History Main / OneGameForThePriceOfTwo

* The trade paperbacks for {{Crisis Crossover}}s tend to be this way. If they release a book at all for the crossover, it's only for a select group of comics and often omitting major parts of the story. Sometimes it's trimmed to the point that it's completely non-comprehensible. ''ComicBook/CivilWar'' is probably the worst offender, with the trade paperback crossing several comic books from the buildup culminating in the character choosing pro or anti-registration, and two comics from the demount. Captain America and Spider-Man appear for handful of panels and the story makes no sense because it omits 90% of the plot.

* The [[Anime/{{Pokemon}} anime]] of all things did this with the first Gen V movies, ''[[Anime/PokemonTheMovieBlackAndWhite Black: Victini and Reshiram]]'' and ''[[Anime/PokemonTheMovieBlackAndWhite White: Victini and Zekrom]]''. Just like [[VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite the games]], they are two versions of the same movie, boasting similar plots but with Reshiram and Zekrom's roles swapped and a few different Pokémon appearing in the different movies. Averted when it came to the home media release, as both movies were released together in a 2-disc DVD set... outside the Australian and New Zealand markets, at least.

** The [[Film/{{Transformers}} movie]] games for the DS (but not the ''WesternAnimation/TransformersAnimated'' game, also on the DS) are basically the same games split between "Autobot" and "Decepticon" versions. Naturally, some vehicles are only available on one or the other.* This is lampshaded in an early mission in ''VideoGame/TransformersTheGameDS''; whichever version you are playing, you get a short piece of dialogue with what's implied to be the protagonist of the other version, in which the Decepticon tells the Autobot that "we may be on different sides, but we're both still playing the same game."
** The DS versions of ''[[VideoGame/TransformersWarForCybertron'' did the same thing. Notably, each version of the game featured 5 levels from the other and the "Arena" mode was identical. The only real difference between versions is the story and the roster of characters you can unlock for multiplayer (Though you could "bet" your multiplayer characters with other players).

** ''Pokémon'' also occasionally has "third versions" released shortly after each new pair of games, which are {{updated rerelease}}s that combine elements of both versions while adding new ones. However, these games mix-and-match the version-exclusive Mons lists, meaning that players of these "stand-alone" third versions will need to trade with ''both'' previous versions to get a handful of remaining creatures and complete their Dex. Later on, even these third versions would come in pairs themselves (meaning one can once again trade with a sister game), though [[VideoGame/PokemonBlack2AndWhite2 the first instance of this]] actually served as direct sequels.

* The ''VideoGame/MegaManBattleNetwork'' games started doing this with the 3rd installment. At first, it just affected side bosses and cards. Later, what version you got affected what storyline bosses you faced and abilities you acquired. This means that, for some reason, in one version of ''Battle Network 5'', the Navi in charge of a water world is ''Napalm''[=Man=][[note]]The other Navi, Tomahawkman, is wood element. You get the water element Navi much later, amusingly enough[[/note]].
** Amusingly, despite being the first game to introduce versions, ''Battle Network 3'' zig-zags this; it was originally released as a single game in Japan, and then a later ''Black'' UpdatedRerelease was made that fixed some bugs and added exclusive chips and bosses. When the game was localized for the west, the original version became ''White'' and the updated version became ''Blue''; unless you just wanted to see how the game originally was, there's technically no reason to ever buy White over Blue. [[note]]That is, except for OneHundredPercentCompletion, as the Navi Chips of Mistman cannot be obtained in ''Blue'' without linking up with ''White'' or playing the [=WiiU=] Virtual Console version.[[/note]]
** The game also hilariously inverts the trope in [=MMBN4=], making you play the game over 3 times to get everything you need. In theory this made one game much longer in comparison since you got three times the play time. It even looked so, since there are 6 plotline bosses you can fight, with 2 completely new ones with their own side quests on each rotation. In practice, however, this was anything but fun, as apart from the 2 side scenarios (which are rather short and comprised about 20% of the overall game) everything else was the exact same, and while the enemies also leveled up through each run, they only got more HP and attacking power, rarely adapting their strategy. Effectively you invested three times the playtime for the same thing over and over again.
*** Also in [=MMBN4=], you can link with the other version and fight in a unique tournament against all of the other version's exclusive boss fights. However, while this is accessible right after the first tournament, doing it before 100% completing the game will not only break the game, it will leave it as nothing more than a piece of plastic. [[GameBreakingBug It screws up the order that you get the souls in, crashing the game so bad, you can't even access the title screen to start a new game.]]
** Battle Network 4 also involved a rare chip called the Z-Saver. This chip can only be obtained by linking up your Game Boy to a ''VideoGame/MegaManZero 3'' game. However, each ''Zero 3'' cartridge only contained one copy of the Z-Saver chip, meaning that not only did you have to find another game, you'd also have to find one that hasn't been tapped of its chip (making rental store copies completely worthless, as their chips have already been gutted and put into their own ''Battle Network'' games). This basically meant that if you wanted the chip, you ''had'' to buy another game.
*** Made worse (or better, depending on view) that said game is of a completely different genre (and a very hardcore iteration of said genre to boot!), so while it is vastly different and thus is not "more of the same", it also means that there were good chances that ''Battle Network'' players wouldn't enjoy the needed game at all.

