History Main / MissingSecret

* ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'': In the original English version for the SNES, the Guru of Time tells you of things that are happening around the world in different time periods. It quickly becomes obvious that he's telling you about the sidequests you have left. The problem is, there's one statement that persists no matter what you do: "One of you is close to someone who needs help. Find this person... fast." This is a translation error; in the original Japanese script and retranslated DS version, Gaspar simply tells the party to speak to its members at the End of Time in order to learn about events or sidequests in their respective eras.

** In ''VideoGame/BanjoTooie'' has some strange loopholes:

* ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong64'' has a number of these -- the most prominent being Cranky's mention of a secret level named Great Girder Grapple in the game's instruction booklet, which fans have hunted for for years. This is most likely a joke reference to the original ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong'' game, which is a crucial element of this game. Another example is a barn with a number of doors in its loft, except one door that never opens. Before deciding on infinite lives, Rare intended to hide a 1-up balloon behind this door.

* ''VideoGame/MegaMan7'' has an empty spot in the weapon inventory menu. Naturally, this one drove fans bananas because the opening cinematic shows a cameo of [[VideoGame/MegaMan1 Cut Man]], leading many to expect some means of battling him and acquiring Rolling Cutter for that slot.

** ''VideoGame/MegaMan9'' also has an empty spot in the weapon inventory menu.

*** Near of the beginning, Link's wounded uncle tells him "Zelda...is...your..." before passing out. Apparently, many players assumed the missing word is [[LongLostSibling "sister"]]--since this is never brought up again over the course of the game, people have searched for some hidden sidequest that reveals their relationship. In fact, the line was intended to be "Zelda is your destiny", as stated [[AllThereInTheManual in the manual]].

* ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong64'':
** The Fungi Forest lobby features three wooden shutters. One opens to reveal a Banana Fairy, while another contains a Chunky Pad, which is used to access a Battle Arena. The third one, however, remains closed. Hacking the game reveals there IS a small area beyond the door but there's no way in-game to open it.
** Inside the Creepy Castle museum there's a conspicuous room with a pillar that can be accessed via a Tiny pad located behind the racetrack. Aside from some purple bananas, there's nothing noteworthy inside and it's seemingly only for decoration. Rareware actually commented on this via Scribes and Uncle Tusk, the company's long-defunct fanmail pages. Aside from explaning the pillar DID something at some point, they did not elaborate any further other than saying it was removed due to "developmental fluctuations".

** The Activation Gem is an accessory you can buy starting in Chapter 5. Its description says that it’s “working as intended,” but as far as anyone can figure out it doesn’t actually do anything at all.

* ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVII'' has a four-character party. You lose one of the characters fairly soon. And then you stay that way for a very long time. You do eventually find another fourth party member, but not before you've unlocked many islands, killed many bosses, and probably assumed you missed something and [[GuideDangIt checked a guide]].

* The ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog'' series has a couple of examples.

* In ''VideoGame/Hitman2SilentAssassin'', there was going to be a weapon which would have served as an alternate fiber wire on replays of the game- a rosary (crucifix!). It was taken out at the last minute, but the space for it in the weapon collection area is noticeable in the final version of the game.
** Ditto for the Mark III rifle in ''VideoGame/HitmanBloodMoney''.
* ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'' has one leftover space on the codec menu, but there's no one to fill it.
** In ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3'', that empty space is reserved for "Healing Radio" frequencies, which can be found by listening in on guards, [[TryEverything meticulous searching]] or blind luck.

* Every class (Both humanoids and monsters) in [[VideoGame/DisgaeaHourOfDarkness the first]] ''Franchise/{{Disgaea}}'' game has its basic form and five [[PaletteSwap recolored]] [[UndergroundMonkey upgrades]], except the Prinnies, which only have 4. The final Prinny class shows up as a BonusBoss in the game - so the class exists but you can't have it in your party. NIS added in a way to get the next tier in the sequels.

