| 1 | [[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/severmore2_5.jpg]] |
| 2 | |
| 3 | ->''"I'm not really sure where 'here' is, to tell you the truth."'' |
| 4 | -->-- '''The Hero''' |
| 5 | |
| 6 | A 1995 ActionRPG modeled on the smash hit ''VideoGame/SecretOfMana''. Despite appearances to the contrary, ''Evermore'' is not a ''VideoGame/WorldOfMana'' entry, but was made from whole cloth by Square USA (now part of Creator/SquareEnix); it's also one of few games to be developed entirely in the U.S. by Square. Mainly remembered for its ambient soundtrack by up-and-coming composer Music/JeremySoule, who went on to provide soundtracks for such classics as ''VideoGame/DungeonSiege'', ''Franchise/TheElderScrolls'' (from ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIIMorrowind Morrowind]]'' onward), ''VideoGame/GuildWars'', and ''VideoGame/TotalAnnihilation''. |
| 7 | |
| 8 | The game stars a [[UnabashedBMovieFan B-movie-loving]] boy who stumbles upon an abandoned mansion on the outskirts of [[EverytownAmerica Podunk, U.S.A.]] After a mishap with a mysterious device, the boy and his {{canine companion}} get warped to Evermore, an artificial world which resembles a mash-up of various epochs in Earth history: {{Prehistoria}}, SwordAndSandal, TheMiddleAges, and finally {{Tomorrowland}}. He discovers four other people who are also trapped, the result of a bungled experiment 30 years ago. His goal becomes to explore this strange world and find a way to get everyone back to Podunk. |
| 9 | |
| 10 | ---- |
| 11 | |
| 12 | The [[ExcusePlot plot isn't as complex as it sounds,]] and the game is full of parodies of the genre, especially the path-of-least-resistance economic tropes: There's a whole segment with the boy hocking items and haggling with merchants. Likewise, spending time in the boy's company is pretty entertaining, with the boy constantly comparing his predicaments to various (awful) movies, and his dog {{shapeshifting}} into various forms (wolf, greyhound, poodle, robot) depending on which locale they're in. It's strictly 1-player, unlike ''Secret'', though a 2-player [[GameMod hack]] for it exists. |
| 13 | |
| 14 | Compared to ''Secret'' and other Square titles, the game itself is rather short. It's also [[NoSidepathsNoExplorationNoFreedom linear,]] with no {{side quest}}s, loads of BackTracking, and only one branching path (choosing whether to tackle the Great Pyramid or Hall of Collosia first). The biggest divergence from ''Secret'' is the VancianMagic system, known here as {{Alchemy|Is Magic}}. Throughout the game, you'll be able to find or buy ingredients for spells, whether offensive or defensive; these range from the commonplace Oil, Water, Wax, Limestone, and Root to exotic ones like Ethanol, Brimstone, Dry Ice, and Meteorite. You learn new formulas by [[TalkToEveryone seeking out alchemists]] (some of whom can be tough to find) and assembling the necessary parts. Use a formula enough times, and it will level up in effectiveness, similar to ''Secret''. |
| 15 | |
| 16 | A long-dead post in the ''Secret of Evermore'' Website/GameFAQs forum featured an extended discussion with one of the game's programmers who happened to stumble upon the conversation. Topics covered before the thread died ranged from what the programmers did after work, to an explanation of what the Gourd does (it doesn't do anything, incidentally), and some personal anecdotes regarding the design process itself. For instance, they used Randi from ''Secret'' as a placeholder sprite for the boy during the prototyping phase. |
| 17 | ---- |
| 18 | !!''Secret of Evermore'' provides examples of: |
| 19 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 20 | |
| 21 | [[folder:#-C]] |
| 22 | |
| 23 | * OneUp: |
| 24 | ** There's an item called Pixie Dust and a Call Bead spell called Regenerate which will restore a small amount of HP if your character 'dies' before they wear off. |
| 25 | ** Literally the name of an alchemy formula, but it fully restores the Hero's health. |
| 26 | * AbandonedLaboratory: Located within a greenhouse on top of Ruffleberg's derelict mansion. Omnitopia is similarly deserted, apart from the Professor and his master, Carltron. |
| 27 | * AbilityRequiredToProceed: |
| 28 | ** The Hero's starter weapon, the Bone Crusher, can't cut through foliage. He can't travel north of Fire Eyes' Village until he gets the Spider Claw. |
| 29 | ** The switches in Antiqua have to be hit from a distance, and the prehistoric spear is too light to do the job. The Hero needs to find the heavier Bronze Spear. |
| 30 | ** Stone barriers and blocked doorways that his Spider Claw is too weak to demolish, forcing him to find a Bronze Axe. Later on, Tinker hands over the Knight Basher to break down the barricades blocking access to his brother's place. (After visiting Omnitopia, the same chest has the Atom Smasher, but it isn't required to complete the game.) |
| 31 | ** The Levitate and Revealer formulas, which serve no purpose other than to remove barriers or bridge gaps. |
| 32 | * AbsurdlyHighLevelCap |
| 33 | ** As was the standard for [=RPG=]s, the Hero and his Dog can reach level 99, but you'll likely finish the game with them around Level 30. |
| 34 | ** The Hero can equip 13 weapons that can all be upgraded twice. 2600 skill points are required to master all the weapons, but each monster will net him a paltry 1 or more skill points. Most of those weapons won't see enough use to reach Level 2. |
| 35 | ** The Hero's Alchemy formulas become stronger the more he uses them, and can potentially be maxed out at level 9. |
| 36 | * AbsurdlySpaciousSewer: There are several of these, and each one is a maze. |
| 37 | * AcceptableBreaksFromReality: Under normal circumstances, Alchemy requires the use of pure and precisely portioned ingredients as any impurities or preparation errors could result in serious and unintended consequences such as misfiring. In this game, any ingredients that you find out in the wild are clean enough and in sufficiently measured quantities to be usable. |
| 38 | * AcidAttack: The Acid Rain and Corrosion formulas call down a bubbling, burning raincloud and a slow-acting deluge respectively. |
| 39 | * AdamSmithHatesYourGuts: Each world the Hero visits has its own form of currency, and there's a steep exchange rate: A Gold Coin is equal to 2 Jewels, which is equal to 4 Talons, which is equal to 8 Credits. The amount of currency needed to buy items tends to stay the same without taking exchange rate into account, so the same item which costs 60 Talons in Prehistoria may cost 60 Gold Coins in Gothica, four times the price. However, even in the same region, item and ingredient prices vary. Alchemy ingredients are often sold by multiple merchants and you can buy a large supply from them to avoid being gouged from other merchants later in the game. Eventually you get the airship and can travel between regions freely. So the trope is less "Adam Smith Hates Your Guts" and more "Buy In Bulk and Learn To Price-Check." |
| 40 | * AddedAlliterativeAppeal: |
| 41 | ** ''The femur of fury! Useful for mangling mosquitoes.'' |
| 42 | ** Elizabeth warns of the "vicious volcano Vipers" before sending the Hero out on his second quest. |
| 43 | ** Pompolonius is having way too much fun introducing Vigor. "The King of Chaos... The Babylonian Bruiser... The Pulverizing Prince of Pandemonium..." |
| 44 | ** At one point, the boy compares Evil Horace's rantings to that of "Emperor Zorn in ''Acropolis Apocalypse''." |
