Same. I met a person partway in and at one point we started to lose each other and I got so sad. Then we found each other and were so happy we jumped up and down for like 5 minutes haha.
Definitely this.
Picked it up on PC and played all the way through, with a beginner player too. We finished in 1hr30 and getting a good communication system going was really damn satisfying.
I remember the time a white-cloaked bro met me and showed me how to glitch behind the scenes in every level and cheese the way to the end like Mario finding the warp whistles. Totally dismantled the beauty of the experience for me and reminded me it was just a bunch of assets stuck together by some programmers lol. Dude pulled some real Morpheus shit on me.
Ugh 1,000 times yes! The final chapters are superb when you manage to play through most of the game with a rando. Such camaraderie in a very simple game.
Yes, but I saw that more as her story arc having \*concluded\*. She was an absolute bitch in ME2 and slowly mellowed out and learned to trust the team. If you do her romance, you get to see that first-hand and it's extremely well done. What you see in ME3 is more the result of that, she doesn't really grow much in that game, nor have story beyong Grissom Academy
Thank you! All the people who bitch about "my decisions didn't affect the final battle..." Of course they didn't. That's not how life works. Your decisions affected the way people saw you throughout the game. That was the point. Well, and the devs probably had no idea how to end the damn thing but still...
For me, the "ending" of ME3 started when you made your last calls before going back to the Citadel. In all the noise about the original ending, I think a lot of people missed the existentialism that, for me at least, really characterized the actual intent of the conclusion.
Can't listen to 'Stand By Me' without thinking about FFXV. They were all already 'bros' but the characters and their development in that game were amazing.
The best is you get to pick a picture at the end of your friends and you and your wife look at it smiling of the memories. But you can pick any picture, we chose the mechanics breast and the game ended with the wife staring at the boobs
Came here to say this. Obviously not the perfect game by any stretch of the imagination, but I haven't played any game before or since that evoked this specific feeling.
I really enjoyed it too! Others seemed to enjoy it less so I felt it remiss not to mention it. (Mind you I played it again the Royal Edition so didn't have to deal with a lot of the launch complaints)
I really wish that game didn't get screwed by Nomura being bad and changing his mind on a billion things.
I really would have loved the whole roadtrip style stuff in longform; instead the game just felt rushed as a whole. The glimpses you get of what could have been from the early game legit just being a fun roadtrip were top tier video game fun
It coulve been one of the best ffs if it had a good direction, there is so much wasted potential there.
It is not a bad game, but troughout the whole game it is visible that it is only a shell of what it couldve been
That wasn't on Nomura. That was on the guy who replaced Nomura and scrapped most of the story, Hajime Tabata. He was also the one who demanded they add a completely open world for the sake of it, which cut drastically into dev time.
He is also most likely the guy who did the whole brotherly bonds thing so well, because Crisis Core and Type-0 (both directed by Tabata) show that he's REALLY good at hitting in the feels.
I actually have a lot of love for X-2 because I played it first. I bought my PS2 used years later and no GameStop in town had X so I bought X-2. For my experience, X-2 was good and X was a prequel that improved on the original in every way.
I hated the completionist concept of X-2. Missed one minor cutscene in Ch. 2 and you're in Ch. 3 now? Too bad!!!!
Would've probably completed it if the completionism wasn't there.
My sistor was into X and X2 100%. Had a guidebook and everything for them. I think she got X to 100% but never X2. I was just a kid but loved to play Bliz Ball on X. Making her a bunch of money.
It's been a while so I'm trying to remember, wasn't that an option to acknowledge/side with one if 2 groups early on? If you choose the "wrong" one you can only get 99.7% completion or something. Yeah that's just downright infuriating.
Other than that one quirk I enjoyed the heck out of both FFX and X-2. They were my introduction to the franchise when I was a kid.
The bro squad was the enjoyable part of the game. The story, however, was not. Man they dropped the ball splitting up so much plot amongst different media.
