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Sequel Hook / Video Games

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Sequel Hooks in video games.

  • Absented Age: Squarebound: Karen Alias reveals that the Gangers weren't the ones who turned Karen into a ghost, which means there's still an enemy out there. Additionally, the game ends with four out of seven Heart Fragments, indicating that the journey is only a little over half complete. Finally, the secret postgame boss states that they are investigating the "Lost World" and that their meeting with Karen isn't supposed to happen yet, implying that they will be an important character in the sequel.
  • Aliens vs. Predator: In the latest game, you get three hooks for the price of one! First, you see Number 6 (the Alien) take over a Weyland Yutani ship and become a queen (future setting?), but you also see evidence that both the player character's Predator and Karl Bishop Weyland are gunning for the Alien Homeworld as their next destination.
  • ANNO: Mutationem: After the ending, which dealt with a few of the ominous threads presented during the story, the unknown faction that manipulated C into accessing Hinterland is mentioned to be working on their agendas.
  • Another Code: Beat the game twice and a post-credits puzzle appears. Figuring it out hints that something happens to Ashley at 16, the age she's at in the sequel.
  • Assassin's Creed:
  • Asura's Wrath has two (three if you count True Episode 18).
    • Episode 18 ends with Asura and Yasha putting an end to Gohma Vlitra, finally saving Gaea and beginning their trip back to Mithra. However, if you fulfill a certain criteria (i.e. gather enough S Ranks from the other stories) then you have the ability to play True Episode 18.
    • True Episode 18 has Asura and Yasha do everything as stated above, but when they do get back, Olga finally returns, attempting to kill Mithra as revenge for Deus. She is then promptly killed by none other than the Golden Spider, who reveals that he has other plans in store for Mithra. While this ending did look like it set up a plot for a sequel, it was eventually revealed to be more of a DLC hook when the final Part was released as a DLC along with the Lost Episodes and two mid-episodes.
    • The True Ending DLC ends on more of a cliffhanger than the last one. After Asura kills Chakravartin at the cost of his own life and saves Mithra and Gaea for good, the post-episode interlude brings about another setting where everyone was reincarnated as apparently normal folk. At least, that is possibly the idea, if it were not for Not!Asura trying to face a meteor coming straight at him, mirroring the Japanese cover art.
  • In Imagic's Atlantis, when the city is destroyed, a single starcraft rises up from the ashes to escape, leading to the events of its follow-up game Cosmic Ark.
  • Axelay: After (finally) beating the Harder Than Hard mode, you get a message saying "see you again at Axelay 2". Too bad it never came out at all.
  • Baby Boomer: If you manage to beat this incredibly difficult light gun game, you get an ending where Boomer makes it into the wrong baby carriage, and you are told to buy the sequel to see what happens next. Since this game was an unlicensed video game, it didn't sell well enough for a sequel.
  • Baldur's Gate:
    • Baldur's Gate ends with one of these, showing that there aren't just one or two Children of Bhaal but hundreds...
    • Baldur's Gate II:
      • The main game does it by having an Omniscient Council of Vagueness monitor your progress. They turn out to be the Children of Bhaal the hero has to face off against in the expansion pack.
      • The Black Pits 2 adventure that comes with the Enhanced Edition of the second game ends with the ostensibly master of the arena you'd been kidnapped to being killed by an unidentified "master" for failing him, and your own group of adventurers :teleported away to some unknown location by the Big Bad of the first Black Pits, who turns out to have survived/been resurrected.
  • Banjo-Kazooie:
    • The ending of Banjo-Kazooie reveals that its sequel is named and several special features (such as Stop 'n' Swop) are being developed for it, which are revealed in the end ("Mumbo's jaw dropped in awe"). Not that any of them amounted to much in the end until the Xbox Live Arcade was invented, but Banjo-Tooie was a good game.
    • Banjo-Tooie ends with Gruntilda swearing that she'll get her revenge in Banjo-Threeie.
    • Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts ends with Grunty working in a video games factory, plotting to make her own devious game. Seeing as you can go into games in the new Banjoverse...
  • Batman: Arkham Series:
    • Batman: Arkham Asylum contains a Sequel Hook in an extremely well-hidden Easter Egg: hidden in Warden Sharp's office is another office, detailing what he plans to do if he wins the mayoral race - turning Gotham into a gigantic asylum, which lines up perfectly with the Spirit of Arkham message.
    • Batman: Arkham City, which did indeed result from said Hook, has the following: The introduction of Hush, and Harley being pregnant with the recently-deceased Joker's child. Also, Azrael's prophecy of Batman's destiny for Gotham. However, the Harley Quinn's Revenge DLC seems to reveal that the pregnancy test that Harley used gave a false positive, negating that particular sequel hook for some unknown reason. In addition there is a boat in the game where if you use the cryptographic sequencer, you can open a hatch. Go down, and you'll find a dead body that jerks back to life if you examine it closely before dying, and a shipment order filled out to one "Johnathan Crane". If you also use the sequencer and move around the screen, you'll find coded messages from the Scarecrow saying he'll have his revenge.
    • Batman: Arkham Knight features a version of the Wayne Manor Predator map from Batman: Arkham City with a piano that can open a panel and a case Bruce seems to be working on, one where he suspects a murder victim knew their killer and the number 4-25. At first, it seemed like a case of Trolling Creator as on April 25, 2016, Rocksteady celebrated the 75th Anniversary of The Joker's debut, but it also foreshadows Batman: Arkham VR, which is about Bruce having a nightmare about a Jokerized version of himself killing Nightwing and features 4-25 as an Arc Number.
  • Bayonetta:
    • Bayonetta 2 contains an inversion. After the credits, Balder, fresh off of absorbing Loptr's soul to keep him from escaping, is seen driving a spear through the Witch statue in the Sunrise and Crescent Valleys, before putting on the mask we saw him wearing in the previous game. After this, the previous game's logo appears on the screen.
    • Bayonetta 3 has a prequel variant. After beating the game, you can purchase an Old Picture Book from the Gates of Hell. To unlock the book, you need to go to past chapters and locate three hidden keys. Doing so will unlock the book, and inside is a secret chapter in which you control Cereza, a younger Bayonetta from her training days, venturing into the Avalon Forest with her doll in hand to save her mother. At the end of the secret chapter is a message saying, "To be continued...", leading into the events of Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon.
  • SNK's Beast Busters ends with the alien brain boss's dying words being "We will return!" and a giant spaceship appearing in the sky above our heroes. While the game received an arcade sequel exactly ten years later, it's mostly unrelated and there are no aliens in sight.
  • Beyond Good & Evil: After the closing credits, a short cut-scene of one of the Dom'Z erupting from Pey'j's hand plays.
  • The Big Red Adventure: The Italian graphic adventure game, itself a sequel of sorts to Nippon Safes Inc., ends with the three protagonists on a camel in the middle of the desert, with a "The End?" written in faux-Arabic font instead of the faux-Cyrillic used throughout the game. No sequel was ever made however, since the software house was disbanded a little later.
  • BioForge: Dr. Escher survived and has been captured, with Dr. Mastaba gloating that she will be his next test subject. But alas, all hope for a sequel/expansion was long since gone.
  • BioShock 2: There's an audio log entry that has a scientist expressing the need to add some mental conditioning to their Big Daddies, because they aren't properly defending the Little Sisters like they were supposed to. The reason for this? At least one of these unconditioned Big Daddies just wandered off. A type of Big Daddy with weaponry, plasmids, and no emotional connection to a Little Sister. I wonder what use that could be for?*
  • Blackthorne: In the ending of the game, after the credits have finished, there is a cutscene showing the same place on Earth where Blackthorne got teleported to Tuul from in the opening cutscene, and an orc teleports in, and laughs. The game was released in 1994, and there is no sequel yet, so there will probably never be a sequel. Meanwhile, the company that made Blackthorne got busy making a little game called Warcraft...
  • BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger: The true ending of this game's story mode is basically a non-ending that introduces the series' Big Bad, whereas The Stinger flat out states the storyline of one of the two new characters in Continuum Shift (namely, Tsubaki's).
  • Borderlands:
    • Borderlands ends with the Claptrap you meet at the beginning of the game getting hit with a beam from the Helios Station on Pandora's moon of Elpis, turning him into the Interplanetary Ninja Assassin Claptrap, who later becomes the Arc Villain of the game's fourth DLC campaign.
    • In Borderlands 2, after Handsome Jack and The Warrior have both been killed, Lilith decides to destroy the Vault Key once and for all, when it projects a map revealing the locations of many more Vaults.
    • In Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel!, after Athena has finished telling the tale of Jack's fall from grace, Lilith orders her firing squad to kill Athena, only for their shots to be deflected by the Eridian who appeared alongside Zarpedon near the beginning of the game, who tells them of a war and that they will need to recruit many Vault Hunters to survive it.
  • BoxxyQuest: The Gathering Storm:
    • The mid-credits Stinger hits us with the massive cliffhanger of Boxxyfan restoring his avatar and taking control of STORM, apparently setting up the events of a sequel. This turns out to be a subversion, because there's an epilogue bonus chapter dealing with the fallout of that cliffhanger, and the "True Ending" makes sure not to leave any loose ends untied.
