7 Amazing Rewards You Got Too Late for Them to Be Useful 

This is why New Game + needs to be more common. You play through the game as designed once, then you get the amazing, game-breaking item at the start of your second playthrough.

Luigi as an afterthought is essential to the character

The first thing that came to mind was the Fallout 2 Hintbook, which you can get from Father Tully in New Reno after beating the game. It yields 10,000 XP, increases all skills to 300%, and can be used an infinite amount of times. Even better, the in-game description says: "Well, THIS would have been good to have at the beginning of the goddamn game."

At least the Shield Weaver armor can be gotten before playing the Frozen Wilds DLC, which is reasonably huge and has the hardest content in the game.

Zelda 64's Gold Skull Spider quest comes to mind. Kill 100 to get infinite money...once you're at the final area in the game

Correction: once you unlock Luigi, you're meant to play through the game again at which point you can get the true final star.

Unlocking Luigi actually essentially opens a new game +. You are now tasked with recollecting all the stories with Luigi. Once you've collected every star with both Mario and Luigi, it unlocks the Grand Finale galaxy. Still annoying and tedious, but calculatedly so.

It's things like this that really require a NG+ mode to appreciate. Getting the extended master sword and bike when I had nothing really left to do just felt lame. Had you been able to start a new game with those in your inventory, or even unlocked earlier in the story, it would have gone a long way to feel good.

I know that Legion from Mass Effect isn’t a reward technically, but you get him so late in the game that it’s kinda dumb. He’s one of the most unique characters in the whole series and you spend maybe 10% of the game with him

In _Stray,_ the reward for collecting all of the memories is a new cool-looking harness for the player. The earliest possible time you can get it is in the last room of the game. It gets taken from you anyway before you even leave that room.

This is why all games need newgame+ We've beaten the game properly, now let us play for shits and giggles with all the OP stuff we have earned!

This reminded me of getting Legion in Mass Effect 2. Such a cool and unique character, one of my favourites. You want to spend time with him but at that point in the game you've already done everything noteworthy.

When I saw Mario Galaxy on this list, I assumed they were going to talk about the Red Star! You have to beat the game, getting most of the stars and finding hidden green stars as well, and your reward is that it lets you FLY (albeit only in select non-level locations)! Yes, thanks, that would have been very handy a bit earlier!

The Shield-Weaver comes in very handy in NG+ - even after Guerrilla nerfed it in a patch. The only time it’s truly useless is at the beginning of Forbidden West, since its battery is dead.

This reminded me of the sword in Metal Gear Solid 2. It was listed in the instruction manual as one of the weapon in game and you don’t get it until the very end and spend the end of the game panicked trying to figure out a new melee weapon that’s your only weapon when you’ve had guns all game.

Probably in most lists already but no stone unturned in Skyrim is not only incredibly long but also gives you a perk to make money easier in a stage where money has become pretty much meaningless

In Spyro the Dragon 2 your reward for achieving 100% completion is an infinite super flame power up, which is pretty much useless at that point

They could make a list of 70 on this one, feels like every game has this going.

Would have quite liked the assault rifle from The Last of Us a lot earlier. Like when Ellie had to fight that big groomy cannibal armed with nothing but a little knife and whatever she could chuck at him.

I immediately thought of Skyrim, where collecting 24 "strange gems" and a helm gets you the helm of Barenziah, which means you find handfuls of flawless gems in every container in the game. But, of course, this can't possibly happen until you're so far advanced in the game that there's nothing you want to buy and the gems are just annoying clutter. Feh!

To be fair the Shieldweaver from HZD came in useful for the Frozen Wilds DLC which was a lot tougher than the main campaign, and also I found the very last boss fight of the main game had a *lot* of chip damage that would make the fight a painful battle of attrition no matter how much healing you were carrying, and the SW armour negated nearly all of that.

At least HZD had a new game + mode that you could use the shield armor in.

