Line #108 VideoGame/DieHardVendetta


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/mv5bytgyn2qyzjctzty1ns00ngvjltg4njatmmflztywnzgwmzi4xkeyxkfqcgdeqxvymta0mtm5nji2_v1_fmjpg_ux1000.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:Hey look, John [=McClane=]'s ''back''!]]
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5	''Die Hard: Vendetta'' is a FirstPersonShooter developed by Bits Studios and published by Sierra Entertainment. The game is based on the popular ''Franchise/DieHard'' film series, featuring the iconic action hero John [=McClane=] and serves as a continuation of the then-trilogy (which has since been declared non-canon after the fourth film was released).
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7	Set five years after ''Film/DieHardWithAVengeance'', John [=McClane=] is called back into action when a terrorist syndicate attacks Townsend Museum for a priceless painting and takes everyone hostage, among them John's daughter, Lucy [=McClane=] who now works as a rookie L.A.P.D officer.
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9	After a daring rescue mission, John is on the trail of retrieving several missing artworks and investigating Piet Gruber, son of John's nemesis, Hans Gruber way back in the original ''Film/DieHard'', currently a financier for the museum, who may or may not be in league with the terrorists.
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11	Alongside engaging in intense gunfights with enemies while completing objectives, gameplay also incorporates elements of stealth, for John to silently eliminate enemies, as well as including a variety of weapons and gadgets John can utilize to overcome challenges.
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13	The game was released in 2002 for the Platform/NintendoGameCube, Platform/PlayStation2, and Platform/{{Xbox}} platforms.
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15	----
16	!! This is going to be ''fun'', John...
17	* AllYourBaseAreBelongToUs: Gruber's private army launch a siege on the Century City Police Department midway into the game, intending to bomb it. It ends with von Laben dead, Lucy kidnapped and Nitric in Gruber's employ.
18	* AirVentPassageway: The loving, evergreen, long-lasting tradition from the Die Hard movies gets carried over in the game, with John using air vents to infiltrate and escape the subway, prison and warehouse stages.
19	* AlternateContinuity: Doesn't follow the timeline of the film series, that the game's developers already confirmed even way back in the game's initial release. ''Film/LiveFreeOrDieHard'' being released five years later featuring Lucy [=McClane=] as a non-combatant whose relationship with John is strained further cements it's non-canon status.
20	* AssistCharacter: In a few scant stages, Lucy [=McClane=] and Sergeant Al Powell (AI-controlled) will help John take down enemies, although they're usually not too much help with their revolvers since the player as John likely have better weapons.
21	* AvengingTheVillain: Defied - John initially assumes Piet's vengeance towards him is because of John killing Piet's father, Hans Gruber, in 1988. Turns out it's NOT the case.
22	--> '''John''': So this is it, Gruber. Go ahead. Take your shot. I'm the one you want. If you've got a score to settle, settle it ''now''.\
23	'''Piet''': [=McClane=], this was ''never'' about revenge. [[spoiler:My father ''[[ParentalNeglect barely said two words to me]]'' my entire childhood. You did me a ''favor'' by killing him]]. This is about money, [=McClane=]. The money which you will now get for me.
24	* BedsheetLadder: The banner variant shows up in the Chinese Theatre stage, where John needs to access a balcony but the doors are locked. The solution? Shoot one side the "Galaxy Thief III" bannner underneath, and use it as a makeshift ladder. John will drop this hint aloud if the player doesn't know what to do:
25	--> '''John''': Hmm, I wonder how secure that banner is?
26	* BondVillainStupidity: Gruber traps [=McClane=] in a certain room in the Nakatomi building with a bomb primed to blow in 30 seconds...and there's an unlocked window nearby with a window cleaner's platform underneath it that John rides to safety. The window's not even closed all the way, so John can easily throw it open and escape.
27	* BorrowedCatchphrase: John's "Yipee-ki-yay, motherfucker!" was used by a few other characters, notably by Piet Gruber when taunting John over a walkie-talkie and later spoken by [[spoiler:Lucy when she shoots Piet before he can try shooting John again]].
28	--> '''Lucy''': Yipee-ki-yay, motherfucker!\
29	'''John''': [[SoProudOfYou That's my girl]]!
30	* BulletTime:
31	** One of the game's features, promoted by the cover art, the "Hero Time" where John moves faster than usual as everything else runs in slow-mo around him.
32	** A few QuickTimeEvent(s) will lead to this, like John pulling a ShootTheHostageTaker in the first stage to save Lucy leading to a cutscene of John's bullet killing a mook in slow-motion.