| 45 | ** Once an undersea passage opens up between Antiqua and Gothica, Horace theorizes that it could be the Hero's "passage to Podunk." |
| 46 | ** Bagel Beasts and Waffle Weasels were among the villains in one of the Hero's movies, ''Attack of the Appliance People''. |
| 47 | ** The Virtual Vest and Magma Mail are available for sale in Omnitopia, and the Laser Lance is found in the same chest as the bazooka from the beginning. |
| 48 | * AirVentPassageway: In Ivor Tower, the player must guide the Dog through a maze in the interior of the castle walls. |
| 49 | * AllSwordsAreTheSame: For the purposes of the battle system, the bone is no different from the broadswords you later pick up. |
| 50 | * AllTheWorldsAreAStage: Omnitopia features numerous enemies from the past three worlds, or at least UndergroundMonkey variants: Raptors, Rimsalas, Aquagoth's Tentacles, {{Rat|Stomp}}s, the killer plants, and mosquitoes all appear. The final battle brings back the Bad Boy and Dark Toaster (evil copies of your heroes) and Magmar. Even the background is full of reminders of past levels, with images of Thraxx's face, machines shaped like Aegis, and the Volcano boiler reappearing as scenery. |
| 51 | * AlliterativeName: Horace Highwater, Perceval Plank, and Tinker Tinderbox. |
| 52 | * AnchorsAway: The Rogues wield these as weapons on the shores and cliff sides of Antiqua. |
| 53 | * AncientGrome: The Antiqua region is a mash-up of not only Ancient Greek and Ancient Rome, but also of Ancient Egypt with a dash each of pirates, Arabic culture, and Ancient China. Given the region was created from the thoughts of the curator of a history museum, there's a mingling of so many radically different cultures and time periods into one idealized place. |
| 54 | * ArtDeco: Ruffleberg's mansion is as kooky as he is, sporting humanoid sculptures, a checkered roofs, a Unisphere, and other abstract shapes. |
| 55 | * AstralFinale: Omnitopia was ''Halo'' before ''Halo'': a ring-shaped {{space station}} encircling the planet. (At least in the illustrations.) The last battle is fought here, but the Hero needs to perform one more errand on the surface world first. |
| 56 | * AttackItsWeakPoint: |
| 57 | ** Thraxx's ribcage shields its beating, exposed heart from damage. |
| 58 | ** The fight with Rimsala boils down to occasionally casting alchemy to keep its statues disabled while you wait for Rimsala's "Eye" to return to its altar so you can whack it a few more times. |
| 59 | * AuthorityInNameOnly: Queen Bluegarden built a sterile castle on the opposite end of Gothica. Under her orders, the citizenry abandoned their homes, and the old castle was allowed to overrun with rats, leading to the oft-quoted line, "'I'm King of the rats, I tell ya! King of the rats!''" |
| 60 | * AwesomeButImpractical: |
| 61 | ** Holding down the attack button to charge your weapon. You cannot simply charge your weapon when your stamina is at 100%; the Hero will automatically swing it around when you press the button, dropping it back to 0%. So, you hold down the button and wait for it to fill back up to 100%. Then fill it up ''again'' to level one. Then fill it up ''once more'' to level two, if you have it. (Which takes about three times longer than a normal swing.) Granted, charged melee attacks are powerful and even game-breaking with the right Alchemy; but more often than not, you'll watch your HP whittle away as your enemies maul you to death. |
| 62 | ** Alchemy. It really is a novel idea, but in practice isn't very effective. Individual formulas take a long time to level up, and ingredients can get pricey, so players will be inclined to save their cash and stick with what they have rather than stock up on a new ingredient type for a new formula. The game offers Heal, Cure, Defend, Hard Ball, and Flash in the opening world before you even get your third weapon, and they cover the Hero's strategic needs, i.e. healing, raising defense, and attacking. Later, Crush and Fireball equates to better firepower, and their ingredients are common in Antiqua and Gothica. Then there are utility formulas like Revive, Miracle Cure, and Barrier. But beyond Antiqua, new attack formulas just don't scale well against increasingly-powerful enemies, and the assorted healing formulas are unnecessary since Heal is cheaper and leveled-up already. |
| 63 | ** Nitro is the strongest formula in the game in terms of power. By the time you find Nitro, you're on your way to retrieve the item which lets you access the {{final boss}}es. To add insult to injury, the ingredients needed to use Nitro can only be bought from two merchants in separate regions, both of whom reside in hard-to-reach locations, And each one only sells one of the two ingredients needed for Nitro. It's as though the developers designed the spell to purposefully invoke this trope. |
| 64 | ** The Laser Lance and Atom Smasher. During most chapters, the sword is the weakest weapon, the axe is the middle ground, and the spear is the strongest. The three Omnitopia chapter weapons are all equal with a 50 attack rating. The Hero got the Neutron Blade at the start of the chapter and has likely been using it the most so far, and you only get these two weapons just before returning to Evermore for the Energy Core for the final boss melee, so there's little room to use them and build them up either. In the end, they will both prove quite useless, since all three weapons have equal attack power, but swords get a bonus from the Silver Sheath whether you have it or not (due to a bug), meaning the Neutron Blade will be your strongest weapon no matter what. |
| 65 | * BackTracking: |
| 66 | ** When it comes time to build Tinker's rocket, he'll need a Gauge and Wheel from the Volcano's exploded boiler. He tells you to go poking around where debris from the eruption would have landed. |
| 67 | ** Debris from Aegis itself can be found in Prehistoria, and its Power Core cuts through Antiqua's underground before somehow ending up beneath Gothica's Chessboard. |
| 68 | ** When the Hero finally returns to Omnitopia, he finds himself in a Junkyard. He'll return here at the very end of the game to activate a teleporter to Carltron's lair. |
| 69 | * BalanceBetweenGoodAndEvil: After deactivating Carltron, the Hero and Prof. Ruffleberg notice that Evermore seems to be wracked with earthquakes. Ruffleberg believes they have thrown off the balance, and only by removing themselves from the equation will it be spared. |
| 70 | * BambooTechnology: Gomi appears to be building a skyscraper using whatever junk he has lying around. Surprisingly averted in the primitive world. |
| 71 | * BarFight: In the Crustacia tavern, there's a pair of [=NPCs=] who endlessly trade blows, and their dialog is what you'd expect from this game. "''Do you mind? We're trying to hit each other here!''" |
| 72 | * BattleBoomerang: Oddly used not by the Hero as in ''Secret'', but by a Nobilian gladiator. It's one of his long-range attacks. |
| 73 | * BazaarOfTheBizarre: Located in Nobilia and Ivor Tower, and themselves the subject of many an FAQ. It's possible to make lots of money with smart trading... or lose a fortune trying. |
| 74 | * BeatStillMyHeart: Among other random items pulled from Blimp's bag is a cartoon valentine heart (not a realistic one) which beats silently. |
| 75 | * BeeBeeGun: The inconspicuous "Sting" formula. It summons a giant beehive which fires a small swarm at opponents. |
| 76 | * BetterThanABareBulb: |
