History Main / BeefGate

* In StarControl2, if you try to leave the solar system without first visiting the starbase near Earth, you are forced to fight off enemies continuously everywhere you go. (About every 5 seconds on average). [[BeyondTheImpossible This did not stop people from managing to beat the entire game in this state]], a task which is even harder than it sounds due to the fact that, among other things, no starbase means no speed upgrades, and the game has a time limit.

[[AC:AdventureGame]]

* ''Anno 1602'' gives the three CPU rivals ships equipped with more cannons than the player's one has, thus making it impossible to swiftly dispose of all competition before the game really starts. In addition, two opponents also have much larger ships than the player's default one (resulting in even more cannons and better storage capacities), although this is made up for by their slow speed.
** The player might be able to sink the ship of the opponent sized as their own one, but even being successful in that will cause the player's ship to be heavily damaged making it sail at a much slower pace, thus crippling any kinds of vital trade and exploration processes.
** On the other hand, something the game does not prevent is saving right at the start of the game, seeking out the best islands, reloading the save and then colonising them before the CPU has a chance to.
* ''BreathOfFire II'': You can theoretically return to Gate almost immediately after getting Spar in your party. You are only actually ''supposed'' to return to Gate much ''much'' later, and the encounters in that area prove it.
* ''ChronoTrigger'' has the bucket at the End of Time, which you can reach about three or four hours into the game. Using it takes you to the final boss. Odds are you don't actually ''want'' to use it until you've made it through the actual plot, unless you're using a NewGamePlus.
** Oh the other hand, using this gate to access the final boss earlier than you "should" is key to seeing most of the dozen or so alternate endings.
** To get to the final boss even earlier (it can be the first battle of your game!) in the NewGamePlus, all you have to do is step on the other side of Lucca's teleporter. This isn't available outside of NewGamePlus, however- and unless you did a lot of LevelGrinding the first time around (or went through the first few [[BonusDungeon Bonus Dungeons]] in the [[VideoGameRemake DS remake]]), you might not be up to the challenge then as you have only Chrono and Marle in your party at that point.
* In the original ''DragonWarrior'', the areas on the other side of a bridge generally have much tougher enemies than before; if you wander into the wrong place when you're not leveled-up enough, death awaits you.
** ''DragonQuestVIII'' has an apparent BeefGate in the very first dungeon, but you can intimidate the foe into letting you through without a fight.
* ''EarthboundZero'': There is a very significant difference between the level at which you ''can'' [[spoiler:wake the dragon in {{Magicant}} and fight it]] and the level at which you ''should''.
** Another ''EarthboundZero'' example that's half this and half BrokenBridge: you ''can'' try to simply walk through the tunnel from Merryville to the next area without clearing the path for the train. You just ''[[DemonicSpiders really]]'' don't want to. (It's even {{Lampshaded}} by a talking skeleton you find halfway through the tunnel.)
** In the sequel, {{EarthBound}}, after you get Poo and visit the museum in Summers, Poo declares that the gang needs to head to Scaraba. On the way out, you overhear a call from a curator at the Fourside museum declaring he's found something extraordinary. You're supposed to go back to Fourside first, which results in you collecting two {{Plot Coupons}}, then to Scaraba. If you say 'screw it' and try to head to Scaraba first, the [[ThatOneBoss Kraken]] shows up to give you a not-so-subtle hint to go the other way. (It's possible to beat it at this point, but it takes a lot of luck or level grinding. Really, it's just easier to go back to Fourside.)
** In ''{{Mother 3}}'', arriving on Tanetane Island places one of these guys in your way. You can fight the Zombieshroom (and in fact, it's the only way to get this miniboss in your MonsterCompendium), but you're at the brink of death so you have to enter the MushroomSamba nearby. It will still be there even if you use cheats to last the fight.
* ''EtrianOdyssey'' is madly in love with this trope. For one thing, it's the ''entire point'' of the [=FOEs=]. Beyond that, certain special cases that are even mentioned ''in game'' (usually in the form of a "you get the feeling that the monsters in this area are much too powerful to fight" message or a quest all about having to get something from its lair while absolutely not drawing its direct attention) include [[spoiler:Wyvern]] in Etrian Odyssey, [[spoiler:Salamox]] in Heroes of Lagaard, and [[spoiler:the Stalkers]] in both games.
* RomancingSaGa2 had the Canal Fortress Gate, a door guarded by 4 regenerating monsters, each time you take down one or two, they will respawn, destroying the gate will allow you to enter the fortress, but if you do, you cannot recruit the City Thief Class and you will also have trouble finding your way around the fortress, also said gate fight will have to be repeated if you leave the area and try to get back in
** Pretty much all the 7 Heroes except the first Kujinshi Battle is a Beef Gate.
* RomancingSaGa3 Had the Red Dragon Ruler and the Abyss Naga at the PointOfNoReturn [[spoiler: Huang City]] The Red Dragon Ruler at the start and the Abyss Naga at the end.
* ''{{Fallout}}'' had this as a consequence of being fairly non-linear. 60-80% or so of the towns will be hard for a few levels if you don't visit the starter towns first, but they are all about the same level of difficulty to get to in the first place. Thus, most of the game is unlocked as of level eight or nine, except for the very end-game parts.
** ''Fallout 2'' has a strategy for sneaking into one of the end-game areas and doing the sidequests there by employing talking skills and running away from any actual fight. This can get you very advanced weapons, the second-best armor in the game, and a mountain of XP that would be a fair reward for near-end game characters, but is utterly insane for starting characters. (One quest gives you 20,000 XP. Starting characters can get five levels from that.)
*** In FalloutNewVegas your goal is to head to the titular town from your starting point - Vegas can even be seen clearly from your starter town. However if you travel directly there, you'll get ripped apart by deathclaws. Going the long way round through other towns and grinding levels is the route you're meant to take.
* ''FinalFantasyII'' seemed to have some sort of unnatural hatred for cohesive world map design, and ended up combining a serious case of this trope with incredibly poor directions. The people in town A say that you should visit town B. Outside of town A lie featureless plains and forests in all directions and nothing preventing you from going anywhere, leaving you to have to take a wild guess which way town B is. If you guess wrong, you will be first-turn ''annihilated'' by the very first random encounter in the area surrounding towns M, N, and O that you just accidentally approached. This, combined with how poorly-done the game's system for getting stronger was in the first place, made it a bit of a WallBanger.
