Feature: See You in the Sequel

The idea of a cliffhanger is probably as old as storytelling itself. I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out our ancestors first used the device thousands of years ago. In more recent storytelling, the frame story of One Thousand and One Nights, featuring Scheherazade and her desire to survive each night, is a canonical example of the device. Since then, pretty much every narrative medium has incorporated the concept in one way or another. So it’s no surprise that the cliffhanger has found its way into video games.

What I find interesting is my reaction to a cliffhanger will be different depending on how the rest of the game was constructed. In some cases I’ll scream expletives at the game, and in others I’ll solemnly accept it. Because of this, I thought it’d be fun to look at my reaction to some of the cliffhangers over the years. I’d also be interested in hearing about which cliffhangers everyone else finds memorable.

It goes without saying that there are going to be spoilers in this article; but each section will clearly note which game(s) I’ll be talking about.

Half-Life 2 Series

The original Half-Life 2 features one of the laziest deus ex machina endings this side of a Euripides play. Gordon Freeman destroys the Citadel’s reactor, and right as he’s seemingly going to be killed, time stops and the G-man comes to the rescue. Aristotle was a notable critic of deus ex machina, so he certainly would not have been happy with the ending of Half-Life 2. You just want to scream “that was the ending?!” at the computer monitor. Luckily, I played Half-Life 2 after its two sequel episodes were already out, so I didn’t have to wait very long to find out what happened next.

Thankfully, Valve seems to have learned from their narrative mistakes. Episode 2 also features a cliffhanger, but it plays much better than the base game’s ending. The big difference is that rather than having the G-man come out of nowhere and save the day, the game ends with a heartfelt fade to black with Alyx crying over the death of her father. Some might argue that this is Valve knowingly subverting their established history of having the G-man come to the rescue, but either way it works well.

Mass Effect Series

Both Mass Effect games end on what could be termed as cliffhangers, albeit relatively mild ones. It’s not like the second one ends with a revelation that the Illusive Man is Shephard’s father, or something. Rather, the cliffhangers serve as a reminder that the story isn’t over yet – the Reapers are still out there and someone needs to stop them. It’s like in a horror movie where the credits roll, but not without first leaving the door open for a sequel (is the monster really dead??).

What also helps soften the blow is that the primary narrative thrust in both games is resolved satisfactorily. In Mass Effect, you defeat Saren and the Reaper vessel, Sovereign; and in the sequel you do find out why all the colonists were disappearing. So even though they’re technically cliffhangers, I didn’t really feel left hanging by either game.

Assassin’s Creed Series

It feels like the Assassin’s Creed series has slowly been raising the stakes on their cliffhangers. The first game ends with a fairly innocuous cliffhanger where Desmond starts to experience the bleed effect (where assassin powers start carrying over into the real world). But to be honest, the ending didn’t elicit much of a response from me, simply because I was over the mediocre first game at that point.

Ubisoft followed it up with the vastly-improved Assassin’s Creed II, but also upped the ante on their cliffhanger. You find out you’re up against the clock for 2012, and it ends with you fleeing your hideout because the Templars have found you. It didn’t really resolve much of anything in the overall series, but I was still fine with how it wrapped up the chapter.

Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood is another story. The cliffhanger is extremely frustrating because of an earth shattering QTE where you can’t actually change what happens, followed by the game just ending. It didn’t leave me very happy, to say the least. I was so traumatized by the ending that I won’t commit it to page. I still definitely liked the game, but not the way it just abruptly ends.

Halo 2

You mind telling me what you’re doing on that ship?
–Sir, finishing this fight.

I’ll be honest – I never actually beat Halo 2 (I’ve beaten the first and the third), so I didn’t experience this cliffhanger first hand. But no discussion of cliffhangers would be complete without this oft-cited example. The game’s ending cut scene basically implies that most of what you were doing through the game was pointless because there are more Halos to destroy, and just when it seems like you’re about to kick ass and take names with the Master Chief on Earth, the game’s over.

This trilogy setup is unsurprisingly very common; the first game is meant to stand alone, in case a sequel is never made. But when the first game sells so well that a second and third game are guaranteed, often there will be a cliffhanger in the second which is resolved in the third. You see this in other mediums too, whether it’s Empire Strikes Back leading to Return of the Jedi, or The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest following The Girl Who Played With Fire.

Diablo Series

Even though these games are light on story, both do end with cliffhangers of sort. In the first game, after the main character defeats Diablo, he jams the soul stone into his head. The game then heavily foreshadows that the effect of the soul stone is overwhelming, and unsurprisingly it turns out in the sequel that Diablo took hold of that character’s body. The ending of the first game didn’t really feel very forced, and like those other cliffhangers in the first game of a series, it only hints at the potential for a sequel.

The base version of Diablo II ended with a much more surprising cliffhanger. It turns out the main character hasn’t been talking to the archangel Tyrael at all, but instead Diablo’s brother Baal. Well, the fact that he already gave the fake Tyrael Baal’s soul stone probably doesn’t help the situation, as Baal quickly takes over and starts burning everything. I remember when I first encountered the cliffhanger, I was genuinely surprised. The expansion hadn’t been announced, so I didn’t really know how long I’d have to wait to see the resolution. Thankfully, it wasn’t that long before Lord of Destruction came out and Baal, too, met his demise. The same can’t be said about Diablo III resolving the cliffhanger at the end of the second game’s expansion.

Dino Crisis 2

I haven’t played this dinosaur survival horror game, but from what I’ve seen its ending is a doozy. Only one of the main characters is able to go through a time machine portal in a building that’s about to explode. So that character, Regina, is told to go back in time, armed with the information on how to construct a time machine. She must then return to save the other two remaining main characters before the building explodes. It’s a paradox that would make Doc Brown from Back to the Future scratch his head. To make matters worse for fans, Dino Crisis 3 had a storyline that was completely unrelated to the second one, so the cliffhanger remains unresolved.

Monkey Island 2

I had forgotten about this cliffhanger, especially since it’s essentially retconned by Curse of Monkey Island, but it definitely ranks as a pretty confusing one. The ending of Monkey Island 2 heavily implies that everything which happens in the first two games was no more than the fantasy of a kid in an amusement park. So becoming a pirate, dating Elaine Marley, and everything else was just a dream. Of course, the alternate interpretation is that you’re just under a voodoo spell, and that’s the way they end up going when the story picks up in the third game.

Framing an entire story as a dream can be pretty frustrating, especially if it happens in an extended format like a television series. In this case of Monkey Island 2, however, it’s a more playful take on the idea, even down to the Return of the Jedi parody where LeChuck has his mask removed. Still, though, it was a pretty weird way for the game to end.

Feature articles appear every Wednesday on Game Canary.

Categories: Features

Tags: cliffhangers

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