History Main / ThatOneComponent

* ''{{VideoGame/Mindustry}}'' has silicon, which is used for ''every single stage'' of unit production as well as building construction and ammo for certain turrets. It's also a synthetic resource that requires two other resources (sand and coal on Serpulo, or sand and graphite on Erekir) as well with power to produce (and a ''lot'' of power on Erekir, where power is hard to come by as it is). Running out of silicon is so common that fans created a shorthand term [[FanNickname "siligone"]] to refer to it.

* ''{{VideoGame/Mindustry}}'' has silicon, which is used for ''every single stage'' of unit production as well as building construction and ammo for certain turrets, and it's a synthetic resource that requires two other resources (sand and coal on Serpulo, or sand and graphite on Erekir) as well with power to produce (and a ''lot'' of power on Erekir, where power is hard to come by as it is). Running out of silicon is so common that fans created a shorthand term [[FanNickname "siligone"]] to refer to it.

It will typically have several or even ''all'' of these to ensure maximum frustration -- though to take this trope to its most extreme form, the game will feature inventory loss on death too, to ensure that you can lose this precious item while running the gauntlet back to wherever you're supposed to take the damn thing. A truly obnoxious game developer might make That One Component [[RevenueEnhancingDevices available through microtransactions]], forcing you to go through the pain of obtaining it or cough up.

* [[GuideDangIt The game gives you next to no information about where to find it]].
* It's an incredibly RareRandomDrop, requiring you to perform the same actions [[ItemFarming over and over again]].

** Several of the Resources in Duviri qualify. Most of the resources spawn on every spiral... except Ueymag, which only spawns on Sorrow, Fear and Anger, because the island it spawns on, Kullervo's Hold, is only present during these emotions, and you need 200 piece of this stupid semi-fictional cactus meat to build Kullervo. Yao Shrubs and Connla Sprouts are almost as bad, as they're only found in two specific areas of the map, and spawn at a far rarer rate compared to Kovnik, Dracroot and Silphsela; these are necessary not only for the Duviri weapons, but for the Incarnon Genesis of several weapons.

[[folder:Beat 'em Up Games]]

* ''VideoGame/HorizonForbiddenWest'': ''Sac webbing''. Given that it can only be collected from dead machines with an unexploded chemical sac, you'll have to go out of your way ''not'' to hit the gigantic glaring weak spot on their body, and you may even still explode the sac by accident if you don't have the right weapons for the job. Still, it's pretty managable even with something like a bellowback(where the chemical sac is 40 percent of its body) just by being patient and shooting the eyes of the machine for weakpoint damage instead. Then you realize that '''[[BearsAreBadNews fireclaws]]''' [[ThatOneBoss have chemical sacs]], and that a key strategy to defeating a fireclaw is [[SubsystemDamage destroying its sac so it can't use its fire attacks]], and you realize you are in for one slog of a battle if you want that Machine Strike piece.

* ''VisualNovel/ALittleLilyPrincess'' has players choose one activity per weekday, which will give Sara points in one of several stats, which are spent to view story events for character routes. Each activity has one of three outcomes, which usually grant one to three points in one or two stats, although a few outcomes have special effects(doubling stat gain or converting that week's stat gains to another stat). Two stats stand out as exceptionally difficult to level up.

** ''VideoGame/EtrianOdysseyIVLegendsOfTheTitan has Eerie Scales, which make the powerful TP-restoring Amrita [=IIIs=]. These are a notorious post-game item drop when it comes to preparing resources for the superboss fights. They're the conditional drop of Moth Lords, only found on the final floor of the BonusDungeon; not a terrible start, as while they're statistically very powerful [=FOEs=], they're easy to get a preemptive on and are made helpless by arm binds. However, the "condition" is that Eerie Scales are a RareRandomDrop, necessitating Formaldehydes to get them in any reasonable quantity, which means grinding Horrific Breaths off of Nightmare Rams on a different floor (these are at least guaranteed to drop, but Nightmare Rams are still a problem due to their party-wide petrification) to turn into Formaldehydes. Even with all that effort, it takes ''three'' Eerie Scales to make one Amrita III, making this a slow and repetitive process compared to making them from gathering drops in previous games.

* Practically any conditional drop in the ''VideoGame/EtrianOdyssey'' series that requires you to kill a monster with [[UselessUsefulSpell curse damage]]. Due to HealthDamageAsymmetry, this will generally be a long, drawn-out process that will have players reaching for a [[RandomDropBooster Formaldehyde]]. The few conditional drops that are based on RNG rather than killing a monster in a certain way can also be examples, especially if it has a low drop rate.