** It is not at all unlikely for a new player who, quite understandably, doesn't know which squares house which monsters, to have their ''very first encounter'' in the ''entire game'' be with a ''Behemoth.'' [[NintendoHard On the other hand, maybe that's fitting for this game.]]
** Not only that, there were definite ways to get significantly out of your league even in places you ''were'' supposed to be. At one point, you have to sneak into an occupied town to rescue someone. The way the game handled the occupation is that it looked and acted like a normal town, except that talking to ''anyone'' led to their calling you [[YouRebelScum "Rebel Scum!"]] and triggering a normally impossible battle. This battle is key to the games many [[DiscOneNuke disc one nukes]] by defeating them for decent equipment to fuel your grinding (and after a bit, using it's higher level to increase your stats faster).
** Though the fact that every single person in the town is a heavily armored soldier should be a hint that these guys might not be so friendly. Really the only points in the game where you can easily wander into an extremely dangerous area are in the beginning, when you leave Altair (the first town), and when you get the ship for the first time, making the entire world map accessible. That said, SequenceBreaking is something you can do at any point during the game-- you can twink out your Teleport level by repeatedly entering a town or dungeon and teleporting out (your HP will drop, but never get lower than 1), and using Teleport is one of the best ways to kill many higher-level enemies when you're otherwise outclassed.
* ''FinalFantasyVI'' more or less ended the game with this, with the final dungeon accessible almost immediately into the second half of the game. You'll probably want to [[spoiler:find the rest of your scattered party]] and build some levels first, though.
** The fact that the game demands you split into 3 separate four-character teams when you try to go in should serve as sufficient warning (if you only have enough people to put 1 or 2 on each team, you definitely aren't ready).
** In the same game, it is possible to get a relic that completely disables random encounters. The Final Dungeon also happens to lack mandatory boss fights on all but one of the routes (until near the end), and is filled with tons of goodies...
** ''FFVI'' also had the part with Locke in the occupied Town of Figaro, with his way constantly being blocked by the powerful [=HeavyArmr=] monsters. It is ''technically'' possible to beat them, but would need extensive grinding and loads of healing items. Using the Genji Glove relic makes it doable without all the obscene grinding and good luck.
* ''FinalFantasyVII'' has this trope in the form of the Midgar Zolom, a giant serpent that would crush your party (at that level, of course) if you tried to bypass Kalm and headed straight for the next dungeon. Once you'd been through the long flashback scene in Kalm, though, you'll find that you can get a materia that lets you capture Chocobos. A Chocobo will be fast enough to give the snake the slip.
** It ''is'' possible to just randomly walk past it on foot though.
** In a later town, there's a (hard to get to) underground hallway guarded by an infinite supply of soldiers who will attack in pairs. They're not especially nasty, but you can't hack your way past them because they'll just keep summoning more, so there's not much to do except turn around and go back when you get bored killing them.
* Similarly to [[FinalFantasyIV FF4]], ''FinalFantasyVIII'' allowed players to go straight through the final castle to the BigBad without unlocking most of their action commands. Since this boss has more hit points than a small planet, and any party member who gets KO'd is lost forever, you're probably going to want to solve all or most of the castle puzzles and get your abilities back. (Furthermore, if you're into OneHundredPercentCompletion, the castle bosses can supply you with any Guardian Forces you haven't collected during your quest -- including Eden, which was previously held in a remote area by an unbelievably tough BonusBoss.)
* ''FinalFantasyIX'' combined this with a SolveTheSoupCans puzzle. Taking the wrong exit from an early cave (in spite of an ally's warning) would lead the player to an uninteresting plateau with really, really nasty random encounters. There wasn't anything that the player could ''do'' on that plateau other than fight thunder dragons, so presumably the overpowered bad guys were there to tell you to turn around.
* In ''FinalFantasyXII'', assuming you haven't [[GuideDangIt opened one of the totally random chests that prevents it from spawning]], it is possible to find and enter the Necrohol of Nabudis much earlier than recommended to grab the [[InfinityPlusOneSword Zodiac Spear]]. It's very difficult as it involves dodging large amounts of very nasty enemies, but it can be done.
** Many of the optional Espers are likewise protected. It's theoretically possible to fight Adremmalech or Cuchulain shortly after Belias, but the enemies in their areas will kill you before you even reach them without massive LevelGrinding.
** The very first time you visit the nomad village in the Giza Plains, you may or may not talk to a child that mentions that they are told to stay close to the village, lest werewolves get them. They ARE in fact out there, by the southern exit of the Plains, and will [[OneHitKill oneshot you three times over]] if you aggro them by accident at your current power level.
* ''FinalFantasyTacticsA2's'' Cinquleur missions. You can take the first one ("[[spoiler:The Red King of Cinquleur]]") as soon as you reach the second town, which should be around level ten ''if'' you avoid the plot and do every sidequest you can first, but the actual mission is to take down a level 44 enemy. Should you pull this off, it proves to be [[spoiler:the first in a series of missions against all of Cinquleur's colored kings, each 11 levels stronger than the one before. Thus, the second mission in the chain, "The Blue King of Cinquleur", pits you against a level 55 enemy, and so on.]] If you can pull ''that'' off, all you need to know about the final mission in the chain is that it's called "[[spoiler:[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin The Five Kings]]]]", and that [[spoiler:the titular five kings have all been promoted to '''level 99''']]. Every mission in the chain can be accessed the ''second'' you complete the mission before it, meaning that the only thing stopping you from doing the entire chain as of the second town in the game is your ability to not die trying.
** To be fair, that last mission is only accessible after you've beaten the final boss. As for the others, while certainly difficult, certain {{Game Breaker}}s exist that let you beat them fairly early, and the rewards for that end up being {{Disc One Nuke}}s.

