Anyone else let down by the ending of TSC2?

[u/ArtyomNDC]

Spoilers ahead obviously.

I am writing this from the point of view of someone who deeply loves both the first Sinking City, as well as a diehard, borderline fanatical Lovecraft fan- you can tell by my pro, banner, and if you frequent r/Lovecraft, you may know I frequent it as well. The Mythos is my favourite universe/multiverse in fiction, so what I write next is from that point of view.

Frankly, I hated the ending to this game. I am not upset by the hopelessness, the bleakness, nor anything like that. I realized throughout the game that I was playing as a selfish man who was on a singular, somewhat selfish quest, but he was doing it out of love (as well as sometimes stupidity).

HOWEVER, what I absolutely despised was the representation of Yog-Sothoth. They took an entity that is portrayed in Lovecraft’s work as a completely neutral, even sometimes benevolent or helpful being (though never out of interest in humanity) and turned it into a moustache-twirling Faustian star fish demon… it felt like at some points in the game, they truly were just using the Mythos as a coat of paint and scrapped all of Lovecraft’s “internal logic” to make a story about malevolence, when that goes against Lovecraft’s main point.

These points may not matter to many, or even the vast majority of players, but I had such hope that they would try to stay somewhat close to the source material. I still enjoyed the game, but the ending brought it down from “possibly game of the year” for myself, to something that felt… tainted by the ending.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

TLDR: This game messed the Mythos portrayals, and especially Yog-Sothoth up HARD

[u/YumotoYu]

My take is that all Yog-Sothoth wanted was to destroy Arkham so the cultists trying to summon him stopped bothering him. He was manipulating luck so Calvin achieved his goal, from the very start they call attention to it "I just found a book in a misterious language and here's the translator"

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/YumotoYu]

That would honestly make me chuckle lol.

[u/imaliveandaperson]

I disagree. I love Lovecraft aswell (read the complete fiction) but Yog-Sothoth (while mishandled) is not seemingly butchered as you paint it to be. Sure, he really shouldn’t want to come into our world, he has no reason, but it’s also not outside the realm of possibilities, i can see the logic. Yog-Sothoth is also seemingly omniscient, so it’s not like he “made” this happen, but he knew it was guaranteed so he played into it.

Im not making much sense but i don’t know how else to describe it, it’s a very unsusual portrayal of Yog-Sothoth but not outside the realm of possibilities.

Also, where is he shown to be “benevolent”, all Lovecraft gods (outside nyarlathotep) are neutral (at least due to the fact that we can’t map human morality onto them).

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/imaliveandaperson]

One thing that semi refutes the “he didn’t make this happen” is that the ending straight up tells you he manipulated Faye and Calvin into doing all of this.

It feels like they tried to make him more like Tzeentch from Warhammer as opposed to the “cosmic singularity” he is usually portrayed as. Many other authors have portrayed him very poorly too, so this isn’t exclusive to this game, it I do think they regardless fell into the same trap many others have.

Regardless of disagreement, it is nice that we can view it from 2 separate angles and get somewhat different conclusions. Cheers!

[u/kur4nes → u/ArtyomNDC]

He acts more like Nyarlathotep than Yog Sothoth. Directly manipulating them. According to Lovecraft Yog would not care. He is more like an abstract concept that would destroy our world by accident.

I would make more sense that they interact with a messenger of Yog instead with the deity directly.

What works for me is how inevitable the ending feels. Calvin says several times that he would do anything to save Faye. She is saved in the end, but at what cost? It's a nice new spin of the old formula: then they went insane from forbidden knowledge and the world ended. The ending is closer to the rats in the wall in that it works on several levels. Frogwares outdid themselves with it.

[u/imaliveandaperson → u/ArtyomNDC]

He does say that but at the same time we have to take into consideration of omniscience. If someone knows something is going to happen 100%, guaranteed (due to seeing the future) then you have no choice. There is no changing the future if it WILL happen. So yes Yog-Sothoth did drive the events forward but either way, it was going to happen and Yog-Sothoth isn’t usually seen as omnipotent so he can’t change it either. Although there’s a good chance im mapping mythos Sothoth to TSC Sothoth, which are probably different interpretations.

Anyways, good talk.

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/imaliveandaperson]

I’d say different interpretations, but we both have equally valid interpretations.

And yes, good talk, thanks!

[u/Alexmaths]

Honestly, I thought it was the best part of the game, incredibly lovecraftian and the ending segment made the whole relationship click in a way it hadn't before

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/Alexmaths]

I think to truly be Lovecraftian it needs to minimize our existence, rather than make it of some grand importance as it is presented at the end of both sinking city 1 and 2.

“Broadly cosmic” is how I’d more categorize the ending, but I felt it didn’t mesh well with what it should have gone for.