** ''VideoGame/DevilChildren''. Like in ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOracleGames'', the story is different depending on what version you played first - Setsuna, the hero of ''Black Book'', goes to the demon world to rescue his younger brother Nagahisa; Mirai, the heroine of ''Red Book'', goes to find out about her father. It got a sequel set a few years later, ''White Book''. Everything after that continued to be split - ''Light Book'' and ''Dark Book'', then ''Fire Book'' and ''Ice Book''.
** Ditto for ''VideoGame/Persona2'', which predates the ''DDS'' example above. All the choices you made in ''Innocent Sin'' will affect some minor things in ''Eternal Punishment''; Tatsuya and Katsuya's names will change depending on what you put Tatsuya's name as, Tatsuya and Apollo will carry over their stats, and dialogue will change. However, most players out of Japan never got to experience the full duology in that manner, because due to NoExportForYou, the two games for them are on different consoles.

* The ''Film/{{Transformers}}'' [[Film/{{Transformers}} movie]] games for the DS (but not the ''WesternAnimation/TransformersAnimated'' game, also on the DS) are basically the same games split between "Autobot" and "Decepticon" versions. Naturally, some vehicles are only available on one or the other.
** This is lampshaded in an early mission in ''VideoGame/TransformersTheGameDS''; whichever version you are playing, you get a short piece of dialogue with what's implied to be the protagonist of the other version, in which the Decepticon tells the Autobot that "we may be on different sides, but we're both still playing the same game."
** The DS versions of ''[[VideoGame/TransformersWarForCybertron Transformers: War For Cybertron]]'' did the same thing. Notably, each version of the game featured 5 levels from the other and the "Arena" mode was identical. The only real difference between versions is the story and the roster of characters you can unlock for multiplayer (Though you could "bet" your multiplayer characters with other players).

* The arcade release of ''[[VideoGame/VirtualOn Cyber Troopers Virtual-ON: Oratorio Tangram]]'' splits the original cabinet configuration into two flavors, known as ''DNA side'' and ''RNA side''. Both have different interface colors and soundtracks as well as Virtuaroid colors but plays pretty much the same.

* Downplayed with ''VideoGame/TimeCrisis'' (a co-op ''arcade'' game series) starting from the second game. The player will play as one of two characters depending on the cabinet side, and ''4'' has a part in Stage 1 where VSSE agents use ''two'' different weapons ''depending on how good you play'', but it's one for each player. Other than this and the angles, it's pretty much the same.

* Both averted and played straight in ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOracleGames'': the games by themselves are completely different (items, dungeons, bosses and so on), but if you want to complete the storyline you need to play a Linked Game requiring both games. And a linked game is a sort of NewGamePlus. You start off with one more heart container than normal and can access more things than a fresh game.

* The trade paperbacks for {{Crisis Crossover}}s tend to be this way. If they release a book at all for the crossover, it's only for a select group of comics and often omitting major parts of the story. Sometimes it's trimmed to the point that it's completely non-comprehensible.
** ''ComicBook/CivilWar'' is probably the worst offender, with the trade paperback crossing several comic books from the buildup culminating in the character choosing pro or anti-registration, and two comics from the demount. Captain America and Spider-Man appear for handful of panels and the story makes no sense because it omits 90% of the plot.

