It's not always as simple as "Halo 1, 2, and 3." Sometimes long-standing game franchises can sprawl and spin-off farther than big fans realize, making for shared universes that might come as a surprise.
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00:00It's not always as simple as Halo 1, 2, and 3.
00:03Sometimes long-standing game franchises can sprawl and spin off farther than big fans
00:08realize, making for shared universes that might come as a surprise.
00:12The Uncharted and The Last of Us series are two of PlayStation's biggest and best first-party
00:17exclusives.
00:18But did you know that one is actually a sequel to the other?
00:21Well, kind of, at least.
00:23In Uncharted 3, there's a newspaper with a headline reading,
00:26Scientists are still struggling to understand Deadly Fungus, an intentional reference to
00:30The Last of Us.
00:31At the time of Uncharted 3's release, however, The Last of Us had yet to be formally announced,
00:36and that newspaper wasn't actually supposed to remain in the game.
00:40Naughty Dog's Neil Druckmann candidly told Kotaku,
00:43"...we just completely forgot about it.
00:45We screwed up."
00:46Fortunately for them, they ended up getting away with it without spoiling their then-upcoming
00:50announcement.
00:51French video game publisher Ubisoft made its reputation by developing some of the most
00:56immersive open-world games on the market, games that emphasize exploration and branching
01:00narratives over linear storytelling and guided adventures.
01:04It's no surprise, then, that Ubisoft would decide to set a few of their fan-favorite
01:07franchises in a shared universe, but the clues aren't always up front.
01:11Fortunately for us, the modern-day sequences of Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag offer some
01:16clarity.
01:17Set in the offices of a video game development studio known as Abstergo Entertainment, a
01:21not-so-subtle front for Abstergo Industries, a.k.a. the Templar Order, the Assassin's rival
01:26faction, these sequences provide several distinct references to Ubisoft's Watch Dogs and Far
01:32Cry 3.
01:33For instance, the security system's presentation offers a blatant reference to the primary
01:37citywide hacking mechanic of Watch Dogs.
01:40Nowhere is our expertise more apparent than in our flagship product, CTOS, a groundbreaking
01:45proprietary security software operating system.
01:49Meanwhile, the Abstergo Entertainment database entry for Ocelot obliquely suggests that Far
01:54Cry 3, the video game itself, could actually be yet another virtual construct of the Animus.
01:59"...Did I ever tell you the definition of insanity?"
02:04Though we rarely see them together, the characters from Rare's Donkey Kong Country, Banjo-Kazooie,
02:10and Conker franchises all inhabit the same universe.
02:13Besides multiple Easter eggs hinting at the connection, the link between these three games
02:18is made explicit in Diddy Kong Racing, in which the titular character recruits the help
02:23of both Banjo the Bear and Conker the Squirrel to defeat an evil intergalactic wizard pig
02:28— appropriately named Whiz Pig.
02:31"...You can't beat me!"
02:33Unlike the Super Smash Bros. series, which features Nintendo's superstar lineup of characters
02:38duking it out as toys, Diddy Kong Racing explicitly implies that Conker, Banjo, and the Kongs
02:44not only share the same universe, but actually might be neighbors.
02:48Rockstar Games' Western action-adventure Red Dead Redemption takes place in 1911.
02:54Their neo-noir action-adventure L.A. Noire takes place 36 years later, and you can bet
02:59your 10-gallon hat they share a universe.
03:02While playing L.A. Noire, not only can you uncover the iconic hat worn by Red Dead Redemption
03:08protagonist John Marston, you can also catch glimpses of his face… on toast.
03:14Just chalk it up to a breakfast miracle.
03:17With ample evidence of a UFO conspiracy that interlinks the background narratives of Grand
03:21Theft Auto V and Red Dead Redemption 2, it's safe to say that Rockstar Games is no stranger
03:26to shared game worlds.
03:28But did you know that Manhunt from Rockstar North was also set in the GTA universe?
03:32A variety of evidence suggests that it is, notably the very location of the game's controversial
03:37narrative.
03:38Manhunt takes place within the fictional setting of Carcer City, a ruthless lampoon of America's
03:43Rust Belt, where street gangs rule the night.
03:46GTA fans who paid enough attention will probably recognize Carcer City from one of its many
03:51subtle appearances in the series.
03:53It's been mentioned at least once in every Grand Theft Auto release since GTA 3, including
03:57the story's spinoffs developed for handheld consoles.
