10 Video Games Where The Bad Ending Is Canon
5. Shadow Hearts
RPG Shadow Hearts' ending is centered around the fate of protagonist Yuri's charge, Alice Elliot.
In the happy ending, accessed by completing a specific side mission before the final boss battle, Yuri and Alice team up to defeat the villainous Atman, after which the pair return to Alice's family in France.
The bad ending, meanwhile, has Alice's soul claimed by Atman, and she then dies while taking the train back to France with Yuri.
Surprisingly, 2004's sequel Shadow Hearts: Covenant reveals that Alice did indeed die, leaving Yuri a depressed shadow of his former self at the start of the game.
This one has a neat little twist, though, as Covenant's canon happy ending sees Yuri go back in time and save Alice from death.
And so, while Alice's demise is ultimately undone, it happens in a way that still keeps her death in the previous game a canonical part of the series' story - a downer ending which must happen in order for it to be gloriously rectified in the sequel.