* ''VideoGame/{{Borderlands 2}}'' parodies this in ''Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep'' where a friggin' VAULT can be seen in the distance from Flamerock Refuge (but never mentioned or visited), similar to ''VideoGame/ConkersBadFurDay'' and the Windmill.
* ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'':
** In some versions, the [[HundredPercentCompletion Percent kills/secrets/items]] count at the end of the level will always display 0% if the level doesn't ''have'' anything of that category. This gives the impression that the secrets are ''there'', but you just didn't find any of them.

** There are also some official levels where it is impossible to get 100% secrets. In ''Ultimate Doom'' maps [=E4M3=] and [=E4M7=] due to bad map design; the former has secret sectors with torches on top of them, the latter an invulsphere that you can't reach and a door that's too thin for the secret to register. These can be triggered by noclipping, however. It's also impossible to get 100% items on Map 27 in the original ''Doom 2'' engine (though not in some sourceports), because there are two Computer Maps and you can only pick up one.
*** For years it was believed that ''Doom II'' Map 15 also had an example of this, due to a peculiarity of the engine; one of the triggers is on a teleport pad, but a teleporter activates when the player crosses the edge, which means you can never enter the sector and trigger the secret. This one was ultimately subverted, however, as in 2018 it was discovered that there ''is'' a way to obtain the missing trigger[[note]]Stand directly in front of the teleport pad and have an enemy push you into the trigger[[/note]]; creator John Romero would confirm on Twitter that this is indeed the intended method of obtaining the trigger, making the discoverer technically the first person ever to 100% complete ''Doom II''.

* Every class (Both humanoids and monsters) in [[VideoGame/DisgaeaHourOfDarkness the first]] ''Franchise/{{Disgaea}}'' game has its basic form and five [[PaletteSwap recolored]] [[UndergroundMonkey upgrades]], except the [[EverythingIsBetterWithPenguins Prinnies]], which only have 4. The final Prinny class shows up as a BonusBoss in the game - so the class exists but you can't have it in your party. NIS added in a way to get the next tier in the sequels.

** ''VideoGame/SuperSmashBrosBrawl'': The event matches come in Easy, Normal, and Hard flavours, but use the same icons as are normally used for a five-difficulty scale, which might make one think that the events can eventually be played on Very Hard and Intense.

** If Mario returns to the Whispering Woods, there's a tree that says, "I know you're busy, but if you ever come back, I've got some stuff I want thrown in that spring..." This ultimately amounts to nothing, because the tree never actually gives you what he wants you to put in the spring, nor tells you what it is.
** The Boot Car is shown as "Boot Car Type B" in its intro cutscene, along with various stats. This may lead you to believe that you can upgrade your Boot Car or buy a better one, but returning to Toad's Automoboots doesn't let you buy anything and you don't end up learning what Type A could be.
** Even after you've seen all the graffiti in Graffiti Underground, Olivia still says that there could be more if you come back later, although you've beaten the game and there's nothing left to do.

* Parodied in ''VideoGame/EpicBattleFantasy 4''. Two special weapons, the Lance of Creation and Blade of Destruction, are touted to be {{Infinity Plus One Sword}}s that boost elemental damage of several types and have a chance of casting certain {{Limit Break}}s randomly. The catch? They're RandomDrops (note that this is a game where all equipment is unique, and thus is only gotten via quests and treasure chests) from [[spoiler:the two cat forms of [[FinalBoss Godcat]] (which are both invincible)]], and checking the descriptions of the enemies in question shows the drop rates at ''0%''. It only serves as flavor and a tease, since the weapons don't exist in-game.

* ''VideoGame/SeriousSam''
** Due to a few broken triggers, some secrets in ''Serious Sam: The Second Encounter'' don't exist but the secret counter still shows like they're there. It also shows up that the game's intro has one stage despite not being playable at all.

*** There were also rumors about being able to get the GS Ball and catch Celebi in non-Japanese versions of ''Crystal'', fueled by the fact that the Celebi event was fully translated and is still functional. No such thing is possible; hacking is the only way of accessing the event in international versions. The UsefulNotes/VirtualConsole re-release of ''Crystal'', however, allows you to acquire the GS Ball after defeating the Elite Four, making the translated event accessible for non-Japanese audiences.

