Far Cry 4's Alternate Ending Isn't What You'd Expect

Far Cry 4's campaign has more than one ending. One of these endings can be reached in less than an hour. You might not like it, though.

Warning: The rest of this filled with spoilers.

At the beginning of the game, Ajay Ghale (your character) is returning to the Kyrat region in the Himalayas to spread his mother's ashes. The bus he's riding into Kyrat is ambushed by the colorful Pagan Min. His forces grab you and another passenger and bring you back to his palace. When your blindfold is taken off, you're at a dinner table with your fellow passenger, Min, and his ally Paul.

The dinner is, well, awkward. Pagan Min shows you currency with his face on it to demonstrate his control over Kyrat. He then sticks a finger in your mother's urn and licks the ashes off it. After revealing that the other prisoner belonged to rebel group The Golden Path, he stabs the poor guy in the back with chopsticks. Min's guards drag off the Golden Path member and he excuses himself. He asks you to stay and enjoy the meal.

At this point, you're supposed to flee the palace. And why wouldn't you? Min's clearly a violent psychopath.

However, if you do wait about 13 minutes (according to the imperfectplayers video above), Min will return as promised. He'll apologize for making you wait and then take you on a helicopter ride to a nearby shrine. While walking to the shrine, he'll say that your father was Golden Path leader Mohan. He sent your mother to spy on Min but the two fell in love and had a child. Mohan killed the child, Lakshmana, and drove you and your mother out of Kyrat.

The shrine is the resting place of Lakshmana. The player places his mother's ashes there, completing her dying wish. He then walks outside, where Min is waiting.

"Oh good. Do you feel better now? Get it out of your system? Good. And maybe now we can shoot some goddamn guns," he says. The credits roll.

You can interpet that last line in two ways. The first possibility: Ajay is joining Min's forces and will help him wipe out the Golden Path. The second, more likely one: it's a reference to the fact that players are now going to replay the game and not wait for Min to come back to dinner. This will lead them to the open-world shooter experience that they bought Far Cry 4 for in the first place.

This alternate ending won't satisfy a lot of players. The opening minutes of the game establish Min as a guy you want to fight, not reconcile with. Nonetheless, it's a fun Easter Egg that rewards players for doing the unexpected. I appreciate the extra time and effort it takes to put a secret like that into the game.

Far Cry 4 will debut in North America on November 18th for PC and consoles. The European launch will follow on the 21st.