History Main / StarScraper

* The planned [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_Mile_Tower Sky Mile Tower]] to be erected in Tokyo, which would be [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin a mile tall]] (or about 1.6 kilometers), and closer to an {{arcology}} than a traditional sky scraper. If they get the go-ahead, the time to build it would take more than 25 years.

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[[quoteright:348:[[LightNovel/ACertainMagicalIndex https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rsz_index_movie_elevator.png]]]]

%%* Circe's tower in ''Anime/Ulysses 31''.

* ''Anime/TengenToppaGurrenLagann'': In '''Parallel Works 8''', Earth was shown with conical drill-themed buildings that reached the stars [[spoiler: during the first war between Lordgenome and the Anti-Spirals]].
* Sengoku and company must deal with a hostage situation in one of these in the first episode of ''Anime/CyberCityOedo808''. The building itself is tall enough to reach into low earth orbit.
* The Ziggurat in ''Anime/{{Metropolis}}'', which is directly compared to the Tower of Babel. The project director shoots this down by saying that the Tower was intended to mock God, whereas the Ziggurat is (ostensibly) to glorify him.
* In the ending credits of the anime adaptation of ''VideoGame/MagiaRecordPuellaMagiMadokaMagicaSideStory'', Yachiyo rides an elevator. According to the floor numbers, the building she's in is at least ''2,611'' stories tall. The tower is actually a metaphor of her lifespan as a magical girl, and the floor number is the number of days she survived - just a little above 7 years.
* ''LightNovel/SwordArtOnline'':
** Castle Aincrad. So big, it's essentially a world within a world (though it's actually the entire ''playable'' world of the fictional SAO game, it does get ported to Alfheim in the second arc). The largest floor is 10 kilometers in diameter, and each one is 100 meters high. Given that there are 100 floors, that makes it 10 kilometers high. But then, that's not counting the fact that it all ''floats in the sky''. The anime also depicts a massive structure extending almost as far ''down'', below the first floor.
** The ''Alicization'' arc has Central Cathedral, which is 100 floors tall, and is easily the tallest structure in the entire Underworld. Kirito and Eugeo are imprisoned in the basement, and are forced to fight their way to the top.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheThiefAndTheCobbler:'' [=ZigZag=], the EvilChancellor, has a tower that is ridiculously tall. The minaret with the three golden balls is supposed to be the tallest in the city, but seems fairly normal in comparison.[[note]][[LoopholeAbuse Technically speaking]], Zigzag's tower is ''outside'' of the city.[[/note]]

* There are several planets covered in these in ''Franchise/StarWars'', they're called [[https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Ecumenopolis Ecumenopolis]]. The most prominent is the galactic capital, Coruscant.
-->'''Atton Rand:''' Watch your step, or you'll be falling for hours.

* Parodied in ''Film/WhoFramedRogerRabbit'' with the Toon Hotel in Toontown which according to the lobby elevator is "450 floors" even though it still looks like it exceeds that.
* The setting of ''Film/TheToweringInferno'', which is set aflame by faulty wiring, is treated as one of these, even though it's only about half the necessary 1000+ meters. It's "the tallest building in the world" at 138 stories and 1673 feet (505 meters) tall, which, as of July 2014, would only put it at #5.

* While its height is never mentioned, the model for Barad-dûr (Sauron's fortress) in ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' movies would be over a kilometer high if scaled up to full human scale. Arguably justified since it takes a literal [[OurAngelsAreDifferent divine being]] to keep it together and [[LoadBearingBoss it promptly toppled over after he died]]. [[note]][[AllThereInTheManual Supplemental material]] indicates that it's a kilometer ''and a half'' high.[[/note]]

* In ''Film/SuperMarioBros'', this is how Dinohattan appears on Koopa's toy globe, surrounded by desert and nothing else.

* ''Film/GodsOfEgypt'': Set's obelisk is 2,220 cubits tall, which makes it even taller than the Burj Khalifa.

