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Sheepinator

Member
Jul 25, 2018
27,956
Doesn't seem to be much of a problem. Even in this thread, countless games to choose from, thousands of games over the years, and people can only name a handful and most of those are debatable.

"When I played [Asura] on release, after the final battle, it literally ends with a "the REAL villain appears, thanking Asura for helping them all along" and the screen says "To Be Continued"."

Pretty standard movie ending. Story concluded, teaser for next one. Didn't they plan a sequel but the sales weren't there to support it?
 

Farrac

Member
Nov 3, 2017
2,082
Alcalá de Henares, Spain
that one was fine, it was very much an epilogue just to set up the next game, which obviously never happened. The ending was truly an ending.
It did happen, though. Just not a fully fledged sequel.
51EZ+dkSH2L.jpg
 

WildGoose

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,219
Like others have said, Prince of Persia 2008 is the one I think of, but the non-DLC ending was actually really good and I thought it was a bold choice to end the game that way. The DLC ending was kind of whatever.

It did happen, though. Just not a fully fledged sequel.
51EZ+dkSH2L.jpg

I don't buy into the Mandela effect really, but I worked in a place that ordered and sold a lot of video games during the time period this supposedly released and I'm here to tell you that I have NEVER heard of this game. What the fuck
 

Farrac

Member
Nov 3, 2017
2,082
Alcalá de Henares, Spain
Like others have said, Prince of Persia 2008 is the one I think of, but the non-DLC ending was actually really good and I thought it was a bold choice to end the game that way. The DLC ending was kind of whatever.



I don't buy into the Mandela effect really, but I worked in a place that ordered and sold a lot of video games during the time period this supposedly released and I'm here to tell you that I have NEVER heard of this game. What the fuck
Similarly, I'm the only person I know that has played it
 

FinFunnels

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
5,610
Seattle
I've only played the first Dead Rising, so I can't speak on that one, but I feel like most of these "DLC endings" in general are kind of shit and only got billed as "true" for marketing reasons.
 

Spacejaws

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 27, 2017
7,795
Scotland
Seems a lot of people refuted it but I also didn't like the Tresspaser DLC. It kinda filled in the blanks after the main story and I feel like if you skipped the DLC Dragon Age 4 wouldn't be setup correctly so it feels like it acts as a true ending.

I think Dragon Age 2 did something similar where it setup Corpheous in DA:I which I never played and I had no idea who the fuck he was or why I should care. I'm gonna be honest I just flat out did not like DA:I and I didn't enjoy any of it's DLC much better.

Prince of Persia is the first time I noticed this and it really spoiled what was a pretty good reboot otherwise.
 
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Enduin

You look 40
Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,470
New York
Dragon Age or any ongoing series is a trickier situation. The story is never just done in those cases as the games are never meant to fully resolve everything. They're always laying the groundwork for future conflicts and plotlines both within the main product and now the DLC that releases after to setup the next full game. So of course any kind of DLC that focuses on series narrative elements is going to feel important because it's continuing story threads they already setup in the main game and are teasing out further for the next. Unless that DLC is explicitly meant to stand on its own as a self contained story you're going to get this issue.

DAO had it with the Witch Hunt DLC, DA2 had it somewhat with Legacy, DAI with Trespasser and ME2 had it with The Arrival. None of them actually provide a true "ending" to the games that was missing from the base game as if the events of that game were left unfinished, but as DLC that continues the overall series narrative their relevancy can feel critical. Especially in the moment as they are the most recent and thus relevant pieces of story info we have, but often times feel far less important once the next installment comes and it turns out ohh that info wasn't actually that critical. A lot of DAO's DLC was like, and same for Legacy in DA2. Like it's interesting and adds depth to the setting and story, but that info isn't that critical nor did anything in them drastically change or add onto the base game's story they were a part of.

Recent Assassins Creed games fall into this too with many of the revelations and events that transpire in their add on DLC being as important or even more so than those in the base game, at least with regards to the modern day plotline of the series. And this is only going to get more common as more of these games move towards that games as a service model. They're selling you the base game, which provides a complete experience, but the intended full story is now going to include future expansions and DLC. That's the whole draw of the setup. Here's a game and if you really like here here's a year+ worth of continuing content that builds off of it and leads into the next entry.

