Batman (NES)… I recall there was precisely one place in the whole game where you had to press the “down” button, and it hit me like a dead-end. More impactful than super-metroid’s noob-bridge, as i had advance warning for that one.
I have not played this game and I
rememberknow this scene.
You didn’t say it had to be a pleasant memory…
This is the one NES game I haven’t replayed as an adult. That god damned seaweed… The whole thing is a slog.
You’re a slog /s
Oh fuck! If only you had a picture of the damn bombs.
Have to get there without getting insta-killed first…
Portal 1 where you find Ratman’s hideouts. It was amazing environmental storytelling that a newbie player like myself back then could’ve easily missed. Felt like playing the friggin cave allegory. I was obsessed with that game. So amazing.
Walking around trying to stay on the blood trail while listening to that baby cry was something …
12 year old me: “WHATTHEFUCKWHATTHEFUCKWHATTHEFUCK!”
I had no warning the first time I encountered the T-Rex and absolutely shat myself
The D-Day landing scene in CoD 2 was i n s a n e at the time. Goosebumps
Shit I still remember this
I don’t know if this counts as a “scene” but the installer for Red Alert 2.
This was my first time experiencing a game installation experience like this and also probably my last time.
Launching the installer for Red Alert 2 and getting greeted with voice acting, game art and hype music was just so unexpected for me back then and really hyped me up.
It’s such a crazy experience, but it’s the type of experience that will likely never come back.
“Warning, Military Software Detected. Top secret clearance required”.
I loved hearing that every time
“Hell March”, right? Loved it.
Here I am, ten years old. Just got home school. Figured I’d get some prince of Persia in before my parents get home. I just got a soundblaster 2.0 and I’ve got BIG speakers, enjoying the amazing sounds at high volume. I’m puzzling, exploring, getting used to there being piles of bones here and there. I’m backtracking through level 3 and this skeleton fucking rises and draws its sword with an eery sound. I’m shitting my pants here and reactively press the reset button on the computer to get out of this.
Loved this game. It inspired the Tomb Raider series quite a bit. Including the Mirror Prince /Atlantean Lara part.
First time realizing you have to wait for the rat to come help you was mind blowing.
I remember thinking that video games will never be more realistic.
I mean the movements were hella realistic for their time, because of the rotoscoping they used.
I would have wanted her to be… curious. And willful, unstoppable even… but with enough compassion to… heal the world… just a little bit.
This was an incredible scene for me too.
The in game memorial for Lance Reddick also hit me pretty hard.
For Mr Reddick, I shed a tear or two. What an astonishing actor and his performance in games too. Man, when I recognized him on Lost. But…
I WEPT LIKE A CHILD at this last scene 😭
Going blind into the game I did NOT expect that!
The animation is crazy visceral. I had nightmares for days.
Tomb Raider (2013)
Played that series last year, (recommend them, fun games.) there were a few “Jesus fucking christ” death animations for sure.
There’s a clip of Conan O’Brien playing this, and you can tell he’s definitely not a gamer, and he’s so shocked by a death animation. I don’t really understand their place in the game, they are so disproportionately violent compared to everything else, and it’s random.
There is a novel called Blood Meridian that has a lot of incredibly violent scenes to the point many consider it unfilmable, but that violence is depicted as an almost detached spectacle, the prose is externalised and the scenes are never lingered on for pleasure. It’s generally considered perhaps the most violent classic novel, but the entire metaphysics and purpose of the book exists in this violence.
When I first played tomb raider, I didn’t notice half the violent scenes, because the medium is so unnecessarily stuffed with it. It wasn’t until replaying it after seeing the Conan O’Brien interview that I really honed in on it.
In comparison to Blood Meridian, it’s so much worse. It doesn’t really have a message or a story purpose beyond showing the setting as dangerous, and it lingers on the violence, taking pleasure in the sudden violence, that has befallen our protagonist who we deeply care about and can internalise her suffering easily. We see a young woman, who we live through and care for deeply, come to a brutal, sickening end due to sheer bad luck, and then we hit restart.
I’m not even really mad about it, like it said, I’m so desensitised to video game violence that I only noticed the brutality of these scenes after seeing Conan. Perhaps the creep of violence in the medium alongside the fact that in 10 seconds, she’s fine and you do it again is enough to justify it, but it’s weird that it exists so normally in the first place.
Bleghh
Arthur’s death scene in red dead redemption hit me so hard, even though I knew it was coming. The music, the build up. I was already a mess losing my horse. It was brutal and amazing, and now I play this game at least once every year.