* The Mile High [=MacIlwaine=] from Nancy Farmer's ''The Eye, the Ear, and the Arm'' is... Well... ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin- a hotel one mile tall.
* Arthur C. Clarke's ''[[Literature/TheSpaceOdysseySeries 3001]]'' contains four towers that reach from the earth to geostationary orbit. Which means they're about ''36 thousand kilometers'' tall--nearly three times the diameter of the planet itself--and several kilometers in diameter. "Seriously tall" doesn't begin to describe it. The engineering problem of actually making something that big and not collapsing under their own weight was solved by constructing them largely from diamond, which was harvested from space (huge amounts of it was ejected from Jupiter in ''2010'').

* Not a skyscraper but a pyramid, the Last Redoubt/Great Redoubt from ''Literature/TheNightLand'' easily qualifies - the main pyramid is seven miles tall, with a 3/4 mile observation tower on top of that.
* The Tyrant's Dark Pyramid in ''Outernet'' is so high it reaches into outer space.
* While not quite an extremely tall building, the starscrapers in Peter F. Hamilton's ''Literature/TheNightsDawnTrilogy'' are named such - as they are skyscrapers IN SPACE. Literally hanging off the outside edge of rotating space habitats.
* Buildings with hundreds of floors are common in the ''Literature/HonorHarrington'' universe. Justified by the ubiquity of counter-grav technology.

* In the short story ''Tower of Babylon'' by Creator/TedChiang, the Tower of Babel does ''not'' get destroyed, and is built up so high that one of the stars crashed into it. (The story takes place in Babylonian cosmology.)
* Spearpoint, the last human city, and its [[spoiler: counterpart on the other side of the world]] in ''Literature/TerminalWorld'' stretches from the ground all the way past the planet's atmosphere, tapering continuously. One character theorizes that they are a form of SpaceElevator from before the fall of mankind and the creation of the [[TechnologyLevels Zones]]. [[spoiler: They are hollow, and lead to a portal inside the planet for starships to use - hence why they extend out of the atmosphere]].

* The Dark Tower in ''Literature/{{Somewhither}}'' rises to a height three times as long as the circumference of the Earth (which means it's approximately one-third of the way to the Moon.)

* ''Bread Overhead'', a sci-fi comedy by Creator/FritzLeiber, has the managerial penthouse of Puffy Bread in one of the stratosphere-tickling towers of New New York, and the SexySecretary telling an unwelcome suitor to go jump out the window, "remembering to shut the airlock after you".

* In ''Series/AlteredCarbon'', the [[FictionFiveHundred ultra-wealthy Meths]] live in gigantic, architecturally impossible towers that pierce the world's perpetual cloud cover by several hundred meters, letting them enjoy perfectly sunny weather every day without the filthy masses toiling in the {{Wretched Hive}}s on the ground offending their sensibilities.

* Sharn, the City of Towers in ''TabletopGame/{{Eberron}}''. Its towers average at around 2 km tall with some of the tallest having half to a full kilometre more. Above them is a flying district of rich people called the Skyway. The city's three dimensional nature means most of the transit takes place with flying vehicules such as Soarsleds and Skybarges.
* Arcologies in ''TabletopGame/{{Shadowrun}}'' can be this.
* The Cardinal's tower in TabletopGame/MutantChronicles is so high that on the top floor, gravity is negligible.