First thing that came to mind was Lanius' giant sword from Fallout New Vegas. Thanks for giving me this weapon for the literally 0 combat left in the game. At least they gave you basically the same thing in the Lonesome Road DLC I guess.

The first thing that came to mind for me was the zenith in Terraria, where you'd have to kill the final boss likely several times before obtaining it. After which, it's little more than a shiny trophy as there's nothing left to bother.

My favorite example is Super Dante in the original Devil May Cry. This option lets you have infinite devil trigger but you only get it after beating Dante Must Die (the absolute hardest difficulty in the first game). I *guess* you can use it for S ranking levels but you’ve already beaten the game at least 3 times when you get this.

The ultima weapon from kingdom hearts series could fit in. Especially with dream drop distance, by the time you get it there’s pretty much nothing left to use it on

Playing through Galaxy with Luigi is actually pretty dope because he breaks the game somewhat, due to his improved jump you can just straight-up skip a lot of stuff lol

Someone already suggested the Omnipotent Orb from Persona 3 which negates all damage except Almighty, but I'd like to go a step higher and suggest the Omnipotent Orb from Persona 5 Strikers. Which you can only get by 1. Beating the game 2. Beating all the main bosses a second time through the Requests system (yes including the final boss, who has two phases) 3. Beating the Reaper superboss, which normally just gives you Joker's best weapon 4. Starting a NG+ on the highest difficulty (note: NG+ only unlocks after beating said superboss) 5. Repeat steps 1-3 in Merciless Mode. This stupid thing requires you to beat P5S's final boss FOUR TIMES, and if you have it there's literally nothing else left in the entire game unless you somehow still haven't gotten the platinum trophy.

I digress when it comes to the Shield Weaver armor. It is beyond useful for the Frozen Wilds expansion, giving plenty of time to use it to its fullest. There's even a uniquely challenging mechanic in that DLC that specifically incorporates the armor.

FF9 Exclaibur 2 Not only do you get near the tail end of the game you also need to get there under an insane time limit at a point when you can't turn back so you missed a lot of interesting things to get an item you can only use on a few bosses

Couple others (that both fit the same vein): Assassin's Creed 4: For solving all the puzzles you get an armor that makes you bulletproof, unfortunately the last puzzle is gated until just before the final mission. Shadow Complex: A suit that makes you indestructible, but you only get it at 100% completion. Like... you did everything, why be indestructible now?

I felt this way about the assistant manager in Arcade Paradise. I was actively trying to get the AM, but unless you halt your main story progress you get them way to late for it to matter

The Iris sumomon from Golden Sun: The Lost Age. You have to make it halfway through the final dungeon before you can even access the area where you get this summon and fight a boss way more intense than the final boss of the game to obtain it. Thankfully, watching a rainbow goddess throw the final boss of the game into a supernova is a good time.

In the game Assassin's Creed 2, the main protagonist Ezio Auditore can acquire both Altair's armor and sword by claiming the artifacts from the tombs of master assassins who came before him to unlock the gate. By the time you have unlocked Altair's armor and sword however, there's not much of the game left to play however.

The Omnipotent Orb in Persona 3, makes you invulnerable to all attacks except Almighty, way too late in the game, and if you dare use it during your Elizabeth fight (the secret boss), she will laugh at you in Megidolaon dealing 10x the Almighty damage you can even take. It's like overkillx10 if you try to cheat your way out with the only item you'd feel safe using in that insane fight, and mind you, this fight is the most difficult fight in the entire Persona series (and afaik, the entire Megami Tensei).

In assassin's Creed Black flag, you can get armor that's invulnerable to bullets, if you complete every Mayan stela puzzle, which means you have to go to pretty much every place in the game. Also, you forgot the fallout 2 manual. Even the item description describes how much more useful it would be if you had gotten it earlier

Gwyn's Greatsword from Dark Souls 1 is one of the best greatswords in the game but you can only use it in New Game+, not to mention you'd have to progress halfway through the game in order to actually be able to exchange Gwyn's boss soul for it.