I'm willing to bet people who like Season Passes and the whole games as a service model and will buy DLC are probably more inclined to do so and enjoy it when that content is building off of and expanding the experience they already liked and leading towards future stuff. Stand alone experiences that just kind of begin and end with that DLC I think tend to get less enthusiasm. So it's to publisher/dev's benefit most likely to make that content feel more integral to the main game/series.
 

Farlander

Game Designer
Verified
Sep 29, 2021
329
It did happen, though. Just not a fully fledged sequel.
51EZ+dkSH2L.jpg

I played it back in the day.

While technically it is a continuation, it didn't actually resolve anything (I guess makes sense given that it released in parallel to the console/PC version).

Though honestly, while I'm sad that PoP2008 didn't get a sequel, without the Epilogue it has an absolutely fantastic ambiguous ending. With the Epilogue it has a.... ok-ish sequel hook ending.

Since the sequel never actually happened and the DS tie-in doesn't resolve anything, I am fine with an absolutely fantastic ambiguous ending.
 

Spoit

Member
Oct 28, 2017
3,977
What's worse is when the DLC is planned as the actual ending, but never actually comes out.

Looking at your FFXV and MGSV
 

MrBS

Member
Oct 27, 2017
6,224
I thought this would be an Asara's Wrath thread.

Super shitty cutting off the true end as DLC. That said the true end was fucking amazing.
 

Ronnie Poncho

Avenger
Oct 27, 2017
2,133
It sure did!

It's one of the worst and most blatant examples too, in my opinion. It really does feel like the ending was just lopped off and sold extra. No guise of it being an expansion.

Wow, really? I just played through DS3 last year and didn't feel that way. But also, I don't remember the story at all. What did I miss out on?
 

Beelzebufo

Member
Jun 1, 2022
4,021
Canada
Eh, it depends. Something like Asura's Wrath sucks, but I don't consider something like what the AC games do the same thing
 

PolskiGamer17

Member
Oct 27, 2017
602
Deadrising 2 has a conclusion DLC...that is locked on Xbox 360 in like forever
not even the remasters added it back it
 

FrostweaveBandage

Unshakable Resolve
Member
Sep 27, 2019
6,629
You mean how, ever since 3, persona games get re-releases that add an epilogue to the plot? i mean, i guess that applies, but those are usually written as a bonus, with the games tidying up all plot threads
And they charge you full price for it.

P4 and P5 give you endings like the end of the movie Clue.

It went like this, but it could have gone like this. That's fine as a narrative tactic, but to go back and thriugh a different canon love interest or a completely redone character arc...i just can't. I love those games too.
 

Buttlet

Member
Jun 21, 2022
66
Mass Effect 2 did this (without The Arrival, the intro to ME3 is a fragile, barely justified shell), as well as made one of the main love interests of ME1 into ME2 DLC.

But because it was really good we're all ok with it.

Which is why I firmly believe they intended to do this with ME3, which is why the official Guidebook had all caps and bold text for only one of the endings.
You've peaked my interest, haha. I will double down and say having Javik as a preorder bonus hamstrings the plots pretty bad if we're jabbing at ME3.
 

PKrockin

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,260
I guess it's better to release the final act as paid DLC than in a re-release of the game on a different platform (Snatcher MSX -> Sega CD).
 

litebrite

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
21,832
Is it still available to download?

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Moose

Prophet of Truth - Hero of Bowerstone
Member
Oct 25, 2017
10,164
Every time I see that screenshot of Fawkes in Fallout 3 saying he doesn't want to help you cheat destiny I laugh.
 

Patapuf

Member
Oct 26, 2017
6,408
Seems a lot of people refuted it but I also didn't like the Tresspaser DLC. It kinda filled in the blanks after the main story and I feel like if you skipped the DLC Dragon Age 4 wouldn't be setup correctly so it feels like it acts as a true ending.

I think Dragon Age 2 did something similar where it setup Corpheous in DA:I which I never played and I had no idea who the fuck he was or why I should care. I'm gonna be honest I just flat out did not like DA:I and I didn't enjoy any of it's DLC much better.

Prince of Persia is the first time I noticed this and it really spoiled what was a pretty good reboot otherwise.

The dev making an Expansion/Story DLC that is narratively important isn't "selling you the ending piecemeal". Ist's the dev selling you new content in a form that's not a full new game.

I get prefering beating a game and never touching it again but releasing good DLC ist not a malicious sales tactics.
 

