You don't expect a horror game based on countering ghosts with a camera to be so heartbreakingly mean at times.
Due to the nature of Player Punches, there are unmarked spoilers.
Fatal Frame
- The Canon Ending. Mafuyu feels compassion for Kirie, after having learned about her past and how pained she is by everything that happened to and because of her, and decides to remain with Kirie at the Hell Gate. This way, Kirie will never have to suffer from loneliness again - Mafuyu gives Miku a slight push to get out of harm's way of the collapsing cave and gives her a last smile. After everything that Miku - and the player - have gone through to try and find Mafuyu, it becomes pointless because he chooses to remain behind.
Fatal Frame II
- The Canon Ending, again. Mio chases after Mayu, who has been possessed by Sae's spirit and dragged to the site of the ceremony. Upon reaching the site, Mio becomes possessed by the atmosphere and begins to strangle Mayu, turning her into a crimson butterfly and completing the ceremony. Then Mio is seen running and stumbling after the butterfly, begging and pleading for forgiveness. The worst part: this is the only ending a player can get on a first playthrough.
- The Frozen Butterfly ending in Deep Crimson Butterfly. After all your efforts to separate Sae from Mayu so Mio and Mayu could escape the village together, Mayu decides that if Mio won't strangle her and complete the ritual, she'll just strangle Mio instead. Jesus, Mayu.
Fatal Frame IV
- Madoka's death. Contrary to the other playable protagonists, she is openly terrified of the spirits she's seeing and can't pull herself together. While seeing her spirit is sad enough, the real kicker comes from reading her memos littering the place. One can see how she slowly lost her mind, trying to outrun the aggressive spirits.
- The failed Kiraigous. Whether it's the one that Sakuya and the protagonists performed or the one with the fake Utsuwa, it hurts to see that a ritual that was meant to appease spirits and smooth their transition into the afterlife has backfired so horribly. Especially when it turns out that, unlike the rituals in the previous games, this one didn't have any sacrifice going on. It was supposed to be a completely death-free ritual.
Fatal Frame V
- Finding out that the reason the Black Water flooded the mountain was because, after being raised to be a sacrifice, Ose realized at the last second she wanted to live with Asou instead. She's just deeply sad and terrified of not having anyone by her side. Even the good ending is a heavily bittersweet one for her, because while her resolve is strengthened by Yuri crying with her, she still returns to the waters of Mt. Hikami alone. Of course, it's much easier to unknowingly get the bad ending instead, where Yuri joins her to be Together in Death...and leaves behind a devastated Hisoka, who has failed yet again to stop someone from ending their life on the mountain.
General
- Miku Hinasaki, the poor girl.
- Notes from her imply that she has always had romantic feelings towards her older brother, which makes her losing him at the end of the first game an even worse punch to the stomach. Her next appearance, in the third game, reveals that she is not over his death and actually considers her getting the Tatoo Curse as punishment for having survived, when Mafuyu died, and actually willingly following Mafuyu's spirit into the deepest parts of the manor and ready to die, just to be with him.
- Things don't stop there. According to the official guide, her following Mafuyu's spirit was also the time she got pregnant with his child - she proceeds to give birth to their daughter, a Shadowborn, which has the side-effect of drastically shortening Miku's lifespan. Terrified of being alone after dying, she proceeds to head to Mt Hikami and gets herself spiritually married to Mafuyu.
- And neither of Miu's endings spells fortune for Miku. Either Miku is already dead by the time Miu found her, meaning whatever you saw during the game was a faint trace of her spirit, or she only has a little amount of time left before dying, leaving her daughter alone again.
- Either way, every one of those games proceeds to punch the player over and over, thinking that what they are doing is there to help Miku and make things better, but ultimately realize it gets worse.