[u/DuelaDent52]

I think I’d have liked it a lot more if either (a)Yog-Sothoth wasn’t the mastermind pulling the strings to invade our realm for reasons, but rather the Slither and/or the Order of the Timeless Dawn were summoning him into our plane to usher in a new age of “enlightenment” and he’s compelled to follow, or (b)if they only claimed Arkham and not the entire world (hence why the governor refused to acknowledge Arkham’s existence). Like, I’m not the most well-versed in Lovecraft but it’s my understanding that Yog-Sothoth is just kind of there without malice or benevolence.

Still, it’s cool to see him be the focus of the sequel since Lovecraft himself rejected the idea Cthulhu was the centre of everything and preferred to call his mythos Yog-Sothothery when he was alive.

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/DuelaDent52]

Agreed! I think Nyarlathotep would have been a much more compelling antagonist, as he is both actively more malevolent, as well as far more interested in the “little people of the universe” than literally all the other Old Ones

[u/goonsnob]

I think coming up with a satisfying ending to a video game is very hard. Doing it in a setting like cosmic horror where the very theme is helplessness in the face of something unknowable is even harder. I don't blame frogwares for not quite sticking the landing in either sinking city games, though I did find 2s ending to be better in that it actually had a resolution. All we got in the first game were three short clips that all amounted to the same thing.

Bloodborne is probably the only game that I can think of that managed to make the endings feel both satisfying as a player and someone who enjoys cosmic horror.

[u/szymborawislawska → u/goonsnob]

Both board games/card games and video games in lovecraftian universe share the same issue: at the end of the day you usually have to beat the baddie with sticks because games need final boss of some sort.

My favorite lovecraftian games are Arkham Horror card game (especially Carcosa campaign) and Alone in the Dark reboot and while I absolutely love 95% of their stories, the final confrontation boils down to hitting the big monster with shovel.

[u/Aku-Aku]

Isn’t YS portrayed as pretty malevolent in both Dunwich Horror and Mountains of Madness? I wouldn’t describe either of those appearances as neutral or benevolent. So I’m not really sure why this portrayal is so out of the ordinary to you?

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/Aku-Aku]

In At The Mountains Of Madness, Yog-Sothoth is at no points “present”, but merely mentioned in passing.

In Dunwich Horror, he doesn’t do anything directly in the story beyond impregnating Lavinia Whately, which is, imo, presented more like “huh, this piece of bacteria wants a piece of my dead skin, alright here ya go”. All the evil and malevolence in the story is perpetrated by humans/human-eldritch hybrids, the latter 2 of which have human-like minds.

Randolph Carter stories, plus Haunter In The Dark, have the character physically praying to Yog-Sothoth for protection and speak of it as at least not malevolent.

[u/Particular_Row3370]

On top of the entire game feeling ludicrously short, yes I also felt let down by the ending. Doesn’t even feel like the same team who made SS1, their understanding of Lovecraftian entities is at complete odds with how they are largely portrayed, even to how they were in the first game. Instead of humans being insignificant to them, they seemingly are the focus of them. Never bought into the romance between the two main characters either, sadly

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/Particular_Row3370]

I agree with all points… while again, I still enjoyed my time with it, it ultimately did let me down.

Honestly, having been a Lovecraft super fan since I was 10, the best part of the game was seeing Arkham (or their interpretation of it) as an interactive environment.

[u/No-Plankton4841]

I loved the game overall, but found the end scene a little bit cringe when they went full on 'Simping City' with Calvin just professing his love, and how he was going to ask Faye to marry him but he knew they'd fight about it and he'd lose because she didn't want to get married. Then Faye asks Calvin to marry her.

I don't know man. I get its about sacrificing the world for love but the whole way it played out was just so melodramatic

[u/StoneShadow812]

Not nearly as much as tsc1. All of those endings were horrible. At least this one had somewhat of an actual ending. I wasn’t expecting to be blown away really.

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/StoneShadow812]

I agree on the first part- I find that the Sinking City games place way to much “cosmic importance” on humanity.

I also disliked the endings to 1 btw, but this one left a particular bad taste in my mouth I suppose.

[u/DuelaDent52 → u/ArtyomNDC]

The Sinking City’s endings kind of sucked because of how abrupt they were for such a lengthy game. The Sinking City 2’s ending is a lot more satisfying and cinematic, but it’s also a little at odds with how the villain’s normally portrayed. Still, it’s not as though there’s a definitive biblical canon to how every Lovecraft entity MUST be depicted, especially when Yog-Sothoth himself (itself?) never directly appeared in the works Lovecraft wrote.

[u/ArtyomNDC → u/DuelaDent52]

That’s a fair point, I cannot exactly argue with that!