Fallen Princesses in Video Games.
- Breath of Fire:
- Nina of Breath of Fire II is a literal fallen princess, shunned by her kingdom for her black wings, which are thought to be a curse, caused by her ancestor, presumably the Nina from the first Breath of Fire I, marrying outside the clan, presumably to Ryu, also hero of the first game.
- Nina from Breath of Fire III is an even better example; she left behind the life of a princess because she preferred life outside the castle, helping to fix the kingdom's problems, to her pampered life in the castle.
- A Dance with Rogues is pretty much This Trope: The Game (Mod). You play as a Sheltered Aristocrat of a princess and the game opens with a neighboring empire of Dhorn conquering her father's kingdom in a flash. The invaders massacre her family and she only survives because a Thieves' Guild infiltrator takes pity on her... but not before raping her. Now reduced to the lowest social stratum, the princess must work for that very Thieves' Guild as a petty thief in hopes that they will keep her safe from the Dhorn.
- Rozalin of Disgaea 2. One day she's living in complete luxury (if entirely isolated), and the next she's pulled into the Veldime equivalent of Kansas against her will and tearing her dress in the woods.
- The female Human Noble Origin from Dragon Age: Origins could also apply, depending on how you RP the character. You are not a princess, but you are the daughter of the second-highest-ranking noble in the country, so that should count for something. Especially because you lose your entire family and become a Grey Warden. Of course, by the end of the game, you can become the Queen of Ferelden... not a bad trade-off, there.
- Dragon Quest V: Prince Harry was a pampered, spoiled and obnoxious brat. Then he was kidnapped by the Big Bad's minions and made a slave together with the Hero. When they manage to escape from their masters, ten years later, Harry's hubris and mean-spiritedness have been thoroughly beaten out of him.
- Final Fantasy IX has Princess Garnet, who notices her mother's erratic behaviour and runs off with a band of thieves to try and help out. She becomes a fugitive and is promptly sentenced to death by her mother. She ends up becoming a queen though.
- Final Fantasy XII has Princess Ashe, who faked her own suicide so she could lead the resistance. She wants to ascend the throne to save the kingdom but has no proof that she is really royalty. Thus the game's plot kicks in.
- Fire Emblem has many fallen princes and princesses, either in the backstory or in in-game:
- Fire Emblem Gaiden and its remake Echoes: Shadows of Valentia:
- Anthiese a.k.a. Celica is one of late King Lima the IV's two surviving concubine children after a deadly coup claimed her father's life, as well as her half-sibling’s life. Though the half-sibling is revealed to have survived later on. She's been in hiding since childhood and it takes a good half of the story for her to be able to formally reclaim her birthright, among other things. The other surviving child is her half-brother Conrad, believed to have perished, but in actuality raised away from her and also hidden: he returns to protect Celica as a masked knight and support her.
- The end of Chapter 4 reveals that Alm is actually the son of Emperor Rudolf and rightful heir to the Rigelian throne; he was sent into hiding as an infant and never knew of his heritage until he kills his own father in combat.
- Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War:
- Princess Tailtiu of Friege becomes one. She still gets to live in her older brother Bloom's palace with her daughter Tine, but is branded as a traitor by her people and horribly abused by her bitch of a stepsister, Hilda. If Tailtiu instead dies childless, she's mentioned to have died in the war, and her younger sister Ethnia is the one who takes her place as fallen princess alongside her daughter Linda.
- Seliph. His grandfather Byron was killed in a conspiracy by his fellow noblemen, his dad Sigurd is killed off and falsely branded as a traitor post-mortem, his Missing Mom Deirdre becomes the Empress of Grannvale but only after being brainwashed and later she dies too, and he's living in a very sheltered and secluded environment before becoming a Rebel Prince and starting to fight to conclude his father's mission.
- Seliph's army includes another fallen prince: Shannan of Isaach, who as a child witnessed the horrible deals that brought the huge mess that Jugdral is into alongside his aunt Ayra, and now is physically strong enough to fight back and help those in need.
- Thracia 776 has more fallen noblemen: besides Leif and Nanna (rightful prince of Leonster and second princess of Nordion, both forced into seclusion), Galzus was the prince of the small kingdom of Rivough, which was destroyed and annexed by Isaach years ago; he barely escaped from all of it alongside his daughter, Mareeta. Then there's Princess Miranda of Alster, forced to hide and run away when her land is invaded as well.
- Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade:
- Princess Guinevere, who had to run away from the kingdom of Bern to escape from her embittered older brother King Zephiel.
- Lilina from Ostia was this close to becoming this after her dad's death, but after being whacked with the Distress Ball she recovers and joins Roy's troupe, and her ending says she recovered her kingdom.
- Sue, granddaughter of the chieftain of the Kutolah tribe, finds herself separated from them in an attack from Bern and captured. Her personal ending doesn't completely leave clear if she's able to revive the Kutolah, but it does say she returned to the plains.
- Prince Myrddin from Etruria, aka Elffin the Bard. He returns to Etruria triumphantly if he lives to the end of the game.
- Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade:
- Lyndis's mother Madelyn, who chose to run away from her father's castle in Caelin than losing her Sacaean boyfriend, Chieftain Hassar of the Lorca.
- "Lyn" herself. She was the princess of the Lorca tribe... then they were all slaughtered before the game even started, leaving her completely alone. Her share of the story has her learning about her maternal family and racing against time to meet her grandfather.