* ''SuikodenI'' has the Kobold Forest. You are not supposed to go there until it is time to meet the elves, but the mobs there can be killed easily with a Fire Rune, leading to you characters being MANY levels ahead of the game. It really helps with the upcoming ThatOneBoss in the next dungeon.
* ''SuikodenII'' had an example of this that was strange enough that it [[GoodBadBugs might not have been intentional]]: near the beginning of the game, when you are still just an orphan with a couple of mercenary friends, you can approach the gate to one of the last areas of the game, Matilda. The gate is locked, and guarded to boot, but for some bizarre reason, you can ''push'' it. That is, you push the entire gate back a few feet, allowing you to slip through the sides, into an area significantly over your level. You don't have a chance against any of the enemies, but if you can run far and fast enough, you can make it alive to a small town you weren't supposed to reach for a few dozen hours, and there you can recruit a couple of characters you weren't supposed to meet until then. Said characters start at levels proportionate to the area, meaning you can use them to power-level your other characters to a ludicrous level before you pick up the main quest line again.
** "Don't have any chance against the enemies"? By that point in time you may already have got the two halves of the True Runes, and Jowy is in your party. You have, in other words, an attack that affects all enemies with a frily good chance of adding the "death" status. [[SaveScumming Save Scumm]] a little and there we go.
* Similar to the ''[[{{Suikoden}} Suikoden II]]'' example, it is possible for ''TalesOfSymphonia'' players early on who navigate the higher-level areas successfully to recruit [[spoiler:Sheena]] early. Interestingly enough, this doesn't cause SequenceBreaking -- instead, a BrokenBridge will kick in and make you do the Asgard Ranch and the wind and light seals before Palmacosta and the water seal, merely rearranging two parts of the Journey of Regeneration (and giving you a few new scenes and some new RelationshipValues-building scenes for your trouble). While doing so makes the game more difficult since the new areas are intended for a party 5-10 levels higher, it's hardly impossible. You ''will'', however, screw up the pacing of the customized weapons, and Palmacosta and the water seal will become ridiculously easy afterwards.
** In TalesOfSymphoniaDawnOfTheNewWorld, there's a room in the Iselia Human Ranch where you can open a shutter and get a card key that will lead you to some new equipment, unfortunately, behind the shutter is also a random encounter that will curb stomp you with ease without a ridiculous amount of level grinding (or just coming back to the ranch later on in the game, though at that point your equipment's much better than what you get.) Fortunately, you're allowed to run away from the fight, at which point you can quickly grab the card key and get the hell out of the room before it starts chasing you again.