Also the Stray Beads from Okami. You cannot collect the final 100th stray bead until you have beaten the game's final boss and thus it is only available in new game plus. Of course unlimited Ink (mana), Solar Power (health) and a tenfold increase in damage is insane but come on! Let me use it!

In Onimusha: Warlords the Bishamon Sword can only be found right before the final boss of the game and only with an item gained from completing the optional Dark Realm, a series of progressively more difficult arena battles. Ultimate Mode has you start the game with the Bishamon sword. However to unlock it you need to complete the difficult Oni Spirits challenge mode and to unlock that you need find all the collectible Fluorite in the main game. You’ve got to work for your rewards in Onimusha

In the game ''GUN'', the reward for 100% completion is access to an armoured horse and a hand cannon, both very overpowered. But the only thing left to use them against are the poor sods you find in the frontier towns.

I’d put forward the Ion Battery from Subnautica. Not technically an item, but a blueprint. You get it right near the end of the game when you could’ve used it to conserve so much more power. Sure, you need them to escape with the rocket, but you could’ve used them way back when your sea glide ran out of battery at the worst possible time.

You know the knowledge of being able to cheese Horizon and get the Shield Weaver Armour with a little work straight after leaving the starting area gives me an idea for a new list. 7 End Game Items You Can Cheese Right Away. Another thing for this list would be being able to get the Sword of Aeons after finishing the start of Fable.

It would be nice if these games had new game + modes where you can take advantage of these rewards.

The "undies" Spiderman suit is only unlocked after 100%ing the game. Sure it gives you the power to 1-hit everything, but damn it, I want to swing around practically naked

The universal pylon from Terraria and the finished gun from Enter the Gungeon both require you to completely fill out the respective bestiary, both of which are absolutely massive with a capital BIG.

In Fire Emblem: Three Houses, there's an item called the Chalice of Beginnings. It's a reward for completing the Cindered Shadows DLC sidestory and made available to you as an accesory for any unit in the main story from that point on. Cindered Shadows is only seven chapters and not especially egregious in any way. And the reward is nice for the effort. Whoever equips it gains immunity to effective damage (i.e.: Weapons that deal bonus damage to flyers, cavalry, etc.) as well as the ability to counterattack regardless of range. In the Musou spin-off Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes, however, the Chalice of Beginnings is the final reward you get after completing 450 achievements, which takes at least three full playthroughs covering all of the campaigns, each of which is dozens of hours long. By the time you unlock the Chalice of Beginnings, which has effects similar to what it does in Three Houses, mind you, you have very likely done everything possible that there is to do and is worth doing.

I don't know if you'd count this exactly, but what about Mewtwo in the original RBY games? By the time you have the chance to catch this powerful pokemon you already did all eight gyms and the Elite Four, so there's nothing much else to do. You COULD trade it in game for the end, but only if you had a friend nearby who caught it, two systems, and a link cable. None of which I had lol.

I just saw the title and thought of Sly 2. You have to beat the game 100% to unlock the ability to use the Mega Jump cheat. At that point it is mostly used for exploring the areas on the map you couldn't really explore before if you want to.

I would have included the mirror shield from LoZ the minish cap since you have to beat the final boss twice to get it and even then it’s only marginally useful

The string of beads from Ōkami would fit very well. It’s easily the most powerful weapon in the game, but the absolute earliest you can get it is the beginning of a second play through. You can’t imagine how annoyed I was to collect the first 99 stray beads and have to look up the last one, only to find out I can only get it if I restart the game with a file that already has most of the collectibles anyways.

In Persona 5 Royal, everyone's third tier personas are super cool and useful. It can be tricky unlocking them, especially if you haven't maxed out everyone's confidant links in the vanilla game (which isn't easy to do, especially for Haru), but you'll get a lot of use out of them. Except you can only unlock Violet's final persona on February 3rd, literally the last day with combat, by which point she's pretty much only useable against the final boss (and the New Game+ plus).

