he walks through Luna to return to the ether (until FFX2 which I never played and sold years ago along with the guide book).

"To the Moon" and "The Walking Dead season one" I think did it for me.

Majora's Mask, at the credits when the Deku Butler finds his son. I just felt so bad. This is when I played the original, as a child, so I reloaded a save and attempted to save the son by destroying the boulder with every bomb I could find. But you can't save him.

Not cry, but there was one game that broke me emotionally. It was Dark Cloud 2 on the PS2. In the game there is a monster transformation badge that when you wear it the monsters are non-hostile towards you and you can talk to them, so I'd approach them in monster form just to see what they had to say before I killed them for that sweet EXP. Most of them didn't say much of interest, but there was one mammoth-like creature that was hanging out in an isolated corner of a valley. He told me that he loved living there because his parents lived there too and he was about to get a baby sister. This of course, was after I'd just killed every other monster in the valley. I just parked my character at the entrance to the empty valley and stared at it, wondering who the actual monster was.

To the Moon and Spiritfarer have both gotten me. I think another one has, but I'm drawing a blank.

"Thanks for being my family" in Clair Obscur really got me. The way Atul leaves in Spiritfarer also hit me really hard.

Posted this on the YT upload too, but in addition to Undertale and Spiritfarer, the final battle of MOTHER 3 totals me. It very clearly influenced UT's "good person gone bad due to trauma and manipulation" plus an estranged sibling dynamic, which always murders me. When the Masked Man takes off his helmet, realizes what's happening, and takes his final shot, it **wrecked** me on my first playthrough. MOTHER and Earthbound got me too, which I went into blind so did not know what to expect during their respective Giygas battles.

For me, there were a few. Spoiler Warning! Mass Effect 2 & 3 I am a huge fan of romancing Tali. During #2, on her loyalty mission, you have the choice to hug her when you both find her father dead from a terrible accident that threatens to destroy their name and their race. On #3, it was the choice of merging Shepard's consciousness with the Reapers (the green ending), because my Shepard would never get to build that house with Tali on her homeworld. Undertale Same reason as Yahtzee. But, the whole game was an emotional joy for me. The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask There is a scene where Link plays the Song of Healing to a man that has cursed to slowly turn into a Gibdo (evil mummy). When played, the man's young daughter returns and tearfully embrasses her father, whom she has been attempting to care for and protect all by herself.

Towards the end of Bioshock Infinite when Booker tried to take his infant daughter back from Comstock. The opening of The Last of Us Spiderman 2018; Peter's last conversation with Aunt May. This one hit me the hardest 😭

It's almost impossible for me to cry when engaging with media nowadays but the games that came the closest to making me cry were Snoot Game and Katawa Shoujo. They hit me in a way that most things wish they could

Clair Obscur, multiple times. The Witcher 3 also, the baby murder scene. I had just had my first child and was pretty sleep deprived. Hearing a man scream in grief over his childs death fucked me up pretty bad.

I've got a few. The first to come to mind was Persona 3. In the original, it was the very last cutscene before the credits that did me in. But playing the Remake, I teared up at the conclusion of the cancer patient's storyline. To the Moon got a few tears as well. Finally, I cried at the ending of Earthbound, because I had grown so attached to the characters on that journey and I was sad to see it over.

Red Dead Redemption 2 honor ending🥲

It's a bit of a shame you don't have any interest in (nor, I presume, any time for, regardless of interest level) Muh-Mor-Puh-Guhs, Yahtzee, because I would be wildly intrigued to see if the Shadowbringers & Endwalkers expansions for FFXIV would get you to turn on the waterworks. It has become a spectator sport for FFXIV fans watching streamers play these expansions to place bets on exactly when in the story the streamer will start sniffling and getting drippy. Note that I did not say IF. It's good fun! (Hm I wonder if this is the sort of thing one could make wagers on using Kalshi or Polymarket...)

The earliest one I can remember was the good ending in BioShock (spoilers). It wasn't just the fact that you saved all of the little sisters, but also that each of them had fulfilling and successful lives because of you. Each of them sees Jack Ryan as a father and the last thing you see is all of your adopted children holding you hand as you die. After that it's when Clementine has to leave Lee behind in Telltale's Walking Dead, and when you find Carlos' body in the street in Saints Row 2.

I don’t recall ever crying over a game. Possibly that’s a personal issue on my part, possibly I just haven’t really gone in for games that could have done that. The only time I can distinctly recall crying over some kind of media was the first time I watched Gandalf’s death in Fellowship of the Ring. I’d read the books, I knew he comes back, it was still well done.

There was a visual-novel deal (not normally something I go out of my way to “play” but it was highly recommended) called “Siren’s Call: Escape Velocity” and FUCK that ending. I spent maybe an hour or more with my tears stopping and starting.