** ''CityOfHeroes'' has nothing to stop level 1 players from entering the higher-level city zones--even Peregrine Island, where even the random purse-snatchers have an average level of 50 or so.
*** The sidekicking system, which allows you to temporarily bring one teammate up to your level (but without granting them new powers) would be nigh-useless if all zones were level restricted. This system makes it much easier for friends to play together without worrying about outleveling each other.
*** Unfortunately, since dying sends you to the geographically nearest hospital and not the last one you visited, there are areas (Independence Port, for one) where you can be take two steps in, be cut down, and wake up halfway across the zone with 40+ high-level mobs between you and safety.
** ''WorldOfWarcraft'' has several.
*** The high level zone of Plaguelands located right next to the undead starting zone. There is a gate that separates the zones and some high level [=NPCs=] guarding it, so most players should probably realize they shouldn't go there, but nothing prevents them from doing so, and running into [[http://www.wowwiki.com/Welcome_Bear Extremely Pleasant Bears.]]
*** Redridge Mountains (one of the early zones for Alliance players) is similarly connected (via a big intimidating-looking gate) to the much-higher leveled Burning Steppes.
*** On the other hand, there are a number of zones when there's no such forewarning. Ashenvale is a particularly notable offender, since that zone is smoothly connected to two much higher-level zones (Azshara and Felwood) with no obvious "danger ahead" signs.[[hottip:*:Actually, the "danger ahead" sign is simple: Most high-level areas are much, much less pleasant-looking than the low-level ones. If you go from lovely forested area to scorched, corrupted hellhole, you should probably turn around. Not always reliable, but generally so.]]
*** Similarly, don't try going from Duskwood into Deadwind Pass at less than level 40, unless you have a deathwish or can run very fast. Ironically, there's a quest available around level 40 that requires you to do exactly that.
**** Doubly so on a Horde character: There's an Alliance town in your way that's tricky to bypass. The horde actually have quests to go there around level 30, despite not having a mount and having to run from far south through an Alliance Zone, completely through a hostile town, and then through Dead wind. On top of that becomes the quest you get from there to Kargath which either requires you to go back through that town, up through the opposing faction's starting areas, and then through level 50 zones with far more mobs than deadwind, or you get the longest run in the game. The horde is not happy.
*** The infamous "Wetlands death run," a route that night elf and draenei players originally had to take in order to get to the Alliance capitals in the Eastern Kingdoms for the first time. It was called that because most players go there at fairly low level, since Darnassus and the Exodar are practically ghost towns, and the zone they had to go through is filled with mobs roughly twice their level. Patch 3.0.2 eliminated the death run once and for all by redirecting the Auberdine-Menethil ship to the newly implemented Stormwind Harbor.
**** Anyway, it was always possible to avoid the whole thing by swimming. Assuming you avoid the [[EverythingsEvenWorseWithSharks hammerhead shark]] and the murlocs in Menethil Harbour's waters, the rest of the journey is completely safe (if incredibly long and boring) until you hit the level 10 murlocs guarding the Westfall coast. (This way, you'd actually end up going through the place where Stormwind Harbor is now - before they built it. You have to admire the human builders for turning the towering, vertical, wall-like cliffs that used to be there into a harbor just like that.)
*** Don't ever try to leave Moonglade by way of Timbermaw Hold on a low-level character. ''You will die''. This particular BeefGate, however, is later bypassed in a ''diplomatic'' fashion: The furbolgs can be befriended at higher levels.
*** Ashenvale and Duskwood (both mid-20s zones), and the Hinterlands and Feralas (both mid-40s zones), each contain a little side area in which a raid-boss-level dragon is guarded by several level 62 elite dragonkin. If you're a young'un out exploring the zone to see what's there, you'll be in for a nasty surprise.
*** This is basically the function of "gear check" bosses that appear at the start of some dungeons, such as [[http://www.wowhead.com/npc=24882 Brutallus]] or [[http://www.wowhead.com/npc=13020 Vael]]. These fights require the raid to put out a very high amount of damage in a very short amount of time while not getting killed by periphery attacks. The message is if you aren't well equipped enough ''and'' coordinated enough to beat this thing, you have no business being in the dungeon -- they're typically the second boss or so, so you can still throw yourself against one before it and gear people up.
** ''EverQuest'' had, back in the days before the Plane of Knowledge, a few of these.
*** Kithicor Forest to Highpass Hold was, in the early days, a killer. Kithicor is a newbie zone in the daytime, but at night swarms with level 45+ undead.
*** The run from Steamfont Mountain to Greater Faydark ran through the Lesser Faydark - an extremely treacherous zone that is mainly low-to-mid level but roamed by some extremely strong higher level monsters, including of course the [[DemonicSpiders brownie scouts]] which have a habit of "snaring" (lowering the run speed) of players they attack.
** ''KingdomOfLoathing'' makes a ''habit'' out of this; you need to have a certain amount of Main Stat to adventure in an area. If you've been progressing at a near-equal rate (or worse, specializing only in your main stat) you'll be royally screwed over unless you avoid going to an area after reaching the next level or so.
*** This can be abused for strategy, with specialized tactics to kill monsters far above your level to increase your growth rate.
*** This can gradually be turned into an inversion, though- an experienced player with good skill selection and some good equipment (not even the rare stuff) can pretty handily finish a zone, then have to level grind for a while to be able to continue the game, even though your character would be able to handle the enemies in the next area.
*** It actually isn't very hard to adventure above your designated level as a Pastamancer, provided you have enough main stat(Mysticality) to enter the zone. Get the jump on the enemy(you'll probably need some equipment bonuses to help with this), cast Entangling Noodles, and then beat down with the strongest attack spell you have. Not a particularly mana-efficient strategy though, and if the enemy breaks out or otherwise defeats your Noodles somehow, you'll get Beaten Up [[GlassCannon pretty fast]]. [[ElementalRockPaperScissors Elemental]] monsters tend to be easier to handle for Pastamancers and Saucerors in general, since they can specify the elemental damage type of their spells using spellbooks or some higher-level abilities, and deal [[SuperEffective massive damage]].
** ''EVEOnline'' is perhaps the embodiment of this trope. As soon as you create your character, you can wing it for the nearest low security space. Except of course, your tiny ship is more likely to be blown up by marauding players rather than [=NPCs=].
** If you want to go anywhere after the first twenty levels on a new character in ''FinalFantasyXI'', you'll be needing to make a StealthRun through a BeefGate. This is worse for players from Windurst; the easiest way to reach the Valkurm Dunes - the usual leveling grounds from Lv.10 to Lv.20 - is to cross a freaking ''ocean'' on a boat occasionally infested by very nasty monsters. Hope you set your Home Point once you get there.
*** It gets easier once you hit Lv.20 and are able to apply for your Chocobo License. Although the amount of time you can spend on a Chocobo is limited, enemies won't attack you; the only way to die on a Chocobo is to be caught in an Area Of Effect spell aimed at another player.
**** Additionally, there are areas that Chocobos will refuse to enter, and you must dismount and enter on foot. These are usually the interior areas, like castles and caves.
