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Hyrule Warriors Should AoC Have Alternate Endings?

Azure Sage

March onward forever...
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I'm seeing quite a lot of people asking for alternate endings where Hyrule is saved. Is that something you want to see?

That is definitely not something I want to see happen. I don't think it should happen. It defeats the entire purpose of the game, which is to see how the Great Calamity happened. I don't want them to chicken out with alternate endings, especially because that would just make timeline things worse. We already know how it ends. They lose. It's sad and heartbreaking, but it's supposed to be that way. That's what this part of BotW's story needs.

So, however people might think it could happen, I don't want it to. What about you guys?
 

MapelSerup

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Nope. We don’t need any more timeline shenanigans. BotW’s story is supposed to be a tragedy, adding alternate endings would undermine that.
 
Nintendo: relive the events of the Great Calamity.

Fans: But Cia and timeline and alternate endings and stuff!!

Honestly, no alternate endings, please. Keep this what it should be with no distractions. This game has the potential to really enhance BotW and deliver a poignant gutpunch for fans to really show the gravity of the situation and just how much was lost during the Calamity.

Shoving in alternate endings or timeline splits or Cia or anything of the such would undo all of the emotional potential this game has.
 
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Only if they are made obviously non canon. Unless they could make one ending an absolute horror show and the other more ambiguous, both ultimately leading to the same result.
 

Bowsette Plus-Ultra

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I think so.

Heck, I think the best way to go about it would be to include a supposed-to-lose fight. You're Link and you're being overwhelmed by a growing and insurmountable number of enemies. In the intended ending, Link collapses from his wounds and has to be spirited away by Zelda, setting up the events of Breath of the Wild, the death of the other Champions, and Zelda being stuck in a glowing cocoon for a hundred years.

Unless you don't.

Maybe you have the gear and the reflexes to back it up. You approach said insurmountable battle and slog through it, downing (presumably) thousands of enemies and pushing your way to a battle with Ganon. In this version, Link stands strong. The Master Sword is battered and broken, but at long last Ganon falls, the Malice draining from his body and revealing the corpse of an deranged Ganon barely capable of stringing together words, let alone sentences.

And it helps for replayability. If there's just one linear storyline, I'm likely to play the game once, put it on a shelf, and never touch it again.
 
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If the game is adventure mode focused, like the first game was, then no one will care about alternate story mode endings. Because adventure mode is the replayability then.
However if they do it DW8 with historical and hypothetical endings then it could work really well.

Also we need to realise this might not be one straignt storyline. It could have a few separate campaigns. Again just like in DW8 that had Wei, Wu, Shu and Jin, as well as the included extended version of the game Lu Bu. Each of the champions could have a storyline focused around them with their own separate endings.

Heck, I think the best way to go about it would be to include a supposed-to-lose fight.
That would be a good idea. You'd not lose though, more like a strategic retreat or similar. You still win the campaign, but that win is really a loss in terms of the overall story. The battle of Chibi is the most famous in relation to this. Assuming you've met the conditions for the hypothetical ending, you can talk to either person at the start to run the historical or the hypothetical version of the mission. In the historical version, you're efforts backfire, all your ships burn and get sunk and you barely escape with your life. Escaping counts as the mission win but realistically you list the battle.
For reference the hypothetial version is your boats not burning and you win the battle as well as the mission.
 

Bowsette Plus-Ultra

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If the game is adventure mode focused, like the first game was, then no one will care about alternate story mode endings. Because adventure mode is the replayability then.
However if they do it DW8 with historical and hypothetical endings then it could work really well.

Also we need to realise this might not be one straignt storyline. It could have a few separate campaigns. Again just like in DW8 that had Wei, Wu, Shu and Jin, as well as the included extended version of the game Lu Bu. Each of the champions could have a storyline focused around them with their own separate endings.


That would be a good idea. You'd not lose though, more like a strategic retreat or similar. You still win the campaign, but that win is really a loss in terms of the overall story. The battle of Chibi is the most famous in relation to this. Assuming you've met the conditions for the hypothetical ending, you can talk to either person at the start to run the historical or the hypothetical version of the mission. In the historical version, you're efforts backfire, all your ships burn and get sunk and you barely escape with your life. Escaping counts as the mission win but realistically you list the battle.
For reference the hypothetial version is your boats not burning and you win the battle as well as the mission.