    • Played straight with the hidden "PC Ending", which raises a ton of questions about the game's universe and ends with the party stranded in a parallel version of earth inhabited by Eldritch Abominations. One could imagine any number of sequels springing from that.
  • Cadence of Hyrule, the sequel to Crypt of the NecroDancer, has the heroine summoned to the The Legend of Zelda universe to aid with a music-based threat. The game ends with Link and Zelda using the power of the Triforce to help Cadence return home, but since she ends up landing in a forest at night, she's left wondering if she's actually returned to her proper universe or not.
  • Case 02: Paranormal Evil: After the credits, there's an ominous statement that Marty and Sally will be involved in Case 03: True Cannibal Boy, with an image of Hans popping up.
  • Centipede (1998): The game starts with the Centipede awakening, which is said to happen every hundred years. In the end cutscene, the narrator says "you should see what happens every thousand years". The answer would presumably have been shown in a Millipede update, though no such game was ever released.
  • Chest: In the dev room, Atan states that he may consider making more content for the setting. There's also the fact that the party only gets to visit a small portion of the world map, despite the many named locations.
  • Chrono Trigger:
    • The PlayStation port has new animated sequences that featured Lucca finding a baby out of nowhere, and the last of the Masamune, all to link the game to its then upcoming sequel Chrono Cross.
    • The Nintendo DS port gives us Dream Devourer, which is presumably the Time Devourer from Chrono Cross. It also has Magus losing his memories, which is a reference to a plotline in Chrono Cross that was abandoned during the making of the game.
  • The Conduit ends on a very abrupt hook, with the Big Bad apparently conferring with his superiors.
  • Conker's Bad Fur Day's original ending involved Conker committing suicide, but it was changed to leave the possibility of a sequel. Thanks to Microsoft, there'll never be one.
  • Contra: The arcade version of Super Contra ends with an alien offspring flying off the final boss's head. The Famicom version of Contra also has a sequel hook that was removed from the American version.
    • Contra: Operation Galuga: Lucia is missing along with the Lemris following her Heroic Sacrifice. All efforts to search for Lucia and the Lemris have already begun. Meanwhile, Bradley transforms into a werewolf and is spied upon by Sheena and Browny. And with the Lemris missing, the gravity shield is offline, thus allowing the Zagard Empire to invade and setting the stage for the Alien Wars. Also, Lucia is revealed to be Dr. Drake's daughter, indicating that he's Dr. Geo Mandrake from Contra: Hard Corps.
  • Crash 'n' the Boys: Street Challenge ends with a teaser for Crash 'n' the Boys: Ice Challenge, an unmade localization of the Kunio-kun game Ike Ike! Nekketsu Hockey Bu.
  • Dandy Dungeon ends with Yamada freeing his Love Interest Maria-chan after defeating his former boss Chairman Ayanokoji who is also Maria's father. Just after the wedding between him and Maria, the girl gets kidnapped by a bat monster (in a shout-out to Ghosts 'n Goblins) sent by the evil foreign conglomerate that absorbed Ayanokoji's Empire Group industries.
  • Deadly Towers: The ending text hints that a new adventure might begin "about 1000 years" later, with "the coming of the Iron Age, and the revival of the Devil of Darkness." Of course, the game had no sequel.
  • Destroy All Humans!:
    • The game ends with a sequel hook in the form of Silhouette informing Crypto that there are branches of Majestic all over the world... However, the sequel takes the plot off in an entirely different direction, and the possible sequel plot left open by the hook is resolved in the space of a single mission.
    • Destroy All Humans! Path of the Furon ends with a large sequel hook. Before beginning the final boss fight, Crypto enthusiastically states "Destroy All Bosses and set up for the next sequel!" Also, after defeating the boss, Pox states "There will always be a reason to Destroy All Humans!" And after Pox takes the throne and Crypto prepares to leave for Earth, Crypto tells Pox "See ya in ten years! You'll like the future, I got a feelin' big hair's gonna be in style again!" Unfortunately, with Pandemic losing the rights to the series, not to mention a few studios shutting down during production, the Americans only got the 360 version, and the PS3 version is only available from Europe.
  • Detroit: Become Human alludes to an impending war between humans and androids in both the ending where Markus leads Jericho in violently liberating the android recall centers and the ending where he detonates a dirty bomb that forces the military to retreat from the city. A more subtle hook is present in the ending where the android revolution succeeds via peaceful demonstration; in the game's flowchart, this outcome is labeled "Androids won freedom — for the moment".
  • Late in Deus Ex, JC Denton discovers the Cloning Bay facility where he was created. Of the four cells, one is empty (the one marked with JC Denton's name) and another is labelled "Alex Denton".
  • Devil May Cry series:
    • In the first game, Dante didn't exactly kill Mundus; he just sealed the Demon Emperor back to the Underworld, with the latter even making a vow to return and rule the human world someday. Dante acknowledges this twice, first in a joking manner, and second when he and Trish escape the crumbling island via the biplane.
      Dante: Let's not forget though, the Underworld's evil is still alive. They will someday return!
      Trish: There's no need to worry, right? 'Cuz the world has the Legendary Dark Knight Dante... and his sidekick!
    • Devil May Cry 4: As Nero inherits the Yamato in the finale, he asks Dante if they could meet again. Dante responds by pointing two of his fingers up, seemingly a sign of affirmation. This promise is fulfilled 11 years later with Devil May Cry 5.
    • Devil May Cry 5: Dialogue lines from the final mission imply the story is not yet completely over; before Dante and Vergil dive down the Underworld to sever the Qliphoth, Dante entrusts Nero with demon-related issues on the human world while they're away, then Vergil also gives Nero his poetry book, telling his son to hold onto it for the meantime, and says he won't lose when they fight again "next time".
    • Several are set up at the end of DmC: Devil May Cry.
      • The WE HAVE AWOKEN message being displayed on-screen; Limbo is merged with the human world, so the public now knows demons and humans co-exist, laying bare all demonic manipulations. The world is forever changed and chaos almost certainly lies ahead.
      • Vergil leaves after the battle to places unknown (and does so again after the Vergil's Downfall campaign).
      • Dante has now sworn to protect humans and developed his powers further, as indicated by his hair becoming totally white in the final cutscene just like how it does when he's in Devil Trigger, but he has not yet reached his full potential, whatever that may be.
  • Diablo II: The original (pre-expansion) plot ended with one of these. The whole story has been set in flashbacks told by a crazy man in a madhouse named Marius who tells the Archangel Tyrael about how he travelled the world with Diablo himself and saw the three Prime Evils rise to power. Eventually he gives up the soulstone of Baal, Diablo's younger brother, to his visitor so all of it can finally end...TWIST! It wasn't Tyrael at all, but Baal in disguise. He kills Marius and takes his soulstone back and leaves to pursue unknown plans.
  • Dice and the Tower of the Reanimator: Glorious Princess: The post-credit scenes show character art for an upcoming game in the Peacemaker series, Peacemaker: Glorious Princess. It also shows screenshots from Dark Lord: Peacemaker, but that game got rebooted into Hero King Quest: Peacemaker Prologue.
  • Donkey Kong:
    • Donkey Kong Country's GBA port has a different ending from the SNES original. K. Rool returns on the Gangplank Galleon just before the credits sequence and threatens to blow up DK Island. The Kongs jump off the ship into the water as it sails away, and Cranky effectively lampshades this trope:
      Cranky: Call that an ending? Looks like a cheap stunt setting up the story for the sequel!
    • Diddy Kong Racing's ending cutscene shows Wizpig, after his defeat, flying off the island in his ship laughing. The ending credits also feature a "To Be Continued" at the end. Rare was indeed working on a sequel named Donkey Kong Racing, but it became vaporware after they were bought out by Microsoft. Diddy Kong Racing's Nintendo DS remake doesn't feature a "To be continued".
  • Digger: The Legend of the Lost City, a NES maze platform game by Rare, ends with the protagonist Digger T. Rock finding the titular city, then looking worried for a moment, and the words "To Be Continued..." appear. However the character never appeared again in any capacity.
  • Dino Crisis 2 has its ending end on a hook where Regina goes back to her own time while Dylan stays behind to die with a trapped Paula as the base they're in explodes. It's stated that Regina has a disc containing information on the Third Energy, which researchers can use to develop a timegate, and thus Regina can go back in time to save Dylan and Paula once the technology is built. The next game ignores the previous two games completely and did so terrible in sales and reviews that Capcom effectively shelved the franchise.
  • Doom: The ending of the original game has our hero escaping Hell and returning to Earth, only to find that the demons he's been fighting have already invaded, setting up Doom II: Hell on Earth.
  • Dragon Age:
    • Dragon Age II ends with Cassandra telling Varric that Hawke was the only one who could "stop this madness" and then asking Leliana if they're going to proceed with the original plan.
    • The Trespasser epilogue DLC of Dragon Age: Inquisition reveals that Solas is the Elven god Fen'Harel and that he plans to restore Elven society by bringing about The End of the World as We Know It. The remaining Inquisition members then discuss their plans and the camera zooms in on a map of the Tevinter Imperium.
