>>97935019
1) Start actually playing games for real
2) Survive till the end

>>97935019
My group's been together for about a decade now so we've completed a few grand, multi-year campaigns. The real standouts have been OC
>A multi-year, plane-hopping 3.5e campaign that pitted the party against an enemy who was eventually revealed to be humanity's first wizard, cursed by the gods and determined to dethrone them from their sacral thones, subsuming all conscious life in the process
>Another 3.5e campaign that started with the party investigating a series of murders in the docks, progressed to a global apocalypse (the zombies were the least of it) and ended with the party ascending to godhood as they shepherded the world back to life
>A Shadowrun campaign that was mostly pretty down to earth and gritty but ended with the party helping spread the secrets to interstellar travel
We've also played through Age of Worms (a pf1e conversion of it) and The Enemy Within (wfrp).

Don't have any real advice on how make long campaigns work as I've always been a player. Occasionally we've had to be flexible with players dropping out or GMs taking a break for a bit but mostly things have gone smoothly.

>>97935019
What do you mean "the end"?
It sounds like you're not actually playing a game and you're just doing some weird story railroad like final fantasy 13.
Fuck off I guess

>>97935019
TPK is a legit end.
If your game has no failure condition, then it is not a game.

>>97935019
My group's had campaigns with large scale and big stakes, but they haven't been long-running zero-to-hero games but ones that started with PCs fairly high-powered. Probably not quite what you're asking, but those campaigns were fine. My personal experience is that it's best to run the kind of game you want to run rather than one that might become the kind of a game you want to run a few dozen sessions in. In other words, if you want something big and epic, start running something big and epic rather than starting with lvl 1 characters. That's not to say that long-running games where PCs organically go from nobodies to legends can't be great, but IMO such games should be run with the mindset of focusing on some short-to-middle term goals that are interesting in and if themselves and seeing how things go from there. As I said, that's based on my personal experience, which applies to my own group and our own playstyle.

Cyberpunk campaign that ended up with the crew getting rich and each one getting on some holiday outside of Night City. (2,5 years)
Pathfinder campaign where we killed a vampire lord and a dragon. (Half a year)
Hunter campaign where we killed the newly fledged vampire that didn't care to keep up the masquerade and was thus hit with a shovel until he dropped and then burnt to crisp. (Three quarters)
Tales of the Loop's official adventures. ,(Three months).
I don't count various one-shots and two-shots.

>>97935019
I've run and played several games that ended. We're nearing the end of one of them now, which is gonna be replaced by another game I'm gonna run.

>>97935019
I did run 2 campaigns that ended. Though i dont understand whats wrong with just losing interest. Its a game, not reaching the end is fine.

My opinion is that if you want a game to reach its conclusion, you must have planned an end in mind (and make sure it is not a meandring end. At most the game should last 16 sessions)