I mean, I say supposed-to-lose. If the level itself is very doable and the player is winning, but then the game says, "Nu, we're losing badly. We need to fall back," then it just steals agency from the player. It has the same effect as fighting an easy boss, but then being shown a cutscene of the boss kicking your ass. It depowers the player.
 
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I mean, I say supposed-to-lose. If the level itself is very doable and the player is winning, but then the game says, "Nu, we're losing badly. We need to fall back," then it just steals agency from the player. It has the same effect as fighting an easy boss, but then being shown a cutscene of the boss kicking your ass. It depowers the player.
I agree with you, that does totally depower the player.

In the battle of Chibi as an example. Who you talk to determines if you win or lose the battle. The turning point is not a specific fight. It's a cutscene. You have left all your boats and have the enemy on the run. You are about to use the fire to overwhelm the enemy. The next cutscene:
In the winnning scenario the fire does it's job and you keep perusing the enemy to the end of the map.
In the losing scenario, the enemy calls on the spirits to change the wind direction. This pushes the fire into your own boats andthe mission objectives change to saving everyone on the boats and then fleeing for your lives to the other side of the map.

You clearly lost in the losing scenario, however nowhere did the game make the player feel depowered by making them forced to lose a specific easy winnable fight. The turning point is based on the story, not on any specific fight. I agree having losing scenarios is great but without depowering the player as you said above. That's never fun.
 

Bowsette Plus-Ultra

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I agree with you, that does totally depower the player.

In the battle of Chibi as an example. Who you talk to determines if you win or lose the battle. The turning point is not a specific fight. It's a cutscene. You have left all your boats and have the enemy on the run. You are about to use the fire to overwhelm the enemy. The next cutscene:
In the winnning scenario the fire does it's job and you keep perusing the enemy to the end of the map.
In the losing scenario, the enemy calls on the spirits to change the wind direction. This pushes the fire into your own boats andthe mission objectives change to saving everyone on the boats and then fleeing for your lives to the other side of the map.

You clearly lost in the losing scenario, however nowhere did the game make the player feel depowered by making them forced to lose a specific easy winnable fight. The turning point is based on the story, not on any specific fight. I agree having losing scenarios is great but without depowering the player as you said above. That's never fun.

I'd agree with that. Mass Effect 2 did something similar. It's very possible for every single member of the protagonist's crew (including the protagonist themselves) to die during the game's finale, but that happening is dependent upon the player's actions up to that point. Although the actual death happens in a cutscene, all the circumstances leading to that are gameplay.
 

Dio

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It's purpose is to tell the story of what happened pre BoTW so I'd say no to alternative endings. This can and should only end one way, with link being defeated and the champions killed.

Like with any origin or prequel the player or watcher goes in knowing what the final outcome is gonna be, it's the story of how it happens which is the reason for viewing/playing.
 

Bowsette Plus-Ultra

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It's purpose is to tell the story of what happened pre BoTW so I'd say no to alternative endings. This can and should only end one way, with link being defeated and the champions killed.

Like with any origin or prequel the player or watcher goes in knowing what the final outcome is gonna be, it's the story of how it happens which is the reason for viewing/playing.

But why not? Why not go a little crazy with it and include alternate tales and tellings? This is a Hyrule Warriors game. It's not exactly a serious storytelling game.
 

MapelSerup

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But why not? Why not go a little crazy with it and include alternate tales and tellings? This is a Hyrule Warriors game. It's not exactly a serious storytelling game.
There’s only been one Hyrule Warriors game. It isn’t safe to assume much about the story or gameplay based purely off the last one.
 

Azure Sage

March onward forever...
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But why not? Why not go a little crazy with it and include alternate tales and tellings? This is a Hyrule Warriors game. It's not exactly a serious storytelling game.
Because this one’s entire purpose is to be a serious storytelling game. They are making it for the express purpose of telling the story of the Great Calamity, which is a tragedy. I don’t want to see them muck it up with a “lol here’s how they actually can still win” ending.
 

Bowsette Plus-Ultra

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Because this one’s entire purpose is to be a serious storytelling game. They are making it for the express purpose of telling the story of the Great Calamity, which is a tragedy. I don’t want to see them muck it up with a “lol here’s how they actually can still win” ending.

True, but I don't see the harm in delving into a what-if ending. Maybe it could come at the end of an incredibly difficult fight that you're designed to lose, or locked behind a second replay of the game.
 

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