History VideoGame / TheBlackHeart

* CreepyCoolCrosses: When Animus uses his Impaler special, the last and most damaging blade is actually a glowing metal cross. He can also spawn impaled on the same cross, in his introduction sequence.

* GratuitousForeignLanguage: Animus speaks Hungarian, and Noroko speaks Japanese. Averted with the Spanish lines, as they were recorded in the original language of the game.

* RedAndBlackAndEvilAllOver: Most of the game. Averted by Shar-Makai and Final, who have [[PurpleIsPowerful purple]] or [[RealMenWearPink pink]]) skin and red gums, and Hashi, who, as a PlantPerson, has brown bark and wears green clothes.

* TheUnfought: [[spoiler:Janos, the actually BigBad]] is never fought in gameplay throughout the game. The closest anyone gets is [[spoiler:Shar-Makai, and of course Final himself. Neither of whom are any match for him.]]
** Averted in the Steam Release, where [[spoiler:Janos]] is a secret boss and hidden character.

* '''Peketo''' - A child driven mad by his abusive father who studied the occult, Peketo once opened a portal to the Other World by accident and became obsessed with the immense power he felt when he gazed upon the barren landscape. As the color of blood was the only red similar to that of the Other World, he wantonly killed people just to see it over and over again. He was later murdered by a relative of one of his victims, but brought back thanks to one of many pacts he made with the dead. Now, he wants to find the source of the power he felt when he first saw the Other World.

* '''Peketo''' - A child driven mad by his neglectful father who studied the occult, Peketo once opened a portal to the Other World by accident and became obsessed with the immense power he felt when he gazed upon the barren landscape. As the color of blood was the only red similar to that of the Other World, he wantonly killed people just to see it over and over again. He was later murdered by a relative of one of his victims, but brought back thanks to one of many pacts he made with the dead. Now, he wants to find the source of the power he felt when he first saw the Other World.

* AttackAnimal: The Shar-Makai are smart enough to follow Jano's commands to the letter, presumably through the magic he used to bind them, but show little sign of independent thought and are incapable of speech.

* AndShowItToYou: The Black Heart had to come from somewhere, right? [[spoiler:Janos does this a lot, it seems -- it's also how he kills]] [[spoiler:his own daughter [[DownerEnding in Ananzi's ending]].]]

** [[StringyHairedGhostGirl Noroko]] is one huge shout-out to Japanese ghost stories. It's probably not a coincidence that her name sounds like [[Franchise/TheRing Sadako]], either.

* OurGhostsAreDifferent: From each other, even -- Noroko and Peketo share a color palette and not much else in terms of powers, Noroko having a somewhat more traditional assortment of ghostly powers from Japanese folklore while Peketo's abilities and appearance have more in common with a Saturday morning cartoon. Possibly justified, given the very diferent circumstances and points in history in which they died.

[[quoteright:303:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/blackheartnewcover.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:303:Clockwise from top: [[StringyHairedGhostGirl Noroko]], [[BigCreepyCrawlies Shar-Makai]], [[CombatSadomasochist Animus]], [[SpidersAreScary Ananzi]], [[GaiasVengeance Hashi]], and [[CreepyChild Peketo]]. Not pictured: [[FinalBoss Final]].]]

[[quoteright:303:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/TBH_game_cover_7709.jpg]]

* ChestBurster: One of Shar-Makai's finishers causes a number of larval Shar-Makai to burst out of his opponent, [[HalfTheManHeUsedToBe cutting them in half]]. This can also happen to the playable Shar-Makai upon death.

* AntiVillain: [[spoiler:Final is trying to stop Prince Janos from taking over both worlds. He's still willing to let Hashi exterminate humanity and put his son Animus through centuries of torment in the process.]] The game sufficiently dark that it's not quite clear whether this makes him an AntiVillain or the BigGood.

** In a way, this is also Noroko's motivation. She was killed long ago, but her spirit is unable to move on. [[spoiler:In her ending, Final helps purge her soul of her anger, granting her wish of ascending to Heaven.]]

* EvilAlbino: One of Final's alternate colors turns him white and gives him [[RedEyesTakeWarning red eyes]], as opposed to being [[RealMenWearPink pink]] with yellow eyes.
* TheEvilPrince: Prince Janos, naturally. [[spoiler:Conquered and laid waste to the lands his father united in peace, killed said father, is seeking an object of limitless power to spread his reign across two worlds, and finally sacrifices his daughter to do it.]]

[[caption-width-right:303:Clockwise from top: [[StringyHairedGhostGirl Noroko]], [[BigCreepyCrawlies Shar-Makai]], [[CombatSadomasochist Animus]], [[SpidersAreScary Ananzi]], [[GaiasVengeance Hashi]], and [[CreepyChild Peketo]].]]