*** Simply reaching your experience party's camp often requires avoiding monsters within one zone, let alone multiple zones. Valkurm Dunes and Qufim Island are good examples of this, particularly the latter due to dangerous undead creatures wandering at night.
*** For the most part though, a character can travel almost anywhere in the game provided they are good at avoiding mobs and/or have access to the items or spells that give the effects of Sneak and Invisible. Many quests and missions in the game require you to travel to areas that are beyond your ability to pass safely through in a reasonable amount of time without avoiding aggro.
** ''PerfectWorld'' has one third of players start out with the ability to fly, and a wide open map. What prevents you from going to the end-game city? Why, the part where you'll get flying level 80s on your tail. Taking the wrong fork in the road or following a small canyon can likewise have a level 10 player walk straight into level 100s. There is usually warnings, though.
*** Special mention: Everyone in the Human race starts out slightly north of a bridge going over Originia River. Here's a tip: [[SchmuckBait Don't cross that bridge. Really.]] Because on the other side of that bridge, there's highly aggro level 40+ mobs. And if you die there, you'll be warped to a higher-level city. Keep in mind that it is easily possible to go there at level 1 before you get any teleport points. If you're female, you might get lucky enough to have a free ride back to Inn of the Eagle, but if you're male, well, good luck not attracting aggro.
**** Speaking of Originia River, if you're Tideborn, you're using Tideform instead of flying, and you have to get to Etherblade fast, use Originia, not the ocean. Why? Because the ocean steers right around Mount Lantern, which is one of the few areas with higher-level water mobs. Yeah.
** The GaiaOnline MMORPG, ''zOMG!'', pretty much allows players to wander wherever. Oh, sure, if you try to go anywhere but south of Barton to start, guards will stop you, 'cause you aren't strong enough, but that doesn't stop you from walking into suicidally tough areas the long way. In fact, this is pretty much the main reason anyone hangs around to orb farm.
*** It is/was difficult to enter Bass'ken Lake if not close to the recommended level because the Outlaw Pup den was near the entrance and spawned mobs of the beasts.
** ''RagnarokOnline'' can be like this if you happen to enter the wrong map. It doesn't help that the higher a monster's level is, the more likely it is to attack you on sight. Then there are mini-bosses and [=MVPs=], which spawn intermittently on what could otherwise be fairly safe maps. Turn the wrong corner without expecting it, and you'll be dead before you can even register what hit you.
** There is a notable example in ''Maple Story'' -- at the bottom of the clock tower in Ludibrium, there's two paths, and in the last area sits a boss that is almost impossible to avoid, and whose level is guaranteed to be over Level 130. However, the thief class in this game comes with Dark Sight, which protects from physical and touch damage from monsters, but at levels lower than maximum it reduces speed. Hence, any thief with enough speed-enhancing equipment can literally walk through the right-hand one, Thanatos, and get to an area where the only notable feature is a locked door leading to an even stronger, and much-more-famous, boss at the extreme bottom of the clock tower.
** ''TheLordOfTheRingsOnline'' almost breaks this trope in Angmar. If you attempt to cross a certain part of the swamp, your character literally gets scared to death (translation: your "dread" gets so high that it paralyzes your movement and decreases your "morale" until you have none left). A certain quest in the storyline has to be beaten before you can cross this area. Of course, you can still power-level your way through the storyline quests if you so choose, but that does mean there's virtually no way a player can get there without leveling up.
*** To gate content that hasn't yet been added to the game, the east bank of the Anduin is lined with level 65 raid-calibre stealth-breaking archers. Characters with the highest Morale in the game last 2-3 hits against them, and it's seemingly impossible to aggro just one, keeping players on the west bank, in Lorien.
*** The Blue Mountains, a level 5-15 starter area, has an high 40s dungeon, which new players can simply wander into, and instantly die. There are a couple of high level mobs just outside the dungeon, giving fair warning, but high level players tend to kill them on their way in. There's another dungeon in the Barrow-downs, with the same set up.
*** Rivendell is a peaceful haven, but reaching it means running a gauntlet of mid 30s animals, typically done well before players are able to fight their way there, but only once. After that, they can use the stables for a safe ride.
** ''GuildWars'' doesn't do this often, but there is one point early on in the slow-building Prophecies campaign that stands out. From the last town in the second major area, you can continue on into the next area and continue fighting level 8 and 11 enemies; or you can take a side exit into the back end of the penultimate major area, which is full of level 24 enemies packing elite skills, level 28 bosses, [[SandWorm giant ice wurms]], etc. If you're playing through the campaign normally, you'll have tier 2 of 7 armor, no elite skills, limited access to normal skills, no access to other campaigns, and be considerably below the player max level of 20. Oh, and you'll have a max of six party members to take into an eight-man zone. Of course, there are players you can pay to [[SequenceBreaking run]] you down to the town down there with no risk to yourself...
** RF Online has it's fair share of these. It does impose a level 40+ restriction on most areas, but even if you meet the minimum level requirement, you're still gonna get your ass kicked pretty hard. Why? Not only do most monsters here can do enough damage to rearrange your face and a good portion of your upper torso, but they come in swarms. It also doesn't help that there is usually no alternative route, and the fact that they have either a slow-spell or have ridiculously ranged guns.
*** Beast Mountain and Elan are the worst cases. In the former, there is a must-do quest to find a tiny little tube. sounds moderately challenging? When you get there, you are faced with flying hornets that kill you in one hit (and are only a few pixels big from normal distance) that comes wholesale, as well as numerous other bugs that lurk in the tall grass (who alert stronger, more docile mobs nearby). When you have sufficient level you can simply walk across the map, but that's only at levels 60 and above, whereas the aforementioned Quest caps you at level 50. Elan also has such a quest, where you must kill a mob that only spawns one at a time, surrounded by equally strong but useless to you mooks. In addition, even if you have hit the maximum level and are wearing the best set of equipment, and is the tanker class, you'll still have a hard time trying to survive in that place.
* Many a DM in most tabletop games rely on a combination of this and {{Broken Bridge}}s to make sure the players go where the DM leads them. [[http://atrocities.primaryerror.net/ One site with a tabletop RPG clich?ist]] mentioned "T-Rex on the Plains", where the DM puts a T. rex in an area just to keep the players on rails.
* ''TheElderScrolls III: Morrowind'' has mostly native fauna hanging around Vvardenfell... but inside the Ghostgate and in the ruins scattered around the map, you see zombies, ash creatures, monsters and divine beings that can kill you in a single hit if you're not leveled enough.