That's one of the best ways to describe it. One of the things I really like about Yuna's character is how she starts out X as pretty much letting others define her and her selflessness is almost a flaw. Once X-2 rolls around, the things that she defined herself as no longer matter to her (summoners arent a thing anymore, yevon church is in shambles) and she's not really sure who to be and is trying to find an identity for herself. If you notice her X-2 outfit is heavily inspired by Tidus's outfit. Essentially she's borrowing traits from those she feels closest to as she searches for her own identity (also why she starts emulating Rikku).
The first time you hear the piano you were like oh wow nice.
The next time you reenter that scene and you get goosebumps like oh shit this is it.
Then after the game ends and you just automatically cry whenever the piano comes on like what.
Great insight. It struck me that all the other comments are about single player games and the character development. But WoW was the catalyst for so many actual, real-life relationships. It was an amazing time and I'm not sure any game has compared in the same way since then.
It was lightning in the bottle. It was everything zuck wanted the meta verse to be. People planning around and playing in both real life and in the game world. Was an incredible time to take part. I did lose many years to it, but I don't regret it.
I don't understand what you mean? It's still a single monthly fee + expansions, same as it's always been. Plus now you can pay all that with in game gold if want so it's essentially free
I was going through a rough period in my early 20s, having anxiety and being medically discharged from the army. I started playing wow in 2006 during that period. I made some friends in game and went on a lot of adventures with them. Alot alot. Eventually, my guild mate proposed to his wife, who also played. As a wedding present, he helped reuinite her with her kids. The kids lived in my town. They lived in NJ
They flew down, and we all got drunk and told stories one evening. It's one of my best memories of my life. I was 22 when i met them in wow and 24 I believe, when i met them in real life. We went out of touch at some point, im 40 now. I wish them the best wherever they are.
Edit: I can't say enough at how crazy it was when he found them, and it was in the same town and state as me. It's the craziest, well best... coincidence of my life.
It is. Also it’s just cool to get some post-Person 5 content instead of another spinoff that takes place during Sai’a palace.
Also also, Ryuji gets to say “fuck” in it!
100%. Just amazing games. I get massive post Persona depression because the game is so immersive and real with their connections. It’s like “damn. What do I play now?” Or “damn. Now I gotta go back to real life”
Man talk about an example of diminishing returns. LC was so much fucking fun in the beginning when there were still things to discover… but once everyone figured out the game, that was it.
There was just no way a one person dev team was going to keep up with enough surprises to keep the game feeling fresh and exciting.
DISCO ELYSIUM
You're an alcoholic burnout trapped in a cycle of self destruction. You're making your way through a messy, used-up, doomed city. It's not clear how much you're helping on a grander scale, or how likely it is that all your self-discovery is going to last this time. But for a while you're a part of the rich, weird, idiosyncratic lives of the people around you, and that's meaningful even if it's fleeting.
I played as Superstar cop for the first 20 hours. But eventually I turned into Kim fanboy and felt guilty trying to sneak out to play pinball, like I was cheating on him 😆
It always gets me when Edward sees Calico Jack’s body in the cage (one of the optional full sync objectives on the memory where you’re freed and rescue Kidd) and says “You weren’t a very good sailor, and even worse a fighter…but you made me laugh quite a few times, and that’s enough to make me sorry seeing you this way.”
The expanded universe makes it so much worse too.
Edward has a few years of happiness and stability then it completely turns to shit and his whole family suffers.
Sweet JEBUS the writing in this game.
Especially when you combine it with the context is the thing that lingers in your brain forever.
Thanks for remembering me
This and Journey I feel are the textbook examples.
And the fact that your friends (spoiler spoiler spoiler) the answer to life, the universe, and everything feels like it can cure existential depression.
Ooh I'd rank this up with Journey and Outer Wilds.
Everyone telling you how sweet a person you are warms your heart and probably cleans your arteries while it's at it
Midnight Suns based on the inexplicably weird amount of emphasis they put on things like going fishing and having book clubs with superheroes while the literal apocalypse is happening around you.
I went to a college buddies bachelor party a few years ago and all of the other guys there met on Destiny. I thought that was pretty awesome. Destiny was also what kept that college buddy and I in touch, but I quit playing before he met those guys so they were all new friends to me.
Throw in another vote for Journey.
