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I don't see what the problem with the endings are. The moment Alicia forced Verso to continue to live is the moment she broke down all her barriers, she was making excuses about Renoir, real or not, to just stay there forever. Verso was unchanged from the beginning to the end, he was in constant grief and was tired of all the grief his fake and real family were in, and has made it pretty clear he is tired and even Verso's soul was done, he was done for quite a while and you've met him too many times as well to not understand that.
yeah, that one was objectively worse.
that being said, i think people feel so strongly about the game's story/endings—good or bad—because they enjoyed the rest of the game so much. it's a great game, with great dialogue and great music and great characters, and for me that makes the effect of a bad story much worse, not more manageable.
it's the same reason i've never rewatched game of thrones—no matter how amazing the first half is, once it crashes and burns into its disaster of a conclusion, it has also cheapened all of the earlier seasons, too.
It is and remains a great game, but the sledgehammer that hammers the dilemma into me is something I would have preferred to have gently invented myself (or not).
no. i prefer bittersweet stories. no story is complete without a touch of tragedy.
my problem with this game's story is that it actively undercuts every triumphant story beat with tragedy. there is nothing bittersweet about it, only bitter.
first, they replace their hook (lumiere's fight for survival and the slow extinction of humankind) with—and i understand this is only my opinion, but you asked for my opinion, so don't give me ♥♥♥♥ for it—a far-less-interesting family melodrama. i don't give a ♥♥♥♥ about renoir's family, not only because it's just less compelling but also because it is actively taking away from a narrative i WAS enjoying.
secondly, they begin to rely too heavily on plot twists solely in service of that far-less-interesting family melodrama. every good thing that happens to the party ends up being a 'gotcha' moment that turns out to be awful for everyone and also leads back to the family melodrama. i like epics with dozens of characters and several interwoven plot threads and world-ending stakes; they took a premise which scratched that itch and through repeated plot twists reduced it to a soap opera whose only stakes were a single family's mental health. that's why i think it's a bad story.
Yes, it leaves a negative legacy. Like when your parents die and they don't leave you anything except a huge debt. That is a kind of legacy too, but is it desireable?
Does it? It not only ignores the struggle of all the people inside of that world, it undoes it completely.
Verso created that world as a source of fun and joy. A place where he could play with his family. Just look at his creations: Esquie, the Gestral, the Gigantas (sp), they are symbols of the kind of world that existed before. The war between Aline and Renoir destroyed that world and made it into one of pain and suffering. To respect the legacy of the world Verso created, would be to atleast first restore it to a better world, before eventually ending it.
Consider who actually carries the paints legacy now that its gone.
Renoir? No, he is the one that completely destroyed the Canvas' world.
Clea? No, she was the one to create the Nevrons and help destroy it and the entities inside. Aline? Sure, but her last memories will be of a completely destroyed world that she failed to protect against her family, who in their desire to get her out of her grief had zero issues destroying that legacy.
Alicia? She came to become attached to that legacy and as she was losing it, she struggled to save it, it became something for her that spurred her life back into action, in contrast to previously living as a living ghost, only to be betrayed and see it all erased.
So for her I would say the 'legacy' involves being even more traumatized as a result.
(note: all of this isn't inherently tied to the Canvas being destroyed, its a result of it being destroyed without any healthy closure and allowing the characters involved to move on first)
That is because you are right, and it is.
If they made the endings (as Verso and Maelle ending) resolve more naturally then the Verso ending would clearly be the bad ending, and Maelle ending the good ending.
It has to be, because Verso's motivations aren't good motivations. I have compared him to a villain before. Like Caius in FF13-2, he sets out to destroy the world and succeeds by the end of the game. Meanwhile, whatever you might think of her mental fortitude and state of mind, Maelle/Alicia clearly has good motivations. Her's was a hero's journey.
Naturallly the villain ending will from our perspective be a bad ending, and the hero's ending a good ending. One ending destroys all of the characters we got attached to and learned to care about, and they do it as selfish betrayal. The other ending tries to save them, perhaps while sacrifising herself in the process.
The only way to make the endings like that seem balanced is to frame the better ending as ''no actually, we made it look very creepy to indicate that its not really a good ending''
The problem is a narrative problem. All endings should have been a branch off Maelle's choices made. We shouldnt have gotten a choice to control Verso in the ending sequence.
By doing that, the player essentially takes agency away from Maelle (the hero, and the one who most shares the player's perspective of the story) and gives it to Verso (the villain).
Even if we don't consider him a villain, his actions ultimately are that of a villain or antagonist. If instead the choice was let to Maelle, then it would feel as if the endings all branch off the heroes perspective and also more in line with what the player experienced, making it feel more like the player, in a way, makes the actual choice.
In order to pick the Verso ending given the choice presented, means actively opposing the story experience that we went through playing this game. The Prologue and act 1 feels? The act 2 wonder and exploration of the world? We have to actively oppose that and say ''nah, lets fight to erase that''. Some like to say ''Verso did it for the Dessendre family'', but a) we are not giving enough story interactions with them to care, and b) his actions contradict that as its clear that for Alicia it results in a worst case scenario. (Alicia's life outside of the Canvas and what her experience inside means for her is not discussed at all, which is a huge narrative screw up)
Meanwhile the Maelle ending, which represents all of that player experience, is hamfisted with creepy framing that makes it look like a bad ending. Its not a natural conclusion of picking that choice.
