Many fan-works deconstruct or parody game mechanics, with a popular one being what happens when you restart a town. It's often presented as either a memory wipe or the character's worlds being reconstructed from the town up while the villagers can't do anything.
The mayoral assistant Isabelle from New Leaf having a crush on the (usually male) protagonist appears a lot.
The games suggest that Sable and Tom Nook were friends when they were younger, until Tom left for the city and came back a changed man. Many fan works try to fix their relationship and pair them up.
Baten Kaitos has half of all fanfics treating the return of the Guardian Spirit in some form.
The reveal that Atlas is Fontaine was not taken well by some fans of BioShock, and a very common theme in fanfiction is creating a version of the story where Atlas is a real person that helps Jack for the entire trip through Rapture.
Fans of Elizabeth from BioShock Infinite tend to dislike her fate at the end of the DLC, and rewrites where things turn out better for her are common. For example, BioShock: Right Place, Right Time, Wrong Guyhad her barely survive being brained by Fontaine by injecting herself with ADAM and kept sane by the imaginary Booker until Mark (the protaganist in this fic) reaches her.
Likewise some fans don't like how Ryan just up and dies on his own terms without really answering for all he's done in ruling Rapture. So they do fics were he's forced to fight for his life by characters he's wronged or pull a Heel Realization and a My God, What Have I Done? before trying to fix the damage, even teaming up with Jack to fight Fontaine.
Many fans who were upset by the implied fates of certain Chrono Trigger characters set about rectifying this in fic form. Of course, given the Chrono series' core conceit of time travel and parallel dimensions, it practically invites this.
While Guile fanfics make up a small percentage in the whole Chrono Cross fandom, the majority of the fanfics portray Guile as an incredibly badass wanderingBlack Mage. Often, he's either a Challenge Seeker or a Blood Knight, especially if the setting involves Bounty Hunter. Occasionally, manliness may be added. Doesn't matter whether he's Magus or not.
A common one is a Fix Fic, in which it's the game novelization with the assumptions that Guile is indeed Magus.
One type of story that has gained some traction in the fandom is having one or more of the other origins meet up with the Warden character and in some instances, have them join the group. (For example: a Dwarven Commoner meets a Human Noble and the dwarf joins The Warden, Alistair, Morrigan and the gang.) They may or may not be Grey Wardens. All Origins fics where all of them team up are a large subset.
For most of the Origins, there is the annoying issue that Duncan saved the potential Grey Warden from certain or nearly certain death, rendering their mutual presence problematic from a canon point of view. But this is actually not as big a problem as it sounds, thanks to the timeline of the origins being vague. The only ones that have explicit time between them are the dwarf origins, and they're the easiest to fit together (Duncan leaves for his deep roads mission with the commoner, the noble catches up the next day).
Unsurprisingly, Dragon Age has lots of dark ritual (of Mate or Die and Stalker with a Test Tube type), both fics and fan art, usually with Alistair as the, uh, second participant and Female!Warden and/or him agonizing over the decision. These range from pure angst to smutty hatesex to conflicted tender lovin' to humiliating performance problems to big happy threesomes. One Fandom VIP fancomic artist, Aimo, even collaborated with the game's head writer on a comic based on a deleted scene where Morrigan herself agonizes about it beforehand.
It's an unavoidable reality that one of Hawke's younger twin siblings will die during the prologue. Many fic writers have chosen to either ignore that particular plot point entirely or else to have someone else - usually Hawke or their mother Leandra - die instead.
Much like Mass Effect, stories where the male and female versions of Hawke appear together as fraternal twins are relatively common, usually with Garret as a mage and Marian as a warrior or rogue to contrast Carver and Bethany.
The story of one or more of the potential player characters joining the one the player chose continues with this installment, with the similar problem of explaining how the three potential PCs who were not chosen survived the Breach.
Inquisition has spawned an entire new subset of fics known as "MGiT," or "Modern Girl in Thedas," in which a fan of the game somehow ends up in Thedas and becomes the Inquisitor. Because the gamer in question knows how the story goes, it can change how they react to situations and characters. These are sometimes Crack Fics, but not always; some are quite serious and in-depth.
Inquisition has also spawned a number of fics in which the Inquisitor is not a player character at all, but rather another character from the Dragon Age universe. All three of the Hawke siblings have been used in this way, along with Anders and Fenris; other choices include original characters who would not normally become the Inquisitor in the game, such as a child or teenager.
There are a number of stories using the idea that a Circle Mage Inquisitor was Tranquil prior to the game, then cured by their trip into the Fade at the beginning.
In The Elder Scrolls series fanfics and roleplays, the Player Character of one game is commonly the descendant or relative of characters from previous games. A particularly popular example is having the Dragonborn of Skyrim be the descendant of Martin Septim and a female Champion of Cyrodiil from Oblivion. (This would make the Dragonborn the rightful heir of the Empire.)
Far Cry 5 fanfics often have Joseph and a female Deputy Rook having children while trapped in the bunker together for years after the end of the game. Joseph is frequently portrayed as feeling that they've been ordained by God to repopulate the world, while Rook's feelings about it are generally less clear cut.
Aeris being resurrected in some form (often abbreviated ARF for Aeris Resurrection Fic).
Cloud becoming a Peggy Sue, joining SOLDIER legitimately and saving Sephiroth.
Cloud/Aerith shippers will often portray Sora as their son.
Final Fantasy XII has a lot of juicy bits of Fanfic Fuel that are not very detailed (or are left up to the audience's imagination) in canon, and the fandom runs with this:
There are many fics about how Balthier met Fran.
Another bit of backstory often fleshed out is exactly how Noah/Gabranth came to hate his twin brother Basch so much, which is only briefly addressed in-game.
A third popular topic along these lines is how and why Vayne killed his two older brothers at their father's behest, also often incorporating their father's in-game remark that he does not want to see his sons war with each other again.
Post-game fics about Larsa's reign as emperor are common, usually with an emphasis on how difficult it would actually be for a child to rule an empire and sometimes with a Downer Ending where he is killed young.
Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The fandom is an obscure one, but that hasn't stopped a fair number of its fans from putting a Star-Crossed Lovers twist on the subplot of the Selkie De Nam, told in a series of letters to the player. If the mixed crystal caravan from Tipanote default name for the player's hometown includes a female Selkie, she will be the caravanner who bonds with De Nam during her caravan's first visit to the Yuke citadel of Shella and later replies to his letters as he chronicles his effort to figure out why miasma is poisonous to people but not monsters, and later to slowly but surely adapt to the miasma in the air. She invariably suffers a broken heart when her caravan comes to Conall Curach at the bidding of De Nam's final letter, only to find that all she can find of him is the bandana he'd been wearing when they met — he was either killed by monsters in-between his last letter and the Tipa caravan's arrival, or turned into a monster by the miasma, so that all she could have done is put him out of his misery.
Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones fandom is in love with the "Seth and Eirika angst over their social positions and how it affects their love for each other, but end up together anyway because they're soul mates" plot.
It has a lot of fics dealing with the female Avatar's role as the Apocalypse Maiden of the plot and how it affects her relationship with Chrom. With the male Avatar it's always about the Time-Travel Romance aspect of his relationship with Lucina and the state of her future.
A lot of fic explores what would happen if the Deeprealms didn't exist and the first generation actually raised their children or waited until after the war to have them.
Most Camilla/Hinoka fic has the normally brash Hinoka turning into a dorky blushing schoolgirl over Camilla. Modern AUs are especially popular for them, too.
Leo/Takumi fanfic comes in one of several flavors: 1) Takumi has a nightmare and Leo comforts him, 2) Leo is being physically abused by Garon and Takumi comforts him, 3) massive amounts of unresolved sexual tension and denial of their feelings that culminates in making out or 4) high school AUs involving any combination of the first three.
Fics dealing with Leo post-Birthright are becoming very popular, detailing the pain of losing his family and the stress of becoming King of Nohr after Camilla declines the throne. The majority of these are Hurt/Comfort Fic that pair him with Niles.
Post-Birthright fics pairing Leo with Corrin are also fairly popular, and within that, the fandom seems particularly fond of bringing them together either by way of a political marriage, or by launching a second campaign to defeat Anankos outright; some fics will even use both premises at once.
Timeline-crossover stories, where characters from the aftermath of Birthright visit the Conquest universe or vice-versa.
The post-ConquestAccusation Fic is very popular, often with Sakura and/or Hinoka being the accuser.
There's a decent number of Shiro-as-Scarlet's-son fan works.
Aged-up Kana fics are extremely common (as is fan art), whether by a Time Skip or just an Age Lift.
An extremely common fanfic premise is a fusion of the Azure Moon (Dimitri's route) and Verdant Wind (Claude's route) paths. This is because Dimitri and Claude canonically end up as allies on Azure Moon, but that route leaves plot threads regarding "those who slither in the dark" hanging. Verdant Wind addresses these, but there Dimitri dies offscreen.
Both Male and Female Byleth exist, each leading different houses. Inevitably one of them leads the Black Eagles for maximum drama post-timeskip.
A Role Swap AU exploring what would happen if someone else i.e Dimitri or Claude had the role of the Flame Emperor.
Giving "those who slither in the dark", a.k.a the Agarthans, a Token Heroic Orc is a very common subplot, given that they're the only purely evil faction in an otherwise Grey-and-Grey Morality setting. This most commonly shows up in Blue Lions fics (possibly due to the above Left Hanging issues), but other route fics use it too.
Because of it being an alternate timeline/universe spin-off of the main series, Fire Emblem: Three Houses, and it having an extremely large shipping culture, it's not uncommon for fans to create stories and comics about Shez, the protagonist of Three Hopes, being exasperated by their Lord's suddenly falling for Byleth, refusing to kill or attack Byleth despite Shez's vendetta, or even outright turning against Shez in favor of Byleth.
Five Nights at Freddy's: Specifically for Security Breach, it has become exceedingly common to see stories where Glamrock Freddy is possessed by Michael or Henry and has come back from heaven to stop William from killing kids for the umpteenth time.
Freedom Planet has protagonist Sash Lilac dealing with her torture at the hands of Brevon in some manner. This most likely emerged from responses to the very next scene, where Lilac's injuries are completely healed with out-of-the-blue healing baths. Not only this, but it is NEVER brought up again and Lilac just seems to forget it happened after that event. This didn't go down too well with some fans, either decrying the act as either pointless or a complete cop-out. Naturally, a number of fics either better convey how Lilac would deal with this (ranging from being a little shaken from the experience to full-on PTSD) removing the healing baths altogether and having Lilac deal with it that way. One example even had her go completely insane from the events, albeit with a number of other factors helping her along.
A few fics attempt to go into Lilac's and Carol's past with the Red Scarves, alongside imagining whatever caused them to leave in the first place, which is a tad vague in canon.
Take the simple format of Boyfriend encountering an opponent (through means that range from normal to ridiculous, the latter especially if the setting and circumstances are separate from their universe but happen anyways just because.) and engaging them in a rap battle to get to know them, and you have a standard FNF mod. The general tone of the bout may range from a friendly competition to a more gradually tense and frustration infused escalation.
Gears of War fandom has a few very predictable plots that closely resemble the following: Girl (always a Tsundere) joins Delta Squad. It turns out she's usually like either an awesome stranded badass or the greatest sniper ever in 70% in cases (the other 30%, she's just a random woman who turns badass the moment she starts tagging along with Baird). Then, she falls in love with Baird, have a brief Slap-Slap-Kiss relationship buildup (sometimes literally), and then ultimately Baird falls in love with her and they have sex.
"Elisabet Sobeck lives" fics are common enough that AO3 has a tag for it. Exploring the mother/daughter connection between Elisabet and Aloy was always very common, and after Horizon Forbidden West came out and revealed a second Elisabet clone, these fics became even more popular.