33	* TheBusCameBack: After their abscence in ''Film/DieHardWithAVengeance'', Sergeant Al Powell (with his last appearance in ''Film/DieHard2'' merely a cameo) and Richard Thornburg make a comeback in the game as major supporting characters.
34	* CampingACrapper: One area John enters in the Chinese Theatre hostage scenario is the toilet, and he can sneak upon a couple of mooks chatting with each other, one of them taking a leak at a urinal. If John isn't spotted, he can gun down the urinal guy ''mid-pissing''.
35	* TheCavalryArrivesLate:
36	** Averted in the Nakatomi Plaza level. [=McClane=] is the last to arrive although ultimately the SWAT grunts are cut down leaving it all up to John, naturally.
37	** Played straight in the Holmes Observatory level. The police only arrive after the whole place has gone up in flames and [=McClane=] has gotten out alive (having killed Frontier, natch.)
38	* CelebritySurvivor: Hollywood Town has Jessie Montana, a starlet caught in the middle of a terrorist attack, apparently having been inside her trailer the whole time. In typical celebirty fashion she'll constantly nag at John for trying to save her.
39	--> '''Jessie''': [''to John after he just sent her trailer flying''] Oh I'm going to make sure that you are going to spend a long time in jail, buster. You are ''so'' going to regret the day you messed with Jesse Montana!
40	* ChekhovsSkill: One of the tutorial stage's last challenge have John attempting to diffuse three dummy bombs. [[spoiler:How convenient that the final stage, Holmes Observatory, revolves around John trying to diffuse Jack's timed explosives to prevent him from blowing up the premiere]].
41	* ContinuityNod: The game references the past three movies every now and then.
42	** '''Film/DieHard'''
43	*** When "Hero Time" is triggered, the background music turns into Symphony No. 9 "Ode to Joy" lifted from the very first film.
44	*** The second-to-last stage is set in the Nakatomi Plaza, which the game lovingly recreates from top to bottom. It sports the same courtyard (where John dropped a dead terrorist on Al Powell's vehicle back in '88) to identical sigils to zig-zagging long tables in the conference rooms.
45	*** John himself lampshades the first movie's events. And Piet taunts John using his father's exact phrases.
46	--->'''Powell:''' Deja vu, heheh.\
47	'''John''': Yeah, I never thought they'd let me back here.\
48	'''John''': C4? Hmm...can't blow up the same building twice can you John?\
49	'''Piet''': Tick tock, tick tock, cowboy...\
50	'''Piet''': What was that you said? Yipee-ki-yay motherfucker?
51	*** One of the explorable areas in Nakatomi Plaza is the indoor pool / mini-waterfall where John fell in to escape an explosion in the film.
52	*** [[spoiler:The game's last cutscene sees John punching out an overly insistent movie producer who wants to buy the rights to his story, much like Holly knocking out Dick Thornburg's lights moments before credits roll]].
53	** '''Film/DieHard2'''
54	*** One area in the subway contains mooks dressed in painters' overalls disguised as janitors, like the skywalk gunfight from the film. There's even an identical tall frame with a mook standing on it like in the movie.
55	*** John fighting enemies in a room full of conveyer belts.
56	** '''Film/DieHardWithAVengeance'''
57	*** The BigBad is related to Hans Gruber, although it's his son instead of brother. [[spoiler:Said BigBad also seems to want vengeance for Hans, but it turns out not to be the case]]. Ironically, uncle Simon doesn't get a single mention at all throughout the game.
58	*** The subway shootout in the game is based on the movie's subway scenario.
59	*** A lot of terrorist bombing plots going on in this game, just like Simon Gruber's MO in the film. Pretty sure Piet got the idea from his uncle's activities five years ago.
60	*** Piet even has a European henchwoman who's an {{expy}} of Katya from the third film.
61	* CutsceneBoss: The game have it's share of boss battles throughout, but [[spoiler:Piet Gruber, the BigBad, was instead shot by John during a cutscene. Then Lucy comes up and puts a second bullet in him]]. His DragonAscendant, Jack Frontier, turns out to be a far bigger threat.
62	* DarkActionGirl: Piet Gruber's henchwoman and minion, Marlin, who serves as the boss prior to the Nakatomi Plaza stage. [[spoiler:Upon being gunned down, she uses her last breath to tell John her boss is waiting for him in Nakatomi Plaza... with Lucy [=McClane=] as his hostage]].
63	* DestroyTheSecurityCamera: In the police station raid, John will need to shoot security cameras to avoid detection thanks to the terrorists taking over the surveillance room.
