Funniest Alternative Endings In Video Game History
Many games let you take various paths while closing out your journey. Sometimes these endings are happy, others are total bummers, and some are just plain bonkers. Maybe they don't make sense, couldn't be canon no matter how many iron balls you stuff into them, or shift the tone from "serious, action-packed epic" to "what writer let their sugar-high kid storyboard an ending?" Naturally, these endings are almost always the best, funniest, and most genius endings of all.
Bard's Tale: skip the final battle and drink instead
Bard's Tale is already a snarky game, a parody of all the epic adventures that take themselves and their quests so super-duper seriously. That said, it's still a real game that tells the story of a real journey and has a real adventure-game ending. But if you aren't feeling that, you're in luck.
At the game's climax, your character, The Bard, has a choice: side with the Demon Princess and help her destroy the world or kill her alongside Druid Leader that The Bard meets along the way. Neither choice, however, holds a candle to the most sensible one of all: saying to hell with both of them. Yep, this is an actual choice: when asked to pick the princess or the druid, choose "Out of Here." The Bard tells both of them he doesn't want anything to do with their many psychological issues. With that, he just walks off, with the other Final Battle participants wondering just what the hell they're supposed to do now.
And what's The Bard's first mission, now that he's basically quit his job as the Chosen One? Drink, of course! He finds his favorite pub overrun by zombies, but instead of slaying them, he drinks with them. Everyone has a gay old time as the world of the living is slowly suffocated by that of the undead, but as long as somebody keeps the beer flowing, The Bard couldn't give a rip if they're alive or not. It's the Eric Cartman "screw you guys, I'm going home" of game endings. It's understandable to walk away from a battle for the planet's soul. That sounds dangerous.
Persona 4 Arena: Yukiko's boxed lunch
Like other fighting games, you can access Yukiko's ending simply by playing as her and winning. But, unlike many other fighters, she has a serious ending and a wacky ending.
To get the weird one, play through like normal until you get to Scene 8. At that point, you'll have the choice to see if something's OK, or leave it be. Leave it be and you'll trigger the end of the game, and a revelation that Yukiko can't cook to save her life. She encounters a wounded Yu and decides that the only way to help him is to serve him her famous "boxed lunch." But whatever she does to prepare it is apparently just south of deadly poison, as Yu immediately collapses, starts heaving, and passes out. The adorably naive (and possibly possessed) Yukiko attributes it to him enjoying the food so much he fell into a happy food coma.
She thinks so strongly of her cooking, in fact, that she invites everyone else in the game to try some. Each character, knowing full well what will happen if they eat Yukiko's cooking, attempts to pass it off to the next person. They all refuse, with Kanji speaking for everyone by screaming, "I'm too young to die!" Yukiko, naturally, interprets their hesitation as not wanting to hog all the food. Luckily, there's plenty to go around for everyone because she thought of everything.
The epilogue has Yukiko acknowledging that all her friends got sick, though she assumes it was swine flu or something. Not even the Swedish Chef is this delightfully obtuse about his own failures.
Silent Hill 2: a dog created everything
Silent Hill, perhaps the spookiest game franchise not named Resident Evil, has its humorous side, but you need to work to see it. To get the "dog" ending, you need to beat the game a lot. You either get all three un-funny endings, or unlock the "Rebirth" ending (which you can only do by beating the game and getting a "real" ending). Then, on your next playthrough, you'll see a doghouse. Look inside and you'll find a key. Use it to enter the Observation Room, and you'll get yourself quite the adorable ending.
Instead of monsters or aliens, you'll find a cuddly shiba inu at the controls, wearing a headset while pushing buttons and pulling levers. When your character, James, sees this, he falls to his knees and cries, "So it was all your work!" in Japanese (even in the American version). The dog walks over and happily licks James' face before the credits roll. But these aren't normal credits — you get scenes from the game interspersed with scenes of the dog while a giant close-up of the dog stares at you. Bonus: the dog yips out a jaunty organ song.
