Apocalyptic Log: Difference between revisions

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** Similarly, all we see of the activation of Unit 04 is a mushroom cloud rising up from the test site, followed by static.
* In ''[[Pokémon: The First Movie|Pokémon the First Movie]]'', Dr. Fuji records logs showing his team's eventual creation of Mewtwo. The final log shows their deaths at the [[Psychic Powers|mind]] of their enraged creation.
{{quote| ''We dreamed of creating the world's strongest Pokémon...[[Gone Horribly Right|And we succeeded.]]''}}
* In the visual and sound novels of ''[[Higurashi no Naku Koro ni]]'', The TIPS show that Shion kept a journal as {{spoiler|she was going mad due to Hinamizawa Syndrome}}. Although you actually do get to see many of the events that the journal refers to, it gives a closer look into her mind as the events unfold and ends with the [[Tear Jerker|"Notebook of Happiness"]] entry, which ends, as you might guess from the ironic title, {{spoiler|"I'm sorry for having been born"}}. Naturally, it was cut from the anime.
* The horror manga, ''Mail'', has a story titled "Portrait"; it starts with a woman picking up and arranging her sister's belongings after she had committed suicide via self-immolation and discovering her diary. The diary describes the last few weeks of her sister's life including finding a rare portrait and her growing obsession with it. It starts of with her trying to discover more about the painting, to learning more about the girl in the painting, to writing in her diary that she thinks there is something creepy going on in her apartment, to thinking that the source of the creepiness is that new painting she is so fond of to realizing that sometimes, the eyes of the sleeping girl would open up, to finally writing over and over again how she wants to die. When reading that last page, the woman who finds her sister's diary realizes that {{spoiler|the last few pages handwriting slowly changes from her sister's handwriting to someone else's. When she realizes this, she looks at the portrait and realizes that it's looking straight at her. It turns out that the portrait of the girl still has the girl's spirit trapped inside due to the sympathy she got in life, cheering her to live on despite the fact that the only thing she ever wanted was to die and end her suffering and since then, has been committing suicide through the various owners of the portrait!}}
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* ''[http://featherfish.livejournal.com/196763.html#cutid1 The Baker Street Record]'', an epic [[Sherlock Holmes]] / ''[[House of Leaves]]'' crossover, is one giant [[Apocalyptic Log]], much like ''[[House of Leaves]]'' itself.
* In ''[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6562450/1/Subject_014 Subject 014]'', a Naruto Fanfiction, Anko is in an [[Abandoned Base]] and is reading one of these and the last entry sudden trails off the clipboard. Anko then checks the date. [[Oh Crap|the last entry was written seventeen minutes ago]]
{{quote| Anko: "Fuck!"}}
* The [[Axis Powers Hetalia]] [[Dark Fic]], ''[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5251546/1/Log_of_the_End_of_the_World Log of the End of the World]'', is [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|exactly what you'd expect it to be]]. Although there are a few chapters where it goes out of the log format, the majority of the fic is written as journal entries written by the surviving [[Anthropomorphic Personification|Nations]] after {{spoiler|a nuclear war kills millions around the world, including Nations like Russia, Poland, Hungary, Finland, Ukraine, Belarus, (South) Korea, Taiwan... The list truly ''does'' goes on}}.
* Dr. Brainstorm records something similar to one while his lab is ablaze in ''[[Calvin and Hobbes: The Series|Calvin and Hobbes The Series]]''.
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** Based upon the real-life incident of herpetologist Karl P. Schmidt (see folder "Real Life", below).