04:00"...in nearby Carcer City.
04:02A good day for law and order as Police Chief Gary Shaver was cleared of corruption charges."
04:09And if there was any doubt, James Earl Cash, Manhunt's sociopathic protagonist, appears
04:13on wanted posters within the Grand Theft Auto universe, most notably in locations like the
04:18police department in San Andreas.
04:20Crime might not pay, but in Rockstar's shared worlds, it'll definitely make you famous.
04:24With its focus on a single-player campaign, Battlefield Bad Company from DICE was a bit
04:28of a departure from the tried-and-true formula of the fan-favorite FPS franchise in 2008.
04:33But the game's humorous narrative, along with its introduction of highly destructible environments,
04:38made it a smash hit.
04:40GameSpot called it, quote, "...quite simply one of the most fun shooters released that
04:44year."
04:45DICE was also responsible for Mirror's Edge Catalyst, the 2016 sequel of their unique
04:49sci-fi action-platformer, also from 2008.
04:52Catalyst expanded the story and gameplay of the original and took a few narrative liberties
04:57in its effort to round out the lore behind Faith Connors and her death-defying run through
05:01the city.
05:02DICE looked into their previous titles to establish a real-world element for the dystopian
05:06future of Mirror's Edge, by placing the boys from Bad Company directly into the expanded
05:10narrative of Catalyst via audio files.
05:13"...and you just called Gabriel Kruger, game."
05:16"...yeah.
05:17We're on first-name basis.
05:18It's a bromance, you know."
05:21Valve Corporation's legendary first-person shooter Half-Life changed the video game industry
05:27when it hit personal computers in 1998.
05:30It tells the heart-pounding story of theoretical physicist Gordon Freeman and his dimension-shattering
05:35discoveries at the Black Mesa Research Facility.
05:38And curiously enough, Black Mesa would prove to be part of the game's connective tissue
05:42to another Valve title, Portal, the award-winning 3D puzzle-platformer released in 2007.
05:48Portal takes players on a wild ride through the Aperture Science Laboratories as they
05:52try to unravel the enigmas of the artificial intelligence known as GLaDOS and learn for
05:57themselves that the cake is a lie.
05:58Astute gamers will recognize the bleak clues in GLaDOS' dialogue that reference the events
06:03of Half-Life, along with a tongue-in-cheek PowerPoint presentation.
06:06Furthermore, Aperture founder Cave Johnson mentions his Black Mesa rivals by name multiple
06:11times in Portal 2.
06:13Whether or not industrial espionage is healthy for business, it's certainly made for one
06:17sweet spinoff.
06:18"...Cave Johnson, new owner and CEO of Black Mesa.
06:21That's right, you've been bought.
06:22First order of business, we're renaming you under the Aperture brand."
06:25While discussing shared universes on his podcast, The Fulbright Company co-founder Steve Gaynor
06:30explained how Gone Home and Bioshock actually take place in the same universe.
06:36In Bioshock 2's DLC Minerva's Den, you can find and play a fictional, vector-graphics-asteroids-esque
06:43title called Spitfire.
06:45Some 50 years later in Gone Home, you can uncover various faux-Super Nintendo cartridges
06:50in Sam's room, including one for Super Spitfire.
06:54Close inspection reveals the game-within-a-game was actually published by none other than
06:59Minerva's Den protagonist Charles Milton Porter.
07:02Gaynor also mentions some other connections.
07:04The airline that Katie takes to go to Europe?
07:07We never named the airline, but their logo is an 80s brand update to the airline that
07:11Jack's plane crashes into Rapture.
07:14The Blazkowicz family has a fairly storied history of violence, and it all canonically
07:19starts with the Nazi-massacring protagonist William J. Blazkowicz in 1992's Wolfenstein
07:263D, which occurs during World War II.
07:29After the family's surname is changed to Blaze, his grandson and namesake stars in 1990's
07:34sci-fi-themed Commander Keen series under the name Billy Blaze.
07:39And then there's the harbinger of doom, a big baddie who gets his left arm and right
07:43leg maimed by BJ in Wolfenstein RPG.
07:47He vows to torment the Blazkowicz family for all eternity, and apparently does just that,
07:53appearing centuries later in multiple Doom games as the formidable Cyberdemon, hobbling
07:58on one robotic leg and swinging one robotic arm.
08:02So it's safe to assume that the heroic Doom guy is actually himself a Blazkowicz, thus
08:07tying together all three of id Software's famous franchises.