I'd argue that the Shield-Weaver outfit for Zero Dawn made the Ultra-Hard NG+ Run a lot easier because of how it has shield gating. So it was not really too late, rather than priming you for NG+

How about the Master Summon Materia from Final Fantasy 7? Not only do you have to acquire every summon materia, but you also have to max level each one. By then, not much can stand in your way.

to be fair there's plenty of Horizon Zero Dawn that can be left until after you've got the Shield Weaver armor. Plus rocking up to the final stretch of the game covered in forcefields just feels powerful!

The Raiden Suit in Metal Gear Phantom Pain. Not only do you have to S Rank every mission in the game, but you also have to wait 2 REAL LIFE HOURS for the suit to be crafted. When I unlocked it, I was so done with the game I never finished crafting it and I still have real life Phantom Pains from it D:

One of my biggest gaming mysteries as a child on Spyro 2: Ripto’s Rage, in which there was a mystery door that could only be unlocked by completing the game to 100%. Almost 20 years later on the Reignited Trilogy I unlocked the door only to find it was a permanent super flame power up, which you literally have no use for because you’ve completed EVERY CHALLENGE

oatchi's infinite rush from pikmin 4. requires 100% castaway rescues meaning you've likely 100%'d the game by the time you get it

A bit surprised not to see the Sword of Aeons on here. In the original Fable it's literally the last thing you ever get, and in The Lost Chapters while you get to play a bit more of the game with it they also significantly reduced its damage. Still ends up being the highest DPS weapon in the game, but that's not quite as fun.

Honestly, many people, myself included, got the Master Cycle Zero before 100% the game. Because the only prerequisite to start the Champion's Ballad quest is to complete the 4 Divine Beasts, it is entirely possible for players to do it without having found every shrine or Korok Seed. I can't remember how many shrines I had finished before beating Maz Koshia, but I know I did it before beating Ganon, which I did when I had completed just 101 shrines. I also know that I still have found less than 600 of the Korok seeds in BotW. As such, the Master Cycle Zero actually WAS pretty useful to me, especially since it was more convenient for the "jump-fences-with-a-horse" korok puzzles than trekking to the nearest stable to get an ACTUAL horse.

If I remember correctly, Luigi was basically New Game + in Super Mario Galaxy. Most of it is the same, but his Cosmic Comet races are much harder than Mario's. He's also slightly harder to control due to his lower traction and floatier jumps. And yes, I am a Luigi fan, thank you very much!

In the original Fable (the Lionhead RPG, not the Westwood point-and-click), pre-expansion, if you kept the Sword of Aeons at the end, then that was a case of getting the most uber weapon in the game off th final boss. Sure, you could continue playing after the end credits, but there wasn't much else that needed doing at that point (unless there were any Demon Doors you hadn't got through yet, or whatever). Once the Lost Chapters expansion came out then you had a bunch more quests and stuff in the expansion area, but the sword was also nerfed somewhat so it wasn't quite as good as it was in the pre-expansion version of the game. Another that comes to mind is from the 1987 dungeon-crawling RPG Dungeon Master (not a DnD game, despite the name). Some way through the game you get the Firestaff, but you can't do much with it until you find the Power Gem to put on the end of it - once you do, you can use it to cast one of several possible random spells, and it also gives the wielder two Wizard levels while they are holding it. The Power Gem is on the bottom-most level of the dungeon, by which point there are possibly only two significant enemies left to deal with - one is the dragon found on that same level and whom you therefore might already have dealt with in order to get to the Power Gem. The other is Lord Chaos, the final boss, on the level above, and whom you need the Firestaff to defeat. Sure, there are a bunch of other monsters in the area with him, but only two different types (and one type is stationary). You can't even backtrack to faff around in earlier levels of the dungeon (not that there's any reason to at this point), because the stairways above Lord Chaos's level are automatically sealed off once you leave the room in which you obtained the Power Gem (though in at least one of the fan-made clones of the game, you can through the gemmed Firestaff over the trigger point and it won't seal the upper doors). I feel like I have played other games which are examples of this, where the final boss drops the best weapon in the game or whatever, but can't bring any more to mind right now...