* From ''[[Monty Python and The Holy Grail]]'':
{{quote| '''King Arthur:''' ''(about the inscription on the rock)'' What does it say, Brother Maynard?<br />
'''Brother Maynard:''' It reads, "Here may be found the last words of Joseph of Aramathia. He who is valiant and pure of spirit may find the holy grail in the Castle of Aaaaarrrrrrggghhh..."<br />
'''King Arthur:''' What?<br />
'''Brother Maynard:''' "The Castle of Aaaaarrrrrrggghhh".<br />
'''Sir Bedevere:''' What is that?<br />
'''Brother Maynard:''' He must have died while carving it.<br />
'''Sir Lancelot:''' Oh come on!<br />
'''Brother Maynard:''' Well, that's what it says.<br />
'''King Arthur:''' Look, if he was dying, he wouldn't have bothered to carve "Aaaaarrrrrrggghhh" into the rock. He'd just say it.<br />
'''Sir Galahad:''' Maybe he was dictating it.<br />
'''King Arthur:''' Oh shut up! }}
* A very abbreviated version can be found in ''[[Event Horizon]]'', wherein the salvage crew finds the ship's logs. The first portion shows the ambitious crew getting ready to perform the experimental hyperspace jump, but it cuts out at the moment of entry, to be replaced by horrific images of what happened to the crew after [[Hyperspace Is a Scary Place|the trip]]. The last coherent line recorded on the log is {{spoiler|"Liberate tutume ex inferis", or "Save yourself from hell".}}
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** Incidentally, you end up being able to ''listen'' to this log in the unofficial 2002 video game sequel of the same name.
* ''[[The Lord of the Rings (film)|The Lord of the Rings]]'': In ''The Fellowship of the Ring'', the titular Fellowship go into the Mines of Moria, but find out that all the dwarves of Moria had died. Gandalf finds the log of the last siege by the orcs:
{{quote| "They have taken the bridge and the second hall. We have barred the gates, but cannot hold them for long. The ground shakes. Drums...drums in the deep. We cannot get out. A shadow lurks in the dark. We cannot get out... ''They are coming''."}}
** The last three words are written in a jagged scrawl with the final letter terminating in swift descending line. It's fairly obvious the author wrote this just before the last line of defense was breached.
* The ''[[Evil Dead]]'' trilogy uses this trope as the catalyst for its plot, as Professor Knowby, the researcher who first unearthed the [[Tome of Eldritch Lore|Necronomicon]], kept an audio journal chronicling his battle with his [[Demonic Possession|demon-possessed]] wife Henrietta, and his failed attempt to survive the night. Unfortunately, he'd also recorded the recitation of the demon summoning spell that'd accidentally caused the mess to begin with, meaning that anyone who listens to the whole tape ends up going through the exact same thing.
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* ''[[Frankenstein (novel)|Frankenstein]]'' may or may not be one of these, depending on whether or not you think the sea captain who narrates the [[Framing Story]] will rescue his ship from the Arctic ice.
* [[Shel Silverstein]] combines this with [[Subverted Rhyme Every Occasion]] in the poem ''Boa Constrictor''.
{{quote| I'm being swallowed by a boa constrictor<br />
And I don't like it one bit!<br />
Oh no, he swallowed my toe<br />
Oh gee, he's gotten my knee<br />
Oh fiddle, he's up to my middle<br />
Oh heck, he's up to my neck<br />
Oh dread, he's ''mmmmmfffff...'' }}
* [[Dan Simmons]] seems to really enjoy these. In ''[[Hyperion]]'' the [[Apocalyptic Log]] is subverted as we get to read the journals from the character as he goes insane from sickness and then as he gets better. In ''[[The Terror]]'' it's much nastier as the journal appears through out the book slowly becoming more and more hopeless until in the final entry {{spoiler|he tells us how he finally managed to kill the people who captured him as he dies of starvation, scurvy and freezing cold.}}
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* A ''[[Doctor Who]]'' [[Expanded Universe]] novel features a Cyberman-obsessed researcher recording her experiences for future references as she is gradually converted into a Cyberman. Unusual, in that no one gets to discover it -- once she's converted, her original personality is wiped away and she no longer recognises the logic in recording it, and so destroys the recording.
* Australian novel ''Underground'' is essentially a set of memoirs written by Leo James -- washed-up property developer and brother to the [[President Evil|tyrannical Australian Prime Minister]] -- during his imprisonment in the near-abandoned Parliament House. In these memoirs, he records the events that led to the permanent state of emergency, his unwanted travels up and down Australia's east coast, his capture and the weeks of torture and imprisonment that followed. The memoirs and the novel end with the moments before Leo's execution:
{{quote| I hear marching footsteps in the hall outside. Orders yelled. I think the fuckers are actually going to shoot me in ''here''. And God help them, they sound Australian.}}
* In the ''LOTR'' parody novel ''[[Bored of the Rings]]'', Tim Benzedrine leaves a note for the boggies the morning after they stay with him in which he enters a drug flashback ''while writing''.