** ''TheElderScrolls IV: Oblivion'' scaled most enemies to the player's level, but trying to get too far ahead on the wrong quest could easily result in some rather unpleasant encounters with vampires, necromancers, or giant fish [[DoomyDoomsOfDoom Of Doom!]]
** The ''Oblivion'' expansion ''The Shivering Isles'' has the Gatekeeper, an enormous axe-handed golem guarding the gate into the main part of Sheogorath's island. There's no way you can beat him in a straight-up fight, so you have to win a mini-quest in order to kill him and move on. [[spoiler:Later on, you rebuild him to fight off the invaders to the Isles, essentially making a Beef Gate ''on your side''.]]
*** [[spoiler:Actually, enough 100% chameleon arrows fired with a nice bow and good marksman and agility values WILL allow you to kill him without the annoying miniquest.]]
** The Gatekeeper is actually beatable in straight out fight, if you're a high level. So it works a bit more like the other examples here.
* The first two ''{{Gothic}}'' games are practically made out of this trope, with many areas filled with monsters which are too tough to fight until you are strong enough. In a slight twist, many of these areas aren't essential, and contain nothing more than the strong monsters and perhaps some nice treasure, meaning that you can avoid these obstacles by simply not going there - though you may need to XP gained by defeating the beef gates in order to beat stronger ones that are guarding plot-essential areas.
* The SNES version of ''{{Shadowrun}}'' had the Caryards section. To move on, you had to either pay the King to let you leave, or challenge and kill the King in the arena. Which you ''could'' attempt to do at any time, but good luck on that without [[GoodBadBugs abusing that glitch that makes him freeze in place.]]
** It's quite doable without cheating, if you bring a bunch of grenades from the trader in the early parts of the game and level up a bit on the other combatants first.
* ''PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor'' has Gus, a guard who is somewhat difficult to defeat early in the game, but can also be bribed. Beating him is usually doable, though, and gets you some good experience and cash.
* A strip from the ''FoxTrot'' [[NewspaperComics newspaper comic]] featured Jason trying to fight his way through one of these, only to have his sister discover that if you don't attack, it will let you pass by in peace. "The biggest, most dangerous monster in the whole game, and you're ''not'' supposed to take him on?"
* ''{{Arcanum}}'' utilizes this in the main quest, which if you've proceeded as straight-forward as the story appears to be, will lead through the familiar rats and wolves smack into a high level golem that will shatter your weapons and armor. The main quest's difficulty levels off and evens out for quite awhile after rather than starting lower and increasing gradually, but this spike in difficulty forces you to engage in LevelGrinding by searching out and undertaking dozens of wholly irrelevant quests, and/or trolling for random encounters.
** There are numerous ways to defeat (or sneak past) the golems without simply grinding. They're simply the first major test as to whether or not you've built a competent character type. A scientist may simply pour on Molotov Coctails, whereas a mage only needs to have learned a decent attack spell, and a diplomat just needs to have recruited a powerful ally.
* While ''GrandTheftAuto 3'' used a literal BrokenBridge to prevent you from accessing later areas, later versions in the series simply triggered an inescapable high wanted level with an in-story justification. These pesisted until you completed enough missions that the requirements were lifted.
* {{Pokemon}} subverts this in Red, [[NoExportForYou Green]], [[UpdatedRerelease Blue]], [[UpdatedRerelease FireRed and Leafgreen]]. In Lavender Town there are numerous ghost pokemon in the 2nd floor onwards whom all are unidentifiable and, while they won't attack, your pokemon won't attack them either out of fear (yes, including your [[OlympusMons high-levelled, EV-trained Mewtwo]]). They, however, don't prevent you from going onward since all you have to do is flee from them. That is, until you reach the stairs to the very top floor, which is guarded by a boss ghost that can't be battled and won't go away until it's identified with a Silph Scope (which has to be picked up elsewhere) [[spoiler: and identified as a dead Marowak seeking revenge for her and her children's deaths]]. This too, can be a subversion because while you were meant to go into Celadon and come back later, [[GoodBadBugs you can skip that and simply toss a pokedoll at the boss ghost to make it leave without a battle or the scope]].
* The Super Nintendo ''TheLordOfTheRings, Vol. 1'' places Hobbiton and Bree two small screens away from one another: cross a bridge, turn north at the crossroads, and you're in Bree. However, to force you to go through the Old Forest and Barrow-downs, the game places a Ringwraith at the crossroads. By time you've finished going through the roundabout route, the Ringwraith is gone. Arguably brilliant, because, why did Frodo and company go through the Barrow-downs in the book? To avoid the Ringwraiths!
** The PC version did this as well, but there was a way to get past the Ringwraith and leave by the road. Following the book up to that point had you encounter some Elves and learn the command word Elbereth, which caused a Ringwraith to flee from battle.
* The board game ''Game/{{Talisman}}'' is made of three rings, the easy outer ring, harder middle ring, and the final stretch ring. One method to get from the easy ring to the hard ring is to fight the sentinel guarding the only bridge. In fact, the vast majority of the game is spent powering up so you can take the next area, making the game one big grind to beat the Beef Gates (And screw over the other players).
* The Undernet works like this in most ''MegaManBattleNetwork'' games. The first game makes it particularly easy to kill yourself this way; the Undernet looks like the regular Net, and most of it's accessible starting about one-fifth of the way through the game. If you're determined and lucky enough, you can penetrate to the deepest Undernet zone at this point, getting tons of money and some ''murderous'' chips for your trouble.
** In ''MegamanBattleNetwork 6'', you can access a very dangerous part of the Undernet from a secret entrance about halfway through the game. There is even a BonusBoss there, one whose stats are so high that he (and the enemies in the entire area he resides in) might as well be considered post-game material. It is very possible to defeat him as soon as you gain access to the area, but you will need very good reflexes (his attacks consist of StuffBlowingUp almost everywhere).
* Beautifully subverted in the DS game ''Rondo of Swords''. The first stage is a town under attack from several high-level armies; you're at level 1 and you have to escape, pronto. You can do this. You can also '''kill them all'''. With clever use of the terrain and battle system, great patience, and more than a little luck, it's possible to defeat every enemy on the field, including plot-significant enemy [=NPCs=]. [[http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/ds/file/939386/52592 This FAQ]] explains how. In fact, all stages will allow you to win this way no matter what your intended mission is (any [=NPCs=] you kill are back later none the worse for wear), but it's most impressive in the first stage because you couldn't power-level your way through if you wanted to.
* In the Playstation game ''Saga Frontier'' if you are playing as Asellus, you are required early on to fight low-level monsters on certain nearby mountain path. Strangely enough, if you go just a little bit further up the path than necessary, you will find a huge monster guarding a door. This monster is a big time {{Bonus Boss}} that guards a small area that contains [[{{Bonus Boss}}an even bigger boss]] and ending-altering potential. If you can pass the two guardians, you [[spoiler:rescue a human girl. Without rescuing this girl you cannot get the fully human ending.]] As you are ending Asellus' story you climb this path again, but with infinite luck you could take on these bosses early...
* ''GeneForge 5'' had these on almost every single map, usually guarding alcoves of treasure and upgrades. These creatures so spiked in difficulty for the area even combat oriented characters would have to progress elsewhere, then backtrack (if they remember) just to see what could be hidden there, and by then the XP rewards were insultingly meager. There were a few early areas prowled or populated by the terrors of the world so overpowered it would take half the game before the characters could feasibly quest there.
** ''Geneforge 1 & 2'' also had these, as opposed to the BrokenBridge style of 3 and 4. Going the wrong way from the early zones would swiftly lead to being up to one's ass in clawbugs and other mid-game enemies.

