A satisfying conclusion is a very rare thing in video games. Game endings are slowly improving in the current generation — we haven’t had any huge controversies like Mass Effect 3 in a very long time. Maybe it’s the greater focus on multiplayer, but singleplayer stories in general just seem to be getting better, and there’s no end to the narratives available on the next generation of consoles.
There’s so much focus on narrative, sometimes publishers extend their games with added singleplayer DLC. Usually it’s just more fun stuff for your character to accomplish — but sometimes, the DLC adds the true ending to a game that didn’t really have one before. It’s like getting a do-over that you have to drop down cash to check out. There are a lot more games that try to sell their true ending as DLC than I anticipated, so today we’re going to list them. Here are 10 games that tried to sell you the true ending as DLC.
[SPOILER WARNING: We’re going to discuss the endings to lots of games here! All the games discussed here are at least a year old, so we won’t be covering anything that just came out — with one exception.]
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Asura’s Wrath
The most famous and egregious example on this list — this is one game that seriously straight-up sells the ending to you. There are a total of 22 chapters for the main story, but you have to buy the last 4 as DLC that costs $6.99. Seeing as this is a purely cinematic game, everyone is going to want to experience the final chapters — and they are pretty incredible.
But let’s back up. Without purchasing the ending, what do you get? At the end of the game, you defeat the evil force at the center of the Earth, but the mystery of the Golden Spider is completely left hanging. It feels like a setup for a sequel. If the ending DLC never released, this would just be a simple anti-climactic game ending. That’s pretty common.
But the ending DLC does exist. And that leaves us to assume it was cut from the main game and sold separately. In the true ending, you battle a god-like being that literally changes the rules of the game as you fight. It’s a very cool ending, one we would’ve liked to have without getting gouged by Capcom.
Fallout 3
The ending for Fallout 3 was infamously hated by the community. In the game’s original ending, you sacrifice yourself — or someone sacrifices their life for you — by entering an irradiated chamber to stop an Enclave plot to poison the wasteland’s water supply. That’s the basic gist, at least. Nobody was happy about the stupid sacrificial ending because it meant you couldn’t continue to play the game after the story was over.
That all changed with the Broken Steel DLC. The game adds a new spin on the ending, allowing you to enter the chamber and still survive. The story continues where it left off, as you re-join the Brotherhood of Steel and defeat the last remnants of the Enclave in the Capitol Wasteland. It’s an epic conclusion that’s far more satisfying than the original lame ending. And you’ve got to buy it, so it counts for this list.
Find for fumbled endings and attempts to sell us extra DLC on the next page.
