History VideoGame / ArxFatalis

* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler: Everything seems to be okay, Akbaa is banished forever, his cult is wrecked and beheaded, king Lunshire meets his long-lost daughter and "rebels", who turn to be her protectors, probably will rejoin Arx kingdom... but they are still forced to live underground and neither the Am Shaegar nor Noden have power to bring the sun back to Arx. ]]

%% PuzzleBoss: [[spoiler: Black Beast.]]
* TheReveal: [[spoiler:The player character being from another world. The discovery of the lost princess of Arx Fatalis and why the Sisters of Ederneum are helping the Human kingdom.]]

''Arx Fatalis'', made by Creator/ArkaneStudios, is a first person WesternRPG that was intended as a SpiritualSuccessor to the ''VideoGame/UltimaUnderworld'' series, and has become [[SugarWiki/NeedsMoreLove somewhat]] of a CultClassic.

* DropInNemesis: [[spoiler: In dwarven mines you are hunted by Black Beast, a {{Nigh Invulnerab|ility}}le OneHitKill MightyGlacier PuzzleBoss. You have to activate a steam hammer, lure the beast under it by whatever means and smash it. This, howewer, just slows it down, but now you can move into other room and throw a lever, which releases another lever, which, it turn, opens the LavaPit so you can lure the monster there. Hell, Black Beast is so slow, so why bother with whole hammer thing? Let's go for the lava already! Well, go and try. Once you throw the lever, the damn creature starts ''running'', effectively going {{Nigh Invulnerab|ility}}le OneHitKill LightningBruiser. Naturally, [[OhCrap your chances of survival plummet]].]] Also, see KarmicDeath below.

* KarmicDeath: [
** [spoiler: The key for the outer world door is possessed by King Lunshire and can't be stolen. Opening the door is completely unnesessary and has no quest related, so in order to open it you must murder the king (who is actually nice and tragic person) to satisfy your curiosity. However, if you open the door, a powerful gust of wind [[NonStandardGameOver freezes you solid]] and dead.]]

* MamaBear / PapaWolf: The dragon, exact gender unknown. Subverted as it can sell one his egg to the PC. Double subverted as it knows it's necessary for saving the world and at least wants a compensation for such a sacrifice.

* NobodyPoops: Averted. Alotar, the king of goblins, shouldn't drink wine, as his stomack can't hold it. So, in order to get him out of his locked trone room, you douse his dinner with wine, and HilarityEnsues.

* PuzzleBoss: [[spoiler: Black Beast.]]

* ShouldersOfDoom: Ylside armor.

* WellIntentionedExtremist: [[spoiler: [[BigBad Iserbius]] genuinely believes that [[GreaterScopeVillain Akbaa]] will bring the sun back.]]
** [[spoiler:Also, Captain Carlo, who assassinated the queen because he suspected her in a conspiracy against the king, but could not tell the latter, knowing it would break his heart.]]

* AmnesiacHero

* BalefulPolymorph: Lord Inut.

* BodyHorror: [[spoiler:Akbaa at the end of the game.]]

* EnergyBeing: [[spoiler:Guardians while in Noden]].

* FeigningIntelligence: Goblins. ''All'' goblins, every time. And it's charming.
* FungusHumongous: In the Rat Men level.

* GridInventory / InventoryManagementPuzzle

* ItemCrafting

* KarmicDeath: [[spoiler: The key for the outer world door is possessed by King Lunshire and can't be stolen. Opening the door is completely unnesessary and has no quest related, so in order to open it you must murder the king (who is actually nice and tragic person) to satisfy your curiosity. However, if you open the door, a powerful gust of wind [[NonStandardGameOver freezes you solid]] and dead.]]

* TheUnintelligible: The Ratmen.