| 77 | ** As a result of growing up on cheesy B-movies, the Hero is fairly GenreSavvy. |
| 78 | ** The four regions hit almost every associated trope you'd expect from them: there's a Volcano in the jungle, there's a Great Pyramid and a coliseum in the middle of a desert, there's a human chessboard inside a hedge maze, and so forth. Combined with the fact the world is actually made from the imaginations of four rubes who may be a few decades out of date, but are still educated and familiar with the common tropes of their respective themed worlds. |
| 79 | * BigFancyCastle: Ivor Tower and Ebon Keep. |
| 80 | * TheBigRace: Played for laughs in Gothica. Perceval Plank abducts your Dog and tries to pass him off as a hybrid "Pigpoodle" in his Exhibition of Oddities. This happens on the same day as the much-anticipated Pig Race; when your Dog gets loose from the carnies, he mistakenly joins the race and far surpasses the other pigs, causing "the Pig's" owner (the Hero) to "win" the race and get dragged off to dine with the Queen. |
| 81 | * BlackoutBasement: Oglin Cave is a pitch-black teleporter maze. |
| 82 | * BlandNameProduct: Modern-day Podunk has a Doughead Software (a play on Egghead Software) store down the street from the theater. |
| 83 | * BleakLevel: Ebon Keep, though it is more melancholy than anything. |
| 84 | * BlindMistake: An old lady in the air vents mistakes the Dog for a furry child and gives him a [[MasterKey skeleton key]] to the castle. Later on, we meet a castle guard who mentions that his wife has poor eyesight and tumbled into one of the vents one day, never to return. |
| 85 | * BloodstainedGlassWindows: The Hero, after fighting a number of monsters that emerge from stained glass pictures: |
| 86 | -->"Those guys were a pane in the glass." |
| 87 | * BookEnds: |
| 88 | ** The game starts and ends in the same places several times over: Omnitopia, Ruffleberg's lab, and the theater in Podunk. |
| 89 | ** At the start of the game, in Prehistoria, you encounter Raptors. Near the end of the game, in Omnitopia, you encounter Metal Raptors. |
| 90 | * BookcasePassage: |
| 91 | ** In the intro sequence, the Hero accidentally loosens a wall panel, gaining access to the old laboratory. |
| 92 | ** In the castle vents, the most linear path to the exit is hidden behind a bookcase. |
| 93 | ** It makes no sense at all for one of the cells in Ebon Keep prison to actually be a secret passage to behind one of the houses in town. But if it led into the castle, the player wouldn't have a reason to explore the town and notice Ivor Tower is a replica of Ebon Keep. |
| 94 | * BoringButPractical: Of the three weapon categories, the axe. Swords are the first weapon found in any chapter. You train with them the longest, and they're the easiest to use, but they're typically weaker than the axe in said region. Spears are the most powerful in their respective chapters, but the Hero's small stature limits their use to ranged charged attacks. Axes make the Hero lunge forward, so they have a pretty good range, but without him directly in harm's way. Admittedly, the animation is a little slower, and the Lv. 2 attack leaves a lot to be desired. |
| 95 | * BossInMookClothing: |
| 96 | ** The Hero encounters an out-of-place [[AttackDrone Guard Bot]] in Gothica. But it's not the same as the bots he fought previously. This guy will seriously wreck the Hero's day if he's not prepared. |
| 97 | ** Evermore is teeming with spiders, but they're more annoying than threating, and poison isn't dangerous unless you're low on health to begin with. Once you get the Insect Incense in Gothica, their attacks simply do nothing. Cut to the final battle: if you unwittingly hurt the harmless cleaning robots, you'll be attacked by Dark Spiders who ignore the Incense, can do upwards of 250 damage, and have 600 HP. Every time you destroy the robots, more spiders spawn, with an additional one being added each time you do. They ''do'' drop the most experience of any non-[[BossBattle boss]] enemy in the game, but that's not worth prolonging this fight. |
| 98 | * BossRush: The final battle, in lieu of a fight with Carltron. When the butler finally gets mad enough to confront the Hero, the professor uses it as a distraction to switch Carltron off. |
| 99 | * ABoyAndHisX: It's just a little wire-haired terrier in the beginning. When the pair reunite in Prehistoria, the Dog has mutated into a huge, hulking cave wolf instead. He keeps changing as you travel between the worlds/regions. He can handle himself in a fight, and tends to inflict more damage than his master in melee mode; you'll probably find yourself setting his AI to passive so he doesn't kill-steal. He can also sniff out chests and Alchemy ingredients on the ground that are invisible to the Hero, but he can't pick up or use items (so Alchemy is out of the question for him). Unlike his owner, the Dog only requires one piece of armor, and upgrades can be found in every region. You'd never have made it to the end of the journey without the Dog. |
| 100 | * BrickJoke: In Antiqua, the Hero finds a boulder suspiciously similar to the ones he levitated in Prehistoria. Do the same here, and Tiny comes out and demonstrates his superior strength by picking up the boulder and throwing it away. ''Far'' away. When he inevitably ends up at the far end of the desert again, the boulder will land and form a bridge for the Hero to cross. Lampshaded by the Hero: |
| 101 | --> '''Hero''': Wow! That boulder was flying for a long time! |
| 102 | * BrokenBridge: |
| 103 | ** The washout from the volcano also floods the river in Antiqua. It creates a gap which the Dog needs to jump across, so he can wheel a platform over for the Hero to ride. |
| 104 | ** When Aegis explodes and Tiny hurls the Power Core away, it crashes at the base of the river, which opens up a cavern into the Oglin Caves. The also drains the river, revealing a new entrance into the Great Pyramid. |
| 105 | ** According to the Queen, there is a raised drawbridge in Gothica which cut off direct access to Ebon Keep. |
| 106 | ** Obstacles like the greenhouse flowers and the heating system can kill the Hero in Omnitopia. He'll have to lower the lights and temperature, respectively. |
| 107 | * BubblegloopSwamp: Prehistoria has two: the tar pits bone-studded cliffs of Bugmuck, and a northern area simply named "Swamp" with bone bridges, giant mosquitoes, and the colossal eel monster Salabog lurking under the stagnant green water. Lovely. |
| 108 | * BuildLikeAnEgyptian: The Great Pyramid dungeon in Antiqua mixes Egyptian architecture and snake-headed guardsmen with creepy Easter Island-faced statues, giant stone fists trying to crush you, winged flying skulls, and lots of poison damage. |
| 109 | * BullfightBoss: |
| 110 | ** That spiked chariot isn't just for show. Vigor can't be hit from the front or sides. You can see from his sprite that he's wearing nothing but a loincloth from the back. |
| 111 | ** Meet the Minitaur. He's not as vulnerable to alchemy, and he also uses the classic videogame ground-shake attack. |
| 112 | * TheCaligula: Unlike the other rulers who actually govern their regions, Horace is content to lead an archaeology team from a camp in the wilderness. His double is much more ostentatious, wearing a red paludamentum and relaying commands from his palace in Nobilia. He only changes into a hat and khakis when it comes time to pose as the real Horace: he tricks the Hero into handing over some {{plot coupon}}s. |