Aloy/Avad fics are reasonably common, and they almost always explore what it would be like for an Action Girl from a matriarchal society to marry the king of a patriarchal society. About half of them have "Sun-Queen" somewhere in the title.
Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number: A common plot seen in fanfics or custom campaigns made in the Level Editor is The Fans surviving the events of Death Wish, often thanks to for-want-of-a-nail events letting them all survive. It’s pretty commonly agreed upon that they move up to attempting to break out Jacket from police custody afterwards, though success tends to vary.
There are plenty of Kingdom Hearts fanfics that feature the main characters (or OCs) travelling to Disney worlds that haven't been featured in the series yet, or are unlikely to ever be.
Before Kingdom Hearts III came out in 2019, fans were writing their own versions of the game ever since II came out in 2006.
Plenty of fics go with the premise that Ventus can talk to Sora while laying dormant in his heart.
A common trend in fics for a long while was to introduce a new member to Organization XIII, often serving as a love interest. These fics, while popular, were often derided for being poorly written, with the OC being shoehorned in. Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days ended up dealing a sizable blow to this genre, as it ended up being a deconstruction of how this kind of character would work in the main canon itself.
One of the series' most popular fanfic trends is to have an OC, often someone from the real world, join Sora, Donald, and Goofy on their travels, usually during II. Most times, the OC gains a keyblade and falls in love with either Sora or Riku. Some fics even give her the χ-blade itself. When poorly written, the fic ends up being a novelization of the game with the OC shoehorned in. A common unwritten rule when writing these kinds of fics nowadays is "Don't give your OC a Keyblade and don't make Sora fall in love with them."
There are countless fics that give focus to Kairi. Alternate Universe Fics where Kairi is the Keyblade wielder in the first game are popular, as are fics in which she stays with Sora, Donald, and Goofy at the end of the first game.
An incredibly popular type of fic is the concept of Sora becoming one of Xehanort's vessels, often as a AU to the ending of 3D. Soranort is so popular that he's a Recurring Fanon Character, especially in the buildup to III's release, as many fans were sure that this would become canon. In the end, Soranort dropped in popularity after IIIJossed the idea.
Aqua falling to darkness was a popular premise long before IIImade it canon.
The Kings Quest (2015) fandom loves to have Achaka survive the Well. Usually this is an excuse for shipping him with Squire/Sir/King Graham, sometimes with MPreg being involved so that Alexander and Rosella continue to exist in this alternate universe (alongside any OC kids the author might potentially create along the way.) It's fairly rare that an explanation for how/why he lived is given; and when it is given, it's usually due to Graham getting injured trying to save Achaka, else the reader is just expected to fill in the blanks or not question it. Queen Valanice, Graham's canonical wife (who here has been split into two women, Vee and Neese), either doesn't exist or Vee and Neese are together as a couple instead of either getting together with Graham.
For those that view the games and anime as separate universes, there are plenty of stories that has the two universes interact. While the character dynamics vary from story to story, almost every single one sees the two Dededes utterly loathe each other.
There's such a specific Fandom-Specific Plot that occurs so regularly in the fic fandom that there's even a Fan Nickname for lampshading it. Called "The Post-DotD template," it goes a little like this: A new ancient evil emerges, and Spyro, Cynder, and a ton of OCs (one of them possibly a human turned dragon) must stop it. A long the way, they encounter Flame and Ember who some how managed to survive the temple raid at the start of the first game, and nine times out of ten Ember is derailed into a invokeddeath eater to make Cynder seem more likable. While all this is going on, Spyro and Cynder are struggling with their Super-Powered Evil Sides while also trying to admit their feelings for one another despite Cynder already admitting her love for Spyro at the end of Dawn of the Dragon, with some contrived situation (usually caused by Ember) breaking them up, only to get back together a few chapters later with little to no problem. Also, double points if Malefor shows up and pulls a Dr. Wily by hijacking the plot. It's impossible to count the number of fics that give Spyro a brother/sister who is also a purple dragon (despite the fact that only one purple dragon is born every ten generations) on both hands.
Trapped in TV LandSelf-Insert fics have all but taken over the Spyro FanFiction.Net archive. Notably, a large number of these involve a character who was in the army/police force/otherwise had special self-defense training getting sucked into the Legend of Spyro setting, as some form of 'justification' as to why they're able to handle themselves in the world.
Rewriting the Legend of Spyro storyline with a different character taking Spyro's place as the hero is also very common, be it an Original Character or a different canon character, with Cynder being a frequent choice.
In fics where Ganon does a Heel–Face Turn, it often comes in the form of him swooping in and saving Link from an OC villain. Bonus points if the situation involved rape, though that's usually saved for shipping fics.
Zelda and Ganondorf are in an Arranged Marriage to unite, or at least ease tensions between, the Hylians and Gerudo.
Novelizations are a very popular type of fanfic with all the games. Typically they end up changing a few things such as adding extra worldbuilding and covering plot holes.
Modern AU Fics, particularly High School AUs. They are usually presented as The Magic Comes Back settings, taking place in a far future Hyrule that has mostly forgotten the existence of magic except for a select few people.
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link: Fanfics for this one are scarce, however some of the few that exist deal with the concept of two Zeldas or how the Sleeping Zelda feels about waking up after several centuries.
Zelda struggling to survive her seven years of exile, mostly involving how she became Sheik.
Fans are very curious as to what happened to Link after Majora's Mask. Did he ever reunite with Navi? Who does he end up with? With the official reveal that the Hero's Shade from The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess is the Hero of Time as well as the direct ancestor of that game's iteration, the general consensus became that Link became a soldier or knight once he reached adulthood, married Malon (with Zelda as the second option if fans don't like Link/Malon), and/or somehow died alone at a young age.
Stories where Link doesn't get transported back into the past at the end of Ocarina of Time, meaning the Child Timeline never comes to be. What happens afterwards depends on the fan. Does he become Zelda's bodyguard, personal knight, or maybe even her husband? Does he keep his Childhood Marriage Promise to Ruto? Does he go back to Malon? What challenges do Link and Zelda face during, and after, the rebuilding the kingdom? Would the goddesses still flood Hyrule? There are many plots that can come from Link staying in the Adult Timeline.