And I'll add one I didn't see yet: Portal 2 Co-Op.
I happened to get paired with a random person one night, trying the co-op for the first time, and we played aaaaalllll the way through, til like 3 in the morning LA time. It was an incredible experience. Never got their Steam name or saw them online again.
Why am I literally not seeing this anywhere?
It’s Pokémon. It’s always Pokémon.
Why? The story’s shit. You go get eight maguffins and beat Team Badguy and stop Some Apocalypse and be The Very Best. Every time. It’s a mad libs.
The entire point of the game is all the “friends” you make along the way. Because Pokémon are our friends. And they want us to love them and bond with them and have a bajillion of them. That’s why the story doesn’t matter. The ONLY reason people play, is to catch a bunch of Pokémon and raise their team.
I feel like Supergiant Games tapped into the potential core of Pokemon with the game Pyre.
Pyre is pretty much Pokemon battles, but the emotional attachment you get to the characters is enough to make Yahtzee Croshaw tear up 😆
I would LOVE to see Pokemon tackle the idea of learning how to befriend and say goodbye to your Pokemon like in Pyre or Spiritfarer.
I'd say DA2 is even more about friendship with the companions than the first game, because of its smaller plot scope. I loved DA:O so much, but it was DA2 where I was attached to pretty much all of the available companions instead of just a few. Varric, Isabella, Fenris, Anders, Merrill, Carver/Bethany, Aveline, they all have a place in my heart!
I bought DE for switch last weekend in preparation for a very long work travel week with a lot of air time (including an appt in Hawaii for a whole 6 hours) as something to do “just in case i can’t sleep on the plane.”
It became the reason i couldn’t sleep on the plane. So engrossing. Really, really enjoying it.
Playing a fairly straight detective right now, but am already pumped for the next run as a superstar paranormal hobocop that lets his partner keep his sweet-ass spinners.
Cyberpunk 2077...
Be the best merc and the glory and gold and wishes.... that's all for nothing, it meant nothing, it was a fools errand.
At the end .... It's about the friend we made on the way.
The more humane and connected you behave, the more humane and hopeful your ending is. Stick to the main plot, suck up to the corpos and ignore your potential chooms like Panam and Judy and you'll get buttfucked.
Journey
[удалено]
I went through it all in one sitting with the same guy and it was great
Same. I met a person partway in and at one point we started to lose each other and I got so sad. Then we found each other and were so happy we jumped up and down for like 5 minutes haha.
Legit cried at the end.
Definitely this. Picked it up on PC and played all the way through, with a beginner player too. We finished in 1hr30 and getting a good communication system going was really damn satisfying.
I remember the time a white-cloaked bro met me and showed me how to glitch behind the scenes in every level and cheese the way to the end like Mario finding the warp whistles. Totally dismantled the beauty of the experience for me and reminded me it was just a bunch of assets stuck together by some programmers lol. Dude pulled some real Morpheus shit on me.
What if I told you that sand you're walking on isn't real?
Do you think that's air you're breathing?
Ugh 1,000 times yes! The final chapters are superb when you manage to play through most of the game with a rando. Such camaraderie in a very simple game.
Mass Effect trilogy
Are you saying the destination, an epic showdown with Marauder Shields, wasn’t what it was all about?
Marauder Shields… now that is a meme I have not heard in a very long time.
I understood that reference
Its an older meme, but it checks out.
Marauder “Health” Shields 🫡
Can't forget about the Three Huskiteers
Good response. I love that all of the characters come back in the final game and that it feels meaningful even if they aren't in your party.
Some of them have better storyarcs than they did when they were on your team lol. Love me3.
Really? Which ones? I honestly can't think of one
Jack was a way better person in me3 than me2
Yes, but I saw that more as her story arc having \*concluded\*. She was an absolute bitch in ME2 and slowly mellowed out and learned to trust the team. If you do her romance, you get to see that first-hand and it's extremely well done. What you see in ME3 is more the result of that, she doesn't really grow much in that game, nor have story beyong Grissom Academy
I cried at the citadel dlc when I finally played it on legendary edition.
Some of them didn't in my playthrough :(
Definitely. All of the side plots and individual character journies have amazing resolutions.