| 113 | * CaveBehindTheFalls: The Hero and his Dog leap off a rainbow-crested waterfall to find the entrance to the Oglin Cave. |
| 114 | * CaveMouth: |
| 115 | ** The Hero fights Thraxx/Choleoptera inside one of these. |
| 116 | ** In the Mammoth Graveyard, entering the skull at the top leads to an intersection between the Volcano and Swamp. |
| 117 | * ChainOfDeals: Used to humorous effect in the desert city, Nobilia. The Hero starts out buying small items like bags of spice and rice, then can trade his way up to the best armor and accessories in the region. If he plays his cards right, he'll wind up with charms that grant permanent stat boosts. Or the Magic Gourd, which is useless. |
| 118 | * ChargedAttack: Like in ''Secret'', each weapon has multiple levels of charge. At first, you only have a choice between a little swipe and a full swing, but as your skill with a weapon improves you can charge up to two power meters into a single blow. |
| 119 | * ChekhovsGun: |
| 120 | ** The Hero will come across some unlit fire pits in his travels. These function as landing lights once you get a set of wings, and they're easy to spot from the sky. He can't land his aircraft just anywhere. |
| 121 | ** The Dog has his own [[OurFounder stone idol]] in the Nobilia square. It later crumbles away to reveal Aegis. |
| 122 | * ChekhovsGunman: |
| 123 | ** "I am Tiny. My strength is needed." |
| 124 | ** Mungola is briefly shown escaping from the sideshow exhibit in Gothica, so the player is probably expecting to fight it later. The Hero can't approach the puppets in the castle, either, since the King just shouts, "Can't see! Down in front!" As expected, they're each revealed as the bosses of Ivor Tower. |
| 125 | * ChekhovsVolcano: The Volcano in the middle of Prehistoria. The Hero goes inside, fights through Vipers, confronts Elizabeth's Twin, then gets blown out through the top to wash up in Antiqua. |
| 126 | * ChokepointGeography: The environments in Evermore seem to exist in their own biome; each is separated from the others in some way. Fire Eyes' Village is on a massive plateau. Gothica sits on entirely different continent. And the final area of the game isn't part of Evermore at all. |
| 127 | * CircusOfFear: |
| 128 | ** The sideshow in Gothica, which the Hero is forced to buy tickets for, is an unimpressive lineup of obvious props -- apart from Mungola, who quietly slinks away when the carnival barker isn't looking. |
| 129 | ** As an ironic punishment, the replicas of Elizabeth, Horace and Camellia are forcibly put to work in the sideshow in the ending, filling the old spot left by the now-deceased Mungola. |
| 130 | ** The Queen and her weirdo puppet show. By wandering west of the throne room, the Hero can watch the entire show unfold. But he can't influence the play or free the King from their thrall, at least not until later. The King is stuck in a trance in a theatre box, unable to do anything but laugh giddily at the puppet show. |
| 131 | * CognizantLimbs: Thraxx, and later his stronger, greener offspring, Choleoptera. |
| 132 | * CommonplaceRare: Alchemy Ingredients are priced according to where the seller is located, and it makes sense for the most part. The easier a merchant has access to an ingredient, the cheaper they sell it for. Iron is only sold in Gothica, since Prehistoria wouldn't be able to smelt it and Antiqua probably isn't able to smelt enough that it could be mass-produced and sold to the masses. Gunpowder is only sold in Omnitopia since none of the other regions have firearms. However, there are still some stand-out oddities: Feathers are only sold by three merchants between Gothica and Omnitopia, even though birds are found throughout Evermore. Vinegar should logically be available in Antiqua and perhaps Gothica, but only one merchant in Gothica sells it; the only other merchant who sells it is in Prehistoria. (He's a member of an Antiqua alchemist guild.) One would presume Grease would be found in Omnitopia with all its machinery, but it's found in Gothica from an alchemist living beneath a chessboard. |
| 133 | * ComputersAreFast: Apart from the CPU partner's pathfinding ability, they will attack at precise moments when they expect to land a hit, as seen [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iA2c0O12GJg&list=PLO2o0_k4kOrwyc46vJ98GxaKJIGzw4HUj&index=9 here.]] |
| 134 | * CoresAndTurretsBoss: |
| 135 | ** The boss of the Great Pyramid, Rimsala. The only way for it to inflict direct damage is by spinning into your characters. The four respawning statues in the arena cast Flash regularly, but they can be disabled for a time with an alchemy attack. |
| 136 | ** Mungola, the final boss of Gothica. It's just a face poking through some stage curtains which silently watches you fight a pair of puppets that defend it. Mungola occasionally casts alchemy like Fireball or Corrosion. |
| 137 | * CrapsaccharineWorld: |
| 138 | ** The different worlds are ironic manifestations of each of the inhabitants' personal utopias. |
| 139 | ** Played for laughs in Ivor Tower, "the happiest place on Evermore!" The city was rebuilt down to the last detail because the Queen found the old one to be old and dingy. When the floor gives in under her weight, it causes a chain reaction which levels the entire castle and covers it in soot and rubble, forcing everyone to migrate back to the old city. |
| 140 | * {{Crossover}}: |
| 141 | ** Look at those yahoos in the spectator stands during the coliseum fight. It's Terra, Locke, Mog, Strago, Relm, and Umaro from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVI''. |
| 142 | ** A Chocobo Egg can be added to your stockpile of charms. It gives the player and his Dog more health. |
| 143 | ** Cecil Harvey from ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIV'' shows up as a shopkeeper in Ebon Keep, and makes references to his adventures. He will lower the price of his wares if the Hero recognizes which game he's from. |
| 144 | |
| 145 | [[/folder]] |
| 146 | |
| 147 | [[folder:D-L]] |
| 148 | |
| 149 | * DeadGuyOnDisplay: Blimp shows up again in Antiqua, and he's mounted the dead Salabog's head on the wall of his store, which is pretty hardcore. |
| 150 | * DecadeDissonance: Evermore was designed with this in mind. From the caveman world on the plateau, to the AncientGrome analogue of Antiqua, to the fantasy Renaissance land of Gothica, and finally Professor Ruffleberg's own space station, all four brushing up against each other. It's a bit odd how every culture, including the cavemen, know to sell you doggie biscuits. |
| 151 | * DefeatEqualsExplosion: Yay, we beat the raptor. Who promptly exploded into flames. This makes a little more sense once you learn that Evermore was supposed to be a paradise before Carltron filled it with animatronic monsters. Presumably the pirates are androids, too. [[BloodlessCarnage (They explode once defeated.)]] Carltron has a squad of these chrome raptors patrolling the tubeways of his city. |
| 152 | * DegradedBoss: |
| 153 | ** Son of Anhur. A pair of them are faced as mini-bosses in the Great Pyramid, and they later appear as normal enemies. |
| 154 | ** For some reason, the cells in Ivor Tower contain refugees from other time periods: a Viper, a Minitaur, and one of Carltron's Mecha Dusters from the beginning of the game. The cells in Ebon Keep contain a Raptor and another attack droid. Higher up in the castle, the stained glass windows come to life and spawn Vipers, Mad monks, and other anachronisms. This is some type of "security system" conjured up by Tinker. |