* DarkIsNotEvil: Most of the cast happens to fall into this category. [[StringyHairedGhostGirl Noroko]] and [[CombatSadomasochist Animus]] [[ImmortalityHurts both want their suffering to end.]] Ananzi is [[DaddysGirl a princess trying to make her father proud.]] And Final is the closest being to an EldritchAbomination here [[spoiler: [[WellIntentionedExtremist but stole the Heart to keep it away from]] [[ManipulativeBastard Prince Janos.]]]] That being said...

** In a way, this is also Noroko's motivation. She was killed long ago, but her spirit is unable to move on. [[spoiler: In her ending, Final helps purge her soul of her anger, granting her wish of ascending to Heaven.]]

* DownerEnding: Nearly everyone. [[spoiler:Hashi is cast into a bottomless pit on the way back to Earth. Ananzi is murdered by her father when Final reveals that Janos is the one who murdered her grandfather, the old King, not Final. Janos kills the Shar-Makai after Final manages to turn them against him.]] Possibly [[spoiler:Peketo, too, since he could be forced to fight his father for eternity.]] It ends relatively well only for [[spoiler: Noroko and Animus, and only because they find some peace in death.]]

* HeroAntagonist: It turns out that [[spoiler: Final is actually this and Prince Janos is the real villain.]]

* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: Peketo. [[spoiler: In his ending, his father refers to him by his real name, Ivan.]]

* VengefulGhost: Noroko, very much so, but not Peketo, who came back thanks to the necromantic rites he performed instead. [[spoiler: Although he does have a sore spot when it comes to his father.]]

* BodyHorror: The... ''things'' that occasionally light up in the background or crawl underneath the rusty metal grill in Animus's stage wouldn't look out of place in ''VideoGame/SilentHill''.

* MeaningfulName: Final is, fittingly, the final boss. Also, Ananzi, whose name is an obvious reference to Anansi the spider god. Also note that this character used to be called Viuda Negra (Black Widow in spanish).

* WellDoneDaughterGal: Ananzi seeks the Heart to earn her father's approval, once and for all. [[spoiler:He kills her for her trouble, once she discovers that he's the one who killed the King, not Final.]]

* TheBadGuyWins: Janos, the Prince of the Other World. [[spoiler:He is the one responsible for the corruption of the Other World, which was once beautiful, by causing endless wars to conquer lands that his father (the King, who was far too old and weak to stop him) gave willingly to others; he enslaved an entire species to be his soldiers, killed the King to gain his powers, framed Final when he stole the heart so Janos couldn't use it, wants to conquer all the other worlds through force and bloodshed, and ends up killing his own daughter, Ananzi, because she outlived her usefulness... and in the end, he ''succeeds'' in claiming back the Dark Heart, killing Final in the process, and acquires his father's powers. The worst thing that happened to him was that he got a couple of bites on his arms from the Shar-Makai.]]

* DarkWorld: The Other World, a hellish place of darkness and blood-red skies. [[spoiler:Or at least that's what it's become through Prince Janos's attempts to unite it under his reign, according to Final.]]

** Played with in Peketo's case. He killed his abusive father and half a dozen others, but nobody in the game seems to think the abuse he suffered justified his becoming a murderer... Including Peketo, who doesn't bother trying to excuse his actions, since he doesn't think there's anything wrong with what he's done in the first place.

* AwesomeButImpractical: Fatal Moves. You must have a full Level 3 super bar, the enemy must be below 25% health, AND it must hit the enemy without them blocking. Pretty much a mix of an [[VideoGame/BlazBlue Astral Finish]] and a [[MortalKombat Fatality]].

* LonelyPianoPiece: A dark version of this forms a major part of the game's {{Leitmotif}}, as well as Peketo's theme, "The Red Dream."

** Janos. [[spoiler:Very appropriate for a two-faced son of a bitch like him.]]

* MsFanservice: Ananzi's outfits are distractingly skimpy. Even her casual clothes expose her belly.

* PlayingTheHeartstrings: The main leitmotif of the soundtrack, along with LonelyPianoPiece.

* PrehensileHair: Prehensile and capable of varying dramatically in length. In one of her intros, Noroko is hanging from the ceiling, cocooned in her own hair. One of her basic moves involves turning her head fast enough to slap the other fighter with it.

* RottenRockAndRoll: Animus's theme, "Chaos and Death", starts out this way, before being overtaken by its Eastern European overtones.

* {{Treant}}s: Hashi's people, the wooden men, are long-lived treefolk charged with protecting the natural world.

** Subverted in that four out of six characters come from Earth, and the closest thing the game has to a hero and a BigGood, Ananzi and [[spoiler:Final]] respectively, are from the Other World. Not only that, but Janos is actually seeking to bring his own brand of "order" to the Other World -- through a campaign of brutal conquest that is actually the reason the Other World is a bloodsoaked ruin.]]

* TheSwarm: Shar-Makai. You get a sense of just how many of the things there are in the special intro for its MirrorMatch.

* TeethClenchedTeamwork: Hashi has a [[VideoGame/{{Darkstalkers}} Le Malta]]-esque sidekick in the form of Bako, whose power is what transports the two of them into the Other World. The two do not get along, since, like the rest of the forest spirits, Bako strongly disapproves of Hashi's violent tendencies.