* [[spoiler: BittersweetEnding: Everything seems to be okay, Akbaa is banished forever, his cult is wrecked and beheaded, king Lunshire meets his long-lost daughter and "rebels", who turn to be her protectors, probably will rejoin Arx kingdom... but they are still forced to live underground and neither the Am Shaegar nor Noden have power to bring the sun back to Arx. ]]

* FakeDifficulty / AcceptableBreaksFromReality: Lampshaded beautifully and justified by the dragon, who goes on a speech about this being Am Shaegar's powers and limitations due to him being a [[spoiler: Guardian from another world]]. According to dragon, what we see as SaveScumming is some TimeTravel realted power which allows the [[spoiler:Guardian]] to foresee potentionally dangerous situations.

* GuideDangIt: Some of the actions you must make to progress have incredibly vague hints, or almost none at all.

* WellIntentionedExtremist: [[spoiler: [[BigBad Iserbius]] genuinely believes that [[BiggerBad Akbaa]] will bring the sun back.]]

* BanditMook: Ratmen can steal your money diring a fight.

* ApocalypseHow: A bit of a strange example as, while the sun burning out has caused somewhat of an apocalypse, most have survived it. Also [[spoiler: the ending suggests there is hope of moving back to the surface in the future]].

* [[spoiler: BittersweetEnding: Everything seems to be okay, Akbaa is banished forever, his cult is wrecked and beheaded, king Lunshire meets his long-lost daughter and "rebels", who turn to be her protectors, probably will rejoin Arx kingdom... but they are still forced to live underground and neither the Am Shaegar nor Noden have power to bring the sun back to Arx.]]

* {{BFS}}: [[spoiler: Inut's Giant Magic Sword.]] A lessser one is Giant Slayer blade. They, however, require a great strength to use.

''Arx Fatalis'' made by Arkane Studios, is a first person WesternRPG that was intended as a SpiritualSuccessor to the ''VideoGame/UltimaUnderworld'' series, and has become [[SugarWiki/NeedsMoreLove somewhat]] of a CultClassic.

* AllJustADream: [[spoiler: The most frightening scene in the game involves Alia and Am Shaegar sitting on the bed (possibly after a sexual intercourse). Camera cuts to Alia's face, which suddenly transforms into ghoul-like creature from the crypt. The next second the scene repeats itsels, but without her transformation.]]

* MightyGlacier: [[spoiler: Liches, Black Beast and Akbaa himself.]]

* AwesomeYetPractical: {{Fireball|s}} and Speed spells. [[spoiler: And the Ultimate Weapon.]]

* AdvancingBossOfDoom: [[spoiler: Black Beast]].

* AwesomeYetPractical: [[{{Fireballs}} Fireball]] and Speed spells. [[spoiler: And the Ultimate Weapon.]]
* BadWithTheBone. Guess what is Am Shaegar's first weapon.

* [[spoiler: BittersweetEnding. Everything seems to be okay, Akbaa is banished forever, his cult is wrecked and beheaded, king Lunshire meets his long-lost daughter and "rebels", who turn to be her protectors, probably will rejoin Arx kingdom... but they are still forced to live underground and neither the Am Shaegar nor Noden have power to bring the sun back to Arx.]]
* BlingBlingBang. ''Nastily'' subverted. [[spoiler: With a secret spell you can summon an extremely tough warrior demoness, armed with a {{BFS}} and clad in what looks golden Ylside armor, who attacks you. After you kill her, in a fair fight or using some trick, she explodes, but you can pick up her sword and a random piece of her armor (helmet, leggings of chestplate) appears in your inventory. However, those pieces are breakable, have no model (they become invisible if you put them on), and have poor armor class compared to Ylside armor. While the leggings have decent armor class (the second largest, actually), they're still half as strong as the Ylside ones and not worth the fight. and the chest plate, probably due to mistake, is only as good as the plain chestplate (''four'' times worse than Ylside). At least the golden helmet plays it straight, as it's the strongest helmet in the game.]]