| 155 | ** Stronger copies of the game's bosses appear in Omnitopia, where their originals were built: Metal Raptors and Eyes of Rimsala are crawling all over Omnitopia. |
| 156 | * DevelopersForesight: [[DevelopersForesight/SecretOfEvermore Now has its own page]] |
| 157 | * DifficultButAwesome: The Bazooka. Yes, you can load three different types of ammo into it, with Cryo-Blast shells shaving off 600 HP. (For comparison, the strongest weapons found during the Omnitopia chapter are all capped at 50.) Plus there's no need to grind up experience for the thing, nor charge it for a more powerful attack. However, each shot [[{{Knockback}} flings the Hero on his ass]] while firing (admittedly very fast) rockets straight ahead. The problem is, enemies tend to move even faster and will dodge your shots if you're a moment too slow to fire, leaving you wide open to counter-attacks as you wait to recharge back up to 100% rather than just [[PistolWhipping beaning them with the bazooka itself.]] Another problem is that shots tend to 'miss' if the enemy scrolls off-screen, a problem exacerbated by the severe recoil, even if your aim was on point. It saves on LevelGrinding if you'd rather just shoot instead of repeatedly swing a weapon for experience, but it can be difficult to get used to and master. |
| 158 | %%* DiagonalSpeedBoost |
| 159 | * DistressedDude: |
| 160 | ** Ruffleberg is stuck doing forced labor, devising new monsters from his control center in space. Otherwise Carltron threatens to shut off the planet and kill everybody. |
| 161 | ** Strong Heart, the chief alchemist and advisor to Elizabeth, is being held captive inside a cocoon in the Bugmuck. The Hero has to free him with the Spider Claw, which is won by beating Thraxx. |
| 162 | * DolledUpInstallment: So, just what was the "secret" of Evermore? Marketing. The game's original title was just ''Evermore''; "Secret of" was tacked on to cash in on the success of ''Secret of Mana'', as well as the recycling of the RingMenu and typeface. Ultimately, this worked against the game's favor: it got panned because it was a good game, but was billed as the sequel to a great game. People walked in with expectations of things (multiplayer, magic, more weapons) that simply weren't there. Worse, when Square opted not to localize ''VideoGame/TrialsOfMana'' into English, most fans mistakenly believed that the decision was made to avoid competition with ''Evermore''. |
| 163 | * DoYouWantToHaggle: One merchant in particular is extremely gullible and will fall for the oldest scam in the book. During the Nobilia market sequence, it's possible to talk him down from his original asking price all the way down to a pittance (a few bags of rice and some spice) in exchange for a bunch of Amulets, which can also be used to trade for some of those tasty charms from the lowermost shops. He'll close up shop for good after that, stating "You're too shrewd." If you try to haggle with him further, however, he'll get fed up and refuse to sell the Hero anything ever again. |
| 164 | * DontGoInTheWoods: The Gothica alchemists live near forests and charge you 80 Gold Coins for Roots. The fact that a large section of the forest is off-limits may imply a danger surcharge. |
| 165 | * DoomyDoomsOfDoom: The Desert of Doom. |
| 166 | * DownInTheDumps: Omnitopia's garbage heap. You start out in the sewer and have to climb your way to Ruffleberg's lab. |
| 167 | * DrunkOnTheDarkSide: Horace's Twin, once he gets his mitts on the Diamond Eyes. When someone acts like a B-movie villain, the Hero should be more suspicious. |
| 168 | -->'''Hero''': "Guaaaahahahaha"? This guy is a looney! |
| 169 | * DualBoss: Two Sons of Anhur trap you in the Great Pyramid. They can't Poison you like the Son of Set, so their only advantage is the ability to fight you in close-quarters. (The room is quite small.) You're rewarded with the Bronze axe for killing them. |
| 170 | * EarlyBirdCameo: |
| 171 | ** The player catches a brief glimpse of Ruffleberg on the space station before being dumped into Prehistoria. |
| 172 | ** After taking out the Guardbots with his bazooka and descending down a floor iris, the Hero runs into his Dog again, who barks a greeting at him. At first, you notice something off about it, but you figure maybe it's just all the metal distorting his barking. Turns out that it was the toaster-dog who joins you in Omnitopia. |
| 173 | * EasterEgg: as demonstrated [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJeGYt1C4p4&list=PLO2o0_k4kOrwyc46vJ98GxaKJIGzw4HUj&index=43&t=323s here]] to more actively accommodate a recent find by [=BlackSliver=], a prominent member of the game's posse of dataminers, [[spoiler:Carltron can appear in Crustacia as the Hero drifts onto its sand, dusting off a crate before walking off to the nearby Firepit site as the Hero comes to]]; this is activated by [[spoiler:using up all of the bazooka's ammo during the tutorial battle]]. |
| 174 | * ElephantGraveyard: The Mammoth Graveyard north of the village is the site of a tricky MultiMookMelee with a pack of Vipers. |
| 175 | -->[[PrepareToDie "Prepare to join the mammoths!"]] |
| 176 | * TheEndIsNigh: The doomsday preacher in the Bargain Bazaar has a degree of MediumAwareness. |
| 177 | * TheEndOrIsIt: A post-credits scene shows Carltron still scheming and up to his old tricks. It's also implied that the world of Evermore still exists in some way. At least, the machine to send people there still exists. The developers actually were interested in a sequel, but poor sales scrapped those plans. |
| 178 | * EternalEnglish: All four lands use the same language. Justified in that they're artificial constructs, not 'real' locations. |
| 179 | * EvilChef: The goofy French stereotype who tries the broil the Dog, thinking he's a prize pig. Even after the mask falls off, "Pierre" still chases him around with a ladle and threatens to cook him. |
| 180 | * EvilIsDeathlyCold: The faux Elizabeth turns out to be the one commanding the Vipers. She plans to freeze out the humans by turning off the volcano's heat, allowing the Vipers to swoop in and take over their settlement. |
| 181 | * EvilKnockoff: |
| 182 | ** Elizabeth, Horace, and Camellia each have robotic clones running around and making trouble. The fake "Elizabeth" is lacking her trademark spectacles, "Horace" is wearing an all-green version of his usual pith helmet and safari pants, and "Cameilla" has off-color blue lipstick instead of red. |
| 183 | ** A trio of "Bad Boys" (a knockoff of the Hero) are encountered partway through the forest in Gothica. Which leads to the line, "...you're [[TwentyPercentMoreAwesome three times stronger than yourself!]]" An upgraded Bad Boy and his Dog companion (who is a much stronger opponent) are fought during the enemy onslaught at the very end. |
| 184 | * {{Expy}}: Given that Squaresoft also produced the ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'' series, you can think of Tinker as the "Cid" of the game, the inventor who gives you your airship. |
| 185 | * EyeOfNewt: The alchemy ingredients often take the form of chemicals, minerals, or various flora. |
| 186 | * FakeKing: A clockwork version in the shape of Queen Bluegarden. |
| 187 | * FatBastard: The gargantuan Queen Bluegarden, who is later revealed to be a robot. When her final line of defense, Mungola, is defeated in battle, she threatens to smash the duo herself -- but only manages to belly-flop a short distance from the balcony, causing the floor to give way under her bulk and fall several stories to the castle base. |