* The poem ''The Slithery Dee'': "...He came out of the sea;/He ate all the others,/But he didn't eat---SL-U-R-P..."
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* ''[[Doctor Who]]'': in the episode "Silence in the Library", the Doctor and his companion listen to a recorded message (censored "for tone and content") on a data-terminal in an abandoned library. "Message follows: Run. For God's sake, run. Nowhere is safe... We can't--Oh, they're here. Argh. Slargh. Snick. Message ends."
** "[[Doctor Who/Recap/S26 E3 The Curse of Fenric]]" featured the runic inscriptions of a Viking who made the mistake of stealing a flask [[Sealed Evil in a Can|containing Fenric, Evil Incarnate.]]
{{quote| "I am the only one left now. I raise these stones to my wife, Astrid. May she forgive my sin. The day grows dark, and I sense the evil curse rising from the sea. I know now what the curse of Fenric seeks: the treasures from the Silk Lands in the east. I have heard the treasures whisper in my dreams. I have heard the magic words that will release great powers. I shall bury the treasure for ever. Tonight, I shall die, and the words die with me."}}
** "The God Complex": The episode opens with a young policewoman writing an account of her final moments as she succumbs to brainwashing that seems to befall everyone who arrives in the 'hotel'. The Doctor and the others later discover this.
* Parodied by ''[[Red Dwarf]]'' in the episode ''Psirens''. While investigating a derelict ship, the crew find a flight recorder showing a fear-crazed astronaut munching a burger as he documents the horrible fate of his crew. A hideous insectoid monster approaches as the astronaut backs away in terror. A spray of red splatters across the screen...
{{quote| {{spoiler|Astronaut: You've squeezed all the ketchup out of my burger!}}}}
* Played for laughs ([[Tear Jerker|sort of]]) in the final episode of ''[[Blackadder Goes Forth]]''. Darling is preparing to go over the top to his death.
{{quote| '''Darling:''' Made a note in my diary on the way here. It simply says..."Bugger."}}
* ''[[Star Trek]]''. Several episodes in several series feature the crew discovering the logs of the last folks to encounter the disease/NegativeSpaceWedgie/villain of the week.
** One especially notable case from ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation|Star Trek the Next Generation]]'': in the episode "Contagion", the ''Enterprise'' downloads one of these from the USS ''Yamato''. Unfortunately, the log had hidden in it the computer virus that caused the Yamato to blow up.
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** In the second pilot of [[Star Trek: The Original Series|the original series]], "Where No Man Has Gone Before", the crew discovered the log of the last people to encounter the [[A God Am I]] ray. It ends with the ship's captain giving a self-destruct order.
* The Atlantis expedition finds an Apocalyptic Log in the [[Pilot]] episode of ''[[Stargate Atlantis]]'':
{{quote| '''Melia:''' In time, a thousand worlds bore the fruit of life in this form. Then one day our people stepped foot on a dark world where a terrible enemy slept. Never before had we encountered beings with powers that rivalled our own. In our overconfidence, we were unprepared and outnumbered. The enemy fed upon defenseless human worlds like a great scourge, until finally only Atlantis remained. This city's great shield was powerful enough to withstand their terrible weapons, but here we were besieged for many years. In an offer to save the last of our kind, we submerged our great city into the ocean. The Atlantis Stargate was the one and only link back to Earth from this galaxy, and those who remained used it to return to that world that was once home. There the last survivors of Atlantis lived out the remainder of their lives. This city was left to slumber, in the hope that our kind would one day return.}}
** Also happens in "The Daedalus Variations". Sheppard & Co., aboard an empty Daedalus, find a video log left by the captain before the ship was abandoned.
* ''[[Stargate Universe]]'' uses a variation of this concept in the episode "Time" - the difference is the log is created by Eli in an alternate timeline then sent into the past through a wormhole.
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== Music ==
* "Death Story" by Lecrae is the last-minute prayer of a gangster on his deathbed.
{{quote| ''I wronged You, I see that, I want to give in,<br />
But I ain't really sure if you'll forgive me my sins...<br />
Well, this is it. No more discussion to do.<br />
I don't know much, but I know I should be trusting in... [[Flatline|BEEEEEEEEEEEEP...]]'' }}
 
* "The Chariot" by The Cat Empire.
