Why are Type-Moon games so depressing?

Visual Novel Community Archive, 2000-2009
#1

I just marathoned through Fate/Stay Night’s 3 scenarios and it seemed to just get progressively more depressing until it culminated into a veritable cluster fuck of melancholy by the time the Heaven’s Feel scenario ended. Since the game forces you to play all 3 scenarios in order (I originally intended to play through Unlimited Blade Works), I’m under the impression the last story was the one they wanted us to see most as the “true” ending.

Then there was Tsukihime, where like 99% of the endings are pretty much bad in some way, either ending with the main character’s death or the disappearance of the heroine or some other crap, which pretty much spread to FSN’s more optimistic endings.

Is there some kind of literary significance to these melancholic endings? If the games were made with a larger variety of more positive outcomes, would they have not been as popular as they are now?

I mean there are “good” endings which aren’t based on the true endings but they seem so shallow and superficial that you feel the “True” ending takes a greater priority as a canonical conclusion.

#2

According to the scenarist, all three routes are on equal footing. However, Fate is actually the true expression of the original concept (and is thus the defining scenario, as far as the character designer is concerned), which may be why you’re forced to read it first.

I can’t think of one.

My guess is that it’s a matter of the writer’s tastes. After all, some people find tragic conclusions or emotional partings to be particularly romantic (i.e. Korean film/TV producers thrive on this stuff).

#3

Some people don’t equal a “good story” with a “happy story”. For my part, I consider stories such as Heaven’s Feel, or most of the routes in Tenshi no inai jyuunigatsu or Gin’iro to be rather beautiful and poetic.
As I used to quote:[list]
[]“Love is a delusion made up by weak hearts & souls in which clever people affect to believe in order to manipulate the former.”[/]
[]“Love is only interesting when it brings great unhappiness, unbelievable suffering, crucifying pain, unfathomable sorrow, endless despair and eternal damnation. When insanity and death become the only ways to escape from love, it means the love story has started to reach an interesting point.”[/]
[]“Tragic, deceptive, insane, innocent-looking, manipulative, immoral, lonely… it’s what makes a girl fascinating and desirable. So lonely and hurt in her heart you absolutely want to comfort her, so insane and immoral you absolutely fear to become close to her, so deceptive and manipulative you wonder if you’re acting out of your free will.
This is what I call ‘fascination’. This is what describes my ideal girl.”[/]
[]“The death of a beautiful woman is unquestionably the most poetical topic in the world.” – Edgar Allan Poe[/]
[]“What is love if not painful and tragic? It’s just boring.” – Elaine Barlow[/]
[]“I enjoy stories of impossible love, where society, fate, nature, divinities oppose the lovers, where love is a poisonous nectar that turns its drinkers drunk at the first sip, making them lose all reason, yet so bewitching they can’t live without drinking more while knowing only suffering, despair and death wait for them in the end, a dream so soft they want it to last forever though aware they’d have to wake up; where love is the only gain and its price can’t be paid by any human being. Love should burn the lovers, passion should devour them, desire should consume them; their only wish, and the only thing they can’t have, ever. For similar reasons, I enjoy stories where love is supposed to be the ultimate saviour, the one thing that would redeem or save its heroes, but fails to; where people would doom themselves because of love.
It’s a pity though I never completely found the kind of story I’d love best: one with eternal damnation and reincarnations, of sin committed out of love and for love, of never reached redemption, where love would be the sword that allows victory, the Graal that heals injuries, the poison that destroys the body and the evil that corrupts the soul.”[/][/list]Truth to be said, it’s what Romanticism is about.

#4

‘Tenshi no inai jyuunigatsu’ (December When There Is No Angel) has been on my top 5 list for years precisely because of that - a beautiful, melancholic and ultimately very satisfying story.
Gin’iro is a classic masterpiece, no doubt about that. One of the titles that got me into visual novels, in fact.

#5

Hmmmm… doesn’t that remind me of… :idea:

Of course! You try to write that story yourself because nobody else does it for you, don’t you?

#6

QFT. Outside of b-gaming, some of the best movies I’ve seen have “not happy” endings: Arlington Road, The Devil’s Advocate, The Usual Suspects, Unforgiven, etc.

Also Fatal Frame 2 (for PS2 and XBOX) is one of the best twin centric stories every made by humanity - the canon ending (Normal) makes Narg cry. The “happy” ending is just plain dumb when you consider everything that happened, while the “good” ending is freaky because it’s not really a joyful ending at all… plus I swear you see Mayu give a devious smile, as if she’s happy about her sister’s plight. Scary… but Narg would still go for them. :smiley:

I used to like Final Fantasy X somewhat, because of the sad ending (the central theme being forgiveness and sacrifice)… but the X-2 addition screwed those thoughts up.