| 188 | -->'''Bluegarden's Evil Twin''': ''[misses the Hero by a mile]'' [[IMeantToDoThat I meant to do that.]] |
| 189 | * FaunsAndSatyrs: Dancin' Fools are common mobs in the Hall of Collosia. They are Satyrs who trot around and attack you with a dervish of daggers. |
| 190 | * FauxAffablyEvil: The Queen, who now lives in a literal Ivory Tower, is mentioned by several citizens as being "really nice". The same person she was in Ebon Keep... only "sickeningly" so. |
| 191 | * TheFerryMan: There is an undead ferryman who will ferry you to Nobilia, "the jewel of the Desert of Doom"... in exchange for one Amulet of Annihilation. [[NoHeroDiscount (Cost: ten thousand gems.)]] He's chatty for a skeleton, constantly remarking on the desert scenery like a tour bus captain. |
| 192 | * FinalDungeonPreview: The game gives you a very brief glimpse of Omnitopia just as the opening sequence ends, culminating with a fight with several robots before you're marooned on Evermore proper. Sure enough, Omnitopia is the final dungeon of the game. There's even a slight nod to the Dog's robot form just before you travel to the surface. |
| 193 | * {{Fireballs}}: At least four different formulas have this effect in varying degrees. Most are very effective with a little leveling. |
| 194 | * FirstTown: Fire Eyes' village is the first town you can rest or buy supplies in, since the Hero was ejected from Omnitopia before he could browse the mall. Plus he wasn't carrying any cash, anyway. |
| 195 | * FlashbackEffects: The prologue is told in [[DeliberatelyMonochrome monochrome.]] |
| 196 | * ForcedTransformation: The Hero can keep talking to the philosopher in Nobilia. He rants that everyone is a puppet of an invisible, "button-pushing overlord". This can be interpreted as either the player or Carltron. The game might prompt you to turn him into a goat, a chicken, or a basket to silence him; this can again be interpreted as willful cruelty by the player or Carltron changing reality to silence one of his critics. |
| 197 | * GameBreakingBug: Talking to Tiny with the Dog will cause the came to freeze, presumably as a result of no dialog being scripted. |
| 198 | * GameplayAndStorySegregation: |
| 199 | ** "Caemilla" enlists the Hero to lower the "drawbridge" in Ebon Keep so her men can clean house. A shortcut to Ebon Keep does appear later, but it's a simple, wooden truss bridge with a roof. Even stranger, the Hero emerges on an entirely-different bridge on the other end. (Wrong size, shape and material.) In fact, it's unclear how the bridges near the Chessboard keep disappearing and reappearing, since they're made of stone and can't be retracted. |
| 200 | ** Omnitopia appears to be built on top of and inside some sort of planetoid. There are no free-standing towers like in the TV commercial or instruction manual; it's all underground. |
| 201 | * GangplankGalleon: Crustacia is teeming with Age of Sail-type pirates living out of a hollowed-out [[DerelictGraveyard wrecked ship.]] Yar. |
| 202 | * GardenOfEvil: The Omnitopia Greenhouse contains Flowering Deaths, carnivorous plants that were genetically-engineered to [[OneHitKill kill anyone who gets too close in one hit.]] |
| 203 | * GhostTown: Ebon Keep, the original city within Gothica, was completely vacated when Camellia's evil twin usurped the throne, with the residents all being moved to Ivor Tower under the pretense that cleaning up their old city was harder work than just building a new one; only Cecil remained behind, later joined by Camellia and Tinker after she escaped from prison. Once the twin is defeated, the situation gets flipped with the populace relocating to Ebon Keep again. |
| 204 | * GiantSpaceFleaFromNowhere: There's a lot of bosses in this game who pop up with little, if any, foreshadowing or story explanation, and are there just to offer you a fight at the end of an area. |
| 205 | * GiantSquid: Aquagoth, the final boss of Antiqua. It turns out to be the cause of a well drying up, which allows the Hero to ride a water bucket up and away into the realm of Gothica. |
| 206 | * GlobalAirship: Tinker's flying machine. Soon to be replaced by one of those Omnitopian space shuttles. However, their use is limited by the fact that are only five landing zones the entire surface of Evermore, plus one more in Omnitopia (only accessible by the shuttle), so it's more like [[WarpWhistle a giant level select menu.]] |
| 207 | * GodSaveUsFromTheQueen: The Queen of Gothica is fixated on keeping her kingdom clean and hygienic, and throws you in jail for allowing the Dog into her dining hall. |
| 208 | * GoneHorriblyRight: Over the course of the game, you gradually learn more about the world of Evermore and its inhabitants; specifically, that Professor Ruffleburg designed Evermore as a realization of its inhabitant's '[[{{Utopia}} ideal world]]', each area catering to their own personal desires. For one resident, Evermore is a prehistoric jungle, while for another it becomes an archaeological dig. |
| 209 | * GreenHillZone: The game begins on a space station, but the Hero is swiftly jettisoned out the airlock and sent crashing to the surface, awakening in an atmospheric jungle. This place seems more hostile than it actually is. There are plenty of hazards, but the enemies don't chew up ''too'' much HP, and they leave [[HealingHerb health-restoring Petals behind.]] The ambush by the Raptors is just for training purposes, and the reward isn't so great that you feel punished for losing. |
| 210 | * GrimyWater: The sewerways under Ivor Tower are toxic and inflict periodic damage, much like the Poison status effect. |
| 211 | * GuideDangIt: |
| 212 | ** Numerous items are {{permanently missable|content}} and certain Alchemy formulas are hard to find. Speed is very well-hidden in a secret passage in the Volcano. Sting requires you to navigate to a specific spot in an impossibly huge desert with no landmarks. Fire Power is in a hidden passageway inside Ivor Tower which only the Dog can enter. Apart from Sting, all of these formulas are permanently missable. The game never exactly goes out of its way to tell you how many formulas are in the game or give any other indication of how to find them, so it's possible to play through the game not even know these formulas exist in the first place. (The only hint that Speed exists was in the instruction manual. The screenshots also gave at least some context on where to find it.) |
| 213 | ** A few mazes are confusing as hell unless one actually starts mapping them out. Unless you know how to navigate through to the end of the Dark Forest (follow the paths with the gremlins in the trees), you'll be stuck for hours. There's a few unique treasures that can only be obtained by going off of the correct path, including an alchemy formula. |
| 214 | ** If you want all of the stat-boosting charms, you will definitely need a walkthrough. The charms are offered by different merchants, depending on how and when you acquire them. Of particular note is the alleyway market in Gothica, which is inaccessible once you beat Mongola at the end of the chapter. A pity because many of the items offered there require trade ingredients from Antiqua, which you can't revisit until much later. |
