Wish I thought of this on April 1st, but oh well. Thought I'd share some of the things I've encountered in videogames that are completely absurd, but often still cool. It's going to be a bit Armored Core-centric, but that's just because I have that series on the brain right now.
Inconsistent scale: Neon Genesis Evangelion did it for the sake of drama, and I forgive them. Armored Core does it, well, just because. Original Armored Core: One city level had a van coming up to the typical AC's shin. Project Phantasma (or so I've been told) had a van coming up to chest level. AC3 had some 18-wheelers coming up to about ankle height.
Absurdity of scale: Armored Core 3 mission: Cause as much damage as possible to cars in a tunnel to provoke and then eliminate local security. The cars were ankle height at most, and the tunnel was tall enough for an AC to get at least a little bit of vertical movement. How about you defend something by making all the access points too small for an AC to get to?
Mission from Armored Core 2: Another Age: Take out four really big planes... They drop you directly on them, and after taking down all the vital bits of one, you just fly on over to the next. Anyone in the game ever heard of cruise missiles? I still think it's a fun mission, possibly because of the absurdity.
All the "Destroy Massive MT" missions: Big honking target? Cruise missiles. But a tiny AC versus big, bad behemoth makes for a really cool standoff.
In the original AC and Master of Arena, you may find yourself on the moon. You also spend all of AC2 and Another Age on Mars, except for an excursion to Phobos. But the gravity's still the same as on Earth.
Armored Core: Silent Line mission: Have to sneak into a base guarded by perfectly vertical and horizontal, not to mention visible sensor lasers. What's so absurd about a noisy, 60+ foot tall robot sneaking into an oversized building with poorly designed security measures? Well, when you put it that way... Well, it's still fun.
--- Moving on...
Nearly every console RPG out there:
Why is it that there are only about 4-7 people out there making a determined effort to save the world?
First, a handful of goblins were a viable threat. A few game-months later at most, you run from lesser deities, but only because they don't give you enough experience to waste 30 seconds on fighting.
Okay, that's about as far as I'll go for now. I'll leave it up to you, dear readers, to link to the various cliché lists out there.
3 comments:
This one applies to just about any RPG:
You can fit a surprisingly large number of bulky objects into your backpack including, but not limited to, bicycles, broadswords, bazookas (alliteration accidental), enough varied chemical potions to make the most die-hard chemistry teacher quiver in fear of an explosive reaction, and the entire corpse of certain monsters. However, any of the aforementioned items will take up the same amount of space as a single arrow. This restriction can be circumvented, however, since you can often squeeze together identical items so they take up only the same amount of space as one. And despite all this, many characters would be too encumbered by any armor more resilient than a robe.
The average animal you find in the wild has money in the local currency inexplicable contained within it. However, if you try to search for, for example, a live of a certain animal, you'll find that many of seem to lack just this.
One thing I loved/hated about Earthbound/Mother 2: You had pretty limited storage space.
Of course, even then, a pack of gum took up the same amount of space as a bazooka.
I present to you The Grand List Of Console Role Playing Game Clichés.
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