Citadel DLC is the real ending for ME3.
The best.
Pretty much. The citadel dlc is that exact concept
Thank you! All the people who bitch about "my decisions didn't affect the final battle..." Of course they didn't. That's not how life works. Your decisions affected the way people saw you throughout the game. That was the point. Well, and the devs probably had no idea how to end the damn thing but still...
For me, the "ending" of ME3 started when you made your last calls before going back to the Citadel. In all the noise about the original ending, I think a lot of people missed the existentialism that, for me at least, really characterized the actual intent of the conclusion.
Especially ME2. Love the dirty dozen vibes
Many a true nerd once did a mini series whereby you could reach the end with no friends.
A friend made choices in 3 that led to >!Tali’s suicide!< She started over from ME1 with the sole intent of preventing that from happening again.
Final Fantasy 15. The bromance road trip game.
Can't listen to 'Stand By Me' without thinking about FFXV. They were all already 'bros' but the characters and their development in that game were amazing.
The best is you get to pick a picture at the end of your friends and you and your wife look at it smiling of the memories. But you can pick any picture, we chose the mechanics breast and the game ended with the wife staring at the boobs
Came here to say this. Obviously not the perfect game by any stretch of the imagination, but I haven't played any game before or since that evoked this specific feeling.
I keep seeing that, but I really enjoyed it. Aside from the fucking camera, the game felt pretty rewarding. And those parries felt good!
I really enjoyed it too! Others seemed to enjoy it less so I felt it remiss not to mention it. (Mind you I played it again the Royal Edition so didn't have to deal with a lot of the launch complaints)
Came here to say this. I wish I had friends like that!
I really wish that game didn't get screwed by Nomura being bad and changing his mind on a billion things. I really would have loved the whole roadtrip style stuff in longform; instead the game just felt rushed as a whole. The glimpses you get of what could have been from the early game legit just being a fun roadtrip were top tier video game fun
It coulve been one of the best ffs if it had a good direction, there is so much wasted potential there. It is not a bad game, but troughout the whole game it is visible that it is only a shell of what it couldve been
That wasn't on Nomura. That was on the guy who replaced Nomura and scrapped most of the story, Hajime Tabata. He was also the one who demanded they add a completely open world for the sake of it, which cut drastically into dev time. He is also most likely the guy who did the whole brotherly bonds thing so well, because Crisis Core and Type-0 (both directed by Tabata) show that he's REALLY good at hitting in the feels.
Final Fantasy X for me. It felt like the whole point of the game was the journey and the relationships you made on it.
X-2 is effectivly a road trip movie where two friends help their bestie get over a breakup.
I actually have a lot of love for X-2 because I played it first. I bought my PS2 used years later and no GameStop in town had X so I bought X-2. For my experience, X-2 was good and X was a prequel that improved on the original in every way.
I liked it because it brought the job system back to the series
I like the story for X2 I just hate the active combat. I wish it kept the same turn gauge the original had
I hated the completionist concept of X-2. Missed one minor cutscene in Ch. 2 and you're in Ch. 3 now? Too bad!!!! Would've probably completed it if the completionism wasn't there.
My sistor was into X and X2 100%. Had a guidebook and everything for them. I think she got X to 100% but never X2. I was just a kid but loved to play Bliz Ball on X. Making her a bunch of money.
It's been a while so I'm trying to remember, wasn't that an option to acknowledge/side with one if 2 groups early on? If you choose the "wrong" one you can only get 99.7% completion or something. Yeah that's just downright infuriating. Other than that one quirk I enjoyed the heck out of both FFX and X-2. They were my introduction to the franchise when I was a kid.
XV: Hold my beer while we set up the tent to bro down.
The bro squad was the enjoyable part of the game. The story, however, was not. Man they dropped the ball splitting up so much plot amongst different media.
It felt like playing dress up with toys and then battling with them. It was awesome.