The Master Cycle is actually essential for 100%ing the game. It makes Korok hunting far less tedious

Ellen giving the seconds tip towards the end was just great

Examples of great unlocks are the Devil Car in Ridge Racer 1 and the Angel Car in Ridge Rager 2, where upon unlocking the Devil Car, you'd also unlock all the tracks in reverse mode, and then when you beat that (in RR2) you'd get the Angel Car and unlock all tracks in reverse mirrored mode, so you had quite a bit of game left to enjoy those unlocks 👍

The fun thing with unlocking Luigi, is rescuing Luigi as Luigi.

Well Luigi is harder to control and acts as a challenge where you collect every star again with a ‘slippery’ character

Something minor, but I always think about; Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess's horse whistle. By the time you get it, you can already transform into a fast running wolf AND teleport over the entire map.

Can we talk about Hoenn's Psuedo-legends? Bagon is locked behind using waterfall in Meteor Falls which requiers the 8th (and last) badge to use, and Beldum is straight up given to you AFTER you've defeat the Champion. Aka, the final boss.

The list will be immense considering how many games have post-game unlocks that are useful during the game itself

I do have to throw out the Final Form you get in Kingdom hearts 2 here, like not only do you not get it until the last world of the game but you ALSO you have to fight RNG to get it to trigger in the first place and THEN you have to go and level up this form to unlock two of the game's three Form Boost passives and the Glide ability.

I did watch it all Ellen! Honest! XD Also, the original Ratchet & Clank has one of these weapons; R.Y.N.O. (Rip You a New One), the single most powerful, and most expensive weapon of the game. So expensive it needs about two playthroughs of the whole story to obtain the Bolts and a farming exploit that needs to be left farming overnight to obtain a substantial amount (which I did). So yeah, like the other entries here, most of the game is done by the time you're able to get it!

Stuff like this reminded me of when i was playing through the shadow of war and mordor games and you beat shadow of war and get a really cool ability to raise the dead while you also take enemies as your own, but its only at the end of the game. Which story wise makes sense but this why i wanted a new game plus for the main story because not only do you get those, you also get some sick looking weapons and armour THAT YOU CANT USE BUT NOW a time that when you get them theres nothing left to do

I always think about pokemon games when it comes to this. You've beaten the whole game? Here have the strongest pokemon and here's your masterball so you don't have to put in any effort to get it. Special shout out to Sword and Shield were they give you a legendary pokemon to make immediately getting the other legendary even easier.

The Shield Weaver armor is pretty handy for a New game+ run on the hardest difficulty tho :)

In the original Final Fantasy XII, there is the Wyrmhero Blade. It has Auto-Bravery and Auto-Faith, high attack, and doesn't require LP to use. However, it requires beating two super-bosses, Omega Mark XII and Yiazmat, to get two of the badges to make it. In The Zodiac Age, you can farm it in Trial Mode.

Tournesol from FF12 (at least the original). One of the best weapons of the game and you basically have do everything but kill the last boss to get it.

As an opposite to this, a weapon you can enjoy early is the scorpion, a sticky grenade pistol in Mass Effect 3

I'm surprised the Blade of the West from New Vegas wasn't on the list. It's one of the best melee weapons in the game and you only get it at the very end from Lanius if you side against the Legion

The Gutsy Bat in Earthbound, available only as a rare 1/128 drop from a rare enemy in the final dungeon beyond the point of no return. It's a fantastic weapon for Ness, even better than the other bat in the dungeon that is in a treasure chest (which has higher attack, but Ness's offense is likely to be so high you'll hit the 255 cap anyway. Why is it fantastic? Massive increase to the Guts stat, which means more crits and more chance of surviving fatal blows. The problem is, while it might be slightly useful during the final boss fight, for a lot of the final boss fight, something completely different which I won't spoil is required to finish it.