* A situation like this happened in Canada during the late 90s/early 2000s. To make a long story short, Creator/{{CTV}} had by 1998 been taken over by Baton Broadcasting, owners of CTV's flagship station in Toronto, CFTO-9. A few years prior to gaining control of the network, they'd launched a secondary system on both their CTV stations, as well as independent and even private CBC stations they owned, known as BBS. The BBS lineup had American imports bought and aired separately from CTV's national schedule. Where they didn't own stations, they usually would license the BBS programming to the CTV station in that area. In UsefulNotes/{{Vancouver}} they went to the long-standing CTV affil CHAN-8, known as BCTV, and Victoria-based sister station CHEK-6. CHAN's relationship with CFTO/Baton was never the best (chiefly because CHAN knew and accused CFTO of having too much influence over CTV) and their affiliation deal was set to expire in a few years. In 1997, shortly after making a deal with WIC (CHAN and CHEK's owners) to air BBS programming, Baton launched CIVT, an independent known as "VTV" on channel 32. They promptly took the BBS programming and put it there[[note]]the rest of the station being a knockoff of the original Creator/{{Citytv}} in Toronto, to the point of City head Moses Znaimer accusing Baton chief Ivan Fecan of stealing City's format outright; given Fecan had previously worked for him, it wasn't without reason[[/note]]. In the rest of Canada the BBS lineup had pretty much already merged with the CTV schedule, but in Vancouver, this resulted in shows swapping between stations, as Baton further screwed with CHAN. Eventually when the dust settled, CIVT was now the CTV station for real and the whole "one network for the price of two" situation was done.

* With the advent of the UsefulNotes/CompactDisc in the late 1980s, UK record companies figured out that they could make people buy the same single twice if they gave you different b-sides on [=CD1=] and [=CD2=], even though [=CDs=] had more than enough capacity to fit all from both singles on. Especially egregious examples happened when an interview would be split into a Part 1 and Part 2 to make the buyer HAVE to buy both to hear it all. What's more, in the UK, CD singles were not allowed to exceed 20 minutes, so you would often get dance mixes that were edited down...with the helpful notice that the full version was available on the DJ 12", thus often necessitating collectors would have to splash out for three 20-minute releases that would have all fit on one 80-minute CD. This practice pretty much stopped in the mid 2000s, when one of the CD singles legally had to be two tracks long and at a fixed price of £2 or lower.

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So you GottaCatchThemAll, eh? Well, well, the good folks in Marketing have come up with a wonderful way to encourage [[SocializationBonus social participation]]! They'll divide some of the game's content (characters, {{mons}}, subplots, or so on) between different cartridges!

[[caption-width-right:240:Be glad you don't also have to pony up for ''Mega Man Battle Network 4: Orange Stars''.]]

So you GottaCatchThemAll, eh? Well, well, the folks in Marketing have come up with a wonderful way to encourage [[SocializationBonus social participation]]! They'll divide some of the game's content (characters, {{mons}}, subplots, or so on) between different cartridges!

[[caption-width-right:240:[-Be glad you don't also have to buy\\
''Mega Man Battle Network 4: Orange Stars''.-]]]

So you GottaCatchThemAll, eh? Well, the Marketing department has come up with a wonderful way to encourage [[SocializationBonus social participation]]! They'll divide some of the game's content (characters, {{mons}}, subplots, or so on) between different cartridges!

* In an odd variation, ''VideoGame/Sonic3AndKnuckles'' actually ''was'' one game that was split in half to meet time constraints. The first half, ''Sonic the Hedgehog 3'', contains the first six zones, and the second half, ''Sonic & Knuckles'', contains the remaining zones and an [[AnotherSideAnotherStory additional campaign]] with Knuckles. The ''Sonic & Knuckles'' cart came with a slot on top that allowed it to use what was called "Lock-On Technology" -- placing ''Sonic 3'' inside the slot would combine the two carts into the complete ''Sonic 3 & Knuckles'', unlocking Knuckles' ''Sonic 3'' levels and the hidden [[InfinityPlusOneSword Super Emeralds]].

* ''Final Girl'' is a solo tabletop game that downplays this while still using it as the core of the game. To play it, you need, at minimum, the Core Box (which contains the bric-a-brac used for most of the game's actions) and a Feature Film (which contains the characters, villain, map, and other elements). However, any FinalGirl and any Killer can be used with any of the maps, allowing for a great degree of customization. It doesn't change that you essentially have to pay for two games to play it at all, though.

** ''VideoGame/DevilChildren''. Like in ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOracleGames'', the story is different depending on what version you played first.
** ''VideoGame/DigitalDevilSaga''. The story is completed in the second game, you get bonuses if you have a completed save file from the first game, and choices you made through the first game affect the second one.

