An expanded ending in a video game that only appears if the players has met a set of conditions throughout the story. What said conditions are can vary, ranging from 100% Completion to never dying. Other times, the terms can be frustratingly narrow or never spelled out in-game, leading to many a player looking up the steps for lack of a way to find the epilogue naturally. In such cases, it can be unclear from a story perspective why failure to meet the conditions would prevent the epilogue from playing out. In examples that better integrate story and gameplay it can be more obvious, like a story scene that requires all party members to stay alive, or the resolution of a storyline with an NPC if the player builds a relationship with them.
In any case, achievement will typically be more difficult than in the base, "vanilla" version of the ending. This epilogue most often appears in the form of an additional non-interactive cutscene tying up loose ends left by the story. As such, it can be considered something of a Bragging Rights Reward, since it offers no new gameplay.
Note the difference from Golden Ending, which is the "best" ending of a game with multiple branching paths, whereas this trope is merely an extended version of a single ending. Though this trope is usually only applied to linear games without any alternative routes, it can occasionally be applied to one ending in a game with multiple and act as a form of Story Branch Favoritism.
Compare and contrast Omega Ending, Algorithmic Story Branching, and Secret Final Campaign. Compare True Final Boss and Secret Level for other similarly hidden game add-ons.
Examples:
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Action Games
- Azure Striker Gunvolt 2: The game has a secret stinger that can be unlocked by completing 80% of the game's challenges, and then beating the Final Boss and watching to after the end credits, and possibly also after the ending save screen.
- Luminous Avenger iX 2 has an Earn Your Bad Ending version of this, unlocked by attacking Kohaku in the final boss battle until she runs out of health. This is set up in such a way that it is next-to-impossible to do accidentally since she is trapped at the top of the room where you're unlikely to hit her. Doing this adds an extra cutscene to the standard ending, where it's revealed that Mother has successfully hijacked Kohaku's body.
Action-Adventure
- In Batman: Arkham Knight, beating the game normally has Batman activating the Knightfall Protocol after his identity is exposed to the world by Scarecrow, leading to the destruction of Wayne Manor with the presumed deaths of Bruce and Alfred. If one beats all the non-DLC challenges, the ending is expanded on by revealing that since that day, James Gordon became mayor of Gotham City, his daughter Barbara is now engaged to Tim Drake, Gotham City is now a much safer place, and, hidden away, a mysterious bat-like figure still protects the city?
- Hollow Knight: Once you speak to Mister Mushroom a certain amount of times, you unlock a post-credits cutscene of him flying over Dirtmouth.
- The Legend of Zelda:
- In Link's Awakening, if you beat the game in a No Death Run, the final cutscene will include seagulls, implying that Marin's wish to become a seagull and fly away from Koholint Island (and, by extension, escape the Dream Apocalypse) was fulfilled.
- Majora's Mask has a segmented ending, where the finale Cut Scene includes several short clips that are each unlocked by the possession of their respective mask. As such, the entire ending can only be seen if you get said masks.note Failing to collect a specific mask instead shows you a picture of said mask rather than the scene, as the scenes are directly related to the resolution of the sidequest attached to them.
- In Breath of the Wild, the epilogue is unlocked by defeating Ganon after recovering all of Link's memories and restoring all four Divine Beasts. The latter is explicitly part of the main story, so most players accomplish that task unless they're going for a speedrun (in which case, get ready for a Boss Rush and a Final Boss with double the health). The former task is completely optional, however, so a fair amount of players won't bother trying to look for the needed locations. After Calamity Ganon is vanquished, if you restored all of Link's memories, you get a post-credits scene where he and Zelda are gearing up to travel across Hyrule together and Zelda shares her plans on how they're going to rebuild the country.
- LEGO The Lord of the Rings: After you get complete the game with a 100 percent, you get an epilogue where Frodo, Bilbo, and Gandalf the White sailing away from Middle Earth.
- Every game of the Metroid Prime Trilogy has two of them, the first becoming available when 75% of the items have been collected and the game has been completed, these are generally short sequences of Samus removing her helmet. The second ones require 100% completion and act as The Stinger:
- Metroid Prime: A dark hand forms out of the remains of Samus's Phazon Suit; the next game would reveal this hand as Dark Samus, the bounty hunter's Evil Twin.
- Metroid Prime 2: Echoes: In space near planet Aether, the particles of Dark Samus reconstruct herself.