The Minish Cap: This game's backstory involves a legendary hero known as the "Hero of Men." He is heavily implied to be an incarnation of Link, but his story hasn't been featured in a game yet. Fans have thus had to write their own interpretations of his life.
There are a bevy of post-game Midna/Link fanfics that involve Midna either remaining in Hyrule, Link searching for a way to get to the Twilight Realm, or some new problem in Hyrule causing or requiring the worlds to be linked once again. There's also a fourth variant where Link and Midna consummated their relationship sometime during the adventure, with Midna discovering that she's pregnant after returning, prompting her to figure out a way back to Link so they can raise their child together.
Fics where Link returns to Ilia after years away looking how to reunite with Midna. Sometimes Link and Ilia even have a kid together from a fling Link had before he went on his journey.
After Skyward Sword, it became popular to have some iteration of Link and/or Zelda find about Demise's Dying Curse, and how it has been responsible for Ganon always coming back to torment them time and time again, and deciding to find a way to undo the curse and kill Ganon once and for all. Bonus points if the story makes use of Ganondorf instead, who also finds out about the curse and also wants to undo it out of frustration that his life is being controlled in such a way, resulting in all three joining forces in an Enemy Mine.
Breath of the Wild: Many Zelda/Link fics taking place after the Calamity cast Link as an Amnesiac Lover while Zelda struggles with him not fully remembering her or their relationship if they're portrayed as having had one before the Calamity. These usually end with either Link remembering his past feelings for Zelda or not regaining the rest of his memories but falling in love with her anyway.
Stories or comics where Zelda gives Link hisreward after the events of the game are fairly common. Funnily enough, Twilight Princess iteration used despite the fact that it's one of the games where they interact the least. Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom are a close second, though, with it being heavily implied that Link and Zelda already had feelings for each other and got much closer in-between those two games.
A popular story setup has Max sacrifice herself for Chloe, usually by Taking the Bullet in the Sacrifice Chloe ending. Some have Max survive and get a Happy Ever After, others have Max die and leave Chloe and the others to deal with her passing.
Many fics suggest that the real cause of the tornado is not Max's powers, but the Prescotts' new real estate development, frequently by having it be on top of an Indian Burial Ground. Thus, if Max manages to kill the Pan Estates, she will avert the tornado.
Rachel Amber having some kind of powers.
Victoria Chase is frequently portrayed as feeling incredible guilty about her actions in the game and develops into a much nicer person. This is often a precursor to pairing her with someone else, especially Kate Marsh, who is portrayed as extremely forgiving.
If Victoria and Kate are being paired up, Victoria deals with her guilt by becoming extremely protective of Kate, up to and including physical violence to defend her.
If Kate Marsh is paired with any other female character, she will usually face rejection from her family on account of them being very traditional Christians. Frequently, Kate's father is more willing to accept Kate even if that threatens his marriage, while Kate's mother and aunt are diehard homophobes.
A surprising number of fics portray Max's parents as homophobic, resulting in them disowning her despite their relationship seeming to be positive in the game.
The fandom has quite a few variations of Samara's loyalty mission since the second game came out, but the chief plot of such stories is either 'the love interest voices disapproval with Shepard being the bait' or another character entirely — usually one of the other squaddies — takes Shepard's place instead. Both styles of this plot are commonly seen with the Female Shepard/Male Love Interest combo.
A fairly common plot is Shepard having a brother or sister that either joins the group or takes over when the in-game Shepard dies in a battle somehow, despite one background explicitly saying Shepard is an only child and the other two saying that Shepard's entire immediate family is dead. This is pretty much specifically an excuse to have both Male and Female Shepards at the same time. Don't be surprised if one is a Paragon and the other Renegade.note This was actually a Knights of the Old Republic plot first; allowing for both the "canonical" male Revan and the fan-preferred female Revan, sometimes done as a nod to the Skywalker twins. Either that or one sibling would be Revan and the other was The Exile. This was such a common trope that it became Hilarious in HindsightAscended Fanon once Mass Effect: Andromeda came out; the protagonist is established as a set of fraternal male-female twins (default names Scott and Sara Ryder), though you only play as one of the siblings.
This fandom has a bizarrely large amount of self-insertions who, instead of being a version of the author that exists in the setting, are written as the author being suddenly teleported into the setting by a magical Xbox 360.
One common Crossover plot in the fandom is replacing the Human Systems Alliance with a space-capable human civilization from another series, such as the Earth Alliance, UNSC or U.N. Spacy. These "replacement" plots almost invariably have a reenactment of the First Contact War with the Turian Hierarchy, even if it makes no logical sense for the turians and humans to be fighting, and often results a gratuitous Curb-Stomp Battle, even if by all logic (and basic physics) the curb-stomp should be going the other way. For variety, some authors instead use the Batarian Hegemony as the enemy the replacement civilization fights. Some writers argue it's justified because humanity doesn't use the same tech base as other races, therefore the Citadel races have to adapt. Some (but not as many) writers bother to remember that the Outside-Context Problem would apply both ways.
Thanks to the controversial nature of the third game, particularly its finale, fix-fics centered on it are rather common. However, extent of the rewriting varies greatly, from the entire game to just specific details of the ending. For instance, there's plenty of fix-it fic allowing Shepard to survive a non-Destruction ending and reunite with their love interest, or allowing the geth to survive the destroy ending, with EDI's survival being optional.
"Stomp fics" in which humanity or some other faction utterly curb stomps the species of the Citadel Council; like the above plots, there will likely be a reenactment of the First Contact War, which may go the same way as canon, but will then result in the humans slaughtering the turians. Some will go so far as having Council homeworlds captured and occupied. You can also probably expect the batarians to get completely thrashed, and in some cases, outright wiped out. The Reapers will also likely not play a prominent role in these stories, or will be completely omitted.