| 215 | * HailfirePeaks: The Volcano is split into three parts: a lava pool which requires you to Levitate rocks to form bridges and unblock tunnels, a strange cooling system which is full of rushing water, and a giant boiler room which maintains the temperature. Too low and the plateau freezes solid; too high and the volcano erupts. |
| 216 | * HeadSwap: |
| 217 | ** Son of Set is named after the Egyptian war god, even though Set has a jackal's head and not a snake's. Anyway, these shirtless, snake-headed foes patrol the outside of the Pyramid and can inflict Poison with their spears. Deep inside the pyramid, you run into Son of Anhur (named for another war god), who has a tiger's head. |
| 218 | ** Hall of Collosia: Megataur is just a modified Magmar sprite with a different head. |
| 219 | * HedgeMaze: Chessboard Plateau. The hedges aren't that hard to navigate, but they are packed with enemies. On top of that, you have to escape a forest maze afterward. |
| 220 | * HelloInsertNameHere: The Hero and his Dog. Screenshots in the manual provide Billy, Spanky, and Buzz as options. The player is given a huge amount of character spaces to work with, to the point that it's possible to give the Hero a first, middle, and last name. |
| 221 | * HoldYourHippogriffs: Taking a breather inside Blimp's mud hut. "It's not the Great Caverns of Makanda, but it's home." |
| 222 | * HomingBoulders: In the Desert, the Hero is barraged by malevolent tumbleweeds. This stuff doesn't just defy the laws of physics by rolling against the wind; it actively ''chases'' the Hero, and absolutely will not turn aside until it has collided with him. After it has either landed a hit or been deflected, it blows away in random directions. This is actually typical of smaller enemies in the game, like spiders: they'll run up, attack you, then run off. |
| 223 | * HyperspaceArsenal: |
| 224 | ** You have limited inventory space, as in ''Secret'', but you can carry up to 99 of every alchemy ingredient. There are a total of 95 ingredients. |
| 225 | ** Due to a bug, you can theoretically carry up to 266 meteorites before it overflows and resets back to 0. You can force the game to grant you 7 petals, 7 Nectars, or 7 Honeys if you max out your total (6) and beat the Raptors/Horace's goons/Aquagoth, who reward you with an extra piece. Lastly, you can get 7 Dino Armors if you collect 6 and then beat the Raptors in the Volcano. |
| 226 | ** The US version has a couple of glitches that surpass the 99 cap for Cryo-Blast shells. |
| 227 | * InTheHood: The Mad Monks are featureless apart from their noses. |
| 228 | * InevitableTournament: The Colosseum in Nobilia, where you face chariot-racing gladiator Vigor [[TheMagnificent the Indestructible!]] |
| 229 | * InevitableWaterfall: When Prehistoria's volcano erupts, the heroes are catapulted high into the air. Luckily, they fall into an upended turtle shell which floats them gently downstream... and then dumps them over a waterfall and off the plateau into Antiqua. |
| 230 | * InstantlyProvenWrong: |
| 231 | -->'''Horace's Twin''': I hate to burst your bubble, Pomp, but the Sacred Dog is a myth. We can't expect a mystic creature to simply slide into the palace!\ |
| 232 | ''[Dog chases a cat into the room and skids to a stop in front of them]'' |
| 233 | * InterfaceScrew: Confound is this game's version of Confuse. All it does is screw up your directional pad input, so it's still possible to fend off enemies. |
| 234 | * IntrepidMerchant: Blimp, the guy who trades in Mud Peppers. He survives "the great wash-out" by Levitating all the way to Crustacia, where he becomes an alchemist full-time. |
| 235 | * ItsAllUpstairsFromHere: Gomi's Tower. |
| 236 | * JustifiedTutorial: A health bar appears once Carltron sics his attack bots on you, so you know you're in quite for a ride. These things can't actually harm you, just knock you backward (unlike the upcoming raptor fight), so you can't lose. Players will also notice a percentage meter which is ticking up. Waiting for it to fill to 100% will result in a powerful projectile attack; otherwise the Hero will just swing the bazooka wildly, which inflicts a fraction of the damage. |
| 237 | * KleptomaniacHero: Subverted in Fire Eyes' Village. The locals there are very welcoming and invite the boy to help himself to the chests (gourds) in their huts. There is one chest in Gothica which is another subversion; you get an alchemy formula and a new guy to buy ingredients from if you don't open it. It's fair game after said transaction takes place, though. |
| 238 | * LevelGrinding: Just like ''Secret'', the Hero's weapons (minus the Bazooka) and alchemy formulas can each gain levels: weapons go up to 3, and formulas go up to 8. Unlike ''Secret'', families don't stack, so each weapon/formula must be ground up individually. The Dog gets a pass: his attacks also level up to 3, but are maintained across each form he adopts. |
| 239 | ** However, there are hacks available that allow weapon families to gain experience across the board (ex. using the Bone Crusher gives experience for the later three swords; grinding all three previous weapons to level 3 means the Neutron Blade will be significantly easier to max out), and/or even groups Alchemy spells into types (ie: healing, elemental attacks, stat boosts, etc.) so that experience gained by using one alchemical recipe of a family gives a fraction of that experience to all spells of that family, even before they're found. |
| 240 | * LoadBearingBoss: |
| 241 | ** Ivor Tower collapses under the weight of its zaftig monarch, and the entire population flees back to Ebon Keep. |
| 242 | ** Carltron. Switching him off causes Evermore to begin breaking up due to the outsiders' influence. |
| 243 | * LongList: In Nobilia, one guard will inform you of all the things he will not permit you to do in the city square. These include laughing, crying, moose-calling, juggling mummified cats, eating pancakes on Monday, and of course, barking like a seal. (It upsets him.) |
| 244 | * TheLostWoods: Gothica's Dark Forest, the forested valley between Ebon Keep and Ivor Tower. The correct path is marked by Greebles in the trees. The other paths are dead-ends, but there is an alchemist to find who will give you the One-Up formula and sell ingredients. |
| 245 | * LotusEaterMachine: Evermore was based on the hobbies of Professor Ruffleberg (Omnitopia's science and technology), his friends Horace Highwater and Camellia Bluegarden (Antiqua's kitchen sink of real-world history and Gothica's medieval FairyTale fantasy world), and his granddaughter Elizabeth (Prehistoria's cavemen and dinosaurs). |
| 246 | [[/folder]] |
| 247 | |
| 248 | [[folder:M-S]] |
| 249 | %%* MadScientist: Sydney Ruffleberg and his surface counterpart, Tinker. |
| 250 | * MagicStaff: Mad Monks retaliate to your close-range attacks by spinning their staves, which inflicts Plague (a stronger version of Poison) or Confound on contact. |
| 251 | * MagikarpPower: The Spear-type weapons are impossibly hard to use in close-quarters combat, but quickly become overpowered once they gain a level. It's a long polearm weapon which the Hero wields in the worst way possible: to deliver incredibly short-range attacks that will usually get him killed in the process. But once he learns how to throw it... |
| 252 | * ManEatingPlant: |
| 253 | ** Carniflowers are among the most troublesome enemies in the jungle. They block important paths and will swallow any character in range, chomping on them for big damage before spitting them out. If the Hero or his dog don't keep away from its tendrils, their support character will have to shred the plant to prevent it from leeching too much HP. |