* BigGood: A well-hidden one. [[spoiler:Final is actually trying to save the chaos from Prince Janos. At the same time, he's willing to sacrifice earth, or at least humanity, as well as the sanity of his son to do it, so it's definitely a case of BlackAndGrayMorality.]]

* DarkWorld: The chaos, a hellish place of darkness and blood-red skies. [[spoiler:Or at least that's what it's become through Prince Janos's attempts to unite it under his reign, according to Final.]]
* DeathSeeker: Animus wants to die, but can't.
* DecapitationPresentation: Peketo holds up his own severed head as one of his win poses. Not his cutesy detachable ghost head, but the sightless, bloody head of his human body.

** Shar-Makai, being an army of EliteMooks rather than single playable character. Its projectile attacks involve summoning more Shar-Makai from offscreen, and for its Killer Mode, it can temporarily tag in two more full-sized Shar-Makai.
* DownerEnding: Nearly everyone. [[spoiler:Hashi is cast into a bottomless pit on the way back to earth. Ananzi is murdered by her father when Final reveals that he killed her grandfather the King. Janos kills the Shar-Makai after Final manages to turn them against him.]] Possibly [[spoiler:Peketo, too, since he could be forced to fight his father for eternity.]] It ends relatively well only for [[spoiler: Noroko and Animus, and only because they find some peace in death.]]

* KillAllHumans: Hashi hates humans, believing they're destroying the earth. Too bad for him his fellow PlantPeople don't agree. [[spoiler:In his ending, he accepts a deal from Final: imbuing one of his seeds with enough power to cover the planet in vegetation while wiping out humanity in one fell swoop. Fortunately for us humans, Hashi's patron Malen saw this coming, and has Hashi's reluctant sidekick/interdimensional guide drop him in a BottomlessPit on the way back to Earth.]]

* PsychoStrings: Shar-Makai's stage music, "Lust for Power".

* RottenRockAndRoll: Animus's theme, "Chaos and Death".

** Plenty of inspiration from ''Darkstalkers'': Bako's role, a sidekick for Hashi who was also sent to spy on him by their mutual patron Malen, is basically the same part played by Le Malta to Raptor on the behalf of Emperor Ozom, the demon Lord Raptor to whom sold his soul.
** Another ''Darkstalkers'' reference: Peketo has a [[PrecociousCrush unique reaction]] when starting a fight with Ananzi, much like Lord Raptor's special intro against Hsien-Ko.

** Between the bobbleheaded Peketo and [[GaiasVengeance Hashi's]] sidekick Bako both resembling ''kodama'', there's probably at least a passing nod to ''Anime/PrincessMononoke''.

* TeethClenchedTeamwork: Hashi has a [[VideoGame/{{Darkstalkers}} Le Malta]]-esque sidekick in the form of Bako, whose power is what transports the two of them into the Chaos. The two do not get along, since, like the rest of the forest spirits, Bako strongly disapproves of Hashi's violent tendencies.
** Comes to a head in Hashi's ending, when [[spoiler:Hashi strikes a deal with Final, who imbues one of Hashi's seeds with enough power to cover the whole earth in greenery, wiping out humanity in the process. The other spirits planned for this, however, and Bako has orders to drop Hashi into a bottomless pit on the way back if the latter decided to go off-script. Which is what happens, so that's what Bako does.]]

** A story example: Bako, Hashi's little sprout sidekick, actually comes with Hashi only because he can teleport him to the Chaos [[spoiler:and to "take care" of Hashi in case he decides to turn his back on their cause.]]

* UnlimitedWardrobe: You'll lose count of how many different dresses Ananzi can show off in her victory animation. [[JustifiedTrope This makes sense]] because A) she is a princess, and B) all of her clothes seem to be spontaneously formed out of spiders, anyways.

* UseYourHead: Animus has a brutal headbutt combo as a special. Shar-Makai slams the other fighter with its head and tail for most of its basic attacks. Peketo throws his detachable head as a projectile.
* VengefulGhost: Noroko, very much so, but emphatically not Peketo, who came back thanks to necromantic rites he performed. [[spoiler: Although he does have a sore spot when it comes to his father.]]

** More surprisingly, [[spoiler:Final. He's trying to stop [[BigBad Janos]]' rise to power by any means necessary. '''Absolutely any.''' Given that the chaos apparently used to be beautiful before Janos got through with it, this might genuinely be a case of NecessaryEvil.]]

** Peketo's anger with his dad can be taken to reference [[spoiler:Franchise/BlazBlue Carl Clover's anger with his father Relius.]]

** Plenty of inspiration from ''Darkstalkers'': Bako's role, a sidekick for Hashi who was also sent to spy on him by their mutual patron Malen, is basically the same part played by Le Malta to Raptor on the behalf of Emperor Ozom, the demon Lord Raptor to whomo sold his soul.