{{quote| ''This is a song that came upon me one night<br />
When the news it had been telling me<br />
About one more war and one more fight<br />
And 'aeh' I sighed but then<br />
I thought about my friends<br />
Then I wrote this declaration<br />
Just in case the world ends.'' }}
* "Chiron Beta Prime" by [[Jonathan Coulton]].
{{quote| ''That's all the family news that we're allowed to talk about<br />
We really hope you'll come and visit us soon<br />
I mean we're literally begging you to visit us<br />
And make it quick before they [message redacted]'' }}
* "Experiment IV" by [[Kate Bush]].
{{quote| Then they told us<br />
All they wanted<br />
Was a sound that could kill someone<br />
From a distance.<br />
So we go ahead,<br />
And the meters are over in the red.<br />
It's a mistake in the making.<br />
...<br />
We won't be there to be blamed.<br />
We won't be there to snitch.<br />
I just pray that someone there<br />
Can hit the switch. }}
* "Space Oddity" by [[David Bowie]].
{{quote| ''Ground Control to Major Tom<br />
Your circuit's dead, there's something wrong<br />
Can you hear me, Major Tom?<br />
Can you hear me, Major Tom?<br />
Can you hear me, Major Tom?<br />
Can you.... '' }}
** The acoustic version on the ''Sound+ Vision'' album even [[Last-Note Nightmare|ends with a choked sob, and the Morse Code for S.O.S. repeating into the fade.]]
* Dr. Jekyll sings an Apocalyptic Log in the musical version of ''Jekyll and Hyde''.
* "Two Suns in the Sunset" by [[Pink Floyd]] describes the last few moments of a man's life before he is killed by a nuclear bomb.
{{quote| ''the rusty wire that holds the cork<br />
that keeps the anger in<br />
gives way<br />
and suddenly it's day again<br />
the sun is in the east<br />
even though the day is done<br />
two suns in the sunset<br />
could be the human race is run<br />
and as the windshield melts<br />
my tears evaporate<br />
leaving only charcoal to defend<br />
finally i understand<br />
the feelings of the few<br />
ashes and diamonds<br />
foe and friend }}
we were all equal in the end''
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* [[Iron Maiden]]'s "Satellite 15...The Final Frontier" is about a pilot in a damaged ship giving his last report.
* "Pioneers over C." by [[Van der Graaf Generator]], which, like "Space Oddity" deals with space exploration gone wrong:
{{quote| We left the earth in 1983<br />
Fingers groping for the galaxies<br />
Reddened eyes staring up into the void<br />
A thousand stars to be exploited<br />
Somebody help me, I'm falling<br />
Somebody help me, I'm falling down...<br />
Into sky, into earth, into sky, into earth }}
* [[Rush]]'s "Cygnus X-1" is about a space pilot flying his ship directly into the heart of a black hole. Subverted in the second part, "Hemispheres", where he comes out the other end.
* Mind.In.A.Box's "Stalkers". By the sound of things, the singer is either suffering from a mental breakdown from paranoid schizophrenia, or being [[You Will Be Assimilated|forcibly assimilated]] by a [[Hive Mind]].
{{quote| ''I can feel my thoughts dying out<br />
so my last thought is just your name<br />
and it is all that will remain...'' }}
* "30k ft" by Assemblage 23 is about a doomed airline passenger making a final phone call to his wife/lover. The song [[Killed Mid-Sentence|cuts off in mid-sentence]] at the end.
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== Radio ==
* In [[Orson Welles]]' infamous radio version of ''[[The War of the Worlds]]'', commentator Carl Phillips describes the effects of the Martian heat ray right up to the bitter end:
{{quote| '''Phillips:''' A humped shape is rising out of the pit. I can make out a small beam of light against a mirror. What's that? There's a jet of flame springing from the mirror, and it leaps right at the advancing men. It strikes them head on! Good Lord, they're turning into flame!\}}
''(screams and unearthly shrieks)'' '''Phillips:''' Now the whole field's caught fire. ''(explosion)'' The woods... the barns... the gas tanks of automobiles... it's spreading everywhere. It's coming this way. About twenty yards to my right... ''(crash of microphone, then dead silence)''
** An even better example is the announcer broadcasting from atop the CBS building in New York, watching the Martian's poisonous smoke drift across the city.
