Enjoy a little closure this holiday season with our best-of list, showcasing the top 10 secret endings of 2019. We’re deep diving into the bonus scenes and extended endings from some of the best video games of the year — some of these endings are Easter eggs, some of them tease future sequels, while others are just the best possible ending you can get.
Discovering a secret ending is one of the most rewarding things, and I absolutely love the extra care developers sneak into their games — whether it’s breaking the rules and beating the boss early in Devil May Cry 5, or solving a game-spanning mystery in the Outer Wilds. Secret endings are awesome, and here’s 10 of my favorites found in 2019.
WARNING: There will be MAJOR plot spoilers ahead! In order, you’ll find secret endings explained for the following games: The Outer Worlds, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, Devil May Cry 5, Blasphemous, Days Gone, Outer Wilds, Kingdom Hearts 3, Dragon Quest Builders 2, Metro Exodus, and Darkwood.
Sunburn (The Outer Worlds)
One of the most hilarious optional endings you’ll find in 2019 is in The Outer Worlds. Like an old-school RPG, you starting stats can determine how you interact with the world — and if you begin the game with very low intelligence, you can merrily select special dialogue options that are uniquely, well… dumb.
It all comes to a head at the very end of the game. To save the Halcyon colony, you’ll need to carefully steer an entire colony ship’s worth of frozen people to a safe location where they can be thawed out. Normally, you can give the controls over to your helpful ship AI — but, if you’re especially dumb, you can choose to steer the ship yourself. Directly into the sun.
Get all the info to unlock the sunburn ending for yourself with our guide here.
The Dragon’s Homecoming (Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice)
Unlocking the best ending in Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice is easily the most complex side-quest on this list. You’ll have to track down giant snakes and execute them, complete main story objectives in a very special order, and bring a Divine Child everything he needs to procure Frozen Tears. It’s all very complicated, and all so you don’t have to sacrifice your charge, Kuro, at the end of the game.
It’s the happiest ending because you get to save Kuro and the Divine Dragon — the dragon travels west, and your hero follows it to the ends of the earth at the end of the story. It’s a much more hopeful ending, and one of the few definitive happy endings in a From Software game.
Learn how to unlock this ending, and all the others, one our full endings guide.
Our 2019 countdown continues — check out even more awesome secret endings on the next page.
