THIS THREAD CONTAINS FARCRY, CRYSIS AND BORDERLANDS SPOILERS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
Okay, so I was reading about Borderlands' crappy ending on Rockpapershotgun and it reminded me I never beat that game, so I finally got around to it. I LOVED the ending... what was wrong with the ending? You suddenly have to fight some fast and bad-ass teleporting aliens that really change things up, then a huge kick-ass boss monster.
It reminded me of Crysis, which was bashed for changing from tactical human killing to fast-paced alien shooting late in the game, and Farcry which changed from slow and tactical humans to quick jumping mutants.
Now, back in the day shooting fast and dumb aliens was awesome. Pretty much every shooter did this, and I don't agree we've grown past it... there is room for both! Is there room for both in the same game though? People seem to think not. Personally though when I got to the end of Borderlands and started fighting teleporting alien scum I was reinvigorated to finish the game, as something different had come along. When I got to the alien ship in Crysis it felt like time for a change, and the dramatic rethinking of the combat at the end made the game feel more varied and epic to me.
So... what's the deal? Why did you hate those switches, if you did, and do you think a game can change the combat style in the middle or toward the end and not frustrate people?

People aren't getting the game they believe they bargained for.

Well, I don't get it either.
I mean, fuck, what's the diff with games and movies? Some movies pull off some frankly dubious "plot twists" too...
I think people take games way too personally.

It's not really the switch, but how it's made.
Far Cry - the game went from tough to instakill as soon as the creatures were introduced. It wasn't even like it was realistic. They just killed you on contact like some shitty old NES Dragon's Lair clone. What with that and the checkpoints, it just got annoying and not very fun at all.
Crysis - was great. I had no problems with it. Yes there were aliens, but anyone that was expecting otherwise wasn't really paying much attention. I liked the inside of that alien mountain base thingy too. I thought that was very nicely done. Warhead had a pretty damn fine ending too.
Borderlands - even the devs admitted it was a rush job ending. I didn't have a problem with the boss but rather the lack of imagination invested in the ending as a whole. It didn't make sense that you, as the only person in any position to open the vault, were actively being encouraged to do so by someone who knew the exact outcome and was trying to use you to avert it... even though just leaving it alone would have achieved the same thing.
It was just a crappy, nonsensical ending. Not that the story was otherwise a truly amazing work of literature mind you.
Bioshock 1&2 I've already expressed my views on.

I haven't completed borderlands yet so anyone relying to me please don't quote me with borderlands examples I skipped over the op's comments on borderlands as well.
That said I actually enjoyed the change in crysis but not in farcry. I think it was mainly down to difficulty and how well the change in gameplay fit. I played both games on the most difficult setting. The gameplay in crysis didn't really change that much apart from the low gravity bits, sure the aliens moved about a bit differently but you still took cover from them. Now in farcry the problem was I went from shooting humans to these mutant ape things that leap across entire rooms and 1 hit killed you.

Boderlands had a terrible ending, I totally agree with that. But if you want proof that a botched job can be handled well in terms of the story, look no further than the original (original, mind you) Ocean's 11. The ending of this one -- thanks for clarifying that the dev team admitted it -- felt like they just threw it together before lunch on a Friday and then said to hell with the players, let's go down to the pub.
Daniel Floyd on Extra Credits did an excellent job of summarizing why I thought God of War 3 had a crap ending, in changing its style of combat as well:
[url=]http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/extra-credits/1946-No-Redeeming-Value[/url]

I never had a problem with borderlands' ending other than the slightly cheap nature of the attacks that could blast you off the plateau to your death and the only way to avoid it was to hide behind a pillar of rock. Then I noticed that you could actually kill the final boss by peeking a gun round the corner and holding down fire...
My real problem is stealth games that force you into a bossfight, those really shit me

I didn't mind the character change in Crysis or Borderlands, but it was horrible in Far Cry. I was already getting dominated by the mercenaries, and having them switch into bullet sponges that could pretty much instakill you seems like it can be considered pretty objectively to be a horrible gameplay decision.
That's what I thought this topic was going to be about, and I despise those. If I'm playing a stealth game, I don't want it to turn into a TPS at the end.

I loved the mutants in Far Cry, the mutant infested levels were some of the best in the game. Lots of tension and lots of cool situations (I'll agree that the very last level was dumb, though).
In Crysis, on the other hand, the best parts of the game were IMO the open levels which gave you plenty of tactical options. Unfortunately, when the aliens appeared all this stuff disappeared, and the game suddenly turned hyper-linear.
Haven't completed Borderlands, so I don't know about that.

I just gave some examples, this would be another. Splinter Cell Conviction annoyed me because even though it was more of an action game throughout, the last couple levels were completely third-person shooting, there wasn't even much of an attempt to make it stealthy.

To flip this around a bit, the best example would be Jedi Knight 2.
You start off relying on your guns to get by which is okay, but when you get into the lightsaber combat, that's where the game comes alive for me.
It's all about how they do it though. Nobody complains about being forced to use the gravity gun in the latter stage of HL2 for example.

People actually finished Far Cry?
Anyway, I like endings that change the pace or style of the combat. It helps to differentiate and sometimes accentuate the ending levels and scenes. Maybe it's just me but I thought that while sometimes they didn't always work out, the devs meant well.

I didn't... :/