Tear Jerker / Don't Starve

• Wendy:
  • The poor girl's beloved twin sister died under unknown circumstances, resulting in a morbid, perpetually depressed child who has never stopped mourning the loss of her sibling.
    Wendy clings fiercely onto the grief over her own sister's death for fear that moving on will cause Abigail's memory to fade.
  • Some of her quotes reveal bits about her character before Abigail's death, including a comment about "Abby" helping her make holiday ribbons curly and a mention of jumping into puddles with her sister. Compare that to her usual, highly depressed self.
    Abigail could always find a way to bring a smile to Wendy's face... sadly, she would later become the reason it went away for good.
  • Some of her dialogue, such as when almost struck by lightning in RoG ("So close to death, yet so far.") and when examining a skeleton ("I envy your escape."), implies that she's suicidal. This would be sad enough on its own, but keep in mind she's a child.
  • She's also implied to have a case of Survivor's Guilt from this.
    Wendy: This time... I can protect you.
• The Telltale Heart from Don't Starve Together is used to revive ghosts, but it only works on PC's (for functional reasons). Trying it on Abigail won't work because her soul is already bound to her flower, and some of the character quotes that result from trying this are sad. Winona's quote is a double tearjerker if you know the context. She of all people knows what that kind of loss feels like, given what's become of Charlie.
  Webber: Wendy would've been so happy if it worked.
  Winona: No one should ever lose a sister.
• Maxwell:
  • His current relationship with Charlie, to some degree. Charlie was one of the few people who believed in Maxwell back when he was a struggling magician, and it's heavily implied that they were romantically involved. Now Charlie absolutely despises Maxwell (for good reason), and Maxwell, despite still being a jerk, definitely seems to feel guilty for what he did to Charlie.
  • His entire backstory could be considered this. He started off as a down-on-his-luck young magician named William Carter, who, after a series of commercial and financial failures, discovered the Codex Umbra, and began using the dark magic in his shows. This quickly spiralled out of control, slowly driving the poor guy insane, and eventually resulting in both him and Charlie being dragged into the Constant. There's a tragedy in seeing this well-meaning and mild-mannered young man devolve into the cruel chessmaster after years of being bound to the Shadow Throne.
  • It appears that Maxwell also has a case of depression (though not as severe as Wendy's):
    Mushroom Planter (rotten): Rotten, all the way through. I relate.
    End Table (flowers wilted): Every lovely flower must one day wilt.
    Machete: Truthfully I was always a hack.
    Wood Fence: My life is one obstacle after another.
    Queenly Figure: Must everything be about my shortcomings?
    Woodlegs' Cage: We are all trapped, in one way or another.
    Dragoon Heart: Hearts only bring pain anyway.
    Gord's Knot: A tangled mess. Like life.
  • And in Don't Starve Together he realizes that among the people he exiled in the Constant through the years there are none other than the twin daughters of his brother Jack, and one of them was already dead to begin with. Maxwell feels so guilty about what he did that he refuses to acknowledge them as his own nieces.
• The "Billy and Mumsy" vignette◊ from the new Gorge event seems sweet at first, with Mumsy teaching Billy how to cook, but then you realize that with the Gnaw in their world constantly demanding food sacrifices under pain of transformation into a (normally, with the exceptions of Sammy and Pipton) mindless beast, Mumsy isn't just doing a cute bonding activity with Billy, but teaching him a critical survival skill. She knows that if nothing changes, he will be doomed to the same tired existence she lives, but even lonelier, given how many others have died off. It sure gives the whole scene a more desperate feel.
  "Always hold the board steady. Remember, a sharp knife is safer than a dull one. Don't forget."
• The Swamp Pig Elder is a grade A Woobie. He's a Father to His Men, and does all he can to help his fellow Swamp Pigs, despite his age. And how does the Gnaw reward him? By destroying the Pigs' houses and sending the Mermification plague on him. When we see him, he is already partially mermified, with scales on his arms that he tries to hide with bandages. He's clearly exhausted from fighting off the plague, as well as from his old age, but he refuses to die or succumb to the plague because he doesn't think his pigs would survive without him. He can't even sleep without being tormented by nightmares. And throughout all this, all he wants to do is fix the pigs' houses so that they can have a roof over their heads again.
  • Also to be noted is the fact that the goats don't care about them at all. The Elder and his Swamp Pigs make comments about the players being unusual ("YOU WEIRD GOAT", for example) just for being willing to trade with them.
• In the Next of Kin cinematic, we see Winona help her friend Genevieve when the Voxola factory starts collapsing. Genevieve and her fellow workers run out the factory, while Winona goes to investigate the disturbance, which ends up with her getting sucked into the Constant. We then see the workers outside the burning factory, and Genevieve falls to her knees in despair because for all she knows, Winona has died.
• In the From The Ashes cinematic we find out that Willow has no family, which is sad. This is topped only by her being with no family and hunted down by the Shadow Creatures ever since she was a child. The cinematic ends with Willow burning down the orphanage where she lived to save her own life, giving us no clue of what become of her after that accident. But for sure now the quotes that imply that she considered Bernie and fire her only friends before the events of Don't Starve Together take on a whole new meaning.