64	* DieHardOnAnX: Well, no doy. The very first stage is a Die Hard-style scenario in the Townsend Art Museum, and later there's a Die Hard in a Theater, Die Hard in a Fish Factory and even goes full circle into a Die Hard in the Nakatomi tower building before ending with "Die Hard in an Observatory."
65	* DistressedDude: Several of them, including the Hollywood records store clerk being held at gunpoint by mooks, the Chinese Theatre projectionist who's nearly suffocating from having a gag over his nose and mouth (until John frees him) and Al Powell in the police station raid. The latter regains his gun after being released and temporarily helps John take on enemies.
66	--> '''Al Powell''': I'll survive. Nothing broken, I'm tougher than these fools realize!
67	* DodgeTheBullet: John does this when [[spoiler:Piet, wounded by one of John's bullets and being DefiantToTheEnd, tries firing a shot at John. The bullet misses in a slow-motion shot, and then Lucy comes up and puts a second bullet in Piet that finishes him off]].
68	* DonutMessWithACop:
69	** Referenced when John infiltrates the police station in the middle of a terrorist raid.
70	--> '''Mook''': [''shooting at some cops''] You're dead, you donut eating homo!
71	** John even lampshades the trope. At least ''twice''.
72	--> '''John''': Just once I'd like to have a normal work day... a little filing, some coffee and donuts. No guns, no bombs, no hassle!\
73	'''John''': [''to Al''] Look, you just rest here. Hell after all those donuts you'd just slow me down.
74	* DoubleMeaningTitle: The game's title and revelation makes the plot sound like Piet's terrorist schemes is payback over John killing his father Hans Gruber all those years ago, but it turns out [[spoiler:Piet never really loves his father anyways, and him antagonizing John isn't out of vengeance over John dropping Hans to his death]]. At any rate, the "vendetta" refers to Jack Frontier's attempts to get back at Hollywood for terminating his contract and dropping him off the limelight.
75	* TheDragon: Piet's henchman, the ex-CIA operative-turned-disgraced movie star Jack Frontier, who opposes John repeatedly in the game's second half [[spoiler:and becomes a DragonAscendant after Lucy shot Piet]].
76	* DragonTheirFeet: After Gruber's killed off in the penultimate level, Frontier goes off on his own, launching an attack on the Holmes Observatory just to kill the actor who took his old movie role. That level is simply cleaning up the last detail.
77	* EvilIsPetty: Jack Frontier used to be a massive movie star with "Galaxy Thief" after his CIA days, but the crummy sequel bombed his career and he was replaced for the third movie. His response? Team up with Piet Gruber, be complicit in a number of crimes including a massive art museum robbery and an ''attack on a police station'' that [[CopKiller killed most of the staff present]], and then [[spoiler:commit a terrorist attack on the Galaxy Thief III premiere, solely out of a completely selfish and petty [[TitleDrop vendetta]].]]
78	* GroundByGears: The Cesar Tuna Factory level at one point sees John face-to-face rotating gears on a ConveyorBeltODoom, so he has both that and the mooks shooting at him to worry about.
79	* GunsAkimbo:
80	** John can equip himself with twin revolvers or Uzis in shootouts, though he can only target one enemy at a time.
81	** Piet's minion, Nitric, uses dual Uzis during his first boss battle. His [[RecurringBoss second]] one sees him using a machine-gun instead.
82	** Marlin carries double revolvers when fought as a boss. She's far more accurate than Nitric, expectedly.
83	* HostageSituation: In ''all'' the levels - the museum, theatre, Hollywood streets, subway, all of them. A frustrated John even lampshades it (after seeing a terrorist demanding three captives to be quiet).
84	--> '''John''': Shit, hostages. ''Why do these guys always have hostages''?
85	* HumanShield: John can grab mooks from behind and use them as captives, before ordering other mooks to lay down their weapons, though only in stages when he snuck upon them without being noticed - if the shootout is already in full-swing John isnt granted this option.
86	* ImmoralJournalist: Dick Thornburg, the asshole reporter from the movies, is as big a {{jerkass}} in video game-form as his live-action counterpart.
87	--> '''Dick''': [''when John rendezvous with him in the opening stage''] This is great! The best footage we ever had in ages - police [[note]]John, currently fighting terrorists in shootouts [[/note]] massacres foreign art benefactors!\
88	'''John''': Where's the rest of your film crew?\
89	'''Dick''': Err, they got ''shot''. [[LackOfEmpathy Occupational hazard]].