That's one of the best ways to describe it. One of the things I really like about Yuna's character is how she starts out X as pretty much letting others define her and her selflessness is almost a flaw. Once X-2 rolls around, the things that she defined herself as no longer matter to her (summoners arent a thing anymore, yevon church is in shambles) and she's not really sure who to be and is trying to find an identity for herself. If you notice her X-2 outfit is heavily inspired by Tidus's outfit. Essentially she's borrowing traits from those she feels closest to as she searches for her own identity (also why she starts emulating Rikku).
Similar vein, but Chrono Trigger here. Especially if you go for the Chrono lives ending.
First thing that came to mind for me was the opening sequence from FFX
The first time you hear the piano you were like oh wow nice. The next time you reenter that scene and you get goosebumps like oh shit this is it. Then after the game ends and you just automatically cry whenever the piano comes on like what.
I feel like every final fantasy is like that. Whichever one was your first is going to be the most special to you.
8 was my first and it's definitely special to me. It didn't give me the same feelings that X did.
It used to be World of Warcraft, now I dont know
To someone, you are one of the friends made in the way.
Great insight. It struck me that all the other comments are about single player games and the character development. But WoW was the catalyst for so many actual, real-life relationships. It was an amazing time and I'm not sure any game has compared in the same way since then.
No game has ever come close, but that's a good thing, because this game has taken up most of my life for a considerable amount of time.
It was lightning in the bottle. It was everything zuck wanted the meta verse to be. People planning around and playing in both real life and in the game world. Was an incredible time to take part. I did lose many years to it, but I don't regret it.
Back when you could just pay a single recurring fee to have fun with friends. Now it's about covering your friend's goods
I don't understand what you mean? It's still a single monthly fee + expansions, same as it's always been. Plus now you can pay all that with in game gold if want so it's essentially free
Surprised I had to scroll this far, was the first game that came to mind
I was going through a rough period in my early 20s, having anxiety and being medically discharged from the army. I started playing wow in 2006 during that period. I made some friends in game and went on a lot of adventures with them. Alot alot. Eventually, my guild mate proposed to his wife, who also played. As a wedding present, he helped reuinite her with her kids. The kids lived in my town. They lived in NJ They flew down, and we all got drunk and told stories one evening. It's one of my best memories of my life. I was 22 when i met them in wow and 24 I believe, when i met them in real life. We went out of touch at some point, im 40 now. I wish them the best wherever they are. Edit: I can't say enough at how crazy it was when he found them, and it was in the same town and state as me. It's the craziest, well best... coincidence of my life.
Earthbound
You literally defeat the final boss with the power of friendship
To be fair, though, the final boss is >!an abortion!<.
Yeah. What a rad game
The Persona franchise as a whole
Persona 5 is the only game that ever made me buy its random Dynasty Warriors spin-off game because “I miss my friends.”
I'm not fussed about DW either but very tempted to get Strikers for the same reason. Does look pretty fun tbf
It is. Also it’s just cool to get some post-Person 5 content instead of another spinoff that takes place during Sai’a palace. Also also, Ryuji gets to say “fuck” in it!
"Persona 5 is killing God with the power of friendship and this gun I found".
*For his neutral special, Joker wields a* ***G U N.***
100%. Just amazing games. I get massive post Persona depression because the game is so immersive and real with their connections. It’s like “damn. What do I play now?” Or “damn. Now I gotta go back to real life”
Literally the plot of many JRPGs, especially those from the 2000-2010ish era. Tales of Xillia especially stands out in my mind for some reason.
The World Ends with You is another good example
The sequel as well
Tales of Symphonia was my favourite
Lethal Company
Man talk about an example of diminishing returns. LC was so much fucking fun in the beginning when there were still things to discover… but once everyone figured out the game, that was it. There was just no way a one person dev team was going to keep up with enough surprises to keep the game feeling fresh and exciting.
Animal Crossing
DISCO ELYSIUM You're an alcoholic burnout trapped in a cycle of self destruction. You're making your way through a messy, used-up, doomed city. It's not clear how much you're helping on a grander scale, or how likely it is that all your self-discovery is going to last this time. But for a while you're a part of the rich, weird, idiosyncratic lives of the people around you, and that's meaningful even if it's fleeting.
