End of Game

SteelRabbit

So, I finished Baldur's Gate for the first time. I killed Sarevok, and was treated to an end cinematic. Then the game just went back to the intro cinematic.

Is that it? No adulation of the citizenry of Baldur's Gate? No finding out how well my character did on the "good" path? Does all my hard work end with just a(n albeit cool) cinematic?

I played the game a bunch as a kid but never beat it before.

ajwz

Nope sorry. You'll find out more about why at the start of bg2

Eudaemonium

Welcome to endings in the 90s.

bill_zagoudis

come on,nothing is meaningfull after you defeat Sarevok(unless you didn't complete the expansion adventures,but why wouldn't you?)

TJ_Hooker

You're actually supposed to receive a solid gold medal from Beamdog. It should be coming in the mail any day.

Majoca

Oh no! I forgot people expect games to have an 'End Game' after the game ends. I wonder if we will get End Movies at the cinemas, when the film ends, there is 2 hours of what happened after the credits.

simply killing sarevok and finding out what happened to your foster father is the end.

secretmantra

Do you want a medal or a chest to pin it on? :P

Madhax

@Majoca

Inception 2: Dom plays with his kids for two hours, taking breaks every ten minutes to check his totem.

Majoca

@Madhax

Haha that is a good example. I actually miss feeling like I have finished a game. I am not sure anyone feels the same, but does anyone remember the feeling you get when you watched a long adventure like Lord of the rings, and you have the strange feeling that you are happy it all worked out but you are not quite satisfied, you cannot accept the peace and quiet, I think that's reason frodo leaves the shire.

I get that feeling with some games, I liked how mass effect 1 ended and when the credits played I didnt feel the need to replay it, and I was happy things worked out but also felt there was more to be done ready for the sequel. If a game doesn't have an end it annoys me. Skyrim is prime example you keep playing until you're sick of seeing it, though it is a sandbox it would be nice to see an ending moment where some credits play and information is given to you how things turned out, Bit like dragon age or mass effect 3 Extended cut but now im just rabbiting on.

scriver

Majoca said:

Oh no! I forgot people expect games to have an 'End Game' after the game ends. I wonder if we will get End Movies at the cinemas, when the film ends, there is 2 hours of what happened after the credits.

simply killing sarevok and finding out what happened to your foster father is the end.

There already are "end movies" to movies. It's the 2-5 minutes after the climax that let's the viewer calm down and/or shows what happened after the Main Conflict was resolved. In fact, they're common in all kinds of narrative media. Call it epilogue, resolution, outro, denouement, whatever, it goes by a lot of names. Beside the above, it can also give a sense of weight to the story and prove that the whole struggle was worthwhile. For example; The reward scene from Star Wars; The sheet-texting scene from 28 days later; every "the hero rides off into the sunset" scene ever; and so on.

As it is now, BG just cuts off right after the climax. And well, while I'm not saying there has to be an epilogue, there's still a reason it is such a common technique.

Gallowglass

scriver said:

As it is now, BG just cuts off right after the climax. And well, while I'm not saying there has to be an epilogue, there's still a reason it is such a common technique.

Yes, and indeed the BG series does have a "what happened to them after it was all over" epilogue, but it's at the end of BG2:ToB. In BG1/BGee we're only playing the first part of the story, it's not all over yet, so an epilogue isn't yet needed to give emotional closure.

There could be a cutscene to link over the gap of a few months between the events of BG1 and the start of BG2, and that'd be nice, but it's a luxury less necessary to player satisfaction than the real epilogue when the story is really over. I guess Overhaul decided that they have more urgent things on which to spend their resources, and they're probably right.