** ''Digimon Story'' (''Dusk'' and ''Dawn'''s precursor) did something similar, although there was only one version of the game, several of the 'elite' Digimon required multiplayer features to access. Fortunately, most didn't and the ones that did were only necessary for multiplayer battles and a few side-quests.
*** Veemon, a very popular Digimon with several possible evolutions, required the player to go on Wi-Fi, find someone with the game and match Digimon to make an egg that may turn into a Veemon. Also, several evolutions were there, but the pre-requisite was to, previously, having owned that evolution in your team. As in, you would have to do the matching, leave a special egg in the farm that would take eons to hatch, to get said evolution to THEN be able to evolve your Digimon to it.

* Even VideoGame/CrashBandicoot and VideoGame/SpyroTheDragon got in on the action with ''VideoGame/CrashBandicootPurpleRiptosRampage'' and ''VideoGame/SpyroOrangeTheCortexConspiracy'', two minigame collections on the Gameboy Advance. Each game had trading cards exclusive to their version that you could trade with others, [[CosmeticAward however the cards didn't affect either game in any way]].

* For a while, the ''VideoGame/{{Bomberman}}'' games tried to add {{Mon}}s called Charabombs to the series and started splitting up the portable games into two versions.

* ''VideoGame/{{Medabots}}'', a {{Mons}} series featuring children playing with alien robots rebuilt into toys (no, really) did this. The first three generations of the game subverted it with the Parts Collection games, which were just a series of battles allowing you to get a complete collection of Medals and Parts without having to trade, wrapped in a flimsy ExcusePlot.
** ''VideoGame/MedabotsAXMetabeeAndRokusho'' follows the model of the ''Pokémon'' games. There are Medabot parts and Medals exclusive to each version, so trading is necessary to get everything.

* ''Gundam: Battle Assault 2'' got this treatment in Japan, where the game's roster was split in half and sold as two budget priced titles, one focusing on ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamWingEndlessWaltz Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz]]'' and the other on ''[[Anime/MobileFighterGGundam G Gundam]]'', with the other suits from the [[Anime/MobileSuitGunda original series]] and ''[[Anime/MobileSuitZetaGundam Zeta]]''/''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamZZ ZZ]]'' also split between them.

* Fictional, action figure version: [[Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000 Johnny Longtorso, the Man Who Comes In Pieces]] is a parody of those British model magazines that sell you a part with each issue, requiring you to [[GottaCatchEmAll collect them all]] if you want to finish your model.

** Amusingly, despite being the first game to introduce versions, ''Battle Network 3'' zig-zags this; it was originally released as a single game in Japan, and then a later ''Black'' UpdatedRerelease was made that fixed some bugs and added exclusive chips and bosses. When the game was localized for the west, the original version became ''White'' and the updated version became ''Blue''; unless you just wanted to see how the game originally was, there's technically no reason to ever buy White over Blue.

** Amusingly, despite being the first game to introduce versions, ''Battle Network 3'' zig-zags this; it was originally released as a single game in Japan, and then a later ''Black'' UpdatedRerelease was made that updated the game, fixed some bugs, and added exclusive chips and bosses. When the game was localized for the west, the original version became ''White'' and the updated version became ''Blue''; unless you just wanted to see how the game originally was, there's technically no reason to ever buy White over Blue.

* ''VideoGame/{{Nintendogs}}'' is a rare case of One Game for the Price of ''Three'' (Later five). It was actually planned to have '''[[UpToEleven FIFTEEN]]''' different versions, but [[WhatCouldHaveBeen was scrapped]] as the debugging each version would be too time consuming.

* ''Gundam: Battle Assault 2'' got this treatment in Japan, where the game's roster was split in half and sold as two budget priced titles, one Focusing on ''Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz'' and the other on ''G Gundam'', with the other suits from the Original series and Zeta/ZZ also split between them.

* The first ''VideoGame/FinalFight'' installment had two different SNES ports. There's a few differences in the DynamicDifficulty and power-ups, but the biggest difference is that either Guy or Cody [[MissedTheCall gets too caught up with business in Japan]] to get involved. (which explains why, unlike the arcade version, they're VersionExclusiveContent)

* ''{{VideoGame/Nier}}'' had two versions which were broadly the same except for changing the main character. In ''Replicant'' (Japanese [=PS3=] version), Nier was a young lad trying to keep his sister Yonah safe. In ''Gestalt'' (Japanese 360 and all international versions), Nier was an older man trying to keep his daughter Yonah safe.