Spacejaws

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 27, 2017
7,795
Scotland
The dev making an Expansion/Story DLC that is narratively important isn't "selling you the ending piecemeal". Ist's the dev selling you new content in a form that's not a full new game.

I get prefering beating a game and never touching it again but releasing good DLC ist not a malicious sales tactics.
I think it's more the game ended on a cliffhanger that is then explained in the DLC which rubbed me the wrong way.

If Tresspasser was its own story like Awakening then cool but it directly answers questions left hanging by the cliffhanger. The main game ending doesn't seem to be a lead in for Dragon Age 4 rather it seems to be for Tresspasser.
 

dskzero

Member
Oct 30, 2019
3,355
Edit: I rescind my stance on Dragon Age: Inquisition. It's been a while since I played it and Trespasser, and I was mistaken on it feeling like a cut ending. My bad.

Doom Eternal could be considered doing this as well. Plus making the DLC harder for no reason.
The second DLC is probably the easier part of Doom Eternal.
 

Ashilyn

Member
Oct 27, 2017
419
street fighter 4 would like to have a word with you (on disc locked DLC at launch)

to suggest that DLC is only stuff that couldnt get done in time is naive at best.

a) Street Fighter 4 didn't have any DLC, it only had the revisions - each of which was a new purchase, which is a whole other problem I'm glad is going away in the age of DLC and patches. You're probably thinking of Street Fighter x Tekken, and frankly we can blame Sony for that one as much as Capcom, trying to moneyhat exclusives for the Vita release. Man, that was some high grade level bullshit.

b) Even to this day I would wager most DLC is stuff that was either only intended ever as cheap cosmetics, or was stuff that they couldn't get finished for the main game, or is always intended as DLC and wasn't really "cut" from the game or purposefully set aside. Examples like Asura's Wrath, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, and Prince of Persia are bullshit, but I roll my eyes at anyone who thinks that's the codified norm.

c) There's a lot of confusing "post release content" (Like the DLCs for any given Dragon Age game or Fallout) for "stuff cut from a fuller ending or experience to sell later".

I hate the practice of selling the ending as DLC but I'm under no cynically driven illusion that that's common.
 

plutoknight09

Member
Sep 18, 2020
50
FF13-2 did this (the OG endling LITERALLLY ended with "To Be continued" then they released a shit DLC with a true ending playing off that). And of course many mentions of Fallout 3 and Asura's Wrath already.

A trend I'm glad died (along with "online passes" which cropped up around the same time iirc)
 

The Albatross

Member
Oct 25, 2017
38,985
Fallout 3 is one that I don't think was done intentionally, I think they genuinely did think that ending was a better ending when they were releasing the game. And then the feedback was rough, they wanted to sell the Broken Steel DLC and it made sense to change it from there.

It was still pretty early and developers were figuring out how to use DLC and what customers would pay for and what would cause them to lose their shit over. Bethesda had just a year or two earlier gotten raked online for the now infamous Horse Armor from Oblivion, which was so criticized it ended up being a meme and representing the idea of nickle and diming players, until everything turned into MTX and now Horse Armor is almost quaint.


There was such strong reaction against DLC, until games like Fallout 3, GTAIV, and Red Dead Redemption "got it right," and then... those would be kinda like... some of the last good DLC, haha, before MTX took over... and now everything is DLC.
 
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ascagnel

Member
Mar 29, 2018
2,200
Fallout 3 is the first one that comes to mind.
Eh, Fallout 3 undermined its ending with DLC.

The game ends by making a specific, if nonsensical, point that the player must sacrifice themselves for the good of the wasteland (even if Fawkes would be healed by the radiation and is right friggin there come on Bethesda). Broken Steel completely undermines that simply by making the player wake up from the "lethal" dose of radiation.

New Vegas handled its DLC much better: it can only be played before the game's climax.
 

The Shape

Member
Nov 7, 2017
5,027
Brazil
It is an absolutely awful practice, but it doesn't happen often, in fact it's pretty rare, which is why it doesn't bother me too much.

Off the top of my head I always remember of Prince of Persia and Asura's Wrath.
 

Fisty

Member
Oct 25, 2017
20,214
It's important to realize that we don't often know development timelines or behind-the-scenes issues that could lead to this sort of thing, or even if it actually is a "cut ending"

Like, maybe it was an idea they had after the development schedule was locked in. Maybe the sequel was cancelled and they wanted to do something for fans.