  • Ecco the Dolphin:
  • Eldritch Lands: The Witch Queen's Eternal War ends with Sofia finally obtaining a piece of the necroshroom and talking to its hivemind directly. This just winds up raising more questions than answers, and many of the game's other established points (Why the deep ones died, what the event that Sofia knows will end her is, among others) also remain open for more development.
  • All three games in the Epic Mickey series does this:
    • In the original game, Mickey Mouse starts dripping with ink after leaving Wasteland, which gives the implication that he'll become the next Shadow Blot. This plot point, however, was dropped in the sequel proper.
    • Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two ends with the different incarnations of Pete kidnapping Gremlin Prescott with the intent of using him for their own plans. Unfortunately, this sequel hook won't be followed because Junction Point's closing has effectively cancelled the Epic Mickey series.
    • The Nintendo 3DS companion title Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion also hints towards a sequel by having Mizrabel promise Mickey that he hasn't seen the last of her after she is defeated. While developed by a different company, it seems unlikely that this game will have a sequel either.
  • Eternal Darkness:
    • Plays a twist of this one by showing a screen claiming you beat the game, with a promotional poster of Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Redemption at the end of a chapter (as part of the game's devotion to messing with the player directly).
    • A more direct example is the presence of a fifth, unknown Ancient which has been confirmed by Word of God.
  • The Evil Within 2: During the game, Sebastian can collect slides and talk with Kidman about their friendship, the events of the previous game, Lily, Myra, etc. every time a new one is found. After acquiring ten, the final one is given to Sebastian by hand by Tatiana, who says he needs to discuss something he has been avoiding. The final slide is a picture of Joseph Oda, Sebastian's friend who was supposedly killed during the first game by Kidman. Kidman however reveals that Joseph is still alive and that the his situation is complicated, but that she'll only give Sebastian more information once he's out of Union, leaving this dangling plot thread to be picked up by a sequel or even a DLC.
  • Exit Fate: In addition to leaving several small parts of the plot unexplained, the game keeps the eventual fate of some main characters rather wide open and ends with a dark screen and text that can only be described as foreshadowing of some sort.
  • Final Fantasy:
    • Final Fantasy X:
      • The game ends with a fairly noteworthy one: Tidus, having performed a Heroic Sacrifice, finds himself in a giant, empty pool of water and swims for the surface with a grin on his face. The International version has an additional bonus movie that more directly sets up Final Fantasy X-2.
      • There's also an in-universe example. Tidus's father Jecht had a move called Sublimely Magnificent Jecht Shot Mark III. The reason for the Mark III? To draw crowds expecting to see Mark I or II, which don't exist.
    • Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII has one in the form of a secret ending obtainable by collecting three MacGuffins. Genesis picks up Weiss, who is apparently Not Quite Dead, and explicitly says, "It is not yet time for slumber. There is much work to do, my brother."
    • Final Fantasy XIII ends with no less than the Dawn of an Era, along with Hope's question of "will we ever see them again?"
    • Final Fantasy XIII-2:
      • This game has an even bigger Hook: One of the main characters dies, the timeline collapses, the bad guy wins, and the final shot is of a crystallized Lightning as To Be Continued flashes on the screen.
      • The Hook gets bigger yet if you play the Requiem of the Goddess DLC story. The ending strongly hints that Lightning is going to return. And then a sequel starring Lightning was announced.
    • Final Fantasy XIV: In a bit of Leaning on the Fourth Wall, near the end of the Endwalker expansion (which marks the Grand Finale of the current Myth Arc), Emet-Selch points out to the Warrior of Light that there's still a vast unexplored world out there that they haven't even seen yet, and drops a few ideas for future adventures to go on later. The first major patch actually involves the Warrior of Light following up on a few of these leads.
  • Fire Emblem:
    • Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade provides an interesting Inverted Trope — the closing scenes of the epilogue, fifteen years later, introduce Roy and Lilina and demonstrate a now-adult King Zephiel's first encounter with Jahn. Of course, these are all things to do with the events of Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade, an earlier-released game to which Blazing Blade is a prequel.
    • Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance ends with some plot elements unresolved, namely the identity of the Black Knight, the behavior of the Rider Bertram, and the identity of the person Sothe was looking for. This, combined with the enigmatic final words of Begnion's prime minister Sephiran, left fans hoping that the next game in the series would continue the story. The sequel, Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, does resolve the unresolved questions.
  • Five Nights at Freddy's:
    • Five Nights at Freddy's 3: Well, everything has been wrapped up. The pizzeria is gone (most likely for good), the animatronics are destroyed, the kids that haunted the suits have finally been laid to rest, the Purple Man has finally been killed, and the last newspaper says that nearly everything has been consumed by a fire. Nearly everything. What remains will be sold at a public auction... and brightening the last newspaper shows that Springtrap may still be around.
    • Five Nights at Freddy's: Sister Location takes this further with the ending cutscene for the "Golden Freddy" mode. Not only is Springtrap still around, but he's confirmed to be the father of our protagonist, who became a Revenant Zombie after Ennard left his body. Eggs—actually named Michael— vows to track down Springtrap.
    • Five Nights At Freddys VR Help Wanted's Halloween DLC "Curse of Dreadbear" has an Easter Egg in the Corn Maze level, where, if you unlock the cellar, you come across a rabbit mask inside a ransacked version of the "Prize Won" screen. Putting it on while holding the Glitchtrap plushie triggers a woman speaking in voiceover, revealing that Glitchtrap has someone who is acting on his behalf.
  • Inverted in the Omicron ending of G-Darius, which has the Belser Army, the series' main antagonists, approaching the wreckage of G.T. and capturing it, therefore making this game a prequel to the entire Darius series.
  • Gears of War: After blowing up the Locust tunnels with the Lightmass Bomb, it is revealed just before the credits that they are Not Quite Dead and will continue fighting until they win or die. Gears of War 2 continues the trend by leaving some unresolved issues and including a mysterious message after the credits.
  • Ghost of Tsushima ends with the Mongol invasion defeated, but Khotan's final words suggest that more Mongols are on the way - and indeed, in real life, a larger Mongol invasion hit the shores of Japan seven years after the invasion of Tsushima. Also, Jin is declared a traitor by the Shogunate for the "crime" of inspiring the peasant class to rise up and fight, as that poses a threat to the Samurai class' social position - Jin's own countrymen may come for him if the Mongols don't.
  • God of War:
    • At the end of God of War II, Kratos goes back in time to the War of the Titans, gathers them all up, and brings them forward in time so they can collectively get revenge on the Gods for royally screwing them over. Kratos, holding onto Gaia, screams up to the Gods, all while holding the Blade of Olympus: "Zeus! Your son has returned! I bring the destruction of Olympus!" The camera pans back to unveil countless Titans climbing up Mount Olympus, ready and raring to get a piece of the Gods. Talk about a cliffhanger. Hah. Indeed, God of War III starts at that exact moment. Zeus repeats his speech to the other gods, albeit with a few slight changes. Kratos also repeats his final line before all the action starts.
    • God of War 3: Kratos fights his inner demons and forgives himself for slaying his family, using the power of Hope to defeat Zeus. Instead of giving said power to Athena, he kills himself, releasing it to the world. After presumably dying right before the credits, an additional scene is shown after the credits. A trail of blood leads from the scene of Kratos's death to the edge of the cliff he plunges off of at the beginning of God of War. But of course, none of this matters because God of War 3 is the end of Kratos's saga. Or it was until the release of God of War (PS4) followed up on the plot.
  • Golden Sun: Dark Dawn ends with Matthew, Karis, and Tyrell coming back home, only to find that the Mourning Moon has returned and ravaged their home, with their parents nowhere in sight.
  • Grabbed by the Ghoulies ends with Cooper and Amber walking towards the town of "Ghoulsville in the Gloom", and right before the final fade-out the silhouette of Baron Von Ghoul in his tiny biplane lurches across the sky after them, indicating that he survived being thrown out of his window and may want a rematch.
  • Granblue Fantasy has numerous instances of these in its story arcs and events:
    • At the end of the "Piece of the Pie" event, Grueler informs the player and Vyrn that the ones responsible for his father's assassination is the organization known as the Foe, a group of fanatics that worship the Astrals and are dedicated to sowing the seeds of war everywhere. Along with mentioning the Society as one of the forces behind the scenes, the same group that Beatrix, Zeta, Vaseraga, and Eustace are a part of, stating that the Society aims to gain control over the whole world by ensnaring primal beasts and using their powers.
    • In Lucio/Lucifer's fate episode, the mention of the otherworldly being is brought up. The being in question being the same one that taunted Jeanne d'Arc (or broke her in her dark version), and also makes an appearance in the "Four Knights of a Fallen Land" event as a demon that was summoned by Isabella who tried to usurp the throne from King Carl. For whatever reason, the being wants Lyria and Vyrn for their own purpose. One of his kind later shows up in the higher tiers of the Extra Co-Op quests to warn the protagonist and Lyria of the dangers.
    • The Society members (Vaseraga, Zeta, Beatrix, and Eustace) have a lore about their involvement in the organization and fight against an entity called the Foe. Said entity being involved with the war that took Ezecrain's hometown is mostly confirmed in the event "Right Behind You", where the Foe is an entity that sows discord among the sky realm to test their unity and if that unity breaks, the Foe can recruit people to their cause forcefully and attack unopposed without anyone capable of defending themselves against such an attack.