* BonusBoss: a hidden spell summons (which one depends on RandomNumberGod) either a huge lightning-fast rat or a warrior demoness with a {{BFS}} who has [[AllYourPowersCombined all your enemies' powers combined]] and is nearly impossible to kill.

* DifficultButAwesome. Drawing runes with the mouse to cast spells requires practice (especially in combat), but looks magnificent.
* DiscOneNuke.[[spoiler: After some early quest, nothing prevents you from travelling to the very rock bottom of the world, where you can get some nice weapons and items and ''tons'' of XP.]]
* DistressedDamsel: Alia, though only episodically, and Shany.
* DropInNemesis. [[spoiler: In dwarven mines you are hunted by Black Beast, a NighInvulnerable OneHitKill MightyGlacier PuzzleBoss. You have to activate a steam hammer, lure the beast under it by whatever means and smash it. This, howewer, just slows it down, but now you can move into other room and throw a lever, which releases another lever, which, it turn, opens the LavaPit so you can lure the monster there. Hell, Black Beast is so slow, so why bother with whole hammer thing? Let's go for the lava already! Well, go and try. Once you throw the lever, the damn creature starts ''running'', effectively going NighInvulnerable OneHitKill LightningBruiser. Naturally, [[OhCrap your chances of survival plummet]].]] Also, see KarmicDeath below.

* InfinityMinusOneSword: [[spoiler: Four of them (the stronger the sword the harder it is to obtain): Giant Slayer blade, forged two-handed sword, giant life-draining, paralyzing sword of Inut, mithril two-handed sword. The latter may be later remade into InfinityPlusOneSword. ]]

* KarlMarxHatesYourGuts. Subverted twice: At the beginning, goblins don't trade jewels because trolls, who do the mining work, went on strike. So, you can buy cheap "goblin mine" stock certificates, then improve the situation with mines yourself and sell them back at double cost as their price rises. Later, if you bring a book about commerce and finance to a troll king, he'll screw the goblins and sell jewels himself, and you, as a friend of trolls, will have a HUGE discount. Otherwise played stright. Also subverted if you have high Intuition, but it's completely useless in any other situation.
* KarmicDeath: [[spoiler: The key for the outer world door is posessed by King Lunshire and can't be stolen. Opening the door is completely unnesessary and has no quest related, so in order to open it you must murder the king (who is actually nice and tragic person) to satisfy your curiosity. However, if you open the door, a powerful gust of wind [[NonStandardGameOver freezes you solid]] and dead.]]

* KillItWithFire: Fireball / Incinerate woks wonders with Ylsides, as well with everything else [[spoiler: except Akbaa which is [[ContractualBossImmunity deliberately fireproof]]]]. Mummies are especially sensetive to fire.
* LightningBruiser: Pretty much every tough enemy ( and player himself with Speed and the Ultimate Weapon). Ylside (well, at least until their Speed spell empties their mana bar), a dragon, summonable Demon Rat and Demoness Warrior and, the worst,[[spoiler: Black Beast in turbo mode (see DropInNemesis).]]

* {{Mama Bear}} / {{Papa Wolf}}. The dragon, exact gender unknown. Subverted as it can sell one his egg to the PC. Double subverted as it knows it's necessary for saving the world and at least wants a compensation for such a sacrifice.

* PuzzleBoss: [[spoiler: Black Beast]].

* SignificantAnagram: [[spoiler: Suiberis is Iserbius]].

* StoneWall. An interesting case is that it can be played UpToEleven. If you pump every point into defence, you will efficiently and very quickly become NighInvulnerable.[[spoiler: Even Black Beast, a OneHitKill on legs, can't hurt you; however, being also NighInvulnerable (though rather MightyGlacier), it can corner you and make you starve to death.]]

* WellIntentionedExtremist: [[spoiler: [[BigBad Iserbius]] genuinely beleives that [[BiggerBad Akbaa]] will bring the sun back.]]

http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Arx_Fatalis_cover_8603.jpg

''Arx Fatalis'' made by Arkane Studios, is a first person WesternRPG that was intended as a SpiritualSuccessor to the ''VideoGame/UltimaUnderworld'' series, and has become [[NeedsMoreLove somewhat]] of a CultClassic.