08:12On the surface, Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy X-2 couldn't appear more different.
08:18The world of Final Fantasy VII is largely dominated by the Shinra Electric Power Company,
08:23which uses the planet's own life force to create an energy source.
08:27The world of Final Fantasy X-2 isn't.
08:30But that's because it's apparently a prequel.
08:33Yep, at the end of Final Fantasy X-2, players can activate a cutscene by talking to someone
08:39who claims to be researching the planet's life force, which he hopes to someday harness
08:43and fuel cities with.
08:45And guess what the boy's name is?
08:47That's right, Shinra.
08:49Sure, Final Fantasy games have a habit of reusing character names, but this seems too
08:53plot-specific to be just a coincidence.
08:57The Callisto Protocol is a survival horror game set in the furthest reaches of outer
09:02space.
09:03The game places players in the shoes of a prisoner in Black Iron, a prison located on
09:07Jupiter's moon Callisto.
09:09When aliens attack the facility, it's up to the prisoner to fight the invasion and
09:12get out alive.
09:14Developed by Striking Distance and directed by Dead Space co-creator Glenn Schofield,
09:18the terrifying-looking game seems like a far cry from the setting of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds.
09:23However, as a Striking Distance rep confirmed for IGN, the two games are actually linked
09:27by a shared universe.
09:29In an interview with GamesRadar, Schofield said that although a few hundred years and
09:33plenty of space separates PUBG and the Callisto Protocol, hardcore fans would most likely
09:38be able to pick up on the references to the wider PUBG universe throughout the game.
09:43Schofield explained,
09:44"...we're helping PUBG Corps right now as a team of writers, working on the lore for
09:47PUBG and its universe.
09:49It's not going to be really deep, but there will be little connections here and there."
09:54Remedy Entertainment's connected universe is more intricate than many fans realize.
09:58Remedy's 2010 game Alan Wake is a bizarre trip through alternate dimensions.
10:02As the title character searches for his missing wife, he begins to see elements of a story
10:06he wrote coming to life.
10:08Did you know references to Mr. Wake have shown up in Remedy's newer titles?
10:11Quantum Break, released in 2016, features several callbacks to Alan Wake.
10:16For instance, a chalkboard in the game seems to describe events from Alan Wake.
10:19Not only that, another Easter egg revealed live-action footage of Alan Wake himself.
10:24Then came 2019's Control.
10:26Through documents discovered during Control, players learn that the game's federal Bureau
10:30of Control investigated the events of Alan Wake, but unfortunately didn't find much.
10:35Footage of Alan can also be found in a hidden area of the game.
10:38Finally, Control's AWE expansion brought bureau director Jess Faden into conflict with Emile
10:44Hartman, a mad psychologist with ties to Alan and Alice Wake.
10:48The Malaysia-inspired island of Panau is the setting of Just Cause 2, the 2010 open-world
10:53action-adventure game from Avalanche Studios and Eidos Interactive.
10:57It tells the continuing story of chaotic hero Rico Rodriguez and his battle against some
11:02of the world's craziest militant dictators.
11:05Interestingly enough, Panau also makes a subtle appearance in Sleeping Dogs, the Hong Kong-based
11:09action-adventure from United Front Games and Eidos' parent publisher Square Enix.
11:15One Easter egg from Sleeping Dogs definitively places these two games in the same universe.
11:19If your timing and radio station are correct, you'll hear a fun little advertisement that
11:23shouts out the familiar setting of Just Cause 2.
11:26For a relaxing getaway, visit the island of Panau, an exotic location where beauty and
11:32luxury are an everyday pleasure.
11:35First released on Xbox Live Arcade in February 2011, Hardcore Uprising is a Konami-published
11:42run-and-gun video game that feels a lot like Contra.
11:46Because it is.
11:47In fact, the game is not-so-secretly the 13th installment in the Contra franchise.
11:52Game producer Kenji Yamamoto told Siliconera in 2010,
11:56"...the game is really inspired by Contra Hardcore.
12:00And it seems to be a direct prequel, as one of the playable protagonists of Hardcore Uprising,
12:05a soldier named Bahamut, later becomes the big bad guy Colonel Bahamut in Contra Hardcore."
12:11Although you wouldn't know it from any of their recent installments, Lode Runner and
12:15Bomberman actually stem from the same universe.
12:18In fact, Lode Runner is Bomberman.