90	* InPrisonWithTheRogues: The Hollywoodland shootout ends with John capturing Nitric, alive, but John unfortunately endangers a Hollywood actress, Jessie Montana in the process leading to ''his own arrest''. Alas, John and Nitric just ''happens'' to be imprisoned in neighboring cells.
91	--> '''John''': Being locked in this cesspool isn't getting any better with you [[note]]Nitric[[/note]] turning it into a goddamned fish market!
92	* InterfaceSpoiler: How do you know the third prisoner is bullshitting you about the secret way out in the [=LAPD=]? The auto lock-on highlights him as an enemy, as opposed to not targetting Nitric or Dowd at all.
93	* ItsPersonal: John's grudge against Piet becomes this after the villain abducts Lucy. ''Again''.
94	--> '''John''': [''while he and Lucy ride the elevator to Nakatomi's roof for the final battle''] Ok, whatever happens up there I don't want you to put yourself in any danger. This is ''personal'' between me and Gruber.\
95	'''Lucy''': Yeah, well ''now'' it involves me.\
96	'''John''': You ready to do this?\
97	'''Lucy''': You lead the way.
98	* JustifiedTutorial: The first stage is a training exercise where John gets to "refresh" his skills in a ShootingGallery. It can't be skipped when restarting the game, the player can instead use a memory card to save before the museum stage.
99	* KillItWithIce: One stage have John taking on Piet and Sumi's mooks in a freezer room loaded with nitrogen tanks, one of which is needed to break down a locked door in John's way. Shooting the tanks will release nitrogen gas that freezes any unfortunate mook in the way, and another shot on a frozen mook leads to LiterallyShatteredLives. In fact, one of John's pre-programmed dialogue in the level is this lovely ShoutOut:
100	--> '''John''': ''[[Film/Terminator2JudgmentDay Hasta la vista, baby!]]''
101	* LikeFatherLikeSon: For all his claims of not caring about his father Hans, Piet's plan is simply a robbery masked as a greater plot...just like Hans himself all those years ago.
102	* LineageComesFromTheFather:
103	** John's daughter, Lucy [=McClane=] (in the few levels where she sees action) is another police officer and a trigger-happy CowboyCop like her dad, who isn't afraid of getting her hands dirty. [[spoiler:She even lets out her dad's trademark "Yipee-ki-yay, motherfucker!" after killing the BigBad]].
104	** Piet Gruber turns out to be another terrorist mastermind, just like his father Hans, and is holding Los Angeles hostage with an experimental warhead.
105	* MuseumLevel: First stage is set in the Townsend Museum where terrorists have taken over, and John's daughter Lucy is among the hostages.
106	* NeverMyFault: Via cribbing the famous speech from Film/OnTheWaterfront, Frontier blames everyone but himself for his fall from grace in the final level.
107	* NightVisionGoggles: The Subway level sees John obtaining these in an area, which come in handy when the last parts of the level are pitch black. The screen, being from John's POV, is entirely green in this particular area.
108	* NotMeThisTime: [[CallBack After escaping Gruber's Nakatomi bomb trap]], John has to assure Powell that [[Film/DieHard it wasn't him that blew the place up this time.]]
109	* NothingPersonal: Said by Jack Frontier after [[spoiler:he betrays his boss, Piet Gruber, leaving the latter to die]].
110	--> '''Jack''': [[spoiler:Nothing personal Gruber, but you had it coming]].
111	* OlderHeroVsYoungerVillain: John [=McClane=] has aged visibly in the game compared to his film counterpart, with his character model in cutscenes sporting graying hair. His main enemies, on the other hand, are Piet Gruber, ''son'' of his first villain Hans Gruber, and Jack Frontier, a disgraced former soldier-turned-actor-turned-terrorist who couldn't be older than forty.
112	* PapaWolf: It's ''John [=McClane=]'' we're talking about here. The bad guys learn this the hard way once they kidnap Lucy.
113	* RailingKill: Mooks behind balconies tend to fall over the side and several stories down when shot. Some cutscenes depicting BulletTime executions will even have the mooks fall in glorious slow motion.
114	* RailroadTracksOfDoom: In the subway, as John infiltrates the railroad tracks, he finds [[HalfTheManHeUsedToBe a mook in two pieces halved around the waist]] lying on the subway tracks. This of course warns him to be careful of passing subway trains, lest he suffers the same fate (Game Over, time to reload your last save) himself.
115	* RelativeButton: Nitric, after being busted out of prison by Piet's terrorists, with John in the cell next to him, leaves behind this taunt to the still locked-up John, for no reason other than to spite the latter for arresting him earlier.