Plots where humans will make first contact with a different race, most often the quarians. They will then form their own alliance in opposition of the Citadel, which will often include the krogan as well. These stories will often portray the two races as arbitrarily oppressed by the Council.note It's made very clear in-universe and even commented on by other characters that what happened to both races was their own fault. It is not uncommon for the above concept and this one to overlap.
Another common AU plot is to have a different squadmate from the first game give Shepard's body to Cerberus instead of Liara doing so. Usually done for shipping purposes.
Legion is so popular that AU fanfics often find some way to include him, or some sort of equivalent Geth ambassador. It helps that he's literally the only named Geth "individual" in the entire series.
A number of fans have taken it upon themselves to try and bridge together the original series and X because, well, it's not like the actual games are going to do this any time soon. Common plot points include Zero killing the original cast (a popular albeit Jossed piece of Fanon), the use of either Evil Energy or Roboenza, and the robot expiration datesnote so far, Roboenza and the robot expiration dates are Red Herrings in regards to certain aspects of the X series, specifically The Virus and the concept of Mavericks. Even outside of this, expect to see quite a few Robot Mistresses (female Robot Masters) pop up, since they're so rare in canon (the only ones being Roll and Splash Woman). There is also the tendency to make new scientists for the Classic series, for similar reasons (only Light, Wily and Cossack are around).
The fandom contains a ton of stories about Dr. Cain completing one final case before either retiring or dying.
There are fics that don't try to "fix" the story as much as try to have it make sense, like explaining how a computer virus can actually affect a physical environment (even humans) or how Reploid "souls" can go back to their bodies. Besides that, there's a lot of fic splintering off from X5/X6, which had multiple endings and was a pretty important point in the series, X5especially.
Other stories include ones where Iris never died, ones where Gate lives and gets together with Alia, ones where the author's favorite Maverick never died and became good again...
Metal Gear: It's a running joke in the fandom that everyone has to write at least one "Tankerfic" — a fic about the alluded-to-but-never-elaborated-upon scene in Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty where Otacon pulls Snake out of a shipwreck in the middle of a raging storm.
Metroid: Thanks to the series hitting a nineteen-year long Cliffhanger Wall after Metroid Fusion, there are many Continuation fics that built off the ending's implication that Samus is now a fugitive being hunted by the Galactic Federation. Even after Metroid Dread revealed that Samus was hired by the Federation for that game's plot, fans are still drawn to the concept. Some continue to write such stories as taking place between the two games, while others have them take place after Dread with the new reasoning being that the Federation learnt that she is now a Metroid and wish to put her in captivity.
Nicktoons Unite!, if a new member joins the original foursome, there is a very good chance it will be Jenny or Zim (the former of which was a Secret Character in Attack of the Toybots while the latter canonically teamed up with them in Globs of Doom). The Loud siblings are also a popular choice, mainly Lincoln himself. Note that canonical fifth member Tak is almost always forgotten about or ignored.
Overwatch has a number of fics where any member of Talon pulls a Heel–Face Turn. Widowmaker is often the subject for this.
It's popular in some Persona fics to have characters involved in each other's Social Links/Confidants instead of the protagonist, and in some cases, this is done for shipping purposes.
Persona 2: Eternal Punishment in particular has a huge number of Fix Fics where Tatsuya gets his happy ending. Most of those fics have Jun also somehow remembering the events of Innocent Sin and ending up together with Tatsuya. Maya is slightly less common but also frequent choice.
It's common to tackle events "post-Seal" where SEES tries to find a way to release the main character from his/her burden. "The Answer", a Playable Epilogue added in the Updated Re-release, is basically a canon version of this.
Some fics involve retellings of the game with both the male and female protagonists. They're nearly always depicted as siblings in this case, though it's not uncommon for them to be shipped with each other instead. note If they are depicted as brother and sister, few seem to go with calling them Sakuya and Kotone Shiomi, however. Note that Persona Q2 justifies the Schrödinger's Player Character aspect of P3P by not only confirming the female protagonist comes from an Alternate Universe, but also suggesting she and her male counterpart are, in fact, the same person. (Do the math.)
Persona 4: There some fanfics where the boys get revenge against the girls for their misery at the Amagi Inn.
It's common to replace the protagonist with either a Gender Flip or instead to give the Wild Card ability to Makoto Niijima and relegate the original Joker to a supporting character role. With the introduction of Kasumi Yoshizawa in Royal, some fans have started to use her in either role, owing to how Kasumi was initially mistaken as a female Joker (especially with her Phantom Thief attire being designed to complement/contrast with Joker's) and her own character arc in the expanded story.
Where the P5 fandom is concerned, 90% of all Akechi fics fall under one of three categories:
Another common occurrence in P5 fiction is that the small, rural town Joker lived in before the events of the game is Inaba, the setting of Persona 4.
A number of writers like to make the protagonist's unseen parents either neglectful or outright abusive, usually as an excuse to have him move in with Sojiro permanently.
Since the release of Royal, there are many fanfic plots that involve Joker preventing Kasumi's death. How this typically plays out is Joker transfers to Tokyo around a month earlier than he does in the game. Around a week or two after moving into Leblanc, Sojiro sends Joker out on an errand. While he is out, he witnesses Sumire running into traffic with Kasumi chasing after her. Joker prevents Kasumi from going onto the road. While he saves Sumire from getting hit from an oncoming car, with the worst thing that happens to Joker usually being a couple of broken bones.
A common plot for Persona 5 Strikers fics is basically retaining the main story of the game, but with Akechi and/or Yoshizawa along for the ride, given how Strikers appears to largely look past Royal-exclusive plot points.
Planetary Annihilation: Due to the nature of the Commander units in that game, there are multiple fanfics where a Self Insert is shoved into a Commander and sent across the multiverse to do whatever they want. These universally end up being Massively Multiplayer Crossovers with all kinds of franchises.
A lot of fanfics written after Portal 2 involved Wheatley returning from space or Chell returning to Aperture, even though both are a no-go in the canon.
GLaDOS or Wheatley being transferred to android or human bodies for whatever reason — or just making them human and not even bothering with the transfer. This in turn created its own sub-set, with one or both of them being originally human to better facilitate the transfer (note that this is at least partially true for GLaDOS). Most of the time, humanoid Wheatley will bear a strong resemblance toStephen Merchant.