• In the Taste of Home cinematic we see Warly cooking for his old mother Angeline. The woman, clearly affected by dementia, tastes the food and her world gains color again, Angeline is able to recognize her child... but only for a few moments before she is back to her dark world. And then something goes out from the gramophone and Warly disappears right in front of his mother's eyes, but Angeline is too lost into her illness to recognize that something is wrong.
  • And this becomes even worse as it is implied in Warly's biography that he was exiled in the Constant because "a voice from a radio" promised him to save Angeline from her illness.
• The cinematic Wish You Were Here features Wendy and Abigail playing together, with Abigail finding the flowers the twins are still wearing in their hair... And then Jack Carter appears, and Wendy is reminded that Abigail is dead. The little girl becomes depressed and she sadly walks back inside while her father can do nothing but watch, worried about his surviving daughter's mental health.
  • The above becomes even more heartbreaking knowing poor Jack will eventually lose Wendy too, on top of his brother William having been missing for years at that point.
• The cinematic Along Came a Spider showcases Webber's origins. A simple boy who loved studying and helping bugs, he yearned for attention from his father, who was too absorbed with his work in studying The Constant with Wagstaff to really pay him any mind. In a fit of anger, he decides to act out and smash the latest thing Wagstaff has brought the old man... which turns out to be a container for a Spider. It devours him whole, but due to being out of its element, instead of merely digesting the boy, they fuse together on a deep level. Hearing the commotion, his parents emerge to see him trying to sneak back into his room, and chase him out with a candle, not even realizing it was their own son. In the end, the reason Webber came to the Constant was because he wants to be separated from the Spider at any cost so he can go back to his family and promise he'll be good from now on.
• The story of Pearl and the Crab King is rather tragic. The player finds Pearl, an elderly, crotchety crab hermit living alone on a small island. She's rather cold to them at first, but as the player does favors for her, like fixing up her house and cleaning up the things on her island, Pearl warms up to them. Eventually, she trusts the player enough to give them her pearl, her lover's last gift to her, and asks them to give it back to the Crab King. The player does that, but the Crab King is too corrupted by the magic he was meddling around with to listen to reason, forcing the player to fight and defeat him. The pearl is cracked in the process, and the player has no choice other than to hand it back to a despondent Pearl, who thanks them regardless for coming back.
  • The Survivor's examination quotes for the cracked pearl only serve further to twist the knife:
    Woodie: "I was only trying to help..."
    Warly: "Oh... oh dear..."
    Maxwell: "Ah. I thought I'd run out of people to disappoint."
  • The reason Pearl's been sending out countless bottled messages? She's hoping for one of the messages to reach the Crab King so he'll return to her. Some of her messages can be found in the bottles.
    I know you're still out there, my dear. I won't ever give up.
    Please come home. I miss you so much.
    I'll keep sending messages, until one reaches you...
• On the surface, Wortox comes across as cheerful and confident. However, some of his quotes show a darker side to his personality, suggesting that this may all be a facade. He seems to genuinely hate himself for taking other creatures' souls, despite needing to do this to eat, which traps him in an endless cycle of guilt. Add to this that he accidentally killed his best friend, and it's easy to see why he feels he's cursed. As the curio cabinet puts it, his levity masks a deep well of guilt.
  Examining Buzzard: "It doesn't want to feed on death. It just has to."
  Examining Merm Head: "I guess there are more distasteful things than soul consumption"
  When holding no souls: "I don't want to suck anymore souls!"
  When holding no souls: "What gruesome things I must do to live!"
  Failed Ancient Chest combo: "It seems my soul is too tarnished."
  Releasing souls (unimplemented): "I simply couldn't bear the guilt."
  Releasing souls (unimplemented): "I didn't want to do it!"
  Releasing souls (unimplemented): "My existence is a curse."
  Examining dead Spider/Frog: "Sorry! I'm sorry."
  Examining Evil Flower: "It's not its fault it's evil."
• Many of the quotes for being attacked or witnessing a murder by another player in Don't Starve Together are this, with several characters sounding genuinely betrayed and heartbroken by their friends' violent actions.
• WX-78's cinematic, Disconnected, shows Winona reconnecting their Empathy Drive. However, after they remember their Dark and Troubled Past and creation, WX rips out the aforementioned Empathy Drive, and CRUSHES IT. Ouch.
• In the A Little Drama update, the survivors can put on a play that dramatizes Charlie's backstory and transformation. It means nothing to the majority of the survivors, but Winona and Maxwell understand exactly what they're seeing, and they're horrified. Winona learns how frustrated Charlie was at her big sister's heavy-handed attempts to protect her. Maxwell can only watch on in grief, realizing the shadows have brainwashed Charlie to the extent that she blames him for absolutely everything while believing the shadows are innocent victims who only wanted to be free, and that they even did her a favor by making her powerful.
  Maxwell: ...Is that really how she remembers it?
• In the same update, Maxwell can perform a soliloquy, where he attempts to put on a magic show. He pulls two shadows from his Codex Umbra, but they vanish within seconds.
  Maxwell: The show was better with...well, it was better before.

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