i play a lot of games; enjoy most of them, but not many actually do touch me on emotional level. see, when you play a certain game, you WILL be involve in it, you will become attached to it - the story line and mostly the characters, among other things. but again, usually most of the time the feelings that you get from games are elation, some sort of achievement, excitement. if there is a bit of loss in the game you will feel the loss too, but not that bad. there is only a few that has left marks in my heart in sad way, so to speak. has touched me emotionally. despite them being action adventure games. like, kill people kinda games. one - i think everyone who has played will agree - is assassin's creed 4 black flag. *spoiler alert* the ending was oh so touching. it's where that "try not to cry, cry a lot" meme can be applied.
the next one which i just finished playing - is metal gear solid v the phantom pain. *major spoiler*
MGS series is known for intricate plots, but this one for me i think is very clever. it really makes you feel the loss when there is a loss in the game. and i suppose pretty much the theme for the game is "loss". every character has lost something in the war and then revenge yada3. but even in present time i.e the timeline which you're playing, there are lots of loss happening. the major one is concerning Quiet, a "buddy" that we take on mission. and quiet was pretty much the only human buddy in the list. with buddy system, the more you do mission with them, the higher your "bond" will be. with that, you can buy them new weapons/ equipment, new command etc. i use Quiet a lot as she was the most helpful. and the story has made some sort of attachment between Quiet and Snake. I was obviously attached too, since I was playing as Snake. in the end, she voluntarily left so as to not spread infection to Snake and all the people in Mother Base. got caught by the Soviets, Snake went to the rescue and they only did one last mission together. and she still left. for good. like, legit. even when you finished the whole game as in the main mission and story line, when you're back to free-roaming the open world, Quiet is gone! can't find her in her cell, not even on buddy list anymore. and i wasn't warned before hand. i think that's what caught me off guard. see normally with any other open world games, if there's loss like this in the story line, when you finish and just to go about free roaming doing side mission, whatever's lost will be back.
i think that's why MGSV has stirred me up emotionally. because it resonates with the real life. you can lose the person that is close to you, that is important to you, that you form attachment to - without warning - and you will not get them back.
people dying is different. people leaving your life not because of death is a totally different thing. it hurts on different level. this opens up my old wound which does not seem to fully heal as of yet.
but life goes on i guess.
....
recovery time from ending a game will usually take a few days