The Psychonauts fandom has more than a few fics involving the child characters growing up to become Psychonauts going on cool spy missions. A popular subset of these fics involve adult versions of Raz, Lili and Dogen becoming a Power Trio.
A popular idea of angsty fan work involves Raz snapping under the pressure of everything that he's experienced over the last two days, with the straw that breaks the camel's back being Ford brainwashing Lucy and Augustus to accept each other as mother and son. Some fan works take it a step further and have Raz become a new "Maligula" or portray him as a Stepford Smiler who is slowly falling apart trying to shoulder everyone's burdens.
Since Otto Mentalis is the only Psychic Six member Raz doesn't go into the mind of, some people have written their own stories speculating what his mental world would look like, with a few speculating that he is a Shell-Shocked Veteran like his friends who does a better job of hiding it.
Red Amitie and Dark (Black) Sig (their alternate forms from 20th Anniversary) are often understood to be destined enemies, presumably in a future where Sig gets fully possessed by his demon ancestor and Amitie obtains power from the people who were responsible for sealing said ancestor (usually through her hat). In any case, it's a common plot in angsty Sig x Amitie stories, where one side tends to tragically die and the other ends up despairing as a result.
Doppelganger Arle returning and getting to find redemption is a very popular plot among fans who want a Happy Ending for Doppel and frequently used as a vehicle for Shipping her with any character of choice.
No thanks to all the disturbing content found in the original Madou Monogatari games, the series is a huge source of Dark Fics. Those almost always star Schezo dealing with or succumbing further to the corruption of the Rune Lord, and often feature Arle as a Hero Antagonist. And, well, let's just say things tend to get real ugly for both characters...
A more lighthearted version of this involves Klug actually befriending the demon living in his book (in his little red form, which Klug strangely ignores in the games), with said demon becoming a sort of mentor or parental figure to Klug.
Many fanfiction authors find a way to spare Arthur from succumbing to Tuberculosis at the end of Chapter 6, often by having another character nurse him back to health or just eliminating the entire plot thread altogether by having someone else (Micah Bell would be the most popular choice) to collect Mr. Downes' debt on his stead.
Another notable AU plot is the biggest "What if?" of Arthur's backstory: What if Isaac Morgan was still alive? His mother, Eliza's, survival is optional.
Many Senran Kagura fics includes male ninjas fighting alongside the female cast or sometimes falling in love with any of the girls, most of the time with Asuka. There's no rule against male ninjas in the series and in fact, Murasame (Ikaruga's brother) is playable in the second game of the seriesnote While his moves are hilariously incompetent in appearance, two supporting characters are retired men who are living legends for their skill, the Hanzo class is taught by a man, and male pronouns are used for some of the unnamed Shinobi in story sequences, conclusively proving they exist. The first game even goes out of its way to show that even romance isn't frowned upon (although the same plot thread also points out that students usually forsake relationships for training and most Shinobi families are marriages of politics and convenience).
A common plot is also crossing over with another team from other series about ninjas. For obvious reasons, Naruto is the main target for any kind of team-up between ninjas.
In The Sims fandom, it's incredibly common for a "Backstory" type fic to be about Pleasantview and how Bella Goth disappeared. It will involve aliens, because the memory that Bella's husband Mortimer and daughter Cassandra have is that she was abducted by aliens. It also is common for it to involve Dina and Nina Caliente, because they arrived the day before Bella disappeared, and because Dina's late husband is Bella's brother. Another common plotline will be to tie Strangetown in somehow, because of the townie in Strangetown that is named Bella Goth. The one neighborhood that consistently is ignored is Veronaville.
Sega has a pretty strict rule against showing Sonic cry, or even being that emotional. Naturally, many fan works try their best to break Sonic to his limits.
It is so common for fanfics to combine the universes of the games and the Archie Comics/IDW adaptations to various degrees that it might as well be the default. Other adaptations occasionally get thrown into the mix (especially Sonic X), but it's those two versions that get the most love, especially in shipping fics.
The default for Shadow/Amy shipping fics is to have Amy Rose be spurned one too many times by Sonic or otherwise get the memo that nothing will ever happen between her and the Blue Blur. Shadow will inevitably stumble across her, nine-times-out-of-ten in a field or forest, as she tries to cope with this and quickly manage to comfort her. Cue the two starting a deeper friendship that leads to romance. Bonus points if Sonic/Sally was the inciting incident, even if the fic otherwise depicts the universe of the games, where Sally doesn't exist.
The few Sonic/Elise fanfics there are usually revolve around Sonic and Elise regaining their memories and reuniting.
Though more pronounced in The '90s when Sonic was at the height of his popularity, there is an abundance of Dark Fic stories in which Sonic, Shadow, an original character, or some other character snaps and goes on a killing spree. These stories are typically a series of loosely connected short scenes in which the chosen character finds a pre-existing character, says a Pre-Mortem One-Liner, and kills the other character quickly but bloodily, upon which the chosen character moves on to the next victim. Any attempts to confront the character becomes a Curb-Stomp Battle with the other side having even messier deaths than usual. They end either with the chosen character ruling over the remaining characters through fear and terror or just abruptly end once the character kills their last victim and the author has presumably had their fill of Wish-Fulfillment. Nearly all of these are of very low quality, having initially flooded fanfiction and fan art websites, but they were eventually banned or rejected. Now they are most commonly found on message boards, social media, and anywhere else these stories can be put up without an approval process.
There are an untold number of fan works starring an Inkling who has just moved into Inkopolis or Splatsville, usually meeting with some of the shopkeepers and/or an established squad and getting into Turf Wars. Depending on the fic, this Inkling will also either become a member of the New Squidbeak Splatoon (undertaking the games' story modes or an entire new adventure) or be a civilian who unknowingly befriends one of the agents.
The Octolings are a fountain of fanfic all by themselves. Common plots involve their life in the underground domes, with early fandom stories also depicting their increasing terrorof Agent 3 and occasional forays into Inkopolis.