{{quote| '''Announcer:''' Smoke comes out, black smoke, drifting over the city. People in the streets see it now. They're running towards the East River, thousands of them, dropping in like rats. Now the smoke's spreading faster. It's reached Times Square. People are trying to run away from it, but it's no use. They're -- They're falling like flies. Now the smoke's crossing Sixth Avenue... Fifth Avenue... a hundred yards away... it's -- it's fifty feet.... ''(a thud, as he collapses)''}}
 
 
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*** Due to Adam absorbing and containing memories of it's previous users, you can sometimes see Ghosts throughout Rapture. The Apocalyptic part comes in because, well, obviously ''something'' had to have happened to them.
* ''[[Blaz Blue]]'' - {{spoiler|Arakune}} actually becomes oddly sympathetic {{spoiler|for a cannibalistic swarm of insects held together by a mind hanging off the brink of insanity}} thanks to this. His arcade ending starts with an audio log on tape, detaling his undisclosed job and how he hates meetings regarding turning a local phlebotonium into weapons because of the "hard chairs and harder people" involved. Eventually, the logs become slightly more detailed as he begins to find out things about the power source that "everyone uses, but no one quite understands". He thinks he's cracked it when it fast forwards forward again... {{spoiler|and we slowly hear his descent from coherent, normal speech into the scattered, stuttering voice he speaks with in game, slowly detailing the process of his becoming Arakune.}}
{{quote| "Of cour{{spoiler|se i}}f {{spoiler|I}} don'{{spoiler|t}} ha{{spoiler|ve a}} face, I{{spoiler|'ll}} j{{spoiler|u}}st make one."}}
* ''[[Brink]]'', as unlockable Audio Logs.
* In ''[[Chrono Trigger]]'', seeing the video playback of the Day of Lavos is what prompts our heroes into trying to prevent it from happening.
* Parodied in ''[[The Curse of Monkey Island]]'' with the plaques of the Plunder Island Naturalist Society.
{{quote| '''Guybrush:''' ''(reading the last plaque, found on the edge of a quicksand pit)'' "[[Quicksand Sucks|Quicksand]] pit. [[Quicksand Sucks|Quicksand]] pits of this type are common throughout Plunder Island's nature trails. Many an unwary traveler has found himself trapped and unable to esca- Someone, anyone, please, please help me, I'm sinking..."}}
* Much of ''[[Dead Space (series)|Dead Space]]'''s story is told through these. In the first game {{spoiler|the opening recording is ''also'' an [[Apocalyptic Log]], but you don't get to see the apocalyptic part until the end of the game.}}
* In the undersea lab level of ''[[Deus Ex]]'', at least one scientist attempts to send a message for help all the way to the last moment. The message, retained in text format, is notably filled with spelling, punctuation, and grammatical errors, as would be expected. In several other points in the game, the last words of the dead are to be found on datacubes left beside their bodies, including in the Hong Kong Canal Road tunnel collapse, X51's underground section and the MJ12 base under {{spoiler|Hell's Kitchen}}.
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** There is also a miniquest near Kvatch involving a man that believes he must appease "The Sunken One" to prevent the rest of the world from suffering the same fate as Kvatch. You don't meet him while he is still alive, learning of his quest (and its depressing ending, as he died believing that his failure to appease The Sunken One will doom the entire world) through journal entries.
** A [http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Trolls_of_Forsaken_Mine Fighter's Guild quest] sends the player to find out why some comrades (including the guildmaster's over-protected son Viranus, who [[I Just Want to Be Special|desperately wants a chance to prove himself in battle]]) haven't come back from clearing out a troll-infested mine. They're all dead, of course. The son's journal, found on his body, explains how it all went wrong, ending with:
{{quote| I hear trolls\}}
I'm sorry Mother
*** For bonus sad points, in his diary he writes about another Fighter's Guild member that he had a very, um, [[Ho Yay|special]] relationship with. Four feet away from Viranus is that guy's corpse.
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* Bungie has a long history with this sort of exposition. Their early games ''[[Pathways into Darkness]]'', ''Myth'' and ''[[Marathon Trilogy|Marathon]]'' all relied almost exclusively on this method of story telling.
