History Main / StoryBranchFavoritism

* In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'', the main character Chrom is the only character forced to get married to progress the game, and the only one with a restricted set of possible lovers. He has to choose between [[CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass Sumia]], [[TheLadette Sully]], [[TheOjou Maribelle]], [[StrangledByTheRedString Olivia]] or [[PlayerCharacter a female Avatar]]. However, the game makes it ''very'' clear that Sumia is the preferred choice.
** On the other hand, the Chrom x Sumia plotline gets pretty much gets dropped after Chapter 13, which is about the point that the story becomes more about Chrom and the Avatar and, if he marries her, becomes ''very'' intense due to [[spoiler:her role as an ApocalypseMaiden]].

** On the other ''other'' hand, Chrom and the Avatar have a ''very'' strong bond [[TheNotLoveInterest regardless of gender or (in the case of a female Avatar) marriage]]. The game shows the two developing as {{Heterosexual|LifePartners}}[=/=]PlatonicLifePartners and it's made clear that Chrom considers the Avatar to be the most important person in his life outside of his family. (Fandom also speculates that the male Avatar is the "canon" gender, but that's neither here nor there.)

CuttingOffTheBranches is a SisterTrope, which can be an ultimate expression of StoryBranchFavoritism, wherein the author outright removes the unfavored branches from later continuity. Related tropes also include {{Railroading}} and FollowThePlottedLine, where the writer forces a character to follow a specific path regardless to what other options are available. A GoldenPath is the one of the most noticeable consequences of this trope.

CuttingOffTheBranches is a SisterTrope, which can be an ultimate expression of StoryBranchFavoritism, wherein the author outright removes the unfavored branches from later continuity. Related tropes also include {{Railroading}} and FollowThePlottedLine, where the writer forces a character to follow a specific path regardless to what other options are available.

** Shepard is often portrayed in the default Soldier class, which by the game's own lore makes the most sense in explaining their prowess in combat. This is particularly true in the first game where it is hard to justify how Shepard can match an Asari in biotic power or a Quarian engineer in Tech skills.

** The early Freedom's Progress mission in ''Mass Effect 2'' has the player choose between turning Veetor over to either Cerberus or Tali. If you choose Tali, Veetor shows up at Tali's loyalty mission later to help the two of you out. If you choose Cerberus, the Veetor subplot basically ends right there; Shepard loses that much rapport with his longtime partner Tali, and over nothing, since Veetor's interrogation at the hands of Cerberus fails to turn up any useful information.

* ''Videogame/FalloutNewVegas'' allows for four different endings: either Caesar's Legion, Mr. House, the NRC or the Courier him/herself will dominate the mojave in the aftermath of the game. Unfortunately for a player interested in being openly anti-NCR and/or pro-Legion, however, there are a ton of NCR quests and locations and only a small handful of Legion equivalents. You can play as someone explicitly opposed to the NCR, but the cost is that a very large portion of the game's content will be closed to you.

** In ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'', during Samara's loyalty mission, you can choose to kill Samara and recruit her target Morinth if you want to and Morinth will be a loyal squad mate for the rest of the game. The favoritism doesn't show up until ''VideoGame/MassEffect3''. If Samara survives her loyalty mission and the suicide mission, then in ''[=ME3=]'' she will show up when you do the Ardat-Yakshi Monastery mission and it will make that mission a much richer experience. If Morinth survives said events of ''[=ME2=]'', all you get is an email from her at the beginning of ''[=ME3=]'', and then during the final mission, you fight her as a Banshee, kill her, and move on.
*** This is quite justifiable when one considers the background facts. Despite the DracoInLeatherPants[=/=]SympatheticVillain treatment she gets, Morinth is bluntly characterised in her first appearance as a hedonistic serial killing psychopath. She has absolutely no interest in Shepard's mission at all and only tags along to keep him from blowing her head off or revealing that she escaped Samara. Naturally, once the Collector Mission is over, Morinth goes back to kill-whoring her way across the galaxy again and dismisses the Reaper threat as being "not her problem". [[DeathByIrony Up until they seek her out for her Ardat-Yakshi genes and turn her into a Banshee, anyway]].

*** Again, justified. Veetor is clearly emotionally unstable and from a species that is physically frail to begin with. Cerberus, despite the fact they are currently working ''with'' Shepherd, are in reality a xenophobic bunch of human supremacists who have a ''bad'' history of messing with things beyond their understanding or doing stuff that is just plain crazy -- case in point, their experiments with Thresher Maws, which included ''injecting Maw acid-venom into peoples' veins to see what the hell would happen''. That giving Veetor to Cerberus only serves to piss Tali off and yields absolutely nothing of value should be obvious from a mile away, especially to people who played through the first game.