For the same reasons as the above, an Inkling finding/rescuing and living with an Octoling was also a common plotline prior to Octo Expansion and Splatoon 3 having their societies begin to freely interact once again.note Word of God would even reveal/retcon that the Great Offscreen War was a very much a regional conflict, with Octolings in other areas of even the same continent going unaffected by the war. These stories often than not end in romance as well. Ironically enough, the second game has this serve as Pearl and Marina's backstory, with their early friendship matching the usual staples of such plots almost beat for beat.
Speaking of named characters, in addition to fics that explore Off the Hook's backstory, Octo Expansion gave birth to a variation involving Agent 3 taking in Agent 8 (or otherwise serving as her guide to the surface) while Pearl and Marina act as Parental Substitutes, often with the two agents developing a romance. Later on still, the reveal of Splatoon 3's idol group (Deep Cut) led to stories depicting Shiver as a former Octarian solider who was taken in by Frye and Big Man several years ago after being found traumatized and alone in the Splatlands. Once again, often with Shiver and Frye developing a romance, though supplemental material would quickly make such stories Outdated by Canon (all three grew up on the surface, with the trio becoming friends in middle school).
Role Swap AU stories where Callie won the Splatfest and Marie ended up with the Octarians instead of Callie.
Fans who were unsatisfied with how Splatoon 2 handled Callie and Marie's reunion have plenty of fan-works which portray it as more emotional. Some go as far as to make Callie a Shell-Shocked Veteran post-rescue.
How did Marina end up above ground and how did she meet Pearl? Many fanfic try to solve these questions. As mentioned above, Octo Expansion filled in some of the blanks, which actually increased the number of these stories, since writers now had a solid base surrounding Marina's culture shock and tech genius to expand upon and explore in-depth.
Stories can use the Legacy system (where you can make a "family tree" of your characters) to have things like, the Counselor teaming up with their long-lost Sith Warrior sibling. Justified in post-Makeb content as threats like the Dread Masters, Revanites, and Eternal Empire forced Enemy Mine among some top officials of both factions.
The Knights of the Fallen Empire expansion sees yet another variation of the "alternate player character options join the player's main" story. Only one of the eight classes can become the Outlander, while the seven that are not chosen suffer various Uncertain Dooms. As with other BioWare games, this led to stories where one or more of the classes the player didn't choose appears and joins up with the Outlander.
A common theme for Dimentio/Mimi from Super Paper Mario is him stealing her diary and using the contents to tease her. However, it should be noted that this does stem from a canon incident.
A fairly large amount of Bowser/Peach fan works center around the popular question of just what the heck do they get up to while Mario's busy adventuring to rescue her from Bowser's clutches. Many also portray Peach as taking a motherly role towards Bowser's eight unruly children. However, this once again is based off of a canon incident (that of Bowser Junior being convinced that she's his mom and even calling her "Mama Peach"). It's actually unknown just how the seven older Koopalings feel about Peach, but the image of them looking up to her as their mom is cute nonetheless.
There's a significant amount of crossovers based on Paper Mario involving either an original character, the author or just about anyone else becoming one of Mario's partners in the games. Probably because it makes for an easy way to introduce new characters to the game universe.
Bringing the partners back is rather popular idea itself, seeing how most of them have huge fanbases.
After Peach rejected Mario's proposal in Super Mario Odyssey, two types of plots sprung up: "Mario gets back with Pauline" plots and "Peach gets with Pauline" plots.
In addition, there are also several fan works who have Peach accept the proposal or have her reveal the rejection was a heat of the moment thing and that she is more then willing to wait for Mario to try again.
If one is to write a Super Robot WarsFan Fic, the usual standard story will do the following: Write a prologue in the style used by the games (with a list of "Series Represented" almost always included), then the plot will basically proceed with the novelized version of the same type of mecha anime crossover story writing style endemic to the games.
The majority of fics involve the cast living together in a large mansion, with the games being represented as tournaments. These stories usually take a Slice of Life approach, focusing on the interactions between the fighters. The PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale fandom would adopt a similar concept, though they're not nearly as widespread.
If you're reading a non-fluffy or non-comedic fic, there's a good chance it involves Master Hand transferring people from their universes into a tournament. Just how much the fighters actually enjoy this (anything from some feeling forced to loving it), along with how violent and gory the fighting can get (can they get injured, is the fighting toned down similar to a sport, or is it a free-for-all blood bath?), differs from fan work to fan work.
A very popular Super Smash Bros. Ultimate AU is having Sonic and Pikachu escape Galeem's lasers along with Kirby and having them be a starting trio for World of Light. Other A Us include the DLC characters either surviving or being dragged in via happenstance.
Tales of Symphonia has quite a few fanfics in which Lloyd has a twin sibling — usually a female who, at least initially, serves Cruxis. Cruxis!Lloyd fics are also popular, most starting with Kratos finding Lloyd and returning to Cruxis with him.
There are many examples of various members of the main party of Tales of the Abyss joining the God-Generals in fan works. Guy seems to be the most popular character for this since he's initially working for Van, but Jade's quite common as well. It's also more of a fan art phenomenon than anything because of the cool God-General uniforms.
Origin stories about how the Original Eighteen (or just Nine, if only one team is the focus) were recruited. These are less common now that peripheral material seems to suggest that in the "canonical" world of TF2, there are far fewer mercs than originally thought.
Slice of Life, usually with much of the humor centered around how nobody could be considered even remotely normal.