** This trope is also invoked to the letter on at least one computer terminal in ''Marathon Infinity''.
{{quote| "The shields are gone, not down, but gone, and so are the engineers. It's coming back, I'm sure: and my last mercy is immolation."}}
** There's also:
{{quote| I am Arther Frain, Chief Petty Officer, USEC Marathon.\}}
Arther Frane calling all USEC personnel. Calling Cmdr. Robert Blake... Calling Security Chief Jones... Arther Frain calling any USEC controlled ship in vicinity... Station hull breached, we are losing pressurization. More than half the men are without vacuum suits. Patrols reporting intruder, last location unknown. Any USEC controlled ship surviving nova event, transport when ready. Arther Frain calling. That is all...
** ''Pathways'' in particular took this even further, as instead of reading the journals lying next to mangled corpses in order to progress, you can use a mysterious artifact to ''talk to them''. Needless to say, most people aren't very talkative after spending twenty or forty years trapped in their corpse as the Horror-spawned monstrosities that killed them shamble by and occasionally nibble on them in the darkness.
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*** "Mocking Query: Coorta? Coorta, are you dead yet?"
* In ''[[Knights of the Old Republic]]'', whilst out on a particular quest on Kashyyyk, you find the corpses of several Wookies -- all murdered by the shape-shifting assassin you're looking for. Thankfully one of his victims was [[Genre Savvy]] enough to keep a diary of the systematic murder of an entire hunting party:
{{quote| We found Grarwwaar's body last night: what was left of it. If we do not leave the Shadowlands soon, I fear we will all become victims of the Faceless One.}}
** ''KOTOR'' enjoys this trope quite a bit. ''KOTOR 1'' let you find the journals of a Terentatek hunting party, each written shortly before the final fights of their owners, each written in a manner that suggests doom. At least one Sith student heading into a tomb left a datapad on how he or she was going to get around the traps and monsters left in there. A party going after a malfunctioning assassination droid with oversensitive hearing and using stealth belts takes a moment to log this and note with irritation that one of their number is clumsy. ''KOTOR 2'' had these in multiple places, from the holorecordings on Peragus to the journal left inside the Jekk' Jekk Tarr's ventilation system...It's hard to find a planet that doesn't have one of these.
*** Malachor V. Unfortunately, this only serves as a stunning reminder that the entire planet and everybody on or around it were obliterated too fast for even The Force to catch up, so maybe it doesn't much count.
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* ''[[Mass Effect]]'' has a few of these. In one case, the party boards a spaceship that is seemingly abandoned besides one brain-dead man on life support. It eventually becomes clear that the comatose man's lover, a powerful biotic, was violently opposed to his being taken off life support. Logs left by the captain and the ship's doctor reference her declining mental state, and it's fairly obvious that she eventually killed all the other passengers. {{spoiler|If you turn off the man's life support, she will appear behind you and attack.}}
** And then there's Ilos, where you can hear recordings from the Protheans {{spoiler|as they try to get the word out about the Reapers in the vain hope of fighting them off.}} The fact that the recording is slightly garbled doesn't help.
{{quote| ''Cannot be stopped... cannot be stopped...''}}
** The second game lives on this trope; nearly every mission or sidequest includes, at a minimum, a datapad or two documenting events in the process of going horribly wrong. Notable examples include the excavation site with the datapad reading, "If you're reading this, GET OUT RIGHT NOW," the {{spoiler|logs of the quarian scientists on the ''Alarei'' (including [[Tear Jerker|Rael'Zorah's last message to Tali]])}}, and {{spoiler|1=the [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1APcaqh0jJs logs of the Cerberus team] studying the derelict Reaper, which depict the horrific course of reaper indoctrination, even though the reaper is supposed to be dead.}}
{{quote| {{spoiler|"But a dead god can still dream!"}}}}
** That last has one log that stands out, at first seeming more banal and harmless than the others. Someone talking about his wife Katy's anger management issues. The other exclaims that Katy is ''his'' wife, he must have told the first the story. He hadn't. They wonder how the hell they can remember the same thing. In context, you can see that this is part of the [[Loss of Identity]] and indoctrination they're going through.
** Part [[Video Game]] and part [[Web Original]], in the days and hours leading up to the release of [[Mass Effect 3]], the Twitter account [https://twitter.com/#!/AllianceNewsNet Alliance News Network], [[Audience Participation|along with hundreds of fans]], performed a flawless viral ad campaign, releasing tweets in real time of the [[Eldritch Abomination|Reaper]] "invasion" of Earth, not unlike the radio show [[War of the Worlds]].