* In ''VideoGame/TalesofSymphonia'', the ending where your party ends up with Kratos is noticeably less developed than the ending with Zelos. Several sidequests are dependent on Zelos' presence in order to be completed, but there are almost none that are exclusive to Kratos. Kratos also has only a single [[AndYourRewardIsClothes alternate costume]] while Zelos has several. Additionally, picking Kratos will also automatically set Lloyd's soul mate as Colette regardless of what his RelationshipValues are at, basically forcing you to pick Zelos if you want Lloyd to end up with anyone else. The sequel, ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphoniaDawnOfTheNewWorld'', outright made the ending with Kratos [[CuttingOffTheBranches non-canon]] by revealing that [[spoiler: Zelos is still alive]].

* In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'', the main character Chrom is the only character forced to get married to progress the game, and the only one with a restricted set of possible lovers. He has to choose between [[CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass Sumia]], [[TheLadette Sully]], [[TheOjou Maribelle]], [[StrangledByTheRedString Olivia]] or [[PlayerCharacter a female Avatar]]. However, the game makes it ''very'' clear that Sumia is its prefered choice.

* Inevitable in most {{Role Playing Game}}s where the GM will attempt to steer the party towards the story branch they want the game to follow, regardless as to how the party may have handled earlier encounters.

* In ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'', the main character Chrom is the only character forced to get married to progress the game, and the only one with a restricted set of possible lovers. He has to choose between [[CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass Sumia]], [[TheLadette Sully]], [[TheOjou Maribelle]], [[StrangledByTheRedString Olivia]] or [[PlayerCharacter a female Avatar]]. However, the game makes it ''very'' clear that Sumia is its prefered choice.
* ''VideoGame/ChronoCross'' gives the player the option to either take on a long quest to find the antidote for Kid's poison or ignore Kid's plight entirely. Guess which route is the more climactic?
** The fact that refusing to help Kid results in a DeusExMachina doesn't exactly do that branch any favors, either.

* In ''FireEmblemAwakening'', the main character Chrom is the only character forced to get married to progress the game, and the only one with a restricted set of possible lovers. He has to choose between [[CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass Sumia]], [[TheLadette Sully]], [[TheOjou Maribelle]], [[StrangledByTheRedString Olivia]] or [[PlayerCharacter a female Avatar]]. However, the game makes it ''very'' clear that Sumia is its prefered choice.

** Shepard is often portrayed in the default Soldier class, which by the games own lore makes the most sense in explaining his prowess in combat. This is particularly true in the first game where it is hard to justify how Shepard can match an Asari in biotic power or a Quarian engineer in Tech skills.

In a story that allows for some degree of StoryBranching, a character is presented with a clear number of choices each with their own viable outcomes. However, one of these options sometimes appears to be substantially more developed then the others or appears to coincide better with the plot as a whole, as if the author wanted the players to follow this path and added all others as [[RedHerring mere diversions]]. This is an example of StoryBranchFavoritism on the developer's part, where a particular branch of the story features more content or is better developed than others--but does ''not'' [[CuttingOffTheBranches render any of the other branches as non-canon]].

* Played with in Creator/MarvelComics' ComicBook/WhatIf series, where writers were able to print several stories based on [[AlternateHistory Alternate Histories]] of the established canon. Although most of these were stand alone stories, popular entries such as SpiderGirl gained there own series in time.

* ''VideoGame/KingsQuest 6'' has a branching storyline. Although there are many variables that dictate who shows up at the finale wedding, the choice of taking the "short path" or the "long path" is the most important. As the "long path" is happier, just about everyone (and the official novelization for that matter) chooses that as the "real" one. See the entry at GoldenEnding.

* In the gimmick film ''Film/MrSardonicus'' just before the end, producer William Castle appears and asks the audience to hold up cards so as to [[MultipleEndings vote for whether Sardonicus lives or dies]]... but Castle only filmed one ending.

* Played with in Creator/MarvelComics' WhatIf series, where writers were able to print several stories based on [[AlternateHistory Alternate Histories]] of the established canon. Although most of these were stand alone stories, popular entries such as SpiderGirl gained there own series in time.

** In Mass Effect 2, during Samara's loyalty mission, you can choose to kill Samara and recruit her target Morinth if you want to and Morinth will be a loyal squad mate for the rest of the game. The favoritism doesn't show up until Mass Effect 3. If Samara survives her loyalty mission and the suicide mission, then in Mass Effect 3 she will show up when you do the Ardat-Yakshi Monastery mission and it will make that mission a much richer experience. If Morinth survives said events of Mass Effect 2, all you get is an email from her at the beginning of Mass Effect 3, and then during the final mission, you fight her as a Banshee, kill her, and move on.