Times Video Game Endings Were Changed
Prince of Persia (2008)
Prince of Persia sees players controlling the Prince for the entirety of the game as he and Princess Elika attempt to stop a scourge of darkness from taking over the world. They do so by healing corrupted areas, but after healing each area, it’s clear that there is more to be done.
To fully defeat this darkness, the dark god had to be sealed off in his temple and the only way to do that was with a sacrifice. That’s why in the game’s final hours, Princess Elika sacrifices her life to seal the temple.
The Prince can’t deal with losing the love of his life and succumbs to temptation from the dark god, who promises to bring Elika back to life if he releases him from the tomb. The Prince does so and the game’s credits begin to roll as the Prince carries Elika’s unconscious body out of the tomb, with darkness seemingly on its way to take over what’s left of Persia.
Many fans enjoyed this ending and many did not — the community seems quite split. What would Elika think of this decision when she wakes up? Why would the Prince doom the world to eternal darkness? What happens next?
These are all questions answered by the game’s epilogue, which was released as DLC roughly a year later. It showed the Prince and Elika once again attempting to defeat the dark god and naturally, they do.
While the ending of Prince of Persia did remain intact, its impact on players was lessened thanks to the epilogue DLC. What was originally a dark and ambiguous ending that catalyzed a lot of conversation within the community was transformed into a cookie-cutter, good-guy-defeats-bad-guy ending that nobody cares to talk about today.