* The Sunspire in ''VideoGame/{{Unreal|I}}'', which shows up in the skyboxes of several maps before you actually reach it. There are seven or eight regularly spaced levels near the entrance, another two near the top, and even then there is a lift that rides at such high speeds the Doppler effect comes into play, which you spend ''ten solid seconds'' on before you reach the other end. And ''that'' is because it's only the top half of the spire that's built into. Its purpose? To send you ''even higher up'' to a FloatingContinent.
* One of the arenas in ''VideoGame/UnrealTournament'', DM-Morpheus[[note]]inspired by the Jump Program scene from ''Film/TheMatrix'', hence the name[[/note]]. To quote the map description:
-->"[[MegaCorp LMC]] knew they had found an excellent arena at the very top of a newly constructed Galaxyscraper [=SuperStructure=]. Thanks to the modern miracle of super tensile solids, these three buildings reach a staggering 12 miles high at their pinnacle. The thin atmosphere and reduced influence of Earth's gravity provide an interesting test of the [[BloodSport tournament]] athlete's ability to adapt and conquer in extreme environments."
* The map returns in ''VideoGame/UnrealTournament2004'' ([=DM-Morpheus3=]) with a similar companion in ''2003'' and ''2004'' (DM-Plunge).
* Whittlebone's (driver of Mr. Slamm) dream is to build one in ''VideoGame/TwistedMetal 2''.
* The Karma Temple in ''VideoGame/DigitalDevilSaga''.
* The Tower of Salvation in ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphonia''. It literally reaches "unto the heavens" and the player never sees its top from the outside.
* The entire point of ''[=SimTower=]'', where the player can build a fully functioning hotel/office complex that spreads over several square blocks, ten underground levels, and up to 500 stories.

* The eponymous [[VideoGame/ExaPico Ar tonelico]] actually reaches out into space. All of humanity lives on it or one of two similar towers, since they're the only things tall enough to reach over [[AfterTheEnd the cloud Sea of Death enveloping the entirety of Ar Ciel.]]
* The TowerOfBabel in ''VideoGame/IllusionOfGaia''. After climbing to the top, the player can look out at the background and see the curvature of the Earth. It also might double as a SpaceElevator, since the allows the main character to simply fly into space to fight the BigBad, without worrying about any pesky little details like "gravity".
* The Cardinal Shaft in ''VideoGame/{{Hellsinker}}''.

* [[BigBad Spectre's]] tower in the first VideoGame/ApeEscape game is so tall it extends into space.
* ''Franchise/{{Halo}}'':
** {{Inverted|Trope}} (literally) in ''VideoGame/Halo4'': On the artificial "[[DysonSphere shield world]]" of Requiem, giant Forerunner structures hang down from the ceiling in the sky, dropping down to nearly ground level. It's actually rather striking, in a beautiful way, since because the "ceiling" is so high that it can't really be seen[[note]](the ceiling is actually visible, but is so distant that one has to look carefully beyond the clouds above to see its texture)[[/note]], the overall effect, visually, is of unimaginably tall skyscrapers that are floating off the ground.
** ''Literature/TheForerunnerSaga'' novels mention that the [[RecursivePrecursors Precursors]] built towers that essentially ''bridged planets''. They were also completely indestructible [[spoiler: excluding a Halo's main weapon]].
* The TowerOfBabel in ''VideoGame/{{Xenogears}}'', an ancient hollow irregular metallic cylinder stretching kilometers into the sky. [[spoiler: It is actually the ancient hull of the kilometers-long spaceship that crashed on the planet in the DistantPrologue of the game, and how humanity first arrived on that world.]]
* The geography of ''VideoGame/DungeonFighterOnline'' includes two continents which may be part of complete worlds, one of which happens to be above the other. (The bottom's sky and clouds eventually turn into the top's ocean and abyssal fogbanks... somehow.) There's a tower connecting them, which players will find fairly early on. While the playable area of the tower isn't that big, it's implied that as players work their way through the multiple in-tower dungeons, they're unlocking access to rapid transit systems and skipping over most of what really is a monumental climb.
* The Tower of Bab-il from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIV'' has its foot in the underworld (which is deep enough that airships have ample sailing space above its mountains), crosses the surface through a huge hole and culminates high in the sky, way higher than the tallest mountains on the world map.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'': The tower called Heaven-On-High in Othard. It actually disappears into the clouds.
* An expansion pack for ''VideoGame/SimCity'' has an addition called Mega-Towers which clearly fit this trope.

