From scripts to actual cutscenes, videogame developers do their best to bring out the emotions in their consumers and players, to make them feel more immersed in the world they've so diligently created. Games utilize everything at their disposal, from making players laugh to even shedding a few tears.
There are moments in gaming that can elicit a feeling of sadness from the player, but very few games can make the player sob right from the get-go. These are some of the saddest opening sequences in gaming history. Get the tissues ready.
7 Life Is Strange
Life Is Strange begins with Max Caulfield returning to her hometown of Arcadia Bay to attend Blackwell Academy. During her photography class, Max experiences some catastrophic visions of a tornado destroying the nearby lighthouse and approaching her town. To regain her composure, she heads to the bathroom. She then witnesses her classmate, Nathan Prescott, have an argument with a girl and shoot her.
Max then develops her rewinding time ability and saves the girl's life, setting the plot for the entirety of Life Is Strange. The girl is revealed to be her childhood friend, Chloe. It is heartwarming to see the pair reunited, but simultaneously saddening to know that Chloe was destined to die. Without Max's accidental telekinetic interference, Nathan would have shot and killed Chloe in the bathroom in a fit of rage.
6 Firewatch
In this first-person exploration game, players take on the role of a middle-aged man named Henry, whose wife sadly develops early-onset dementia. To escape from his bleak reality and his wife's deteriorating state, Henry takes a job as a fire lookout stationed in Shoshone National Forest, Wyoming, hence the game's title, Firewatch.
Firewatch is truly a melancholic journey, from beginning to end, as Henry forms a bond with Delilah, who is a fellow lookout and his only emotional outlet. The players' choices will influence the tone of Henry's relationship with Delilah. While patrolling this idyllic wilderness, Henry encounters an unsolved mystery, finding the belongings of the son of the previous fire lookout. This discovery unravels a whole can of worms which proves that one cannot outrun their problems, as the metaphor of the later all-consuming wildfire highlights.
5 BioShock 2
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BioShock 2 begins in the underwater city of Rapture in the year 1958. The first-person perspective shows a Little Sister holding up a Big Daddy doll. The reflection in the window indicates that the player character is a Big Daddy themselves, holding hands with this Little Sister, clearly showing their emotional attachment. The unlikely pair then become separated after the Little Sister senses more ADAM.
The Big Daddy finds her again, surrounded by ADAM-addicted splicers. The Big Daddy shows his strength as he brutalizes the splicers, coming to the Little Sisters' defense. Sofia Lamb appears and says the Little Sister "is not your daughter," and the child's name is Eleanor Lamb, her biological daughter. She then commands the Big Daddy to kneel and shoot himself with a gun. With Eleanor's cry of "Daddy" reverberating through the silence, the pistol fires, and the screen fades to black, revealing the BioShock 2 title screen dripping with water resembling tears.
4 Stray
Stray's prologue begins with a family of three cats waking up and watching a thunderstorm. This steampunk-looking environment is a cats' playground as they get to parkour and explore pipes and overground wastelands, meowing along the way. Players build an emotional attachment to these cats, as they can have cute interactions like drinking water together or nuzzling each other.
Stray takes a sad turn as the other three cats jump across an ominously-squeaking pipe. The playable cat is the last to jump across, and as they do so, the pipe breaks, causing them to lose footing. Their family looks down, meowing in terror as the playable cat scrabbles to get back up and eventually tumbles down into the bleak darkness. Their family's concerned meows echo as the player regains consciousness in a world far from what they know.
3 That Dragon, Cancer
That Dragon, Cancer is a short but emotional rollercoaster that revolves around Ryan, Amy Green, and their son Joel. It documents their real-life experiences as Joel was diagnosed with an atypical teratoid rhabdoid tumor, a type of cancer, aged twelve months. He was given just four months to live, but Joel defied all odds, living for four more years after his first diagnosis.
That Dragon, Cancer is played as an exploration game with both first- and third-person perspectives through several abstracted scenes based on the Greens' real-life experiences raising Joel and his heroic fight against cancer. There are fourteen short vignette stages where the player gets to experience emotional moments Joel's parents faced throughout his life; this game memorializes Joel Green and has touched the hearts of many gamers worldwide.
2 The Last Of Us
The Last of Us genuinely toys with emotions as players are subjected to its immersive and emotionally scarring prologue. Players are immediately put in the role of Joel's daughter Sarah, as she is waiting for him to come home from work. As the night progresses, players see the horrors of the zombie-like outbreak through her innocent eyes.
These small moments with Sarah, the coziness of their initial home environment, and Joel's desperation make Sarah's death at the end of the prologue much more heartbreaking. As they reach a survivor's camp, Sarah is shot by a soldier, and she bleeds out in Joel's arms, who was ultimately unable to save her. This event in The Last of Us emotionally scars him and foreshadows his later bond with Ellie.
1 Ori And The Blind Forest
Ori And The Blind Forest has one of the most tear-jerking introductions of any game in history, making players feel emotionally attached to the Studio Ghibli-esque characters, Naru and Ori. Coupled with the immersive narration from the Spirit Tree, the unlikely pair form an adorably-flourishing relationship as Naru provides and cares for Ori as her own.
This idyllic and peaceful Nibel Forest turns dark as the Spirit Tree begins to decay, leaving the world desolate and empty. Naru sacrifices her last piece of fruit to Ori and slumps to the ground. Ori ventures outside, finding a bountiful food source. As Ori runs home, with arms brimming with apples, they see mirages of Ori's memories with Naru. Upon entering the cave, Ori hopefully offers Naru some fruit, only to find out she had passed away, likely from starvation. Players watch on, heartbroken, as Ori curls up on Naru one last time in grief before leaving their home with "no reason to stay."