* ''{{Zork}}'' seals off its areas by making it so that if you try to wander around in the dark without a light, you'll have an ever increasing chance of being instantly devoured by a grue.
** Not exactly a BeefGate, though, since being eaten by a grue is instant death with no chance to fight back. Several other adventure games, including ColossalCave, feature similar darkness threats (in the original, it was "you fell into a pit and broke your neck.")
* In {{Ultima}} IX there is a dragon in the serpent spine mountains, who tries to prevent you from wandering too far off track until you can handle it. The area past him isn't actually particularly high level- he's more there for plot reasons.
* The ''{{Avernum}}'' series has plenty. Your party is basically capable of wandering wherever they feel like going. If they head into an area they aren't prepared to enter, a roving monster is likely to kill everyone in a few turns, maybe even in ''one''!
* Technically, in ''{{Freelancer}}'', once you get past the initial BrokenBridge you can go wherever you like between missions. Surviving is another matter.
* Beef Gates are very common in ''Heroes of Might and Magic'' series.
* In the ''{{Ys}}'' series, if you wander anywhere you're told not to, like the Abandoned Mine, you're dead meat. Bosses also often act as beef gates, [[ForcedLevelGrinding forcing you to level grind]] or obtain the SwordOfPlotAdvancement, etc.
* In ''S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'' heading into the restricted area of The Bar without authorization will result in you getting marked as an enemy of [[RightWingMilitiaFanatic Duty]] followed by being quickly gunned down by guards.
* The Guardian of Orion serves this purpose in the ''MasterOfOrion'' games.
* Relatively early on in ''DigimonWorld3'', our hero encounters Zambamon, a very high leveled boss whose attack is so strong that your Digimon flees after the first hit. You have to find a special item in a long FetchQuest in order to scare him away. Far later on in the game, you can find Zambamon again and battle him for real. This time your Digimon should be at a high enough level to put up a good fight.
** And at the end of the game, one of the final cities is blocked off by a legion of Knightmon. It is near impossible to win this fight against them, so you have to go to all the other cities and collect the admin keys before entering the city
* A very old example: in the text-based game of ''TheHobbit'', your path is blocked briefly by trolls, who will eat you if you try to fight them. Normally, one waits for daybreak so that they'll turn to stone, but very rarely they can be killed by Thorin and Gandalf. It's also possible to get into their cave early without the key by breaking the door, though by the time you get Sting, they'll have petrified.
* In ''{{Overlord}}'' , when the player first reaches Heaven's Peak, Sir William's citadel is guarded by three Succubi (who are [[DemonicSpiders very powerful flying enemies]]). On top of that, your ''ExpositionFairy'' flat out tells you not to go until you have a reason to.
** Not that killing them will accomplish anything, as the gate to the citadel remains shut tight until you've killed the succubi's KingMook.
* If you go the wrong way during the introductory missions against Nine-Toes in ''{{Borderlands}}'', you'll run up against {{Badass}} Skags twice your level.
** Also, the [=DLC=]s you can visit pretty anytime. This troper beat the game with 3 of his friends at ~35 level. Then we started the 2nd playthrough and decided to shoot some zombies of the first DLC. The very first encounter took us about 10 minutes to care of and a lot of revives.
* Once you get your spaceship, for a time the original PhantasyStar will not attempt to police you with anything but this trope, including things like "directions", "subtle clues" or "the slightest hint whatsoever". Unfortunately, it has not "locked the gate" with very high level monsters, and the spell you need to get into (but not beat) the final dungeon is unlocked at a very low level. If you don't know where to go, you'll soon be able to go everywhere, which makes it even harder to go in the right direction.