* The plastic administrations building of Shachihata, in ''VideoGame/{{OFF}}'', probably takes the cake. It's so tall that the elevator has you manually type in a five-digit floor number between 00000 and 99999. Yes, including the basement and [[spoiler:secret floor]][[note]]Typing in "99999" takes you to the roof, rather than an actual floor[[/note]], the building has a whopping '''100,000 floors'''. And that's not even counting the fact that at least one floor has several floors of its own. That's quite a lot of floors for a building that [[ItMakesSenseInContext merely imports parcels of plastic]].
* Dr. Wily's fortress in ''VideoGame/MegaMan10''.
* The Neo Arcadia Tower in ''VideoGame/MegaManZero 3'' used to be a space elevator connecting Earth and the Moon. ([[AllThereInTheManual Official sourcebooks]] in fact state that this was none other than the [[VideoGame/MegaManX8 Jakob Orbital Elevator]].) It doesn't go quite that far any more, thanks to the [[VideoGame/MegaManX Maverick]] [[GreatOffscreenWar Wars]], but its top floor is still high enough for the curvature of the Earth to be visible.

* The Kobold Tower in ''Shippu VideoGame/MahouDaisakusen'' is a tower so tall that it extends into orbital altitudes.
* The [[spoiler:Empire Porky Building]] in ''VideoGame/{{Mother 3}}'' is made out to be one of these. Every elevator the party takes allegedly leads to the 100th floor where [[spoiler:Porky]] claims to be, and one of the floors hasn't even been fully constructed yet!
* The Shard in ''VideoGame/MirrorsEdgeCatalyst'' is 8000 feet (2.4 km or 1.5 miles) tall, more than four times the height of its original ''VideoGame/MirrorsEdge'' counterpart.

* In ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'', players of SBURB (or SGRUB) alter each others' houses with the game. Since one of the main goals is to reach increasingly high-up Gates in the sky, their houses eventually become these as a matter of necessity. Examples include [[https://www.homestuck.com/story/2681 John's]] house, [[https://www.homestuck.com/story/2576 Terezi's]], and [[https://www.homestuck.com/story/3304 Jade's]]. [[https://www.homestuck.com/story/5272 Later panels]] show that these towers are nearly as tall as the entire BabyPlanet's diameter in the late game. Even later on, they are [[https://www.homestuck.com/story/7912 tall enough to dwarf their planet]].

* ''WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb'': One of the many things the title characters built and lost in a single day comes from "The Doof Side of the Moon", where they built a starscraper that touched the Earth's moon. [[spoiler:When Doofenshmirtz [[ItMakesSenseInContext rotates the moon]], he ends up dragging the starscraper out of the ground [[ItWasHereISwear before Linda can see it]].]]

* ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime'': In the season 6 episode "The Tower", Finn builds an enormous tower reaching into space with a psychic arm in order to find his father and get revenge for him causing Finn to lose his right arm.

* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-Seed_4000 This is the tallest building fully envisioned with design plans. It's not meant for serious construction though.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime'': Finn builds one with a psychic arm in order to find his father and get revenge for him causing Finn to lose his right arm.
* The ''WesternAnimation/ColorClassics'' cartoon "Greedy Humpty Dumpty" has Humpty Dumpty as the king of Fairytaleland ordering the wall around his castle be built high enough to reach the sun, in the mistaken belief that it's made of gold. It does not go well for him when he actually gets there.

* The planned [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_Mile_Tower Sky Mile Tower]] to be erected in Tokyo, which would be [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin a mile tall]], and closer to an {{arcology}} than a traditional sky scraper. If they get the go-ahead, the time to build it would take more than 25 years.

* ''Film/BladeRunner''.

-> ''"Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth."''

--> -- [[Literature/BookOfGenesis Genesis 11:4]] (NIV)

* The Challenge Tower in ''VideoGame/MortalKombat9''. It consists of approximately 300 stone blocks that are stacked on top of each other. Each block represents a battle or mini game.

* The Challenge Tower in ''VideoGame/MortalKombat9''. It consists of approximately 300 stones blocks that are stacked on top of each other. Each stone represents a battle or mini game.