12:21The proof comes from the ending of the original version of Bomberman on the Nintendo Famicom,
12:26which shows the robotic Bomberman escaping from bondage and becoming human.
12:31But not just any human, he becomes the Lode Runner himself.
12:34Therefore, the original Bomberman is technically the prequel to the original Lode Runner, which
12:39itself features a whole slew of Bomberman sprites.
12:43Since then, the two series have gone their separate ways, but they'll forever be linked
12:47by a long-forgotten metamorphosis.
12:50"...what took you so long?"
12:51"...what took you so long?"
12:52"...what took you so long?"
12:54Japanese video game designer Hideo Kojima likes to fill his games with Easter eggs,
12:59and that's why his graphic adventure game Policenauts offers plenty of clues that it
13:02shares a universe with Snatcher and Metal Gear Solid.
13:06Policenauts has tons of Snatcher references.
13:08In addition to a few direct cameos from the cyberpunk adventure game, there's a Snatcher
13:12calendar in Jun Ishida's office, and Victor Yergin's uses the same brand of sunscreen found
13:17in both games.
13:19There's also a Snatcher target in the police station's shooting range that plays a remixed
13:23version of the game's Pressure of Tension song when it's hit.
13:26In Metal Gear Solid, you can find two promotional posters for Policenauts in the nuclear warhead
13:31storage building, with a third popping up in Metal Gear Solid 2's Sons of Liberty.
13:36Drebin893 drinks a soda called Narc, which is named after the addictive drug in Policenauts,
13:41and there's even a bar named after Solid Snake in Policenauts' old L.A., and that's just
13:46scratching the surface of the cosmic clues.
13:48Happy hunting!
13:49The Red Faction series from Volition and THQ tells the story of the titular faction's resistance
13:54against the oppressive reign of the nefarious Altor Corporation, set amidst a sci-fi future
13:59of dystopian proportions.
14:01Meanwhile, the Saints Row series from Volition and THQ, along with later-day publisher Deep
14:06Silver, chronicles the story of the Third Street Saints, a street gang-turned-global
14:10crime organization who face rival criminals and corrupt law enforcement during their ongoing
14:16slapstick quest for domination.
14:18While the first game in the series was a relatively straightforward GTA clone, later entities…
14:23well, they got a little wild.
14:24You can't kill me.
14:27My people will avenge my death.
14:29Not with a bang, but with a whimper.
14:32As luck and the cheeky developers of Volition would have it, the events of the Red Faction
14:36series actually take place in the future of the Saints Row universe, and the nefarious
14:41Altor Corporation is the link.
14:43The Altor Corporation has been using a secret R&D lab to conduct unethical experiments on
14:49the citizens of Stillwater.
14:51In case you missed it, the episodic expansion packs Altor Exposed and Corporate Warfare
14:55for Saints Row 2 are probably the most overt references to Red Faction's big bad adversaries
15:01in the Saints series.
15:02The first of these two DLC packs lays the groundwork for exposing the megacorp's seedy
15:07operations, while the second installment offers players a chance to, quote, put a permanent
15:11end to Altor's corruption head-on.
15:14The result's one of the craziest canonical crossovers in video game history.
15:18The science fiction stylings of Nier Automata from PlatinumGames and publisher Square Enix
15:23seem like a far cry from the medieval fantasy of Drakengard from Caviar Inc. and Macrospace.
15:29But these two action RPGs are separated by a lengthy span of sequels and studio changeovers,
15:34so they actually exist squarely in the same universe.
15:37The description of Nier Automata on the game's official website tells us its story takes
15:41place in the distant future.
15:43That future is, in fact, the far-flung time period following the events of Drakengard,
15:48which chronicles the dark fantasy story of the deposed Prince Kaim and his efforts to
15:53stop the malevolent Watchers from destroying the world.
15:56Game scholars understand the E ending of Drakengard, in which Kaim and his dragon pal Angelus travel
16:01across a dimensional boundary to fight the Queen Grotesquerie in modern-day Tokyo, to
16:05be the canonical ending that leads into the 2010 hack-and-slash RPG Nier, which is itself
16:10a direct forerunner of Nier Automata.
16:12Don't worry if you're confused, you're not the only one.
16:15In Nier Automata, quote,
16:16"...mankind is driven from Earth and takes refuge on the moon.
16:19Now with the full history laid out before us, we finally understand that particular
16:23Earth to be the alternate history Earth of Drakengard, known as Midgard."