Undertale has a very prominent one in the concept of Genocide Papyrus. Fans really love to ask themselves the question "in an Alternate Universe where Frisk/Chara kills Sans first and confronts Papyrus as the Final Boss of Genocide Run instead, what would happen"? The concept is played in different ways depending on the author, often mixing and matching the different approaches. Sometimes it's played for Rule of Cool, wherein Papyrus shows himself to be Not So Harmless and gives Frisk/Chara the beating of a lifetime, comparable to Sans himself. In other cases the emphasis is on Papyrus' evolution from lovable goof to vengeance-crazed, broken individual. And occasionally the author decides that someone like Papyrus simply could never be as cold and vengeful as Sans was, and has him break down in the middle of battle or being unwilling to hurt the Fallen Child. This concept is often known as "Disbelief Papyrus" (subverting Papyrus' "I believe in you" from the regular Genocide Route). Papyrus is typically depicted wearing Sans' jacket over his "battle body", wielding a giant bone as a weapon, with his right eye glowing orange (in contrast to Sans' blue left eye), and with the ability to either dodge or block attacks, as well as to use KARMA like his brother.
Even in the best ending, you can never really save Asriel Dreemurr, who will eventually revert to being an emotionless flower due to his lack of a soul. Fans have long been entertaining the idea of a "Ultimate Pacifist" ending which would allow Asriel to remain himself. In many cases, this involves Frisk pulling a Heroic Sacrifice and giving their soul to Asriel. Gerson's explanation of Boss Monster parents sharing their soul with their children also inspires many fans to write about Frisk splitting their soul with Asriel.
One popular fanfic and fan art setting is the so-called "Floweypot AU", in which Frisk brings Flowey to the surface in a flowerpot, and Flowey ends up living with them and Toriel, grumping at every opportunity. Frisk may attempt to teach Flowey to love again and/or find a way to turn him back to Asriel, overlapping with the above plot.
A recurring idea is known as Gasterblaster Sans, where he is overtaken by the power source of the Gaster Blasters he uses in the No Mercy run, putting him through a Forced Transformation into a skeletal monster of either canine or reptilian appearance. Or sometimes his head just changes shape. Either way, it's always Played for Drama. Whether he's fully mentally aware himself and in control during the ordeal varies depending on the author. Sometimes Papyrus is put through this plot as well, due to being related to Sans and the implied connection both share with W.D. Gaster.
AUs in general are very popular in the Undertale fandom. They run the gamut from cosmetic changes (like Outertale, which is Undertale in space), to character swaps, to human AUs, to Nightmare FuelAUs. Some of the AUs even have their own blog, and there is also a lot of fan art where characters from the original Undertale or an AU meet characters from another AU. Some of the more basic types are:
AUs where the monsters are sealed in places other than the Underground, like Outertale above or Oceantale.
The 'character swap' AU, popularized by Underswap and Storyshift: taking characters and placing them in other characters' roles. It's essentially the direct descendant of Homestuck's Bloodswap plot.
Darker and EdgierAUs popularized by Underfell, where it's a world of "Kill or be killed". Whether the monsters are jerks with hearts of gold or completely irredeemable depends on the author, but Flowey is always a good person and ally.
"Alternate Timeline" AUs. These ones, instead of changing a basic element of the source material from the get-go, instead have a character make different choices during canon events (usually a Genocide run) and results in derailment. Some well-known ones are Dusttale and Aftertale, where Sans goes... extreme measures to end the resets, to put it mildly. Glitchtale also starts as one of those, and Underverse reveals that its "main universe" is one of these.
Post-canon AUs, which explore events after a canon ending. The Flowerpot AU is one of these, but a few famous ones are Horrortale (a post Empress Undyne ending), or Quantumtale (post Pacifist Neutral). The Season 2 of Glitchtale is one of these.
Pre-canon change AUs, in which the differences are caused by the actions of characters prior to Frisk falling in the Underground. For example, Caretaker of the Ruins and the NSFW Underlust are the results of Chara taking significantly different actions in what was originally canon Undertale.
Basic mechanics changes, where some element of the way the In-Universe mechanics work is different than canon. For example, Glitchtale introduces additional soul mechanics, and Flowerfell has Frisk grow a flower out of their body every time they die.
Mixing AUs together. There are so many Fellswap and Swapfell (not to be confused) AUs that they're now named like Pokémon games, and that's just scratching the surface. It's safe to say there is a swap version of everything.
More than a few fanfics tend to focus on plots themed around Frisk being raisedby all the monsters of the Underground, with not just Toriel, but also other main characters like Sans or Undyne, or even minor characters like Muffet playing a role in parenting Frisk.
One plotline that really took off post-Deltarune involves Frisk meeting and befriending Suzy, a monster child from the capital who is briefly mentioned in a rare in-game event yet never appears onscreen. Her exact appearance and personality will vary Depending on the Writer, but no matter what, she'll always resemble a younger version of Deltarune'sSusie.
Until Dawn has a specific Fix Fic type in which the character Josh Washington survives and is rescued from the mountain instead of the two canon routes of him dying or transforming into a wendigo. Relatedly and in a broader scope is the Hurt/Comfort Fic genre devoted specifically to exploring the fallout of the game's events on whoeversurvives from the group of friends, how they handle (or don't) their traumas and how they reconcile (or don't) with each other (most tend to go for a Golden Ending of everyone surviving and becoming True Companions).
Due to the Valkyrie Profile series currently focusing on side stories and prequels (Covenant of the Plume and Anatomia), fans have taken it upon themselves to write the hypothetical Valkyrie Profile: Hrist to go with the two main games (the original/Lenneth and Silmeria). Notably, tri-Ace themselves aren't above poking fun at Hrist being the only Valkyrie sister lacking her own game at present; the Seraphic Gate of CotP, true to form, has Hrist try to force her way into the spotlight and matter-of-factly point out to Wylfred that the name of the series isn't "Mortal Profile." Her pre-fight quote is even an agitated "Where is my leading role?"
Jaina and Sylvanas being forced into an arranged marriage to put a stop to the ongoing war between their two factions is quite popular in Jaina/Sylvanas fanfics. In these fics, both start out hating each other before slowly falling in love.
There's at least one fanfic in which Taretha Foxton leaves Durnholde Keep with Thrall and survives as a result. There are also a few that address the chemistry between Jaina and Thrall during Warcraft 3 (and the expansion) that even Thrall's voice actor doesn't want to admit to. And that's not even getting into events with Garrosh.
) Her and Numbuh 1 have also most likely gotten together.