There was a way to get The Shield Weaver armour early, although it took a lot of glitches and trickery. But it made the game so much more fun!

I saw the title of this video and immediately thought, "The Shield Weaver Armor from HZD better be in there." And it was. 😊

Thanks Ellen

I had no idea that the j key, l key, and arrow keys let you skip backwards and forwards! That's nice to know! Thanks Outside Xtra!!!

Luigi is a new game plus hard mode. You replay the whole game as Luigi, re-collecting all 120 stars with slippery shoes and a higher jump height than you're used to. Doing so unlocks the 121st star for both your Mario & Luigi files. Also, Luigi has brand new dialog throughout the game, like in the levels where Luigi has a power star and you need to find him in that level to obtain it. Saving Luigi as Luigi gets completely different dialog, like Luigi suggesting that in an infinite universe with infinite possibilities there must be somebody that looks, dresses, sounds, and is named identically to him, so it's not weird at all actually to meet what seems to be a copy of himself. Unlocking Luigi is Super Mario Galaxy's halfway point.

Basically every "best weapon in the game" that can only be obtained by beating the toughest final optional superboss.... Thanks i guess?

You just need to have done the four divine beasts in order to start the DLC, though, so you could theoretically still have a lot of other stuff to complete when you get the motorcycle.

The plasma gun and laser rifle in Deus Ex: Human Revolution. You get them both so late, and they're so easy to miss, that most people don't even know they're in the game. When you get the plasma rifle, the only thing left to shoot is innocent and practically immobile builders!

This made me think of the Concrete powers in InFamous Second Son. You only get it during the fight with the final boss, most likely after you already did all the side missions.

Seeing Ellen cry just makes me wanna give her a hug and say "everything will be alright". Seriously though I love the videos you guys and gals make, few channels on RU-vid can genuinly make me laugh as much as you guys!!! Keep up the good work ❤

I didn't know about using the J and L buttons to rewind YT vids until Ellen mentioned it! Not sure I would want to use them all the time, but thank you! :-D

This reminds me of A Short Hike, where if you've managed to catch every type of normal and rare fish there is to catch in the game and deliver it to the sea captain that wants them, he gives you... A new, fancier fishing rod that makes it easier to catch rare fish. Rare fish that you have no use for now, seeing as you've already caught them all. Also, the first time you give him a unique fish, he will pay you, but every fish of that type after will only give you bait - to make it easier to catch more fish. Which means there is truly absolutely no use for the fancy fishing rod, unless you plan on filling your entire inventory with fish bait for some reason.

Final Fantasy 12's Wyrmhero Blade. An awesome Dragon Quest reference that you can only get by completing the tedious fishing questline and defeating the two most powerful bosses in the game, one of which is the enemy with the most HP and highest level IN THE ENTIRETY OF FINAL FANTASY

Also: the Dragon Rend shout in Skyrim. Great, now that you've probably done literally everything else and became a master dragon slayer, NOW you get the shout that knocks dragons to the ground for easier slaying.

Thanks for mentioning the J/L and arrow shortcuts at the end there. I genuinely didn't know about them !!

I did a beeline through the beasts and dlc so I could use the bike to clean up other quests in botw. Still a little salty they don't let you drive it in the desert, but totk made up for all that.

Knew about the directional keys but the J/L trick was new to me, thanks!

The Wyrmhero Blade in Final Fantasy 12 is such an example. By the time you get the weapon you basically have nothing to use it on

My joy in completing GTA Vice City 100% and unlocking a cool attack helicopter was soon dampened the realization that all I could do with it was menace harmless passers-by.

The utter tease that is legate Lanius sword of the east and helmet. The acquisition was so late that they could have grafted them onto his skin.

My dad only uses Shield-Weaver for travelling, we've nicknamed it the "Falling-off-Cliffs" armour, because he prefers climbing over the mountains to taking a road or fast-travel.