* Going directly left of the FirstTown in ''{{Shantae}}'' results in your being assaulted by a pack of nagas--they move quickly, shoot homing [[MakesMeWannaShout screech attacks]], and they have huge amounts of health (moreso at night). You'll need powerful attack items, more health, and possibly one of the optional strong attacks to survive. [[spoiler: Or you can sneak by with Vanishing Cream, but you'll meet a BrokenBridge anyway.]]
* In {{Castlevania}}: Simon's Quest, going left initially is an easy way to get butchered by way-too-powerful enemies.

<<|VideoGameTropes|>>

* The board game ''Talisman'' is made of three rings, the easy outer ring, harder middle ring, and the final stretch ring. One method to get from the easy ring to the hard ring is to fight the sentinel guarding the only bridge. In fact, the vast majority of the game is spent powering up so you can take the next area, making the game one big grind to beat the Beef Gates (And screw over the other players).

** ''EVEOnline'' is perhaps the embodiment of this trope. As soon as you create your character, you can wing it for the nearest low security space. Except of course, your tiny ship is more likely to be blown up by marauding players rather than NPCs.

* Beautifully subverted in the DS game ''Rondo of Swords''. The first stage is a town under attack from several high-level armies; you're at level 1 and you have to escape, pronto. You can do this. You can also '''kill them all'''. With clever use of the terrain and battle system, great patience, and more than a little luck, it's possible to defeat every enemy on the field, including plot-significant enemy NPCs. [[http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/ds/file/939386/52592 This FAQ]] explains how. In fact, all stages will allow you to win this way no matter what your intended mission is (any NPCs you kill are back later none the worse for wear), but it's most impressive in the first stage because you couldn't power-level your way through if you wanted to.

[[caption-width:280:Yes, he's got [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bovine_spongiform_encephalopathy BSE]].]]

* {{Pokemon}} subverts this in Red, [[NoExportForYou Green]], [[UpdatedRerelease Blue]], [[UpdatedRerelease FireRed and Leafgreen]]. In Lavender Town there are numerous ghost pokemon in the 2nd floor onwards whom all are unidentifiable and, while they won't attack, your pokemon won't attack them either out of fear (yes, including your [[OlympusMons high-levelled, EV-trained Mewtwo]]). They, however, don't prevent you from going onward since all you have to do is flee from them. That is, until you reach the stairs to the very top floor, which is guarded by a boss ghost that can't be battled and won't go away until it's identified with a Silph Scope (which has to be picked up elsewhere) [[spoiler: and identified as a dead marowak seeking revenge for her and her children's deaths]]. This too, can be a subversion because while you were meant to go into Saffron and come back later, [[GoodBadBugs you can skip that and simply toss a pokedoll at the boss ghost to make it leave without a battle or the scope]].

** Also, the DLCs you can visit pretty anytime. This troper beat the game with 3 of his friends at ~35 level. Then we started the 2nd playthrough and decided to shoot some zombies of the first DLC. The very first encounter took us about 10 minutes to care of and a lot of revives.

*** On the other hand, there are a number of zones when there's no such forewarning. Ashenvale is a particularly notable offender, since that zone is smoothly connected to two much higher-level zones (Azshara and Felwood) with no obvious "danger ahead" signs.

** ''FFVI'' also had the part with Locke in the occupied Town of Figaro, with his way constantly being blocked by the powerful HeavyArmr monsters. It is ''technically'' possible to beat them, but would need extensive grinding and loads of healing items. Using the Genji Glove relic makes it doable without all the obscene grinding and good luck.

*** Ashenvale and Duskwood (botn mid-20s zones), and the Hinterlands and Feralas (both mid-40s zones), each contain a little side area in which a raid-boss-level dragon is guarded by several level 62 elite dragonkin. If you're a young'un out exploring the zone to see what's there, you'll be in for a nasty surprise.

*** The run from Steamfont Mountain to Greater Faydark ran through the Lesser Faydark - an extremely treacherous zone that is mainly low-to-mid level but roamed by some extremely strong higher level monsters, including of course the [[DemonicSpiders brownie scouts]] which have a habit of "snaring" (lowering the run speed) of players they attack.

** Not only that, there were definite ways to get significantly out of your league even in places you ''were'' supposed to be. At one point, you have to sneak into an occupied town to rescue someone. The way the game handled the occupation is that it looked and acted like a normal town, except that talking to ''anyone'' led to their calling you [[YouRebelScum "Rebel Scum!"]] and triggering a normally impossible battle. This battle is key to the games many disc one nukes by defeating them for decent equipment to fuel your grinding (and after a bit, using it's higher level to increase your stats faster).

* Similarly to [[FFIV FF4]], ''FinalFantasyVIII'' allowed players to go straight through the final castle to the BigBad without unlocking most of their action commands. Since this boss has more hit points than a small planet, and any party member who gets KO'd is lost forever, you're probably going to want to solve all or most of the castle puzzles and get your abilities back. (Furthermore, if you're into OneHundredPercentCompletion, the castle bosses can supply you with any Guardian Forces you haven't collected during your quest -- including Eden, which was previously held in a remote area by an unbelievably tough BonusBoss.)

* Similarly to FF4, ''FinalFantasyVIII'' allowed players to go straight through the final castle to the BigBad without unlocking most of their action commands. Since this boss has more hit points than a small planet, and any party member who gets KO'd is lost forever, you're probably going to want to solve all or most of the castle puzzles and get your abilities back. (Furthermore, if you're into OneHundredPercentCompletion, the castle bosses can supply you with any Guardian Forces you haven't collected during your quest -- including Eden, which was previously held in a remote area by an unbelievably tough BonusBoss.)

The other way to defeat a Beef Gate, of course, is power-leveling (in games that allow you to).

<<|VideoGameTropes|>>
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** To get to the final boss even earlier (it can be the first battle of your game!) in the NewGamePlus, all you have to do is step on the other side of Lucca's teleporter. This isn't available outside of NewGamePlus, however- and unless you did a lot of LevelGrinding the first time around (or went through the first few [[BonusDungeon Bonus Dungeons]] in the [[VideoGameRemake DS remake]]), you might not be up to the challenge then.

** Some other twists on the trope: the bug-ridden temple (which will not open until the player has died many times), and the pyramid (which only opens for a certain level range, closing again when you get too tough for the temple's boss).

* ''FinalFantasyIX'' combined this with a SolveTheSoupCans puzzle. Taking the wrong exit from an early cave would pit the player against some incredibly hard -- but not impossible -- enemies. There wasn't anything that the player could ''do'' there other than fight those monsters, until much later in the game, so presumably the overpowered bad guys were there to tell you to turn around.
** An ally nearby warns you about using that exit.

* ''EtrianOdyssey'' is madly in love with this trope. For one thing, it's the ''entire point'' of the [=FOEs=]. Beyond that, certain special cases that are even mentioned ''in game'' (usually in the form of a "you get the feeling that the monsters in this area are much too powerful to fight" message or a quest all about having to get something from its lair while absolutely not drawing its direct attention) include [[spoiler:Wyvern]] in Etrian Odyssey, [[spoiler:Scylla]] in Heroes of Lagaard, and [[spoiler:the Stalkers]] in both games.