It's possible for That One Component's rarity to be acknowledged InUniverse, with it being some form of {{Unobtainium}}, but it could be a CommonplaceRare instead. If the item requiring That One Component is powerful but with very low durability, there's a good chance it's TooAwesomeToUse.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Warframe}}'', crafting a [[MiniMecha Necramech]] not only trivializes most of the game's open-world content, but is mandatory to access "The New War" quest from the main storyline, and therefore all the content locked beyond it. The most tedious part is getting four types of spare parts, one for each component recipe because those parts drop only from hostile Necramechs on the Isolation Vault bounties on Cambion Drift. Even one of them can cause trouble, being a LightningBruiser with [[AttackItsWeakPoint only shoulders and spine vulnerable]] and [[ElementalRockPaperScissors damage resistances]] not matching those of every other Drift enemy, but the best option is the highest level bounty, where you have to defeat [[DualBoss three of them]] because despite declared drop rate being 12.5% for each part, damaged pod and engine seem to have [[RareRandomDrop about 5% if not less]].

* ''Videogame/FireEmblemThreeHouses'' has eight types of ore that can be used to restore weapon durability and improve weapons by forging. The three types of ore for the most common weapons are easy to obtain, and Venom Stones fall under JunkRare due to being only used for [[ScrappyWeapon the unimpressive Venin weapons.]] The rarer types (Mithril[[note]]for Sacred and Blessed Weapons as well as Archanea regalia[[/note]] Agarthium [[note]] for Aymr, Agarthian and Devil weapons[[/note]], Umbral Steel [[note]] for Heroes' Relics [[/note]] and Arcane Crystals [[note]] for magic weapons [[/note]]) are only available by shattering the barriers of monster units that may be rare too, or as a reward for limited quests. This severely limits the use of many weapons that have to be repaired with these types of ore, particularly as most of them are only one per save file and have a low durability stat, making them TooAwesomeToUse.

* ''VideoGame/BreakInRoblox: Pizza can be one of the four requirements to save Twado. The only way to obtain Pizza is to go outside and get Pizza Boxes and deliver them to the base, and depending on how many, there can potentially be only ''one'' Pizza Box, resulting in the Reformed badge being unable to be obtained unless someone else has a spare piece of Pizza, since Twado potentially has it as the requirements, and to get one of the pieces required to get the Reformed badge requires you to give the Pizza to the Annoying Kid (not a Golden Pizza, as he will only request it ''after'' you give him the Pizza).

* ''{{VideoGame/Grounded}}'':

* ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedOdyssey'': Ancient Tablets are required for most ship upgrades, but they're also the only resource you can't just pick up in the wild everywhere, or get from disassembling equipment. They're found in ancient ruins all over the Greek world instead, a measly four pieces at a time, and since most of them are locked behind a BeefGate of some sort, you won't be able to fully upgrade the ''Adrestia'' until well into the late game no matter how much leather, wood or iron you've stockpiled. They can also very rarely be bought from blacksmiths in limited quantities, but there are ''dozens'' of blacksmiths in the game and [[GuideDangIt you can't tell which ones are selling the Tablets]]/

* ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedOdyssey'': Ancient Tablets are required for most ship upgrades, but they're also the only resource you can't just pick up in the wild everywhere, or get from disassembling equipment. They're found in ancient ruins all over the Greek world instead, a measly four pieces at a time, and since most of them are locked behind a BeefGate of some sort, you won't be able to fully upgrade the ''Adrestia'' until well into the late game no matter how much leather, wood or iron you've stockpiled. They can also very rarely be bought from blacksmiths in limited quantities.

** The Forsaken require sacrifices to summon that are either rare (deer heads only have a 50% chance of dropping from deer), found on tough enemies (Ancient Seeds are dropped by Greydwarf Brutes and Nests, which constantly spawn greydwarves until destroyed) or hostile biomes (Withered Bones are easy to find in crypts but require surviving the swamps and the crypts), or both (Dragon Eggs in the cold, blizzard-prone mountains, fortunately they can be seen from a distance; Fuling totems are in camps swarming with the BossInMookClothing Fulings).

It's possible for That One Component's rarity to be acknowledged InUniverse, with it being some form of {{Unobtainium}}. If the item requiring That One Component is powerful but with very low durability, there's a good chance it's TooAwesomeToUse.