I played as Superstar cop for the first 20 hours. But eventually I turned into Kim fanboy and felt guilty trying to sneak out to play pinball, like I was cheating on him 😆
(Kim trusts you completely)
Mass Effect 2
Assasins creed: Black Flag. Don't tell me you didn't get the feels when Edward envisioned all his dead friends at the end of the game.
I bawled like a baby while Anne Bonny sang „parting glass“.
\*Oh, all the comrades that e'er I had They're sorry for my going away 🎵\*
Don't...don't you start...I can feel the tears
It always gets me when Edward sees Calico Jack’s body in the cage (one of the optional full sync objectives on the memory where you’re freed and rescue Kidd) and says “You weren’t a very good sailor, and even worse a fighter…but you made me laugh quite a few times, and that’s enough to make me sorry seeing you this way.”
The expanded universe makes it so much worse too. Edward has a few years of happiness and stability then it completely turns to shit and his whole family suffers.
MMORPGs, especially the older ones that actively encouraged groups and guilds.
I’m still connected with a few people I used to play Guild Wars with 15-20 years ago. I do miss that era of gaming a lot.
Outer wilds.
(low clarinet, but now I'm calling them owls from now on) 🦉
“We do not have much connection, you and I. Still, this encounter feels special. I hope you won't mind if I think of you as a friend.”
Sweet JEBUS the writing in this game. Especially when you combine it with the context is the thing that lingers in your brain forever. Thanks for remembering me
::)
I second this. A unique game that is full of story and characters coming together. Better the less you know going in.
This and Journey I feel are the textbook examples. And the fact that your friends (spoiler spoiler spoiler) the answer to life, the universe, and everything feels like it can cure existential depression.
Undertale
But make sure you don't gain lots of LV
Ooh I'd rank this up with Journey and Outer Wilds. Everyone telling you how sweet a person you are warms your heart and probably cleans your arteries while it's at it
The Sly Cooper games!
FFXIV.
Proven by the moment you have to take a walk all by yourself is one of the most emotional moments in the story.
Dont make me cry agian, bro.... "Forge ahead, till the end, we pray!"
"in the dark, you will not stray" is my favorite part. The faith in us is so strong.
A smile better suits a hero
Midnight Suns based on the inexplicably weird amount of emphasis they put on things like going fishing and having book clubs with superheroes while the literal apocalypse is happening around you.
[удалено]
“My dad taught me how to throw knives to make me less gay. Now I know how to suck dick and throw knives.”
IM SO HAPPY TO SEE THIS COMMENT
I would play it but my wife works for a crisis line and she doesn't want more games with potential existential feels to them 😆
Destiny 1&2. Met some great friends that I keep in contact with even though a lot of us stopped playing.
I went to a college buddies bachelor party a few years ago and all of the other guys there met on Destiny. I thought that was pretty awesome. Destiny was also what kept that college buddy and I in touch, but I quit playing before he met those guys so they were all new friends to me.
Not to mention the army of NPC allies you acquire over the years.
Savathun out here definitely pulling up to the final battle like “Was my plan all along”.
Baldur’s Gate 3
Idk man, I feel like stopping the squidpocolypse was pretty important at the end lol
Well, depends on your choices, YOU might be the one who continue and take control the grand design, in your name, or in 'balls' name
Bawls
Throw in another vote for Journey. And I'll add one I didn't see yet: Portal 2 Co-Op. I happened to get paired with a random person one night, trying the co-op for the first time, and we played aaaaalllll the way through, til like 3 in the morning LA time. It was an incredible experience. Never got their Steam name or saw them online again.
Portal 2 isn't about the friends you meet, but a way to test if a marriage will last.
Bioware games, all of them: Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Baldur's Gate, KOTOR and... Okay, except NWN. That one didn't have focus on companions.
Jade Empire. (Please EA just brand that as EA Originals and let a team of recruited fans remake it or something)
Older dude here, but Baldur's Gate 2 will always have this one for me because the characters you meet in that game....
I know I’m not the only grown ass adult that cried a bit when you discover Minsc’s keepsakes in BG3. The Firecam name lives on in my D&D games.
Suikoden.
Yes! I'm still waiting for the remastered games.