    • Additionally, the "Right Behind You" event ends with the warning that the battle with the Foe, now identified as people that live in the moon, is not over, and Neutronon's last words is that they plan to go after the creator.
    • During "Auld Lang Syne 2017", the Joya ends up rocketing off into the cosmos. Rather than wait a year to address it, the February story event "Auld Lanxiety" focuses on Zooey and the Divine Generals dealing with this.
    • The "What Makes The Sky Blue" event, which commemorates Granblue Fantasy's anniversary of running its service, speaks of the game lore about the Astrals and their creations and their connection with the Crimson Horizon mentioned often. Part II, "Paradise Lost", ends with the revelation of Beelzebub gaining the dark half of the abomination that was once sealed by Lucifer himself and that the fight against Belial and Beelzebub isn't over.
    • A huge one with the "Dawning Sky" arc's end for the next arc of the main story. The Grandcypher suffers heavy damage from the falling debris of the Great Wall's destruction and ends up falling to the bottoms of the sky, the Crimson Horizon. Noa, through his bond with the Grandcypher, assures the player that their travels are not over yet.
  • The bootleg-game-inspired Grand Dad ends with a teaser for a sequel to a completely unrelated game — after the ending screen, the screen cuts back to the graveyard level from earlier, and lightning strikes one of the tombstones, engraving the face of Steven from the obscure arcade game My Hero. Then the coffin rises out of the ground, and Steven punches his way out. The game finally cuts to a splash screen saying "TO BE CONTINUED IN PART THREE". It turns out that it's teasing a sequel to an earlier Fan Sequel the author made for My Hero.
  • Guild Wars: Eye of the North: The victory cutscene at the end of the main story ends with a brief glimpse of a gigantic dragon-like creature awakening in the chamber where the player characters have just defeated the Great Destroyer. Sure enough, Guild Wars 2 is set in a world dominated by ancient, reawakened dragons.
  • Half-Life:
    • The first Half-Life ends with Gordon being hired by the mysterious G-Man who had been watching over him throughout the game, then put into storage pending an "assignment".
    • Half-Life 2 concludes with the G-Man returning Gordon to stasis after he destroys the Citadel's reactor, while informing him that he can expect even more assignments in the future due to his extraordinary talents.
    • Episode One ends with Gordon and Alyx caught in the shockwave of the Citadel's destruction, and Episode Two ends just before an expedition to the Borealis (and just after Eli's tragic demise).
    • And then Half-Life: Alyx overwrites the hook from Episode Two with another one entirely, in which Eli and Gordon set out to rescue Alyx from the G-Man, who used her to undo Eli's death and placed her under his employ.
  • All Halo games have ended with sequel hooks:
    • Halo: Combat Evolved has 343 Guilty Spark scooting away from the destroyed Halo.
    • Halo 2 ends on a cliffhanger. Halo 2 and 3 are the second part of a Two-Part Trilogy so this is pretty much a given.
    • Halo 3 shows the presumed-dead Master Chief and Cortana drifting through space towards a mysterious planet.
    • Halo 3: ODST (an interquel) shows Truth watching as his forces excavate the portal to the Ark.
    • Halo: Reach (a prequel) ends with the scene that starts the first game — the Pillar of Autumn approaching Halo.
    • Halo Wars ends with Serina's voice telling the captain to wake up. The game has an achievement called "Ready for the Sequel", which was rather ironic for a time, due to its developer going under, until Halo Wars 2 was finally announced by a different developer.
    • Halo 4 doesn't have a hook for its main campaign, but the Spartan Ops campaign (which occurs six months after Master Chief's story) ends with Jul 'Mdama's fleet evacuating Requiem and Dr. Halsey defecting to the Covenant.
    • Halo 5: Guardians ends with a Halo moving into view as an off-screen Cortana hums a tune.
  • In Haunting Starring Polterguy, poltergeist Polterguy's last piece of dialog tells us that he will continue spooking around after he has been revived and made a ghost again. However, no sequel was ever produced.
  • The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1984): The last line of this Interactive Fiction game is, "You set one single foot on the ancient dust — and almost instantly the most incredible adventure starts, which you'll have to buy the next game to find out about." Alas, the sequel never even came close to being released.
  • Hostile Waters: Antaeus Rising has two. Not only does the ending cinematic reveal that your Heroic Sacrifice might have spawned something even worse, The Stinger suggests it was in vain.
  • House of the Dead:
    • House of the Dead, at least from 2 and up, always has the best ending possible show a limping man lamenting either humanity or how the Big Bad for that game could not finish off the protagonists, and how this same man still has plans despite such failures.
    • The House of the Dead: OVERKILL ends with a recorded message from Papa Caesar, revealing that Isaac Washington's father is still alive.
  • The inFAMOUS franchise:
    • inFAMOUS ends with Cole, regardless of his morality (although his attitude will be quite different depending which side he's now on), waiting for the arrival of the Beast.
    • inFAMOUS 2: In the good ending, a dead Cole is sent off to sea when suddenly a question mark-shaped bolt of lightning strikes his coffin.
  • Insanity's Blade, a retro-styled hack 'n' slash on Steam, ends with the barbarian Thurstan becoming a part of his magic sword after defeating the final enemy, and then his ghost appearing in front of his companion Finn urging him to go on new adventures, before the typical "To Be Continued..." appears. However the developer ended up making Battle Princess Madelyn that, while conceptually similar, has nothing to do with the barbarian's adventures.
  • Jak and Daxter:
  • Kabuki Quantum Fighter for the NES has, after the end of the game, a sound test with a super-deformed Scott (oddly present only in the American version) that says "I'll be back. Watch for my next adventure." An adventure that never happened. However, the PS2 game 7 Blades is a sequel of sorts to Zipang, the film on which the Japanese version of KQF was based, so in a convoluted way this title still received a sequel.
  • Kang Fu ends with a message saying ""See you in Kang Two". No sequel with such a title was ever released.
  • Khimera: Destroy All Monster Girls ends with a Cryptic Conversation between two unknown parties who targeted the island where the game is set.
  • Kid Icarus: Uprising got one... in another game. That being Super Smash Bros for Wii U. A dialogue between Pit, Dark Pit, Palutena, and Viridi reveals that after defeating Hades, Viridi has been gathering her forces once more, and Dark Pit is now working for her and itching to face Pit in a fight again.
  • Kindergarten:
    • The first game has a blatant one in the secret ending. After Nugget kills everyone but himself and the protagonist with the power of the 25 talismans, he says that he and the protagonist "must travel to another school" and "[...]do it all again! Only bigger and better!" He even outright calls it Kindergarten 2. This was followed up on two years later (though as the sequel follows up on the Omega Ending and not the secret ending, [almost] all the characters are alive again).
    • The secret ending of the sequel has one that's very similar to the first one, albeit more vague, with Nugget (acting as an Author Avatar) saying he "will think about it".
  • Kingdom Hearts: This is featured in many games in the series, even going so far as to integrate them into gameplay so that the player has to finish certain tasks to get them.
    • Kingdom Hearts II: The games always end with a letter from King Mickey being opened and read, but not showing the player the contents, and the bonus movie you can unlock as before shows a ludicrously vague explanation of the plot for the prequel. Yes, a prequel hook.
    • Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep turns out to have a Distant Finale that is probably the biggest Sequel Hook in the series, and that Distant Finale is a continuation of the second game's Sequel Hook, which pretty much refers to the other three games made after it (coded, 358/2 Days, and Birth by Sleep). Combine their Hooks and you get a massive Sequel Hook for Sora's new journey in a possible third game to reconnect Kingdom Hearts.
    • Re:coded gets a big one as well, revealing that Xehanort is due to return now that Sora has taken out both Xehanort's Heartless and Xemnas, his Nobody. Furthermore, Yen Sid is going to hold a Master Qualification Exam for both Sora and Riku in order to prepare them for the upcoming battle.
    • 3D ends with Sora recovering from having his heart shattered and bathed in darkness, and the Big Bad not only alive and well, but almost finished assembling an entire new Organization. The secret movie you have to jump through the most hoops to get shows Yen Sid summoning Kairi to train with the Keyblade she got back in II.
    • Kingdom Hearts III:
      • The base game ends with Sora performing a Heroic Sacrifice to revive Kairi, and Braig/Xigbar revealing his true identity as Luxu and summoning four of the five Foretellers to explain his role to them. We then see another flashback of Eraqus and Xehanort playing chess, where Eraqus says he has a "new game" and places seven dark pieces on the board with a single light one. The secret ending after that is an even bigger Mind Screw, with Sora alive and well with Riku in the middle of Tokyo with the 104 building in the horizon and the protagonist of the fictional video game from the Toy Story world looking down at Riku from the top of a building.
      • The DLC expansion Kingdom Hearts III Re:Mind' adds a whole mountain of hooks. A year has passed since Sora vanished, and all the heroes are on various quests to find clues to save him. Mickey, Donald and Goofy are exploring Disney Worlds. Terra, Aqua, and Ventus are exploring the Realm of Darkness. Roxas and Xion are exploring their own memories. Kairi subjected herself to a deep sleep in the hopes of reaching out to him. Riku plans to explore a strange dream he's been having with the help of the Fairy Godmother. Meanwhile, Sora runs into Yozora, who is very real, and battles him. Aftewards, Yozora returns to his own world in a recreation of the trailer for Final Fantasy Versus XIII and is met by a man that sounds just like Luxord.
    • Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory lays plenty of groundwork for the upcoming sequels. After exploring Sora's memories, Kairi learns that he may be trapped in "unreality", or the world of fiction. With the help of the Fairy Godmother, Riku and Kairi head to The Final World and meet the Nameless Star, the spirit of a girl that's searching for Yozora. She believes that Sora could be in her own world Quadratum. Riku uses his power to create a portal there and heads in alone. Kairi stays behind and decides to train under Aqua, while Yen Sid sends Mickey to Scala ad Caelum to find more information on the Foretellers and their knowledge of this new world.
  • King's Quest V: Absence Makes the Heart Go Yonder!: Cassima is freed from Mordack and goes back to her homeland, Alexander mentions that he wants to visit her in the Land of the Green Isles, and Cassima mentions her Vizier, who was the one who introduced her to Mordack. This sets up the plot of Kings Quest VI.
  • Knight Bewitched 2: In the ending, Lissandra seeks to defeat the divine being who is pulling the strings behind Typhus and Lilith, and Uno and Malady plan on secretly helping her.
  • The Legend of Zelda:
  • LEGO Adaptation Game:
    • The first LEGO Star Wars had a bonus level for obtaining 100% Completion taking place at the beginning of A New Hope, starring Darth Vader and a stormtrooper boarding the Tantive IV and ending with Leia entrusting R2-D2 with the plans for the Death Star.
    • LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes ends with a shot of Brainiac looking at Earth from space and declaring "[He has] located it", setting up the plot of the third game.
    • LEGO Marvel Super Heroes has a post-credits scene of Nick Fury meeting with the Guardians of the Galaxy, who warn that something is coming for Earth.
    • LEGO Dimensions had a post-credits scene from the perspective of an unknown figure, who is corrupted by a leftover piece of Lord Vortech. However, due to the end of support for the game and the death of the Toys-To-Life Game genre, this one likely won't be resolved.
    • LEGO DC Super-Villains had a post-credits scene with Darkseid and his forces being attacked by the Anti-Monitor.
    • LEGO Marvel Super Heroes 2: After the credits, the Avengers are met by Ravonna, Cosmos, and the Supreme Intelligence warning that there's a new threat coming their way.
  • Limbo of the Lost, of all the games in the world, ends with a Sequel Hook, showing Fate and Destiny about to pick another mortal pawn for their game and starting the whole process all over. Considering that the game was savaged for being irredeemably terrible and a major example of video game plagiarism...
  • Lunarosse: Beating the game 100% adds a post-credits scene where Corlia is approached by Eris to look into something called Last Word.
  • Machina of the Planet Tree -Planet Ruler-: In the ending, Cram mentions that he wants to look for the Skynaut, an airship, which hints at the sequel, Flying Dreamer. The Author Avatar in the sound room also mentions plans to make the sequel.
  • Machina of the Planet Tree -Unity Unions-: Before dying, Nova states that Corona's mother, Aurelia, is still alive. However, Arcturus and Dalpa fear that she may have lost her sanity due to being connected to the Boundary for too long, but there's no confirmation. Despite the horrifying implications, Corona wants to journey to find her mother, though she wants to learn swordplay before doing so.
  • Marvel Ultimate Alliance ends with a shot of Galactus plotting his revenge on Earth's heroes for stealing his planet-eating devices, and The Stinger revealing that Black Widow was The Mole after all. These all end up being subverted in the sequel: the Galactus incident is said by Thor to have occurred offscreen between the two games, and the second Hook appears to have been completely forgotten when you meet the character in question.
  • Mary Skelter: Nightmares, in its post-game ending, has the Blood Team coming across another Jail. The sequel initially appears to ignore this, adding new protagonist Tsuu and a non-Death by Origin Story Little Mermaid but having an otherwise identical premise; however, it eventually comes to light that the sequel is a result of the first game's timeline being modified, which occurs shortly after the Sequel Hook in the first game. The post-game of the Embedded Precursor version of the first Mary Skelter then allows players to subvert the events that lead to the sequel: taking advantage of Jack's and Tsuu's Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory, the Blood Team accomplishes Tsuu's goal by reviving Little Mermaid in the first game's timeline instead of mucking things up with time travel.
  • Mass Effect:
    • Near the end of Mass Effect, Shepard says that there's still Reapers in Dark Space, and that they still need to be defeated. They run off, and...the game ends. Though of course, it was revealed that it was planned as a trilogy before the game came out.
    • Mass Effect 2:
      • Given the entry for the first game, this one naturally ends with Shepard (or Joker, if Shepard died) studying the Collectors' data on Harbinger while the thousands of Reapers out in Dark Space prepare for their invasion.
      • The final DLC for Mass Effect 2, "Arrival", has Shepard blow up an entire solar system, but slow down the Reaper armada by several months. Hackett confronts the Commander on this and informs Shepard it won't be long before s/he's brought to Earth to stand trial for what s/he's done.
    • Mass Effect: Andromeda has a whole slew of them. The Dragon is still around and active, and depending on the player's choices it'll turn out she's called for back-up. The Initiative is ready to get up and running on their actual colonization efforts, there's a hint that the Remnant's creators are somewhere out there, never mind the beings who set off the Scourge. Ryder learns there's a signal from the fifth, missing Ark, imploring anyone who gets it to stay away]], and the Initiative's mysterious backer, whoever they are, is still unaccounted for. Whether they'll ever get any follow-up...
  • Mega Man:
    • Mega Man (Classic)
      • Proto Man arrives just in time to save Mega Man at the end of Mega Man 3, but apparently not Wily, who had a large piece of debris dropped on him. However, in the "Pan Up to the Sky" Ending, Mega Man fails to notice a familiar ship flying in the distance.
      • As a Call-Forward, Mega Man: The Power Battle ends with Dr. Wily claiming that he started construction on a robot that will surpass both Mega Man and Bass. The Power Fighters further runs with the idea by having Wily actually show off the blueprints of this new robot: Zero.
    • Mega Man X:
      • Mega Man X has one after the end credits: Sigma shows up on a screen and taunts X, saying that his spirit still lives on, which turned out to be a hint about Sigma's true nature as The Virus.
      • One of the endings to Mega Man X6 is a Distant Finale which shows Zero going into stasis and surrendering his body to completely expunge it of the Maverick Virus, as well as be studied to develop an anti-virus. Like the Power duology from Classic, this is a Call-Forward that establishes some plot threads that were explored in Mega Man Zero.
      • In Mega Man X8, the Final Boss whacks Axl in the head, leaving him comatose and with an ominous-looking shard in the wound.
    • Mega Man Zero
      • Mega Man Zero 2 ended with X telling Zero that a madman named Dr. Weil is responsible for corrupting the Mother Elf, turning it into the Dark Elf. Elsewhere, Dr. Weil is commanding his creation Omega to act.
      • At the end of Mega Man Zero 3, the Dark Elf is purified, reverting to the Mother Elf and safely taking Zero back to the Resistance Base. Both Ciel and X (the latter just before permanently retiring to Cyberspace) tell Zero that Weil may have had a setback when Zero destroyed Omega, but he is still ruler of Neo Arcadia, and very much a threat.
    • Mega Man ZX:
      • The original game drops the majority of the Hooks in Aile's storyline, with both the Co-Dragons and even the Big Bad Serpent dropping hints to The Man Behind the Man and that stopping Model W isn't even close to the end of the overarching story.
      • Advent: A secret ending shows Master Thomas preparing to continue what Master Albert originally set out to do. The former even recruited the enemy MegaMen to do his bidding.
  • Metal Arms: The last part of the credits shows Dr. Exavolt blasting off in a shuttle, cackling and saying, "I'm not finished with you yet, Glitch!" Unfortunately after this game, Swinging Ape Studios was bought out by Blizzard Entertainment to work on Starcraft: Ghost, and when that game became Vaporware, so too did Swinging Ape.
  • Metal Gear:
    • The MSX2 version of Metal Gear ends with Big Boss swearing revenge on Snake.
    • Metal Gear Solid ends with a phone call between Ocelot and his true employer, Solidus Snake, the President of the United States and the third clone of Big Boss.
    • Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty ends with a certain fact about the Patriots' identities coming to light...confusingly.
    • Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater ends with an embittered Naked Snake becoming Big Boss, and with a call between Ocelot and his true employer the CIA Director, setting up the alliance between Ocelot and Big Boss that will give birth to the Patriots.
    • Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops ends with another phone call, this time between Ocelot and "the man with the same codename as Null" (Zero, hoping to invite Big Boss to form the Patriots).
    • Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker ends with Naked Snake finally accepting the title of Big Boss and forming Outer Heaven.
    • The only games not to end with sequel hooks are Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake and Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. The former (which itself was an unplanned sequel) ends with no intention for another sequel, while Metal Gear Solid 4 is the Grand Finale...
    • ... until Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, which ends with Raiden apparently striking out on his own to start a one-man war against the World Marshal PMC.
    • Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes, being a prologue, ends with Snake managing to rescue Paz, Chico and the captives of Camp Omega, and the mission is seemingly a success...only for them to reach their base and find it under attack by a mysterious PMC, XOF. Snake manages to save Miller before the base is destroyed, but Paz awakens and reveals there was another bomb in her body they missed. She jumps out the helicopter to save them, but doesn't clear the distance before she blows up, causing the helicopter to crash and Snake and Miller become critically wounded and soon captured. Chico's fate remains unknown. If that wasn't enough, a post-credits dialogue reveals that Skull Face wants to kill Zero, and he interrogates Paz for his location, as she is one of the few agents to have met him personally. Paz agrees to give Zero's location, but the tape ends before we hear her give the details, which leads into the next game, Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain.
  • Metroid:
    • Metroid: The game's ending warns that while Samus succeeded in her mission and restored peace, it may be invaded by the other Metroids. This is followed up in Metroid II: Return of Samus. Though in a superb bit of Irony, it winds up being Samus who "invades" the Metroid homeworld.
    • Metroid Prime Trilogy: All three main games feature Sequel Hooks as part of their Segmented Endings, unlocked via 100% Completion. Yes, even Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, though it's supposed to end the trilogy. In the first two, the Big Bad reveals that she's Not Quite Dead, and in the third, a mysterious ship follows Samus's to parts unknown. The ship was since confirmed to be the Delano 7, piloted by Sylux from Metroid Prime: Hunters, making the hook more blatant.
    • Metroid Fusion leaves an even more egregious one: What the hell is Samus going to do now, since the Federation (or at least some rogue group within) probably isn't too happy with how her adventure on the BSL space station went. It would take until Metroid Dread almost two decades later to get an answer to that, however.
  • Might and Magic:
    • Might and Magic VI ends with Roland Ironfist still missing and his fate uncertain, the Kreegan king Xenofex unencountered, and Archibald Ironfist (released during the course of the game) at large and, as the ending cinematic reveals, plotting to regain the power he once had. All of these are followed up on in VII.
    • Might and Magic VIII has the ending cinematic show a small spider-like robot detach from the badly-damaged Escaton, be told to tell "them" that he has failed, and then scurry off, with context from your encounter with Escaton heavily suggesting the them in question are the Ancients. Then the next game took place in a new world, with the old one destroyed for Heroes IV and Might and Magic IX (in an unrelated fashion to the hook), and then the developers went bankrupt and the purchasers of the rights decided to reboot in a new, entirely fantasy, setting, and then their belated Might and Magic X was a commercial failure, so the chance of the hook being followed up on is extremely slim.
  • Mogeko Castle: The Happy End contains a pretty obvious hook, and leads into the trailer for Mogeko Castle Gaiden: General Hashasky's Great Adventure.
  • Monster Bash appeared to hint towards a possible sequel in the ending cutscene, where the villain Count Chuck boasts to Johnny Dash after his defeat that he has in-laws.
  • The ending cutscene of Monster Force ends with the heavy implication that the game's main villain Dr. Percy Frankenstein will return from the dead to fight the young monsters again.
  • Mortal Kombat:
    • Mortal Kombat 9 reveals that Shinnok is ready to perform his act in Mortal Kombat 4 after the timeline has been altered, and generally, the heroes' side have been in a worse condition.
    • Mortal Kombat X reveals that Raiden has become a Knight Templar who takes a hard-line stance in Earthrealm's defense, threatening to destroy any who would threaten it.
    • "Mortal Kombat 11" has Liu Kang attaining godhood and replacing Raiden. He also goes back in time and recruits a young Kung Lao to be the new chosen one.
  • Mother:
    • EarthBound Beginnings is sort of odd about this — the English translation and the Japanese Compilation Re-release have a definite Sequel Hook with Ninten being contacted by his father, saying something else had come up... except the actual sequel, EarthBound, doesn't have anything to do with Ninten, his family, or anything else left unresolved in the game (Giygas aside, but his actions in Beginnings aren't so much as hinted at).
    • EarthBound:
      • There is a sign in Fourside that reads: "(Planning Meeting for EarthBound 2. Only those who are related to this project are allowed to enter. APE Software Development Team)" If only the meeting didn't last eleven years.
      • Following the ending credits, Ness receives a taunting message from Porky, who is somewhere in time and space. This is followed with a "The End?" on the screen. The Japanese version however had a more unsubtle "To Be Continued..."
    • Subverted in Mother 3. You get the "The End...?" message, but try walking around...Eventually, dialogue from the characters will start, assuring you that everything is fine and saying their goodbyes. Then the credits roll. The actual ending screen simply has "The End" on it, with no Sequel Hooks of any kind.
  • MYST: In the "good" ending, Atrus returns to D'ni after ostensibly destroying his sons' prison books (though this is retconned in MYST IV) to continue his work to stabilize the world where his wife Catherine is held hostage by a foe "much greater than [his] sons can even imagine," (his father Gehn) and tells you he'll likely need your help again. This is the plot of the sequel RIVEN.
  • Namco × Capcom:
    • Demitri tells Morrigan and Lilith that Jedah is coming back. Sure enough...
    • At the end of Project × Zone, as Mii walks back to her mansion, Kogoro says he's glad he doesn't have to worry about the fate of the world anymore, but Mii mentions that it might happen again, as long as she has the "power". At the end of Chapter 31 of the sequel, Otohime assures Tarosuke will be joining the rest of the heroes on another big adventure in the future.
  • Ninja Blade has the hero Ken Ogawa's father cryptically tell Ken to "save your mother" around 3/4ths into the game. After the final boss, Ken mentions to his handler that he has "something to take care of" and is then shown disappearing somewhere in the city...implying that he's off to discover and save his mother whilst explaining nothing.
  • Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath features this after a double plot twist in the end sequence. After defeating the Big Bad Sekto, you find out that "Sekto" is really the demon you heard about at the Grubb temple earlier in the game, and that Sekto is really the old guardian of the Grubb Tribe, having been brainwashed by a face-hugging parasite. When it looks like Sekto is dead, and everything is back to normal, you see the octopus-like Sekto swim down the newly restored river, apparently looking for a new host]]. Sadly, Oddworld Inhabitants dropped out of the video game business after Stranger.
  • Overlord I simply features a The End... Or Is It?, but the Expansion Pack Overlord: Raising Hell ends with a fairly straight Hook. The Overlord you were just playing is trapped in the Infernal Abyss, possibly forever, but his Mistress is pregnant. Unsurprisingly, the sequel involves you playing as the Overlord's son, trying to undo the Happily Ever After that ensued in the absence of a legitimate force for evil.
  • Perfect Dark Zero ends with Joanna Dark being an agent of Carrington Institute, and she has her first real mission in the original game.
  • Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Justice For All unusually has its sequel hook in the middle of the game: At the end of the second case, Morgan Fey, the mastermind behind the murder, vows revenge. Said revenge plot is put into action in the last case of the third game, Trials and Tribulations.
  • Pikmin 2 has a rather closed ending, but the first has a best ending where several Onions of colors not seen before fly up from the planet — hinting at at least fourteen additional Pikmin types, but this has not been referenced in either sequel and the Onions were later redesigned anyway. The third game also has three on its best ending: the narrator implies that the Drake's initial crash wasn't an accident, the credits (on any ending) end with something crashing on PNF-404 and the Pikmin running to it, and there's a way to view an SOS revealing that Louie was left stranded on the planet again.
  • Pokémon:
    • Starting with Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire, the two games at the start of a generation feature a legendary Pokémon only available after becoming the Champion, who bears a resemblance to the legendary mascots but has no explicit connection. Then an Updated Re-release (or a pair of sequels) focusing on them usually comes out and reveals they do indeed have a relation. Thus far, there's been Rayquaza, Giratina, Kyurem, Zygarde[[labelnote:*]]which actually didn't have a game, though the animé picked up the slack, and Necrozma.
    • Pokémon Black and White have several potential plot points brought up during the postgame. It was commonly assumed that they would be followed up in the inevitable third version...but with the announcement of Pokémon Black 2 and White 2, it turns out they were this.
    • Pokémon X and Y has an NPC give the player the Strange Souvenir item, which depicts a Pokémon venerated as a protector in a far-off region, one that isn't any of the previous ones. Pokémon Sun and Moon reveals that said region is Alola, and you can even buy the item at the Thrifty Megamart.
    • The postgame of Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness shows most of the bosses that you face through the course of the game (Gonzap, Chobin, Lovrina, etc.) appearing in the Nintendo Hard Orre Colosseum. If you manage to defeat them, they all send you friendly emails.. bar Ardos, who declares you Cipher's number one enemy and says he will resurrect Cipher one day. After over a decade, we're still waiting.
  • Portal:
    • The game ends with a run through an industrial-like mass of corridors and vents until we see a room holding the promised cake, a buffed-up Companion Cube, and some spheres in the background. Suddenly, their "eyes" glow a bright orange one by one, before a claw arm puts out the cake candle and floods the room in darkness. Then GLaDOS's Villain Song plays.
    • A later update modifies the cutscene shown outside the facility near the end, giving a more direct hook. An off-screen robot or android says "Thank you for assuming the party escort submission position" before dragging the player backwards.