And yet, the game saves the most nonsensical part for the very end, as we see Maria (the sexy, maybe-a-demon-maybe-not clone of James' dead wife) clad in lingerie. Instead of a dog barking, we get Maria moaning with pleasure. Why? Who knows? Fin.
Chrono Trigger: girl talk, followed by Crono talk
Chrono Trigger has over a dozen endings, depending on when you time-travel to beat Lavos (or let him beat you, if you want the ending where everyone dies horribly). To get the goofiest ending, entitled "A Slide Show," fight Lavos after Schala opens the Queen's door but before you power up your pendant. Kill the world-eating dink, and you get Marle (the Daphne of the game) and Lucca (Velma) shattering the fourth wall while gossiping about boys.
The ladies complain about the game being over then present a slide show of the various male characters while giggling about them. They see a hunky soldier and comment on the "VERY nice scenery," dismiss an older guy as "shifty," laugh about a handsome dude who may or may not "pluck his eyebrows," and debate whether a caveman is hot or not.
Before they can get to swooning over Frog's human form, Crono shows up to do the one thing nobody expected from him: he talks. He runs in to scold the girls for yakking about boys instead of presenting a real slide show. He gets over it pretty quickly, though, and the three run off to have fun in the present. That's it, the end. And if you were curious, there isn't a corresponding "gossip about pretty girls" ending. You'll just have to ponder dating Ayla the cavewoman on your lonesome.
Tekken 6: Lee makes explosive golf holes out of his enemies
There are lots of Tekken games, most of which feature the following canon ending: Jin Kazama or Kazuya Mishima wins. There might be a few dozen characters to play as, but the main story is basically about the estranged father-son duo of Jin and Kazuya. But what of the other characters? Glad you asked.
Tekken has tons of non-canon endings — plenty of them weird and goofy — but the strangest, funniest, and most explosive of all has to be Lee Chaolan's from Tekken 6. Lee hates the Mishimas because they're kind of his adopted family and they screwed him over. So if you win the game as Lee, he takes full advantage of his newfound power. Watch as he kidnaps Heihachi, Kazuya, and Jin, then straps them to giant rockets and tortures them with explosive golf balls. The first one explodes about 15 feet away from them and opens up the rockets' fuses while also choking the family in ash and smoke. The second ball hits Lee's targets perfectly, lighting the fuses. Off they go into space, exploding into beautiful fireworks as a pretty girl compliments Lee on his great shot.
On the one hand, it's triple murder. On the other hand, it's way more entertaining than standard golf. Find a non-lethal version of this and watch the PGA's ratings (ahem) skyrocket.
Street Fighter II: Chun-Li, the young single girl
This is a pretty easy ending to get — just beat M. Bison as Chun-Li. Once you do, you'll get closure to her story in two ways, although one's a bit more progressive than the other.
She starts by kneeling at her father's grave, informing him that she has avenged his death by killing Bison and crumbling his evil empire. "Finally," she says to her father, "you can rest in peace." What's Chun-Li going to do now? Will she continue to fight? Become a trainer? Take over Shadowloo and reform it in her image? Maybe just party?
Yeah, it's that last one. She happily tells her dead father that, since his death is avenged, she can "go back to being a young, single girl." Away go her fighting gear and tight hair-bun, and in their place are short-shorts, a midriff-baring halter top, and a sexy mane flowing in the breeze. No more hitting people. Let's hit the club! It's one of the more unexpected endings of the game, and certainly the silliest. Girls just wanna have fun, after all, even if they have to save the world before doing so.
1213: the Land of Chocolate
1213 is a great game you can play for free. Of course, the game's free, but the money you save will likely go straight to your therapy bill. At the end of the game, your character escapes his underground bunker only to find a planet with no breathable atmosphere. While your character is immune to the poisonous gases, he has too much brain damage to be of use to anyone. That's the real ending, and there is no good ending.
But, if you unlock the secret ending, you get something a little better. To find it, endure the real, super-depressing ending then, when your stats show up, blink sadly at the screen until you get a code. Play the game again, use that code to get a special item, and escape the bunker. Instead of a world filled with poisonous gases, you get one filled with chocolate. Everything is chocolate — the houses, the roads, and even the people are all cocoa-loaded goodness.