* The Challenge Tower in ''VideoGame/MortalKombat9''. It consists of approximately 300 stones blocks that are stacked on top of each other. Each one represents a battle or mini game.

* The Challenge Tower in ''VideoGame/MortalKombat9''. It consists of approximately 300 stones blocks are stacked on top of each other. Each one represents a battle or mini game.

* The Challenge Tower in ''VideoGame/MortalKombat9''. It consists of approximately 300 blocks, each one representing a battle or mini game.

* ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'': In the episode ''They Call Him Mr. Ed''. Eddy decides to make a non-profit company to booster the Eds' morale by "going up". Ed takes this to be literal and spends most of the episode building an elevator made entirely out of junk. At the end of the episode, the Eds ascend the elevator and reach the Earth's moon. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for the Eds, the elevator breaks and they are left hanging onto the moon. How they manage to get back down to Earth, alive, is shrouded in mystery.]]

* In August 2011, Saudi Arabia announced plans and contracts signed to build a [[http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43988244/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/t/worlds-tallest-building-coming-saudi-arabia/#.Tj1YhGHdVpg 1000-meter building]] called the Jeddah Tower, (previously Kingdom Tower). Yep, that's an even kilometer.

* ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'': In the episode ''They Call Him Mr. Ed''. Eddy decides to make a non-profit company to booster the Eds' morale by "going up". Ed takes this to be literal and spends most of the episode building an elevator made entirely out of junk. At the end of the episode, the Eds ascend the elevator and reach the Earth's moon. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for the Eds, the elevator breaks and they are left hanging onto the moon. How they managed to get back down to Earth, alive, is shrouded in mystery.]]

* The Revolution from the first ''Battletoads'' video game. It serves as the final and most difficult level in the entire game. The Revolution is also known as The Dark Queen's Tower.

* ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'': In the episode ''They Call Him Mr. Ed''. Eddy decides to make a non-profit company to booster the Eds' morale by "going up". Ed takes this to be literal and spends most of the episode building an elevator made entirely out of junk. At the end of the episode, the Eds ascend the elevator and reach the Earth's moon. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for the Eds, the elevator breaks and they are left hanging onto the moon. How they managed to get back down, alive, is shrouded in mystery.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'': In the episode ''They Call Him Mr. Ed''. Eddy decides to make a non-profit company to booster the Eds' morale by "Going up". Ed takes this to be literal and spends most of the episode building an elevator made entirely out of junk. At the end of the episode, the Eds ascend the elevator and reach the Earth's moon. [[Spoiler: Unfortunately for the eds, the elevator breaks and they are left hanging onto the moon. How they managed to get back down, alive, is shrouded in mystery.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy'': In "They Call Him Mr. Ed", Eddy's decision to make a non-existent company centered entirely on going up leads Ed to spend the episode building an elevator out of junk until it eventually reaches the moon.

* The Revolution from the first ''Battletoads'' video game. It serves as the final and most difficult level in the entire game.

--> -- [[Literature/TheBible Genesis 11:4, New International Version]]

* The mysterious tower in ''Anime/ThePlacePromisedInOurEarlyDays'' is so tall it surpasses clouds and mountains. Built in Hokkaido, it is visible from Tokyo on a clear day. That's a distance of more than 800 kilometres as the crow flies - for Europeans, more than double the distance between London and Paris.

Indeed, it is not uncommon for them to be a single city in their own right.

* Sharn, the City of Towers in ''TabletopGame/{{Eberron}}''. It's towers average at around 2 km tall with some of the tallest having half to a full a kilometre more. Above them is a flying district of rich people called the Skyway. The city's three dimensional nature means most of the transit takes place with flying vehicules such as Soarsleds and Skybarges.

* The mysterious tower in ''Anime/ThePlacePromisedInOurEarlyDays'' is so tall it surpasses clouds and mountains. Built in Hokkaido, it is visible from Tokyo on a clear day.

A ''seriously'' tall building. So tall, in fact, that this page's image is probably going to require you to scroll down at least the entire height of your screen again.