What Are The Scariest and Saddest Nintendo Game Over Screens?

Let's take a look at Nintendo Game Over cutscenes that are hard to top for their sadness, scare factor or sheer absurdity.

1080p 60fps Gameplay recorded and edited by Nintendo Unity. Consider to like, share and subscribe to support the channel.

Games
Banzo-Kazooie
Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland
The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX
Metroid Prime 2
Metroid Prime 3
Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door
Paper Mario: Color Splash
Punch-Out!! Wii
Donkey Kong Country
Donkey Kong Country 2
Donkey Kong Country 3
Donkey Kong 64
Luigi's Mansion
Luigi's Mansion 3
Fire Emblem Echoes
Pikmin

Friends

[D_YellowMadness]

The Luigi's Mansion one seems the darkest to me because it's not that everyone's dead. It's that everyone's trapped in a fate worse than death with no one left to save them. Especially bad because the scientist who makes the technology necessary to save them is trapped too. Truly a hopeless situation.

[sandshew]

Love that the game over scene from DK 64 was turned in to King K. Rool's final smash

[thiccjuze]

Honestly, little Mac retiring has to be the happiest and saddest endings in all of gaming history. Never have I almost cried hearing Doc saying his last farewell to the player😭

[randominternetman]

What makes Punch-Out Wii's so horrifying?

It's PERMANENT. You'll need to delete and create a new save file to play again.

[onepiecefanization]

The Banjo Kazooie and the DK64 game overs scared the hell out of me when I was a kid. Banjo's sister turning green and closing in on K-Rool's face as he's laughing freaked me out.

[captskuzzbruh]

Metroid Prime might have the most abrupt and honest portrayal of death I've ever really seen with a main character and it feels very real in a way that is extremely unsettling.

[VestedUTuber]

The Punch-Out Wii ending isn't so much sad as it is bittersweet. Mac retired, but he retired on what was ultimately a high note - he made it to the top, he defended his title as long as he could, and he went down fighting.

[codename]

Honestly, the part that gets me with Shadows of Valentia's Game Over isn't the mass graves. It's the fact that it says _The End_ instead of Game Over.

[jvts]

For those wondering about the context of the Tingle game over, the player character only became Tingle after Uncle Rupee spoke to him about Rupeeland, a place where you can enjoy feasts, meet hot singles and not have to work or study ever again. Uncle Rupee tells him how the only way to reach it is by throwing loads and loads of rupees into his pond. He also warns Tingle that should he lose all his money in the process, he will die.

The game over scene seems to be Tingle's dying dream in which he hallucinates all the things he was promised but never got on his quest.

*SPOILERS*



It should be pretty obvious that Uncle Rupee is scamming Tingle, but the pond was able to become a tower, so you could also be forgiven for thinking he was being genuine. But no, Rupeeland is what the world will become if Uncle Rupee becomes all powerful: a place where everyone else becomes a Tingle and has to work forever while Uncle Rupee gets all the benefits.

In the true ending, the MC is blessed with the power of rupees as a reward for beating Uncle Rupee... but instead of using them for good, he uses them to indulge in everything he wanted at the start of the game.

[tanookimarioiscool]

3:04
Minor Correction: The "Zombie Luigi" Game Over wasn't actually a Game Over. It was simply something made for one of the trailers. I wouldn't blame anyone if they thought it was a Game Over though, since it still is pretty creepy.

[mattcouture]

The worst part about the Banjo Kazooie and DK64 Game Overs was that you'd get them when you Save and Quit whenever you were done playing, not just when you ran out of lives. That always freaked me out as a kid.

[lsv]

One thing about the Zombie Luigi thing is that it was likely E3 or Spaceworld flair.

[EditPoster]

I'm surprised Majora's Mask's game over wasn't mentioned. "You've met with a terrible fate, haven't you?" Gets me every time. Also there are some other creepy ways to die in Twilight Princess, Majora's Mask, and Ocarina of Time.

[lanehoran]

The Punch Out!!! game over is actually kind of heartwarming. Doc saying " Good Job son" put a smile on my face.

[ExtremeAce]

Metroid Prime: Shows a crack in Samus' visor with her head tilting while a flatline plays over. Creepy
Metroid Prime 2: Literally shows her heart malfunctioning with a constant loud flatline beeping over. Terrifying
Metroid Prime 3 Regular Death: Shows her blood splattering all over her visor. Uncomfortable
Metroid Prime 3 Terminal Corruption: Phazon fully takes over Samus, turning her into another Dark Samus. Nightmare fuel

[DonutBurger]

Imagine getting brutally murdered for shoplifting a single product.
Also, one creepy Game Over screen that wasn't shown here is the one at the start of "Super Paper Mario" when you refuse Merlon.

[SlyFrye]

I love how in donkey Kong country 3 when you do get the game over you can actually keep the music playing by pressing buttons in the controller which will make those blocks continue to jump and you can play more music. it's like a game within the game over screen

[goopi_eh]

In Minish Cap, right before the final boss, there's a timed enemy rush that you can actually fail. If you do, there'll be a cutscene of princess Zelda dying, which is not only unusual for a series where main character is more or less always destined to win, but also marks one of the two occurences of alternate endings in Zelda series ever (the other one being Link's Awakening).

[empresscarrie]

My sister and I would play Banjo when we were young and the game over screen, honestly, it made us cry, it made us absolutely BAWL our eyes out. I remember being so scared when I'd get low on life and seeing Banjo and Kazooies icon get more and more beat up. I learned to run away from the game every time I game overed.

[zeospark]

Dude I'm glad I never really play the Metroid Prime games when I was younger. Seriously the game over screens include Samus' heart stopping and straight up a pool of her blood on the ground? Hot damn...