*** ''[=FireRed=]'' and ''[=LeafGreen=]'', to implement a feature from ''VideoGame/PokemonRubyAndSapphire'', have a house on Seven Island with a box blocking a doorway. In the Japanese versions, scanning a battle card for the e-Reader would unblock the door leading to a battle with the Trainer the card is for. However, international releases of everything past ''Ruby and Sapphire'' (including their UpdatedRerelease, ''Emerald'') removed e-Reader functionality due to poor sales in North America and a lack of a European release, but oddly enough the door is still there and due to the removal of the e-Reader features it is always blocked. Interacting with it says that there's wind blowing from behind it, but that's all.

** ''VideoGame/SuperMario64'' has a sign outside Boo's Mansion that reads "If you walk out of here alive, you deserve... a ghoul medal." Players spent ages trying to determine what it meant. It turns out it's just a pun.

* ''VideoGame/NoMoreHeroesIII'': As Travis progresses in the assassin ranking charts, parts of the overworld are unlocked so they can be explored for sidequests, activitires and assassination challenges. But even after you clear the game, certain parts in the map won't be unlocked, despite the Forbidden sign teasing that they'll be available at one point like the other parts. [[spoiler:This includes the whole central island where the Damon Tower is posed, as "accessing" there for the Rank 1 stage takes you directly to the inside of the tower, not the city surrounding it]]. Suda 51 confirmed in an interview that these areas couldn't be implemented due to time and budget constraints.

* ''VideoGame/MortalKombat9'' has one in the character select screen (in the UsefulNotes/Xbox360 version only). The game only has a few unlockable characters, all of which become selectable in the bottom row of the character select screen when unlocked. The [=PS3=] version got [[spoiler:the console-specific [[VideoGame/GodOfWar Kratos]]]] in the bottom right corner; the Xbox 360 version gets [[spoiler:nothing]]. The space on the character select screen is always unselectable, and shows a duplicate picture of [[spoiler:Cyber Sub-Zero]], who is selectable in the bottom left corner. In an odd twist, during multiplayer matches the player on the right can only select the bottom right corner, and the player on the left can only select the bottom left corner (especially odd since these corner spots then expand to show the downloadable characters, which as a result show up mirrored in each corner).

* ''VideoGame/{{Bugsnax}}'': Catapulting yourself onto the rocks behind Floofty's shelter in the Boiling Bay will result in you being teleported back to the beach, giving you the error message [[https://snorpington-fizzlebean.tumblr.com/post/640064381909172224/my-spouse-found-this-message-while-jumping-around "The Triplicate Space is not yet available to you."]] You can complete the entirety of the current version of the game and you will never gain access to an area with this name.

* ''VideoGame/TombRaider'', ''VideoGame/TombRaiderII'' and ''VideoGame/TombRaiderIII'' (and maybe later games too) each have one medipack in a location that's inaccessible (outside of [[GoodbadBugs bugs]] anyway)[[note]]Palace Midas in I, Temple of Xian in II and Coastal Village in III[[/note]]. In the first game's case, someone contacted Creator/CoreDesign and found that it was originally going to be accessible in a part of a level that was removed.

* In ''VideoGame/Hitman2SilentAssassin'', there was going to be a weapon which would have served as an alternate fiber wire on replays of the game- a rosary (crucifix!). It was taken out at the last minute, but the space for it in the weapon collection area is noticable in the final version of the game.

* The buildings and alleyways in ''Franchise/{{Splatoon}}'''s various hub areas serve as shops and entrances to the game's modes, but there are always a couple of them that exist strictly to promote the atmosphere of a large, crowded city. These include a walled-off train station just behind the starting area in [[VideoGame/Splatoon1 the first game]]'s Inkopolis Plaza, and a coffee shop in ''VideoGame/Splatoon2'''s Inkopolis Square that you can't enter, but can see Spyke (an important [=NPC=] from the previous game) typing away at a computer from the window.