#7

Not that I’m attempting to think very highly of myself or anything. But I’m essentially working on building my own game or VN. This was something I had engaged in since like 2000 as I gradually kept brainstorming ideas. Now I’m just about ready to write but when I started checking things out like Kara No Kyoukai, Tsukihime and Fate/Stay Night. I noticed many of my ideas and concepts were similar if not the same as Kinoko Nasu. I realized that he and I have similar ideas. Only I wish to take my ideas to another direction.

Undoubtedly when I finish my work, if executed the way I imagined it, will probably feel like a game in the Type-Moon universe, without the type-moon cliches.
So thats why part of the reason I asked my question is because I want to minimize cliches, but I also want my desires as an author/scenario writer to be reflected in my work. My goal isn’t so much to become a famous bestseller, but rather write a story good enough to attract an artist that would make my work come to life visually. That for me would be the ultimate profit.

#8

Of course.

#9

I like the Usual suspects too Narg. SPOILERS FOR FFVII AND FFX . ffx was cheapened buy the end I felt a stereotypical hero dies so heroine can live. In FFVII when Aeris dies it was cold and meaningless, I felt hollow and empty-that is how death scenes should be done ladies and gentlemen.

#10

Kind of, but not really. Well, for FFVII, because I’d already been spoiled, it didn’t mean anything at all; but I’d dispute that characterization of FFX.

MAJOR FFX SPOILERS FOLLOW

[spoiler]It’s more than that – Tidus never lived. Oh, sure, pehaps once upon a time, someone named Tidus lived in the land of Zanarkand. But the Tidus you play as is not that Tidus, he’s the waking dream of a people long long dead, themselves held in bondage by a dead sorceror who cannot move on. Everything about FFX is set up to lead to Tidus’ obliteration; the forces maintaining his existence are the same forces twisting and breaking the world unto the point of destruction.

If it feels like the end came out of nowhere only to drive a knife between Yuna and Tidus, that isn’t how it went down. Tidus is an aeon, Yuna is a summoner. She can make him do anything she wants. If she wanted to save him, she’d just do it. And her land would be screwed; at the end of FFX, summoning has been destroyed, because if it hadn’t been they could not have won.

It’s a fine point, but there’s a lot of subtlety in FFX’s story – much of it, unfortunately, left to read between the lines. Also it did not help that the game was too cavalier about the fourth wall, and its own munchkin nature. But the subtlety makes the game a lot more interesting than a lot of other RPGs.[/spoiler]

#11

I think the problem I have with poor endings in B-Games is you get all this build up, and you get immersed into the role of the protagonist, only to face an unavoidable disappointment no matter what you do. So it feels like all that effort was for nothing.

Well executed I suppose the bad ending would be nice. I’m still debating how I should plan for the ending of my scenario.

#12

You wrote about “poor” and “bad” endings, not “happy” or “unhappy” ones, which[list=1][]shows your bias about unhappy endings,[/][]doesn’t apply to Tsukihime, or Fate/stay night since in bad endings, the protagonist dies and actual game endings are either “Happy Endings”, “Normal Endings” or “True Endings”.[/][/list]That being written, I think your “(…) only to face an unavoidable disappointment no matter what you do. So it feels like all that effort was for nothing” comment shows a simplistic, almost naive, POV about stories. To me, accomplishment isn’t about complete, immediate happiness, nor even success, but about what was learnt, what was done and how it was done. It’s not about you, but about you in relation with the others.
To take game examples, Hisui’s True Ending wasn’t “for nothing” because Akiha and Kohaku had diedbut very worth it, for what Shiki and Hisui learnt from this experience, for what Kohaku learnt in the end, and for what was done: the release of everyone from their past. Sakura’s Normal Ending wasn’t “for nothing” because Shirou and Ilya has died and Sakura spent the rest of her life alone, growing flowers but very worth it, for the flowers Sakura grew were flowers of forgiveness, and, ultimately, upon her death, she forgave, was forgiven and met Shirou again.
You see, it’s the difference between Andersen’s “Little Mermaid” and Walt Disney’s happy-ending adaptation.

Failure and sadness teach you better than success and happiness.

#13

I agree with everything OLF said, but he left out one important thing. The REAL reason why Type-Moon games are depressing:

Isn’t it sad?

#14

You know, with all the rumours about a Sacchin route in the remake, TYPE-MOON should make a side story portraying Sacchin not having a route and people commenting about it, just to not ruin the zillions threads and doujinshis about how “isn’t it sad, Sacchin?” :twisted:

#15