- A minor example would be Rath, prince of the Kutolah tribe. He was exiled due to a prophecy saying that he had to search for his destiny on his own. He's a bit luckier, though, since his solo ending says he's taken back by the tribe.
- And Priscilla and Raven, too. Their Ostian clan was destituted for corruption, their parents were Driven to Suicide, she was adopted by other nobles in Etruria, he became a mercenary alongside his retainer.
- Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance has Princess Elincia, who escaped from Daein's assault on Crimea purely through virtue of the fact that her birth was kept hidden. The plot of the game revolves around freeing Crimea and placing Elincia on the throne, a task made more difficult because her birth was hidden.
- Fire Emblem: Awakening has Say'ri, Warrior Princess of Chon'sin, whose realm is taken over by the Empire of Valm. She becomes a member of La RĂ©sistance, then joins the Shepherds. Additionally there's Chrom's Kid from the Future Lucina, who is this after the Bad Future takes over her realm. Her sibling (either M!Morgan, Cynthia, Kjelle, Inigo, or Brady), whether male or female, and cousin, Owain, will fit in here as well.
- Fire Emblem Fates has Azura (daughter of the dead King of Valla, first raised in Nohr and later in Hoshido) and the Heirs of Fates' versions of both Kanas, Shiro, Kiragi, Siegbert and Forrest (sole survivors of their worlds, which fell victim to bad endings).
- In Fire Emblem: Three Houses, all routes other than Crimson Flower lead to Dimitri being ousted from Faerghus in a coup after the end of Part I, and he spends the timeskip on the run living as a vagrant.
- In Fire Emblem Engage, Ivy, the crown princess of Elusia, ends up being deemed an expendable pawn by her father Hyacinth after failing to seize Brodia Castle and is assigned to hold the line without any Emblem Rings while Hyacinth returns to Elusia to sacrifice King Morion to Sombron. Then, after Sombron eats Hyacinth to gain even more power from royal blood, he usurps control of Elusia completely, forcing Ivy to abandon and betray her country (making her public enemy number 1 to the Elusians) and defect to Alear's group as they flee Elusia after losing their Emblem Rings.
- Fire Emblem Gaiden and its remake Echoes: Shadows of Valentia:
- According to the JPN flyers and console ports, Tyris Flare from Golden Axe is the princess of a nearby kingdom that was invaded by Death Adder years before the action takes place. Her parents were killed in the invasion (and her mother the Queen died protecting her), and Tyris shaped herself into a powerful and stripperiffic Action Heroine to take revenge.
- Injustice 2: After being disgraced and arrested at the end of previous game, Princess Diana alias Wonder Woman becomes one due to joining the Regime and being an accomplice to Superman's reign of terror. She lives now in exile in the country of Kandaq under Black Adam's protection and seeks to restore the Regime by freeing Superman from his prison, as well as reclaim her birthright. In her Arcade Ending, she succeeds in these goals and attacks Paradise Island with her allies to force her former Amazon sisters to submit.
- Jade Empire's Silk Fox/Sun Lian. Literally. Though only after her father dies and her uncle takes over.
- The Legend of Zelda:
- Princess Zelda fits this category in some of the games. In Ocarina of Time she's forced to spend seven years in exile as Sheik while Ganondorf ravages her kingdom, in Wind Waker she's the last heir of a fallen royal line doomed to wander the oceans, in Twilight Princess her throne is usurped by Zant right before her coronation, and in Breath of the Wild her kingdom is destroyed and most of the people she cares about are killed at the hands of Calamity Ganon.
- The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess: Midna definitely qualifies as well. Not only is she the princess of the Twilight Realm, Zant seized power and cursed her with an imp's form, leading to Midna's fall from grace and a struggle to regain what she once had.
- Mace: The Dark Age: Namira is revealed to be this in her arcade ending. She was an Arab princess whose family was murdered by the King of Assassins and sold to slavery by one of her own guards. She was sent into a Royal Harem where she is taught how to fight by one of the court's eunuchs and embarks on a revenge quest against her family's killer. She may regain her lost glory in her own ending... Or end up in an even worse position than before in Al Rashid's ending where she becomes his brainwashed Sex Slave.
- Mitsumete Knight R: Daibouken Hen has a male example with none other than The Hero, Christopher MacLeod: he's actually Prince Conor of the fallen Parmet Kingdom, thanks to the schemes of Orcadia, an Empire bent on the conquest and domination of Zardos Continent. Conor is on a quest of revenge again Orcadia, not because of his fallen kingdom and the loss of his parents (he was 4 at the time, thus too young to remember them), but because when he was 12, Orcadia's men discovered him and his beloved little sister Melinda, captured and atrociously tortured them, to the point that Melinda died under the torture's shock. If the right conditions are met in your playthrough, Conor can achieve his revenge, destroy Orcadia, and become the King of the restored Parmet Kingdom.
- Octopath Traveler has Primrose Azelhart, a once-wealthy noblewoman until her father was murdered by three mysterious men with crow tattoos. Left destitute by his death and the loss of her home, her search for revenge led her to become a dancer in a tavern with the implication she also had to prostitute herself to get by. However, she endures the loss of her honor in her effort to find her father's killers.
- Averted by Natalia in Tales of the Abyss. While she wasn't actually born into the royal family, but a replacement for the stillborn princess, the citizens of Baticul and her father still defend her because she's done so much good for the kingdom.
