Gaming

The final dream in Disco Elysium. After picking up clues all game about your past, your broken relationship and the reasons you are the way you are, the heart wrenching emotional impact had me reeling. Not mention it's written and voice-acted beautifully.

Suddenly everything makes sense as Harry gets constantly dressed-down, his futile attempts to cling to the past denied and his insanity laid bare. The letter in the ledger, the little Headless FALN rider figurine, the obsession with Dolores Dei, that awful phonecall on the payphone, everything comes together in a beautiful climax of absolute sadness, ending on that devastating final line:

"This is real darkness. It's not death, or war, or child molestation. Real darkness has love for a face. The first death is in the heart, Harry.

See you tomorrow"

Ys VIII had SO many:

As Adol: Climbing down Gens d'Armes to finally meet Dana, Eternia sitting in the distance.

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Adol and Dana having a little heart to heart before the final dungeon, hoping that maybe destiny isn't real just this one time, and she isn't fated to die soon.

The scripting in the true final boss, with the dawn breaking over an endless field of water, as the introduction ends and the fight begins.

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Fighting through gods and spirits to bring Dana back one last time, to say farewell.

As Dana: White Memory. God. Making peace with Olga, and having her finally open her heart to you as a dear friend, a message from beyond the grave. Watching the last sparks of your civilisation die out in an apocalyptic winter. Valley of Kings, learning that you're the first person to break a divine apocalyptic cycle, but still bound by fate.

I legitimately couldn't enjoy video games for two weeks after I finished Ys VIII. I still get really emotional thinking about it.

But it's nothing compared to FFXI, my favourite game of all time:

Chains of Promathia is incredible from start to finish. Weathering the emotional assault of death beyond death and the decay of the spirit in the Promyvions, this horrible, haunting, gloomy drone in the background; and then immediately being taken to this place of both incredible healing beauty and immediate and poignant, human sorrow.

Witnessing the exact moment where a dear companion begins to waver if he's on the right path with you, and seeing his doubts culminate in fighting you, to the death if need be. Seeing the guilt, shame and lingering doubt when you win... and forgive him.

Seeing the god of regeneration send a little glimmer over the view of a fallen kingdom, which you've probably sat and stared at with strangely passive wraith enemies. The entire Distant Worlds song and cinematic as a whole, closing out a musical and narrative theme that had been developing over three years. Definitely another storyline where I had to sit and just process it for a bit. Took me a year to come around on Aht Urhgan since I did it the day after Promathia.

Seeing the ghost of a city-state wiped out by genocide, brought back into a state of undeath by a god of war and chaos, sacrifice himself to save the heritor of the empire that claimed his city. The music for the fight that follows right after, Ragnarok.

The sadness that makes your heart sink, of wandering the Shadowreign era of Vana'diel, seeing a world ravaged by war, hearing Flowers On The Battlefield add an incredible, keening aura of melancholy everywhere, albeit with little glimmers of peace... broken by the drums of war as battle rages once more.

The end of Adoulin, Forever Today. Closing the book on one of your most personal adventures, alongside some of the most brilliant and heroic characters. The sense of finality mixed with renewal, with musical callbacks to the Theme of Final Fantasy and the Prelude.

Rhapsodies of Vana'diel, especially the ending. Seeing the bravery of an old friend's daughter sacrifice herself again and again as the cosmos rejects her presence in the past. Building a relationship with a character just as sincere and brilliant as her father. Her final monologue to you: "Master, this is not 'Farewell.' It is 'See you soon.' Until our paths cross once more, the blessing of Phoenix is yours to wield. And I will be with you, always."

The beautiful poem being sung as this all happens, leading into the Adventurers' Chorus of over a hundred actual players from across the world, singing the title music from the first release of the game...

The end of Half Life 2 Episode 2 before HL:Alyx retconned it - that fade to black with Alyx sobbing 😭

When

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!Niko walks out the window!<

in OneShot

Walking into Erana's Peace for the first time in Quest for Glory 1 (1989). For a more recent example, walking or driving into safety with a massive load in Death Stranding, as well as most of the rest of the game.

The beginning of The Last of Us.

The end of Final Fantasy X.

The entirety of disc 3 of Final Fantasy VIII.

Ostagar in Dragon Age: Origins, and then the march to Denerim before the final battle.

Awesome.