Yes, the restoration of the Canvas, and using that restored Canvas as a means to get Alicia to appreciate life again while paving the way for her improvement in the real world.
That way the legacy of Verso is passed onto Alicia, kept alive through inheritance for Aline's sake, Renoir can be glad that Alicia is not living like a ghost anymore and that Aline left Verso's legacy to Alicia, and Clea has Renoir back so she can fight that war with him and maybe also help Alicia teach her painting.
People talk about the theme for this game being Grief, but for some reason seem to forget that with grief, whats most important is moving on. You don't move on from grief by removing ways to deal with it, you move on by resolving the grief in a healthy way.
But I doubt the creators of the game will write it like this, since imo they are too obsessed with Tragedy and sad endings. I don't think they took enough lessons from jrpgs if they think a story can't or shouldn't atleast aim to have a good ending. There's a reason why FFX got a story sequel.
Especially in the modern days where there's already enough sadness and tragedy around in real life, a story that ends on atleast somewhat of a hopeful note (even if its just a glimmer of hope) resonates better.
At minimum I think, if they were going to go with the choice between Verso and Maelle regardless, then they should have given resolution to the Canvas people in Verso's ending, (instead of Verso betraying everyone after the heroes saved the day) and in Maelle's ending they just shouldn't have done the creepy framing.
Let players decide for themselves if they consider either ending a good or a bad ending.
But yeah, we will see if any of these discussions and feedback actually matters and they despite to do anything with it in form of a DLC or whatever.
As I've mentioned before at a different time, I dont have much faith in the writing considering how they managed to crash the landing of this game's story.
On top of that both endings didn't feel very satisfying like you have two choices, let everyone and everything die or let them live as slaves. Idk man overall the game was extremly solid but A3 soured the whole thing for me.
The family melodrama is basically what the whole story is, ever since Fake Alicia appears to Maelle in the black and white world.
None of the issues you presented tell me why these endings are bad, because you do have an ending just for you, Maelle's ending.
When you explore the world, it's stated multiple times they are sentient and independant.
To them their life aren't fake.
It's even worse than the Matrix because they can't escape, so they are dommed to disapear with the painting.
yes. that's true. thank you. i'm not trying to be counseled or convinced, i'm airing my grievances in a public forum to see if my point of view is shared by like-minded peers. it's a kind of validation-seeking, right? makes me feel less crazy. i'm glad someone finally got that through their thick skull.
the family melodrama is the whole story. that's my problem with it. had i known it was going to be family melodrama the whole way down, i'd never have bought the game. i got bait and switched with my wallet and my time. it's a bad feeling. i don't even have any thoughts on the ending because the part of the story i liked ended in act 2.
Pretty much.
If the story (and everything else) in the earlier parts of the game wasn't so good then people wouldn't care so much that that the later parts weren't done very well.
The story was an amazing fantasy story, that became a poorly written drama story.
Its like going from Lord of the Rings to Eastenders.
Verso betrayed literally everyone in his life. And he was about to betray everyone again. Why should we care if Alicia betrayed one person and its him and its as direct response to his betrayal?
With that said, people have already said that we don't consider her keeping Verso alive to be a good thing and something that shouldn't be part of her ending. (or atleast, not in that way, maybe if there was some way to give him a will to life again)
- Choose Verso to kick Maelle's butt and basically invalidate your entire journey just to show the game that you learned your lesson like a good little boy
- Or choose Maelle to kick Verso's butt and give the game a middle finger out of disappointment
What amazing choices truly, as if people are blind to the fact that the story is about overcoming grief through escapism, as if it wasn't obvious from the get-go of ACT III.But I kept playing because I was hoping surely they won't turn this into JUST a basic plot about escapism, surely they will not invalidate their own world-building and instead elevate their characters to rise above such a basic dilemma.
Like come on... really? That's how you're gonna end this fantastic intricate story after 120h? With something as basic as eScApIsM bAd? And then not only does it do it, but it does it by completely ignoring the relationships, the choices, the journey... making Maelle and Verso acting like the most insufferable brats after everything we all went through together, while completely ignoring Lune and Scielle - using them as mere tearjerker plot devices.
And then the endings too just being melancholic self-absorbed cliffhangers about Maelle where she is either depressed in real life or happily deluded in another life, neither which show her character growth nor progress the lore/universe itself any further.
If someone were to ask me what I thought of Clair Obscur prior to its final 5 minutes, I would've said this is the best game I ever played without a moment of doubt.
But with its final 5 minutes... I felt like Verso, wishing I could Gommage myself from existence. It was so unsatisfying and hate what it did to its characters at the end just to preach eScApIsM bAd!
I personally would have found it boring if it played out exactly like i expected, just defeating the paintress and then everyone lives happily ever after
I mean there could have been another plot in which the paintress was actually good in a different way, but i also expected that
what i didnt expect was what happened, i get that you are saying it became just about a families mental health, but i personally liked that it became a story about grief, letting go, and thinking about fantasy worlds we escape into to get time off our real lives.
It became way more personal and thought inducing on a emotional level than a story which you propose for could be
but i get that those are opinions, not everyone likes the same kind of stories, its often based on what people deal with in their own lives, some just want an epic cool story, not get emotional and have to think about real life topics