  • The Professor Layton series has these in the form of pictures that appear after the end credits. These pictures all relate to the next game in line for the series. The only exceptions are Professor Layton and the Unwound Future, which doesn't have such a picture, and Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask, which goes further by replacing the picture with a full-blown cutscene that not only ties this game with Professor Layton and the Last Specter and Professor Layton and the Eternal Diva, but also sets the stage for the sixth game.
  • Psychonauts has the campers all going home and Raz and Lili sadly separating... only to suddenly reveal that the head of the Psychonauts (revealed to be Lili's father) has been kidnapped by a dangerous enemy, and both kids fly off with Sasha, Milla, and Oleander to rescue him. Despite the obvious hook, the creator was unsure if there would be a sequel, given the first game's poor sales but cult status, although one was eventually released as the result of a successful crowdfunding campaign in 2018, with the aforementioned sequel hook forming the basis of a standalone game for the Playstation VR, Psychonauts in the Rhombus of Ruin, intended to bridge the gap between the first game and its sequel. The sequel proper, Psychonauts 2, would follow in 2021.
  • Quest for Glory:
  • Rastan has different ending sequences depending on the version, but they generally end with Rastan promising to tell stories of his further adventures.
  • Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando drops a comically blatant one when you have the duo buy a Captain Qwark statue from the Plumber.
    The Plumber: See ya in another year or so.
    Clank: What did he mean by that?
  • Rave Heart: On the Greldian Asteroid, Ellemine encounters a mysterious being that has vague but ominous plans for the galaxy. In the ending, the mysterious being states that they will use Ellemine's desecendants for their plans.
  • Razing Storm: The true ending of the arcade mode ends with the protagonists defeating the Giant Space Flea from Nowhere True Final Boss, only to find that they are too late to save their allies and that most of them have been either killed or taken prisoner. Going against your commander's orders to mount a rescue mission to save your remaining allies, the game ends as you and your team head out to save the other team.
  • The Reconstruction:
    • The Golden Ending drops massive reveals about the true nature of the plot that put everything in a completely different light. However, not a whole lot is actually explained about the circumstance or context of these reveals — you'll have to play the prequel if you want to know that.
    • Then there are a few actual Hooks — the council of "greater shra" in Moke's sidequest and the final +ii emitter, among others.
  • The early Resident Evil games were very fond of their sequel hooks. Both endings in Resident Evil 2 hint at a sequel with both player characters giving a reason for their hooks; Leon wants to take down Umbrella while Claire wants to find her brother, Chris. Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (which takes place before and after the previous game) ends with Raccoon City being nuked and Jill declaring that Umbrella is going down. Resident Evil – Code: Veronica revolves Claire's sequel hook by finally reuniting with Chris and the game ends with Chris declaring that Umbrella has to be taken down. By Resident Evil 4, Umbrella finally is taken down, but completely off screen by Wesker, who leaked info about their practices to the U.S. government and Capcom stopped doing sequel hooks.
  • Renegade Ops: We are told that Natasha and Inferno are working for some great power, but who or what that is, we don't get to know.
  • ReVOLUTION (2002): Jack goes after the magnate guy, and on the final level, in the very end, we see a car fly away. The ending cutscene shows Jack just standing there, and then Marcus, the resistance leader, comes with his car, says, "It's over Jack, let's go", they go away, and then the staff roll goes by. However, a sequel was never made.
  • Rick Dangerous 2 ends with the hero entering a teleporter, his nemesis The Fat Guy revealed to be alive and the words "What will Rick do next?", however a third game was never made.
  • Rhythm Thief & the Emperor's Treasure concludes with the true Napoleon still very much alive, with Isaac, Raphael's Disappeared Dad, by his side, ready to go ahead with his true plan.
  • Sacred Earth Series
    • Sacred Earth - Promise: The game ends with Balcruade and Zuleika on the run, which means the protagonists will have to stop their thievery in a future installment. The Stinger reveals that Relima is a Prophet and that she'll have a major role in shaping the world's future.
    • Sacred Earth - Alternative: In the ending, True Konoe fails to revive her family members and instead summons Daphnel and Alan, two people from Miltiades. The Storyteller states that the Celestial Tree that Konoe summoned could spell disaster for the rest of the multiverse.
  • Saturday Morning RPG suffers from this. The fifth episode (out of planned six) came out much later than the other four, and it appears that the developers won't continue working on the game, so the final episode will never come out; the scene at the end of episode 5, with the hero Marty preparing to defeat his arch-enemy Commander Hood once and for all, will never be resolved. Those who play the game on Steam will also never get all the achievements, since at least one is linked to the missing sixth episode.
  • Shining Wisdom ends with the Valley Fairy using her powers to revive the protagonist, which is against the rules, so she's banished to a labyrinth for eternity. After the credits roll, Princess Satera says that Mars went on a new adventure to save the fairy. Said adventure was never made, but plenty of other Shining games were.
  • Simon the Sorcerer:
    • Rather than just having its own self-contained story, Simon the Sorcerer ends very unsatisfyingly with a game show host hijacking the plot to make a shameless plug for next year's sequel. Even Simon is baffled and asks what is going on. Because it's so abrupt and forced in nature, the player experiences no sense of award for completing the game.
    • Simon the Sorcerer 2 ends with Simon still trapped in Sordid's body.
  • If Sin and Punishment: Star Successor is beaten on the Isa & Kachi Mode, we see Isa and Kachi discuss how their enemies will still inevitably come for them. Kachi's memory starts to return, and she remembers that she is in fact Achi. Or that she was just faking her memory loss, and she knew who she was all along? That's what the American version implies anyway.
  • At the end of Skylanders: Giants, Kaos and Glumshanks return home to Kaos's castle to find his mother waiting for them, and she becomes one of the main antagonists in Skylanders: SWAP Force. This example is later retconned, as in Swap Force Kaos doesn't communicate with his mother until a quarter into the game.
  • Sly Cooper:
  • Sonic the Hedgehog:
  • Space Quest:
    • The VGA remake of Space Quest I: The Sarien Encounter ends with a still scene of Roger Wilco getting an award and narrator's text saying that Roger doesn't get the girl yet, not in this game. The remake was made in parallel with IV.
    • Space Quest II: Vohaul's Revenge ends with Roger Wilco defeating Vohaul, destroying his base, and escaping in an escape pod. He has no idea where he is and the pod's running out of oxygen. All Roger can do is hibernate in the cryo bed, only to be thawed in Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon.
      So long and thanks again for saving your people.
      THE END
      FOR NOW
    • Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippers:
      • At the end of the game, Roger is shown a portrait of his future wife (an animated hologram!). Their future son only speaks of her in the past tense and refuses to tell more. She does appears in V, but her relationship with Roger doesn't progress very far yet. What's worse, in VI the plot swerves in a very different direction.
      • The time travellers go not to different times, but to different games of the series. Much of the action happens in X and XII. No games have been made after VI so far.
  • Spelling Jungle: Both games ending with Yobi telling the player that "Perhaps, we shall meet again" (in Jungle) or "Perhaps, we shall meet yet again" (in Blizzard). The latter turned out to be a red herring, as no third game was made.
  • Near the end of Spider-Man (PS4) Mary Jane discovers a secret lab in Osborn's penthouse with his research and Green Goblin weapon prototypes. The Stinger reveals that he never sent Harry away for treatment at all; he was keeping him in a Healing Vat in the lab and experimenting on him with the Venom symbiote.
  • After you beat the first Splatoon's Hero Mode, Cap'n' Cuttlefish hints at something to come when you talk to him at his shack:
    Cap'n' Cuttlefish: There be a storm a-brewin'...I feel it in my cuttles!
  • The second Splatterhouse game features one, though how it plays out depends on which region you're in:
    • The Japanese version has the Terror Mask tell Rick that by going to the land of the dead to revive Jennifer, he "removed the forbidden seal", before telling him that it will see him again.
      Terror Mask: Don't forget. You removed the forbidden seal.
      See you again. Good-bye!
    • The English version, meanwhile, is a bit more straightforward, albeit vague, with it, stating that as the mask still remains, history could repeat itself...
      Rick: The monstorous visage disappeared into the lake.
      And the Terror Mask has left me as I was with Jennifer.
      But what of the mask?
      As long as that mask remains....
      It can happen again.
  • Splinter Cell:
    • Splinter Cell: Conviction has one, though it might take some Fridge Logic to notice: Reed's plan may be foiled, but Megiddo is still out there.
    • Splinter Cell: Blacklist:
      • The game ends with the Big Bad revealing that there are a dozen countries supporting his terrorist group.
      • In the co-op campaign, Fisher and Briggs recover the Not Quite Dead body of Kestrel from Conviction's co-op campaign and move him to the Paladin's medical bay.
  • In the Golden Ending to SPY Fox in: Dry Cereal, the title character tries this on Monkey Penny during their chat upon Fox landing on William the Kid's blimp and Monkey Penny telling him not to let Kid get away:
    SPY Fox: But what about the sequel?
    Monkey Penny: There are other supervillains out there. We'll be fine.
  • Spyro the Dragon:
    • Spyro the Dragon: The 120% ending shows Spyro humiliating Gnasty Gnorc in a live interview, leading to Gnasty using his magic to trap all the Dragons in crystal again, just like the intro. Also just like the intro, he doesn't trap Spyro. This seems to be the setup for a potential sequel... but then the sequel ended up getting had a completely different plot.
