How many different endings does a story need?

Having multiple endings is clearly appealing, but endings are a vitally important part to a story, possibly the MOST important part – where things come to pass, characters find the biggest revelations, redemption presents itself…

Ok there’s 3!

But if you have many different endings, how can you keep the quality up? Aren’t you most likely dissipating the original idea?

A badge of pride or a story spread too thin?

Collecting endings is an endeavour 100% suited to human activity. Most of us harbour innate “collector” tendencies. (But that’s what Pinterest is for isn’t it?)

“How many endings does it have?”

It’s a question bandied about all interactive stories and games… and it drives me crazy!

Why don’t people ask – what’s the story like? Or if measurement IS required – how good is the story?

Some examples of numerous endings in games:

• Star Ocean Second Evolution – 86 endings
• Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3 – 50 endings
• Nier:Automata – 26 endings

I don’t know the first two games at all. I know Nier:Automata does its endings very well, but let’s be clear – 3.5 of those “endings” are actually different versions of the entire game and story rather than just endings. But the rest of the endings are quite good, to the credit of the game, the endings start unlocking at appropriate points in the story experience and add more layers of narrative and understanding.

I prefer the ONE solid ending with a complicated and multiplicitious(?) journey to get there. Most games do it that way – the “string of pearls” approach to interactivity.

Oh go on then, maybe just TWO or even THREE endings is ok…

Why do we always want more?

It’s human nature…

One fervent collector of historical documents refers to his own collecting propensity as “a genetic defect”. More likely, collecting is a basic human instinct; a survival advantage amplified by eons of natural selection. Those of our ancient ancestors who managed to accumulate scarce objects may have been more prone to survive long enough to bear offspring. ha.com

More about the emotional and psychological aspects of collecting

Multiple endings in practice

When I first started making interactive stories, back in 1998 I determined that the branching narrative tree was not for me.

I was making a thing called The Blues Player. It was my first cohesive interactive production, a little light on story, but big on energy!

I took the traditional branching narrative structure – and turned it around.

So instead of going from 1 option to 64 options, the experience went from 64 options to 1 option – 1 ending.

I’m proud to say the concept worked just fine.

But that’s what the project was, a concept rather than a story.

Increasing the number of journeys you can take to get to the end

More recently I made a small story game called Mid Game Crisis. (It’s about getting divorced so tons of fun for all the family – not!)

I randomised the branching structure to create 268 million ways through the story… it’s an experimental work and the story is more thematic than narrative, but it has a story “frame” that is consistent for each version played, so you could say there are 268,435,456 ways through the story but only ONE ending…

The MGC Twine Project Flow

Did it work?

I don’t know, but I was happy with the outcome.

How many endings do you have in your interactive story?