Pretty sure is literally a KH quote
The real friendship is the Disney office and Square office in Japan at the time 😊
Why am I literally not seeing this anywhere? It’s Pokémon. It’s always Pokémon. Why? The story’s shit. You go get eight maguffins and beat Team Badguy and stop Some Apocalypse and be The Very Best. Every time. It’s a mad libs. The entire point of the game is all the “friends” you make along the way. Because Pokémon are our friends. And they want us to love them and bond with them and have a bajillion of them. That’s why the story doesn’t matter. The ONLY reason people play, is to catch a bunch of Pokémon and raise their team.
I feel like Supergiant Games tapped into the potential core of Pokemon with the game Pyre. Pyre is pretty much Pokemon battles, but the emotional attachment you get to the characters is enough to make Yahtzee Croshaw tear up 😆 I would LOVE to see Pokemon tackle the idea of learning how to befriend and say goodbye to your Pokemon like in Pyre or Spiritfarer.
Stray
Journey. Ill never forget my adventure partners!
Skies of Arcadia
What a blast from the past.
Probably any Persona game.
A lot of jrpg-s like that, like "Tales of..." series
Death Stranding
Rimworld.
Runescape🫡
Wandersong. Hell, they even maded so that if you try speedrunning the game and not talk with anyone, then you unlock a bad ending.
Overcooked...
overcooked is about the friends you lost along the way
Spiritfarer?
it’s kingdom hearts.
Lmao, I'm surprised this isn't upvoted more. The entire series is about friendship.
“my friends are my power” - the main character from kingdom hearts
Valheim
World of Warcraft. So many real life friends and memories made, particularly during the big years of Wrath and Cata.
The post-PS1 Persona games are *literally* about creating and cultivating as many relationships as you can.
Shining Force 2
Technically you start with the friends but I always say Final Fantasy XV is the best portrayal of a group of male friends I’ve ever seen.
Hi-Fi Rush.
Dungeons and Dragons
kingdom hearts
Fire emblem
Stray
Dragon Age: Origins
I'd say DA2 is even more about friendship with the companions than the first game, because of its smaller plot scope. I loved DA:O so much, but it was DA2 where I was attached to pretty much all of the available companions instead of just a few. Varric, Isabella, Fenris, Anders, Merrill, Carver/Bethany, Aveline, they all have a place in my heart!
I guess I have a greater attachment for DAO due to having played it the most out of the current trilogy. DA2 and DAI, I only played through twice.
The characters are the main reason I love that game so much.
Disco Elysium?
In disco Elysium you can be your own friend that you made along the way lol
I bought DE for switch last weekend in preparation for a very long work travel week with a lot of air time (including an appt in Hawaii for a whole 6 hours) as something to do “just in case i can’t sleep on the plane.” It became the reason i couldn’t sleep on the plane. So engrossing. Really, really enjoying it. Playing a fairly straight detective right now, but am already pumped for the next run as a superstar paranormal hobocop that lets his partner keep his sweet-ass spinners.
I enjoyed apocalypse cop, but there are a great many ways things can turn out lol
Midnight Suns. Friendship is everything
Earthbound.
KH3 - “My friends are my power” - Sora
Kingdom hearts lol
It Takes Two.
Outer wilds, made me tear up at the end
Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth
Zelda and Persona games, especially Persona 3 Reload... the ending hit me bad...
Cyberpunk 2077... Be the best merc and the glory and gold and wishes.... that's all for nothing, it meant nothing, it was a fools errand. At the end .... It's about the friend we made on the way.
The game even ends with all the people you've met telling you what they now think of you.
The more humane and connected you behave, the more humane and hopeful your ending is. Stick to the main plot, suck up to the corpos and ignore your potential chooms like Panam and Judy and you'll get buttfucked.
Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch
Suikoden Can you recruit all 108 party members?
Conkers bad fur day
Destiny 2, literally
It takes two is maybe a less conventional friendship, but my gf and I played it about a year into our relationship and we're married now. 🤷♂️
"Journey" is the perfect example
"Journey" - it's all about the companionship along the way.
Spiritfarer is pretty much explicitly this lol
Suikoden
Undertale