    • Spyro: Shadow Legacy game ends with Spyro preparing for another attack from the Sorcerer sometime in the future, implying he's not done yet. However, due to the two Continuity Reboots that came to pass after this game, this seems like this won't be happening, at least anytime soon.
  • Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II: Did you honestly think that Darth Vader was going to remain captured? Unfortunately, Executive Meddling led to the third game being cancelled, so it's possible and likely that we will never know how this plot point is resolved, just that it is since that kinda is required for the original trilogy of films, which take place after the Force Unleashed games.
  • Sunset Overdrive: When looking through binoculars at the end of a broken highway, to the left of the Downtown Player Fort, looking into the area of the "Dawn of the Rise of the Fallen Machines" Downloadable Content, the player says:
    Wonder what's out there— maybe we'll find out in the sequel.
  • Super Mario Bros.:
    • New Super Mario Bros. ends with Bowser Jr. dragging his father (who attempts to get up momentarily) across the floor of the castle, with the former turning his head to the screen to laugh. This seemed like a typical open-ended Mario ending at the time, but come New Super Mario Bros. Wii, they did indeed come back — and with familiar reinforcements...
    • At the end of Super Mario Galaxy, once you defeat Bowser at the end of the game's final level with all 121 Power Stars, we actually get to see Rosalina thanking Mario for saving the Galaxy and bidding him farewell, but after we see her fly away in her spaceship, it's revealed that she accidentally (or purposely) left one of her Lumas behind on Earth. Also, considering the fact that the entire timeline had to be rewritten as a result of the universe being destroyed and reborn, everyone's all now back at square one, and as a result Bowser now wants to take over outer space again, which leads to...
    • Finishing the game without every Shine Sprite in Super Mario Sunshine displays an image of Il Piantissimo getting ahold of Shadow Mario's Magic Paintbrush. The fruits of this hook never came to be, however, as Il Piantissimo has yet to appear in any game since (though he could possibly be the Shadow Mario that's unlockable in Mario Golf Toadstool Tour since Bowser Jr is also playable there).
    • An odd internal example happens in Super Mario 3D All-Stars, which contains the latter two games plus Super Mario 64. All three games are emulated, but an interesting discovery by dataminers that revealed more features than the Sunshine emulator needed hints at possibly more classic compilations for the Switch to come.
  • The prototype of Super Ninja Boy ends with the Auraballs getting stolen by an unknown villain, leading to a screen saying "Super Ninja Boy 2 is coming up soon!!". Although the sequel was released in Japan, the American version was ultimately cancelled.
  • Super Robot Wars:
    • Shin Super Robot Wars: At the end of the Space Route, Char Aznable sends a message to Londo Bell, whom he expects to be in a festive mood, yet unjustified by what Char is convinced has been a horrific mistake for mankind. He reckons they got lucky with this victory, and points out that Balmar is sure to send a second, or third fleet to Earth, without any shortage of firepower. "Just how far will Londo Bell's efforts last?" he muses, ostentatiously checking himself and claiming sarcastically that sour grapes weren't the intent of the message. Shin never got a sequel, but it got rebooted with the Super Robot Wars Alpha series.
    • Super Robot Spirits: After you beat Levi, she reveals that she is a puppet of Commander Gozzo. Gozzo thanks Levi for her efforts and intends to commence his invasion of Earth.
    • Endless Frontier ends with hooks that could lead to a sequel, or even bringing the characters or setting into the rest of the Super Robot Wars series: A possible war between the Rubdor and Ezel, the exploration of the rest of the Mal Tierra (possibly leading to the discovery of full-sized Personal Troopers), and a hook in Original Generation Gaiden leading to Endless Frontier itself.
    • Super Robot Wars UX:
      • In the ending, Lostbarrel and Sawatari are still on the run and being fought by Skull Force.
      • Elder Gods Kurou and Al are going to entrust their son to regular Kurou and Al.
      • Nyarlathotep is still unfought.
      • Cao Cao's tactician Sima Yi's face portrait goes from pink to red and he begins facing to the right like an enemy.
  • System Shock 2: SHODAN is seemingly defeated by the player character, but there is a final scene showing two other survivors of the Von Braun as they make their escape in an escape pod. One of them, Rebecca, begins acting strangely and starts speaking in SHODAN's voice. "What's the matter Tommy, don't you like my new look?" Sadly there has never been a direct sequel other than the Spiritual Successor BioShock games.
  • Tachyon: The Fringe has a slightly more obscure example, which can be missed if the player does not pay attention to in-game news reports. One of these near the end of the game announces the invention of Tachyon Wave Generators, which will eventually allow gates to send ships throughout the galaxy. Unfortunately, Novalogic never made a sequel.
  • Le Temple Perdu de l'Oncle Ernest ends with Chipikan retrieving the golden statuette from the temple and telling the player that they might see each other again one day, setting up the next game: La Statuette Maudite de l'Oncle Ernest.
  • Theia - The Crimson Eclipse: The Another Withered Future epilogue shows that the victory that Seth's party achieved won't last, since the Orihalcon is still a non-renewable energy source that will eventually dry up. Seth's descendant, Dayke Sideris, uses the Original Light to unlock Arca Babylon, which will supposedly solve the current crisis, but the epilogue cuts off before he can reach that place.
  • The first two Thief games end with these. The third game ends with what could be considered the exact opposite: a Book Ends.
  • Time Crisis:
    • Time Crisis 5 ends with Wild Dog launching the briefcase out of VSSE's hands before blowing himself up a fifth time and later being discovered by a mysterious man with a katana, who retrieves the case and says, "How about that! Wild Dog is good for something after all." This is followed by a message announcing a True Mastermind Edition, which will feature three more stages.
    • The spinoff Project Titan also ends on one, with Miller's name finally being cleared, and him declining an award from President Serrano and driving off into the sunset to track down Kantaris, who had escaped earlier.
  • To the Moon has this in the form of a stinger in which Neil appears to take out a bottle of painkillers and gulp it down before leaving with Eva, implying that he's either addicted or dying. It also has a checkmark appear next to "Episode 1: To The Moon" afterwards.
  • The Trail Of Anguish ends with something happening to your character that will allegedly be explained in the sequel. That was back in 2001...
  • Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion ends with a post-credits scene that concludes with Adon leaving her post on the Council of Voice to try and save Joshua Fireseed. The Council of Voices is then seen appointing a mysterious figure to ensure she doesn't succeed. Acclaim Entertainment intended to continue the story in a future sequel. The company went belly up in 2004 though, and the Turok game license went to Touchstone Games, who promptly rebooted the whole Turok story. It's very unlikely that this ending is ever going to be resolved.
  • The 2012 reboot of Twisted Metal ends with Sweet Tooth's son Charlie seeking to continue his father's legacy and take revenge on Calypso for killing him, while Sweet Tooth's daughter Sophie has been brought Back from the Dead by Calypso and looks like she'll be an adversary to Charlie.
  • If the right choices are made, a post-credits sequence in Until Dawn reveals Josh has started to transform into a wendigo and is living in the caves under the mountain.
  • Viewtiful Joe, being a videogame about adventures that takes place inside movies, almost invokes this trope at the end of the games.
  • In Voyage Inspired By Jules Verne, after getting off the moon, Michel crash-lands on Earth and finds himself on a desert island, where he's found by Captain Nemo.
  • WET: One of Pelham's bodyguards, a rapier-wielding gentleman named Ze Kollektor is only fought one by Rubi as a Cutscene Boss before he disappears from the story saying We Will Meet Again. Tarantula is also revealed to have survived getting her neck snapped by Rubi in the post-credits scene. A sequel was announced in 2010 but quietly abandoned in 2011 - no official announcement was made but press agencies noticed that former employees had the project listed as cancelled on their CVs.
  • Wild Woody: At the end of the game, Lowman tells Woody they'll be back next time the world needs saving, and Woody says that would only happen if they sold a zillion units. Being that this was the last Sega CD game at a time when people were moving on to the PlayStation and Sega Saturn, it's understandable why the game didn't sell well enough for a sequel.
  • In A Witch's Tale, after the second playthrough, Alice says Liddell can return when she's grown up. Then we see Loue watching Liddell from a rooftop.
  • XCOM 2 ends with the Ethereals warning the Commander of an unknown enemy that's followed them across the galaxy, and will come for us next. We then see an ominous glow rising from a fissure in the ocean floor. The War of the Chosen expansion adds an additional cutscene where after the Resistance retakes Earth, Geist says to his Templars that humanity just won a battle and that the real war is on the way.
  • X-Men Legends ends with Apocalypse viewing the outcome through a monitor.
  • Xenoblade Chronicles X has too many to count. In short: what exactly is the Samaar Federation, what are the Ghosts, who is the Great One, who is the Black Knight, who exactly is L, who built the various ruins dotting Mira, what's the deal with Elma, who is Eleonora really working for, what's the purpose of J-Bodies, what's the deal with Mira anyway, how is Lao still alive, and most obviously, how the hell are everyone's mimeosomes still functioning even though the Lifehold Core has been destroyed for several months?

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