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* Bones are scattered throughout the Crystal Desert in ''[[Guild Wars]]''. Examining some of them lets you read the last written entries by the person when they were alive. The desert really, ''really'' sucks, by the way....
* A quest related diary in ''[[Tibia]]'' ends like this:
{{quote| It's just [[Aloof Big Brother|Arthei]]... he got burnt really badly... I barely recognise his face... Kala is sitting at his bed 24 hours a day with red swollen eyes and praying for his life. When she falls asleep in exhaustion we are keeping watch.<br />
<from here on, all of the pages have been torn out, only the last page remains:><br />
[[Came Back Wrong|THE FIRST DAY OF ETERNITY I CAN SEE NOW. FOOLS. ALL OF YOU. HAHAHAHAHA.]] }}
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* The summer camp in ''Psychonauts'' has a history of the area display, complete with gradual decent into madness of the entire town. The display is matched with the rings of an ancient tree, making it a literal Apocalyptic Log.
* One of the secret Reports in ''[[Dissidia]] 012 Duodecim Final Fantasy'' is written by a {{spoiler|Lufenian}} scientist. It's a log of the events happening around his lab in {{spoiler|Cardia}}, including a few things about {{spoiler|Garland}}'s growth and {{spoiler|Cosmos}}. When disaster strikes, his final log is this:
{{quote| Military on orders to [[Deadly Euphemism|expunge]] all persons with knowledge of experiments.<br />
Lab is on fire as I write this. But I'm not letting go of these documents. This will be my final stand.<br />
Sucks to know you're going to die. }}
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** In an early quest, you are tasked with recovering the journal of a dead Dwarf outside a cave filled to the brim with spiders. Piecing together the pages reveals an Apocalyptic Log that ends with the Dwarf preparing to take the battle to the spiders to keep himself from being used as bait for his cousin, a spider-slayer who has passed his prime.
* There are a quite a few of these in ''[[Skyrim]]''. One example can be found in Japhot's Folly. Japhot's journal chronicles his ill-fated attempt to start a settlement on the inhospitable hellhole of an island. Even when the rest of the settlers went [[Screw This, I'm Outta Here]], he stubbornly refused to leave. He was eventually reduced to eating ice-moss before starving to death. The journal is found in a a small locked room with Japhot's dessicated body. The final entry in the journal?
{{quote| ''OH GODS HELP ME''}}
* In the original 1992 ''[[Alone in The Dark]]'' game, one of the first things you find is the suicide letter of Jeremy Hartwood. It is literally written just after he has unwittingly released the evil of the mansion and hears the footsteps of the newly awakened abominations closing in.
* Every dungeon in ''[[Tales of Maj Eyal]]'' has some form of records or diary entries, and almost all of them end with the writer about to die horribly at the hands of the dungeon boss. Twists include: the writer let the boss kill him, the writer allied with the boss, the writer ''is'' the boss, and, at least once, the writer may possibly have gotten out alive.
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* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viCAX8WupTY "They are piling dead and wounded in our tunnel. Arm's weak from pounding key, long hours, no rest, short rations, tired. I know how a mouse feels. Caught in a trap waiting for guys to come along and finish it up."]
* Scott's diary from the 1912 [[wikipedia:Terra Nova Expedition|Terra Nova Expedition]]. Quite depressing reading.
{{quote| We shall stick it out to the end, but we are getting weaker, of course, and the end cannot be far.<br />
It seems a pity but I do not think I can write more.<br />
Robert.<br />
[Scrawled]<br />
Last entry. ''For God's sake look after our people'' }}
* The onboard video camera was recovered from the wreckage of Space Shuttle ''Columbia'' after the disaster and the last few minutes were played, although it stopped before the actual disintigration.
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** Less 'heroic', but far more fitting with this trope is [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTMF6k3c3q4 Kevin Cosgrove's last phone call] from an upper floor in the south tower of the World Trade Center. As he describes the situation, he suddenly shouts, "''Oh, '''God!'''''" and screams as the building collapses around him.
