List of bad endings in games

A bad ending occurs when the player finishes a video game but is not completely successful for some reason. Generally speaking, in a "bad ending", the player has reached an end-point of the game, and has technically won, but the victory is incomplete, and, in some cases, isn't much of a victory at all. Most bad endings are achieved by being defeated in a certain fight, but some cases are simply glorified Game Over screens.

Examples
For example, in the arcade version of Street Fighter Alpha 3, failure to defeat the game's end boss M. Bison at the 10th and final stage results in an ending where the player character is placed in a machine and his/her power is used to destroy a city. Another example is in Metroid Prime Hunters where if Samus Aran does not free the Ambilics from the seal sphere before beating Gorea, Gorea is killed, but the Obliette explodes with Samus inside.

In several Sonic games on Genesis and Game Gear, A bad ending is earned by failing to gain all available Chaos Emeralds. In the Game Gear version of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, for example, Sonic is trying to rescue his friend Tails from the clutches of Dr. Robotnik. If Sonic has 5 Chaos Emeralds by the time he defeats Silver Sonic, Silver Sonic will then yield the 6th emerald without any further dispute. If not, he cannot continue on and must abandon his quest. In the credits, Tails is presumed to be dead. Strangely, in the Genesis version, nothing "bad" happens if you fail to get the emeralds. In Sonic CD, Sonic must get all seven time stones or smash the Roboticizer in the Past of each Zone, or he cannot earn the good future in the final boss stage, Metallic Madness 3. Also, in the ending movies, the Little Planet reappears tethered to Sonic's world after previously detaching when the last boss is beaten.

In a game with multiple endings there is usually at least one bad ending (a simple structure is to have one bad, one neutral and one good ending). For example in Metal Gear Solid there is either an ending where the main character's love interest survives (the good ending) or dies (bad ending). Another example is The Suffering (and its sequel) which has three endings which can be described as "good", another "bad" and the other neutral (interestingly, in this case all three are canon).

The Myst game series is famous (or infamous, as some may put it) for using multiple endings in all of the games. For example, in Myst, if the player gives Sirrus or Achenar the final page to their book, they will be trapped and the appropriate brother will be freed. In another Myst game, Myst III: Exile, several endings lead to the player being killed by Saavedro, and still others lead to the aforementioned character destroying the item that the player is trying to recover from him. There is also an ending in this same game that could be considered a 'good ending', but is not ideal. (See the page on Myst III: Exile for more information about its endings.)

A bad ending is similar to a false ending, although with the latter, the player still continues with the story.