* The trade paperbacks for {{Crisis Crossover}}s tend to be this way. If they release a book at all for the crossover, it's only for a select group of comics and often omitting major parts of the story. Sometimes its trimmed to the point that its completely non-comprehensible.
** ''ComicBook/CivilWar'' is probably the worst offender, with the trade paperback crossing several comic books from the buildup culminating in the character choosing pro or anti registration, and two comics from the demount. Captain America and Spider-Man appear for handful of panels and the story makes no sense because it omits 90% of the plot.

* With the advent of CD in the late 80s, UK record companies figured out that they could make people buy the same single twice if they gave you different b-sides on [=CD1=] and [=CD2=], even though [=CDs=] had more than enough capacity to fit all from both singles on. Especially egregious examples happened when an interview would be split into a Part 1 and Part 2 to make the buyer HAVE to buy both to hear it all. What's more, in the UK, CD singles were not allowed to exceed 20 minutes, so you would often get dance mixes that were edited down...with the helpful notice that the full version was available on the DJ 12", thus often necessitating collectors would have to splash out for 3 20 minute releases that would have all fit on one 80 minute CD. This practice pretty much stopped in the mid 2000s, when one of the CD singles legally had to be two tracks long and at a fixed price of £2 or lower.

* The first single "Hajimari wa kimi no sora" of [[Anime/LoveLiveSuperstar Liella!]] from the [[Franchise/LoveLive Love Live! Franchise]] has been sold in two different versions called "Minna de Kanaeru Monogatari Edition" and "Watashi wo Kanaeru Monogatari Edition". Both versions contains the main song and the song 'Dancing Heart La-Pa-Pa-Pa'. But the first variant has the song "Dreaming Energy" and the second variant has "Watashi no symphony" as their third song. Furthermore they differ in their voice dramas.

So you GottaCatchThemAll, eh? Well, the Marketing department has come up with a wonderful way to encourage [[SocializationBonus social participation]]! They'll divide some of the game's content (characters, {{mons}}, subplots, or so on) between different cartridges! Sure, you can still play the game by yourself, beat the FinalBoss and watch the credits roll, but the ''only'' way to get true OneHundredPercentCompletion is to find ''other'' people who have purchased the ''other'' versions (or simply buy the other versions yourself) and trade your exclusive content for theirs. This is particularly common with {{Mons}} games.

* In a similar vein, any time a CombiningMecha set comes out as the multiple parts instead of the whole set (Anime/{{Voltron}}, Franchise/PowerRangers, combining Franchise/{{Transformers}}, etc.) it could count as this; each toy is perfectly playable on its own, but you ''need'' to have them all if you want to do what it's ''supposed'' to do! ''Series/PowerRangersSamurai'' was particularly egregious about this - it requires ''eleven'' full sized Zords in order to complete the Samurai Gigazord. Most series limited the number of mecha to 6 or 7, to match the number of rangers plus one unmanned extra.

* A situation like this happened in Canada during the late 90s/early 2000s. To make a long story short, Creator/{{CTV}} had by 1998 been taken over by Baton Broadcasting, owners of CTV's flagship station in Toronto, CFTO-9. A few years prior to gaining control of the network, they'd launched a secondary system on both their CTV stations, as well as independent and even private CBC stations they owned, known as BBS. The BBS lineup had American imports bought and aired separately from CTV's national schedule. Where they didn't own stations, they usually would license the BBS programming to the CTV station in that area. In UsefulNotes/{{Vancouver}} they went to the long-standing CTV affil CHAN-8, known as BCTV, and Victoria-based sister station CHEK-6. CHAN's relationship with CFTO/Baton was never the best (chiefly because CHAN knew and accused CFTO of having too much influence over CTV) and their affiliation deal was set to expire in a few years. In 1997, shortly after making a deal with WIC (CHAN and CHEK's owners) to air BBS programming, Baton launched CIVT, an independent known as "VTV" on channel 32. They promptly took the BBS programming and put it there[[note]]the rest of the station being a knockoff of the original Creator/{{Citytv}} in Toronto, to the point of City head Moses Znaimer accusing Baton chief Ivan Fecan of stealing City's format outright; given Fecan had previously worked for him, it wasn't without reason[[/note]]. In the rest of Canada the BBS lineup had pretty much already merged with the CTV schedule, but in Vancouver, this resulted in shows swapping between stations, as Baton further screwed with CHAN. Eventually the whole situation resulted in a DisasterDominoes effect (see that page for the whole story); when the dust settled, CIVT was now the CTV station for real and the whole "one network for the price of two" situation was done.