- Metroid Prime 3: Corruption: Samus enters her ship and leaves Elysia. In space, she's followed by the Delano 7, the ship of Sylux from Metroid Prime: Hunters.
- In Psychonauts, reaching Rank 100 by finding all Figments, sorting all Emotional Baggage, restoring every Challenge Marker (which involves finding every Cobweb and Card in the game), and re-braining all of the other campers will result in a final secret cutscene playing, revealing that Mr. Pokeylope and Linda have a past with one another.
Action RPGs
- Every game in the Kingdom Hearts series has an extra epilogue that is unlocked by meeting prerequisites that differ based on difficulty (in most cases, it is inaccessible on the lowest difficulty, requires 100% on normal, requires certain optional content to be cleared on the second hardest difficulty, and a simple game clear is enough for the hardest, but even these details vary per game).
- Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep Final Mix has a playable epilogue that is unlocked by clearing each character's story and the final story (along with a few other requirements for difficulties lower than Critical).
Adventure Games
- Freddi Fish: In the first game, all of Freddi's friends that you choose to help will thank her and Luther at the end of the game.
- Finish Last Window without using the hints of the In-Game Novel the story unlocks an additional few pages that basically serve to tie up a few last odds and ends.
- Sally Face: Getting every game achievement unlocks a "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue after Chapter 5's end. Sal uses his new powers to help his friends clean up the mess that the darkness wrought on the world, Todd gradually recovers from being possessed, but they have yet to find Larry's ghost again.
Hack and Slash
- In Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, a spin-off of the above-mentioned Breath of the Wild, completing certain missions in the postgame will unlock a bonus cutscene of Zelda successfully repairing Terrako.
Platformers
- Mega Man ZX Advent: Beating the game on Hard Mode unlocks an extra scene between Master Thomas and Master Mikhail following the Final Battle. It's revealed that Thomas is just as evil as Albert, and only helped the heroes and their allies kill the latter due to Thomas opposing Albert's violent methods with Model W. It's also revealed that the four evil Mega Men who had been working alongside Albert survived the fall of the Ouroboros, and are now apparently subservient to Thomas. It's also heavily implied that Master Mikhail will either be killed or imprisoned by Thomas and his new henchmen because He Knows Too Much.
- Super Mario Galaxy: By collecting all 120 Power Stars, you get to see Rosalina thanking the player for collecting all of the Power Stars in the game, and then vanishing. Suddenly... Super Luigi Galaxy!
Roguelike
- In the postgame of Hades, the epilogue can be achieved by Zagreus maxing out his bonds with all of his Olympian relatives. The ensuing cutscene features him successfully reconciling the Olympians with Hades and Persephone.
Role-Playing Games
- Final Fantasy XIII-2 has an additional epilogue that can be unlocked if the player defeats the Final Boss with their Paradox Scope activated after collecting all 160 fragments. This post-credit scene shows Caius sitting on Etro's throne, declaring that the Goddess is dead.
- Hyperdimension Neptunia mk2 and its remake have no less than 5 extensions for its Normal Ending, depending on each nation's Share amount and Nepgear's Lily Rank with other characters. Each extension has Nepgear hanging out with different characters, whether the Makers, her sister Neptune, or the CPUs of another nation.
- OMORI: If the player makes sure to consistently water Basil's flowers in Headspace, an additional cutscene will play after the good ending credits, showing Sunny and Basil smiling at each other as their respective Somethings disappear.
- Persona 4 Golden: If the player maxes out the Aeon Social Link and clears the Hollow Forest dungeon in February, the true ending will be extended, showing the protagonist returning to Inaba months later and reuniting with his friends.
- Workshop In The Ironwood Grove: Beating the Superboss adds another line to the epilogue, beyond what's gotten for beating the final boss:
???: And rumor has it that, under the ground, she's even raising a new-born baby dragon...
Shoot 'em Up
- BLUE REVOLVER: Clearing the game on Parallel mode, including the True Final Boss, with no continues gives you the same ending specific to your character, but adds a final thank-you message from the developers.
Turn Based Tactics
- Phantom Doctrine has an extended campaign, which is only playable after beating the game once. Defeating Valhalla in this extended campaign gives the player a Distant Finale mission nine years later, where the Cabal tracks down Tai-Pan, who has taken over the Beholder Initiative's operations, and eliminates him.
