The Gamer's Quarter

[Cycle]

* Call of Cthullu: Dark Corners of the Earth

Upen discovering what he actually is, and after all that he has witnessed, your character can no longer face life and offs himself.

* Flood

After 42 levels, you, as the final member of your species, finally emerge from the sewers for the first time in your life and are immediately squashed by a car.

* Tetris

You just can't win.

KEEP 'EM COMING.
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[Dracko]

Bitch, you stole my Tetris answer!
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"This is the most fun I've ever had without being drenched in the blood of my enemies!"

[Cycle]

I don't know what you're talking about, good sir. I don't need to listen to these WILD accusations!
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[The Great Unwashed]

The original Diablo!

Congrats on killing the big guy - now shove his soulstone in your forehead and go on to become him!

Awesome ending.
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[dhex]

planescape: torment.

i never got past the very first puzzle in dark corners of the earth. i should go back sometime.
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[kirkjerk]

Among classic games, it's kind of a trope, too numerous to list.

Even Pac-Man ends in a crush of a mangled maze and distorted characters, like the Pac version of "The Matrix" just started breaking down.

Or well... maybe there's a distinction to be made, games that in (rough) theory could be played forever but in practice (and maybe in theory depending on how well they're programmed) you're going to run out of lives, and games that have a distinct ending, but it's a downer, and not allowing the player's character to reach their stated goals.
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=/ \(<D)_/
==/\/ >_ kirkjerk.com

[dessgeega]

many of these examples just have negative endings - in terms of play, these are optimal endings, victory conditions. these are the resolutions of the story, they just happen to resolve badly for the protagonist (though not necessarily for the player, who has just "completed" the game).

as for arcade games that can only end in failure, i think missile command does the most with it.
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[Cossix]

The Darkness fits within these lines.

Spoilers!

Not only do you commit suicide (TWICE!) but at the end of the game, The Darkness helps you get your final revenge ONLY IF you allow it to gain full control over you, the very thing you'd been fighting against the entire game!

[dhex]

missle command is a good example, but almost every arcade game would have to be included because they almost all eventually end by the player giving up, having been quartered (or half dollared) out of commission.
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[bleak]

[ryan]

I worked on a game - Galactic Assault, I believe - where the last level is when you find out that an alien tearing through the galaxy is actually the universe's reaction to a parasitic organism (humans) and the final message from an ancient race is basically 'We all fucked up.' The End.
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Come to me, Mordel. We shall depart.

[Redeye]

[dhex]

well he's paying his fair share for once, to be sure.

but most people wouldn't consider an eternal damnation war a win.
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[bleak]

[Hospital Zone]

Breath of Fire Five: Dragon Quarter. It demands that you play for a while, die, then start from the beginning with some of your levels. Apparently you have to do this a few times to make it near the end and see any conclusion at all. There's no scripted ceremony in doing so either (although I think there's a bit of a flaky plot that mentions why in the manual), it's just a reload your stuff, like a new game + until you get it right. I was too frustrated with the game to begin with and didn't want to deal with that crap so I put it away.
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he was the first to realize there was no future in farming

[Redeye]

[Intentionally Wrong]

The Interactive Fiction game "Rameses". While dessgeega might contest its status as "unwinnable", the "victory condition" represents the protagonist's ultimate rejection of all of the player's attempts to improve the quality of his life.

[bleak]

[dessgeega]

[Cycle]

The reminds me:

* DEFCON

Everybody dies!
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[Redeye]

[helicopterp]

Good catch on defcon, cycle.
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Like you thought you'd seen copter perverts before. They were nothing compared to this one.

[JasonMoses]

[dhex]

[Worm]

Immortal Defense, DROD, Halflife.
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Exit stage left, exit stage right, there is no place to run, all the fuses in the exit signs have been BURNT OUT

[Harveyjames]

Every Leisure Suit Larry Game, since the beginning of the next game always sees Larry out on his arse again, the girl of his dreams exposed as shallow, heartless and cruel. It's a pretty bleak series of games. Bad sax, bean dip, casinos and cruise ships. It's got a David Lynchian quality to it that's completely unintentional; check out a playthrough of Larry 3 to see what I mean.

[Cycle]

I played through Larry 3, the point and click remake released not that long ago... man, that game was so brutally hard! It happened in a sort of real-time, and if you didn't know where and when to be or figure something out soon enough, you'd be screwed.

I still loved playhing through it though. With a walkthrough, of course. I like how every airport looks exactly the same.

EDIT: LOL, nevermind. It was Larry 2! I don't think I played the third one, now that I think of it.
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