116	--> '''Nitric''': Think about this, ''[[GratuitousSpanish muchacho]]'': While you're in here I'll be with your daughter!
117	* SchmuckBait: One prisoner in the [=LAPD=] claims to know a secret way out of the precinct to safety. You let him out of his cell and what does he do? As soon as he gets to the entrance, he runs to the bomb-wired doors. You're gonna have to shoot him so he doesn't blow everything sky high.
118	* {{Sequelitis}}: In-universe example with the ''Galaxy Thief'' trilogy, a movie series which Piet's minion Jack Frontier used to star in. The first ''Galaxy Thief'' was a success making Jack a star and led to a sequel being greenlit. Unfortunately, this time ''Galaxy Thief II'' bombed despite making plenty of money, with Frontier's wooden performance being a particular target for critics; the studios' decision to replace Jack in ''Galaxy Thief III'' leads to Jack's StartOfDarkness and allying himself with Piet Gruber before [[spoiler:eventually attempting to commit a terrorist attack on Holmes Observatory at the premier of ''Galaxy Thief III'']].
119	* ShowWithinAShow: The "Galaxy Thief" movie trilogy. The final level is John preventing a terrorist bombing on the third movie's premiere.
120	* ShootTheRope: During the chaos at Sierra Correctional, at one point some of the inmates capture and attempt to execute surviving SWAT guys by hanging them from their necks, for no reason other than shits and giggles. John has to save the one surviving guy from this by shooting the rope before he chokes to death.
121	* ShoutOut:
122	** There's a water tower in Hollywoodland's corner that looks exactly like the one in Warner Bros'. It even has a red version of the Warner shield logo on it's side!
123	** The Sierra prison level at one point has John uncover a secret entrance in a prison cell, hidden by a poster (of a girl in a bikini) covering a hole in the wall, ala ''Film/TheShawshankRedemption''.
124	** Frontier's MotiveRant in the final battle is drectly cribbed from ''Film/OnTheWaterfront'', word for word.
125	* SillinessSwitch: Using either the Big Head or Pin Head cheats grows or shrinks the head of EVERYONE in game, and alters their voice to match. Try Pin Head mode if you want everyone to look like shrunken headed freaks who sound like characters from WesternAnimation/SouthPark!
126	* SnipingMission: In Hollywood Town, with John obtaining a sniper rifle and tasked with clearing out all the other enemy sniper guards before they can take any more of the SWAT guys out.
127	* StupidityIsTheOnlyOption: The last parts of the Hollywood Studio level features a locked gate that blocks [=McClane=]'s way. His solution? Not to climb over the gate (despite it not being particularly tall) or ShootOutTheLock but to shoot a clamp holding in place the trailer of a multi-million dollar actress while she's still inside! And this ends up with [=McClane=] arrested to keep Jessie satisfied. Nice move, John!
128	* TimeBomb:
129	** Twice in the Nakatomi Plaza stage. For the first, Gruber traps John on the [=22nd=] floor with a bomb primed to go off in 30 seconds, which John escapes of course. For the second, John eventually finds Lucy, tied to a chair in a conference room with an explosive vest strapped to her chest. And he'll need to disarm the bomb within 2 minutes by finding the detonator and deactivating it.
130	** Holmes Observatory, the final level, involves Jack Frontier installing timed explosives to blow up the building on the premier of "Galaxy Thief III", which John needs to track down and diffuse.
131	* TurnInYourBadge: Powell orders John to hand in his badge and gun when he arrests him at the end of the Hollywood Studios level. Mostly as a formality.
132	* WhereItAllBegan: Near the end of the game, Piet Gruber carts a captive Lucy off all the way to [[Film/DieHard Nakatomi Plaza]], where [=McClane=] dropped Hans to his death all those years ago. The trope name even gets referenced by Gruber's DragonLady.
133	* WhyWontYouDie: A repeated phrase uttered by Piet Gruber, and some of his mooks. Then again, they're fighting John [=McClane=].
134	* {{Yakuza}}: It turns out Piet is in league with the Japanese criminal underworld, led by the Yakuza mob kingpin Sumi Kazawa, who's suppling Piet with a prototype RDXS Ample rocket weapon in exchange for the stolen artworks from Townsend Museum.
135	* YouKilledMyFather: Not that Piet seems to care in the end, as he claims his father "barely spoke two words to [him in his] entire life" and that [=McClane=] did him a favour in killing Hans. In the end it's all about the money...[[{{Irony}} just like Hans.]]

Context VideoGame / DieHardVendetta