Cutting Off the Branches: Difference between revisions

* Blizzard's early ''[[Warcraft]]'' games were like this. In order to have a sequel worth mentioning, they decided that the Humans (the "good guys" of the first game) had been defeated and sent packing, as refugees, to nations on the northern half of the continent...and then, five years later, the Orcs (the "bad guys") decide to follow them, lusting for more conquest. In ''[[Warcraft]] II'', the Alliance victory is considered canonical, as is their "successful" campaign in its expansion, ''[[Beyond the Dark Portal]]''. However, it should be noted that missions in ''both'' campaigns are considered canon. The only missions that ''aren't'' canon are the ones that end the campaign and don't allow for the canonical ending of the story. Blizzard mostly abandoned this method with ''[[StarCraft]]'' and all following [[Real Time Strategy]] games, instead constructing the story so that one campaign flowed into the next... but ''[[StarCraft II]]: Wings of Liberty'' does have two missions where a player must make a decision about whether to help an ally or not. {{spoiler|In both cases, the canonical storyline has you helping your ally--Ariel Hanson and Gabriel Tosh.}} A third mission, late in the game, requires a decision that affects how the final battle is fought, but is deliberately vague in terms of canonicity.

* The ''[[Diablo]]'' series contains a minor example of this. The first game allows you to choose one of three characters to play, a male Warrior, a female Rogue, and a male Sorcerer. After defeating Diablo, this character embeds his soulstone into his or her forehead in an attempt to contain Diablo forever. It doesn't work, and in the sequel the hero is possessed by Diablo, becoming the game's villain. Although never explicitly stated, it is pretty clear that the Warrior is canonically the one who did so, as the character is male (unlike the rogue) and Caucasian (so not the sorcerer). If you look very carefully you can find hints about what happened to the Rogue and Sorcerer, but they clearly didn't do as well as their meat shield buddy, if "possessed by Satan" can be considering doing well. It is implied that the rogue and sorcerer go on to become minor bosses for earlier quests (Blood Raven and The Summoner respectively).

* At the end of ''[[Legacy of Kain|Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain]]'', the player has the option of making a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] for peace, or to rule over a broken land. Alas, peace doesn't make for good sequels... His choice turns the world into a blasted wasteland. {{spoiler|And it was the better choice for the world in the long run. It's complicated.}}

* Most of the ''[[Super Robot Wars]]'' games allow you to pick and choose between a variety of main character combinations (usually a male and female) and a choice between a [[Real Robot]] or a [[Super Robot]] (4/F/F Final being the first of the lot), but the games that plays this trope straight are the Alpha series. In Alpha, players have four different male and female portraits, with four distinct personalities to choose. This is resolved in Alpha 2...''somewhat'', by making one of the characters, Kusuha Mizuha (and Brooklyn "Bullet" Luckfield, by extension), become the canon protagonist of the Alpha series, by giving her a Super Robot route in Alpha 2, while adding three more routes: a male [[Super Robot|Super Robot route, and male and female ["Real Robot]] routes. In Alpha 3, Kusuha retains her Super Robot"] route, and three more routes are also made, with the added bonus of having the characters from Alpha 2 ''reappear'' in the Alpha 3 routes. Example: Cobray Gordon, the male Real Robot pilot of Alpha 3, has Arado Balanga, the male [[Real Robot]] pilot from Alpha 2, appear ''only'' in his route, with the other pilots following suit. All well and good, right? But then Sanger Zonvolt (the male Super Robot pilot in Alpha 2, who first appeared in [[Gaiden Game|Alpha Gaiden]]) appears in ''all 4'' Alpha 3 routes, not just the Alpha 3 male Super Robot route.