* Less known is the 1349 [http://www.bbc.co.uk/northernireland/ashorthistory/archive/topic38.shtml report of the Black Death]:
{{quote| I, Brother Clyn of the Friars Minor of Kilkenny have written in this book the notable events which befell in my time ... so that notable deeds shall not be lost from the memory of future generations I, seeing many ills, waiting for death till it come, have committed to writing what I have truly heard; and lest the writing perish with the writer, I leave parchment for continuing the work, if haply any man of the race of Adam escape this pestilence and continue the work which I have begun.<br />
 
<br />
 
(in another hand) Here it seems the author died. }}
* This is sort of the whole reason they have black boxes on airplanes. The CVR, or Cockpit Voice Recorder, records everything said in the cockpit and over the radio on an aircraft.
{{quote| [[wikipedia:Alaska Airlines Flight 261|ALA 261]] - I think if it's controllable, we oughta just try to land it --<br />
ATC - you think so? ok let's head for LA.<br />
ALA 261 - [thump]<br />
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* While it doesn't work 100%, it's still an interesting type of this. In Aokigahara, a forest in Japan famous for the amount of suicides that have taken place there, photos have been taken of trash and items strewn around where the bodies were found. There are things like shoes, hair brushes, papers, glasses, and much, much more. If you were to look through it, it would probably give you a great deal of information about the person and what was going on in their lives before they ultimately ended themselves.
* On a lighter note: [http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2010/jun/23/wimbledon-2010-tennis-live Xan Brooks of the Guardian liveblogs the Isner-Mahut match at Wimbledon].
{{quote| '''7.30pm:''' Let it end, let it end, it's 46-all. It was funny when it was 16-all and it was creepy when it was 26-all. But this is pure purgatory and there is still no end in sight. John Isner has just struck his 90th ace. Nicolas Mahut, poor, enfeebled Nicolas Mahut, has only hit 72. Maybe we should just decide it on the number of aces struck? Give the game to Isner and then we can all crawl into our graves.}}
** The blog reached full-on [[Zombie Apocalypse]] proportions in a couple of places.
* An episode of ''I Shouldn't Be Alive'' recalled the story of two campers, hopelessly lost in the woods, stumbling upon the abandoned campsite of a more experienced climber. Among his belongings, there was a detailed journal recording the climber's attempts to get out of the valley, and his dwindling food supply. {{spoiler|They later found his body.}}
* A [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eejQPUyeNiY recorded footage] of a diver who had a diving accident and died, the video shows how he goes in the water, starts diving just as he normally would, but things starts to go wrong when the diver begins sinking and cannot react. The video basically records the process along with the reaction of people watching it. Be warned, the footage is rather disturbing...
* On a lighter note, some [[Let's Play]] footage also sound like apocalyptic logs, especially those of [[Nintendo Hard]] Rom Hacks. (See, for example, [[Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 (Let's Play)]], or any of Proton Jon's ''Kaizo Mario'' videos.)
{{quote| '''Proton Jon'' (audibly on the verge of tears): MOVE FASTER POKEY!}}
* There is an [[Urban Legend]] of a man detailed his agony of being [[Locked in a Freezer]]. A freezer which [[Your Mind Makes It Real|turned out to be turned off.]] According to Snopes, there is no proof that this ever happened.
* The events that the film ''Lost Signal'' are based on.
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* [[American Civil War|"June 3rd 1864, Cold Harbor Virginia, I was killed." The final entry of a Massachusetts volunteer in the Army of The Potomac.]]
* The [[wikipedia:Valentich Disappearance|disappearance of Frederick Valentich]] in 1978. While flying his light aircraft from Melbourne to King Island he reported to ATC that he was being harrased by an unidentified 'aircraft' that he presumed was an Air Force jet of some kind, but none were operating in his area, nor were any civil planes in the vicinity. In his final transmission he comes to a frightening realisation:
{{quote| That strange aircraft is hovering on top of me again (open microphone for two seconds). It is hovering and (open microphone for one second) it's not an aircraft.}}
* [[Ulysses S Grant]] completed his autobiography five days before succumbing to throat cancer. His notes concerning the progress of his cancer were reportedly required reading in medical schools for many years.
* During the shooting at Columbine High School a library phone line was left open by a teacher who called 911 before the shooters entrance forced her to leave the phone to go hide. The open line caught and recorded the sounds of students being killed and injured, the dialog of the shooters to their victims and each other, and after the shooters leave the surviving students being told to quickly flee out a nearby door then dead air.