Interestingly enough, the basic explanation for it is similar to the super-sad real ending. Your character narrates, to the tune of "Dance Of The Sugar Plum Fairy," how an accidentally unleashed virus permanently changed the world's atmosphere, and now he's the only one immune from turning Hershey-licious. Initially, he finds this sad as hell since he's all alone. Soon, though, he decides that "death by sweeties" isn't such a bad way to go. He strolls off to eat him some chocolate people, and if diabetes takes him, at least he'll die fat, happy, and filled with candy goodness. There are worse ways to live out the end of the world.
Undertale: an annoying dog rules the world
In Undertale, you have the option of killing as many or as few monsters as you like. What ending you get depends on how merciful or bloodthirsty you were. To get the silliest, and therefore best, ending of all, you need to kill four monsters — Toriel, Papyrus, Undyne and Mettaton — and that's it. If you do that, you get the funniest and happiest ending of all.
Your character walks through a portal to escape the underworld. After the credits roll, wacky music plays as the monster Sans calls to inform you that a dog — the annoying white floof who kept showing up in the game to screw up your progress — is now president of the underworld. He sounds like the laziest leader of all-time, as he "sleeps on the throne and does absolutely nothing." And yet, this novel form of governing seemingly makes everyone in the underworld happy.
But wait, there's more! Flowey, the evil flower you fight at the end of the game, then shows up to yell at you for ruining his plans. He theorizes that you did this simply to lull the underworld into a false sense of security before you and Flowey reunite to conquer the land. And that's the way the underworld ends: not with a bang, but with a delusional, homicidal, flowery whimper.
Mortal Kombat 9: Kurtis Stryker becomes a celebrity
This is another ending that's easy to get — just beat Shao Khan with Stryker. The only challenge is convincing yourself to play as Stryker rather than someone much cooler. But if you do win with the cop, you get an ending unlike many in Mortal Kombat. Whereas most deal with demons and the underworld and souls and treachery, this one is wonderfully pedestrian.
Stryker, having saved the world, is hailed as a hero and receives a ticker-tape parade, the Congressional Medal of Freedom, and a one-way ticket to Celebrityville. Not that he wants it — after all, he was simply doing what he needed to do. Hell, he even titles his biography "I Was Doing My Job," cementing his aww-shucks reputation. Of course, Hollywood wanted to do a blockbuster, but Stryker refused for the greatest reason possible. The studio wanted to cast Johnny Cage as Stryker, but under no circumstances would the cop allow himself to be played by such an egomaniacal blowhard.
It's an awesome punchline, the Fatality of savage put-downs, but you have to admit it sucks to be Johnny Cage in this scenario. He just wanted to do his job!
Final Fantasy 13-2: Mischievous Mog's Marvelous Plan with Flan
Final Fantasy 13-2 has plenty of strange endings to choose from. To get them, you have to win the game and receive the Paradox Scope, which will allow you to activate several different Paradox Endings throughout the game. This one in particular, Mog's Marvelous Plan with Flan, comes by way of defeating a Giant Flan boss without making the battle easier by solving the paradox. Do so and you get something peculiar.
In this ending, after defeating the flan, Serah and Noel accidentally unleash "gelatinous organisms" the world over. Soon, the world becomes the property of flans, with one giant, evil flan to rule them all. To fix their error, Noel and Serah magically transform themselves to look like monsters so they can sneak in and present the giant flan king with a delicious feast of poison flan. So the flan are cannibals now, in case you needed another reason to be disturbed.
It gets weirder. After Noel nags Mog, his Moogle helper, to get all the ingredients for the poison flan, Mog angrily rants about doing all the work, threatens to poison Noel with the flan, and then has a manic breakdown as he fades into the darkness. And that's all folks — you don't actually get to kill King Flan, and whether or not your party ever does is left entirely to your presumably very confused imagination. It's an ending equal parts funny, adorable, and off-putting, which is way more fun than whatever melodramatic crap Lightning was getting up to in the main timeline.