* AllJustADream: [[spoiler: The most frightening scene in a game involves Alia and Am Shaegar sitting on the bed (possibly after a sexual intercourse). Camera cuts to Alia's face, which suddenly transforms into ghoul-like creature from the crypt. The next second the scene repeats itsels, but without her transformation.]]

* BlingBlingBang. ''Nastily'' subverted. [[spoiler: With a secret spell you can summon an extremely tough warrior demoness, armed with a {{BFS}} and clad in what looks golden Ylside armor, who attacks you. After you kill her, in a fair fight or using some trick, she explodes, but you can pick up her sword and a random piece of her armor (helmet, leggings of chestplate) appears in your inventory. However, those pieces are breakable, have no model (they become invisible if you put them on), and have poor armor class compared to Ylside armor. While the leggings have decent armor class (the second largest, actually), they're still half as strong as the Ylside ones and not worth the fight. and the chest plate, probably due to mistake, is only as good as the plain chestplate (''four'' times worse than Ylside). At least the golden helmet plays it straight, as it's the strongest helmet in a game.]]

* BlingBlingBang. ''Nastily'' subverted. [[spoiler: With a secret spell you can summon an extremely tough warrior demoness, armed with a {{BFS}} and clad in what looks golden Ylside armor, who attacks you. After you kill her, in a fair fight or using some trick, she explodes, but you can pick up her sword and a random piece of her armor (helmet, leggings of chestplate) appears in your inventory. Howeverm those pieces are breakable, have no model (they become invisible if you put them on), and have poor armor class compared with Ylside armor. While the leggings have decent armor class (the second largest, actually), they're still half as strong as the Ylside ones and not worth the fight. and the chest plate, probably due to mistake, is only as good as the plain chestplate (''four'' times worse than Ylside). At least the golden helmet plays it straight, as it's the strongest helmet in a game.]]

* FeigningIntelligence: Goblins. ''All'' goblins, everytime. And it's charming.

* GoodIsNotNice: It isn't stated anywhere that a [[spoiler: world-saver demigod]] can't rob a bank (howewer, it's owner and especially his fiancee can count as AssholeVictim). Or simply [[KleptomaniacHero loot everything that isn't nailed down or on fire]] (and if it is, you have a pickaxe and Douse spell).

* KarlMarxHatesYourGuts. Subverted twice: At the beginning, goblins don't trade jewels because trolls, who do the mining work, went on strike. So, you can buy cheap "goblin mine" stock certificates, then improve the situation with mines yourself and sell them back at double cost as their price rises. Later, if you bring a book about commerce and finance to a troll king, he'll screw the goblins and sell jewels himself, and you, as a friend of trolls, will have a HUGE discount. Otherwise played stright. Also subverted if you have high Intuition, but it's complrtrly useless in any other situation.

* {{Mama Bear}} / {{Papa Wolf}}. The dragon, exact gender unknown. Subverted as it can sell one his egg to the PC. Double subverted as it knows it's nesessary for saving the world and at least wants a compensation for such a sacrifice.

* SlasherSmile: [[spoiler: Seconds before slashing at you, Black Beast raises it's paw and tilts it's head, giving the impression of a ''nightmarish'' smile.]]

* AwesomeYetPractical: A [[{{Fireballs}} Fireball]] and Speed spells. [[spoiler: And the Ultimate Weapon.]]

* FakeSkill / FakeDifficulty / AcceptableBreaksFromReality: Lampshaded beautifully and justified by the dragon, who goes on a speech about this being Am Shaegar's powers and limitations due to him being a [[spoiler: Guardian from another world]]. According to dragon, what we see as SaveScumming is some TimeTravel realted power which allows the [[spoiler:Guardian]] to foresee potentionally dangerous situations.