| 254 | ** The greenhouse in Omnitopia, which must be crossed, is honeycombed with "Flowering Deaths" that are not meant to be fought. If you approach any of them with the lights still on, they will reap 999 damage, triggering an instant game over since it bypasses Aura and Barrier. |
| 255 | * ManualLeaderAIParty: Granted, you only have one party member. |
| 256 | * TheMaze: |
| 257 | ** Bugmuck Swamp, full of [[LilyPadPlatform lily pad paths]] that only appear when certain enemies are slain. The Hero needs to take the long way around to reach said enemies. |
| 258 | ** The desert south of Nobilia, where east and west eventually {{WrapAround}}to each other. The Hero only needs to run straight north or south to reach his destination, but this one contains a difficult-to-find alchemy formula named Sting. |
| 259 | ** Gothica is chock full of these. Among them: the hedge maze around the chessboard, the Dark Forest in the middle, and another maze at the end. And to a lesser extent the sewers under both castles. This isn't even taking into consideration that you have to pass through a maddening teleporter maze to even get into Gothica. |
| 260 | * MeaningfulName: |
| 261 | ** Blimp is an expert on levitation. |
| 262 | ** "Aegis" is a word which means shield, defend, or protect. The name makes sense when you consider that Aegis can raise a shield to become invincible. |
| 263 | ** Tinker's brother, Gomi. ''Gomi'' means "garbage" in Japanese, an appropriate name for the ramshackle tower he lives in. |
| 264 | * MiniBoss: |
| 265 | ** Prehistoria: The Raptors in the opening. Vipers ambush you in the Mammoth Graveyard after you save Strong Heart. |
| 266 | ** Antiqua: Son of Anhur in the Great Pyramid, and a miniature version of the Megataur (Minitaur) in the Hall of Collosia. Later, the Hero has to return to the Pyramid to intimidate Tiny and get him to cough up the Diamond Eyes. |
| 267 | ** Gothica: The Footknight, and later a robot replica of the Hero. Three of them, in fact, with increasingly-powerful Alchemy attacks. |
| 268 | * MirrorBoss: Bad Boy and Bad Dawg/Dark Toaster. Both of them are [[RecurringBoss fought twice]]: Aegis spawns copies of the wolf-dog from Prehistoria, and three Bad Boys corner you on a bridge leading to Ebon Keep. In the final boss melee, you have to fight one last copy of the Hero and his robo-dog. |
| 269 | * MirrorWorld: Ivor Tower and Ebon Keep are flipped images of each other, with some minor architectural changes to the castle and a darker palette. |
| 270 | * MoneySpider: Lampshaded in one case where a shady character is offering the amulet you need to get a ride across the desert and charging the outrageous price of 10,000 Jewels for it. Worse yet, exchanging his money for the local standard effectively cuts the Hero's wallet in half. To come up with the money, he'll likely have to do a lot of grinding. When the Hero actually returns with the money, the cloaked figure is astonished that he went to the trouble. |
| 271 | -->'''Monk:''' Wow! I didn't think anyone would ever come up with the cash! I mean, you had to fight a lot of spiders and thieves to get that money! Since you went to so much trouble to buy this, basically, worthless piece of cra...[[LastSecondWordSwap ss jewelry]]... |
| 272 | * MonsterTown: Crustacia is made out to be a WretchedHive, even though the denizens are actually pretty nice to you. The Rogues and Mad Monks in the settlement are harmless. But if you venture outside of the cove, they'll try to beat you to death with anchors. |
| 273 | * MookMaker: |
| 274 | ** When its shield is up, Aegis is immune to all forms of damage. It also summons monsters to keep the Hero occupied. Aegis actually has no other modes of attack. |
| 275 | ** The final boss battle opens with a wall of [=TVs=] that display flickering images of enemies that come to life, until Magmar careens though the wall and destroys it. Before that happens, an unseen Carltron zaps your duo with electricity to create Bad Boy and Dark Toaster. |
| 276 | * MundaneObjectAmazement: Prehistoria Talons are considered historical relics in Omnitopia that have more value than Nobilia Gems and Gothica Coins. |
| 277 | * NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: |
| 278 | ** The dancing puppets, [[{{Satan}} Mephista and Old Nick.]] |
| 279 | ** There's a good reason why you can't pass through the Omnitopia Greenhouse with the lights on: It contains "Flowering Deaths." |
| 280 | * NapoleonDelusion: The King of Gothica hasn't made any public appearances since the city was moved, but you find can a guy with a crown and scepter prancing around one of the houses in Ivor Tower. According to his wife standing nearby, that isn't really the King; he's just a plumber. |
| 281 | * NewsTravelsFast: |
| 282 | ** The game tends to allows alchemists sell new ingredients at around the same time that you learn new formulas. |
| 283 | ** Played for laughs when Tiny launches the exploding power core into the sky before it can level Nobilia. Madronius instantly arrives to relay news from Horace's camp of a tunnel formed by the impact on the other side of the continent. It took at least fifteen minutes for Tiny's much bigger rock to land in Crustacia, which sits between Nobilia and the camp. |
| 284 | * NewWorldTease: On his first visit to Omnitopia, the Hero gets booted to the surface world by Carltron. It takes the rest of the game to return to the room where he originated from. |
| 285 | * NextSundayAD: Released in October of 1995, takes place a non-specific date from that same year. |
| 286 | * NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: ''The Show of Life'' by Billy Shakesbad. |
| 287 | * NoSell: |
| 288 | ** There are some plants in Omnitopia that are so immune, nothing phases them. Except turning out the lights. |
| 289 | ** The whole purpose of the Insect Incense: all insect monsters, such as mosquitoes and spiders, can no longer deal damage to either character. The Hero simply stands there while they awkwardly attack. |
| 290 | * NonLethalBottomlessPits: |
| 291 | ** Horace had his men dig pits around his camp to prevent his doppelganger from looting its treasures. When you fall down one of them, you just reawaken in one of the tents. If you don't take the long way around to Horace's camp, this is likely how you'll first meet him. |
| 292 | ** Pits serve as nothing more than an obstacle or an annoyance after one of those Hall of Collosia bridges retract when the timer runs out. It should be lethal, but the hero lampshades, "Boy, I'm glad we missed those spikes at the bottom!", or, "I'm glad we found that secret passage in the pit! Now, let's not go down there again." They also don't inflict any damage. |
| 293 | * NoobCave: The giant skeleton in Bugmuck Swamp. |
| 294 | * NotTheIntendedUse: The Energize spell fully charges the attack meter in about a second, allowing for rapid-fire {{charged attack}}s. However, since attacking and dashing use the same SprintMeter meter, it can also be used to run continuously without tiring out. Since the number of landing spots for the Windwalker is extremely limited, the Hero still needs to travel a lot on-foot, and Energize can save quite a bit of time while running to the Alchemist to resupply. |
| 295 | * NotRareOverThere: Annihilation Amulets. 10,000 gems to get one if you don't want to cross the desert on foot, and once on the other side you can easily buy a couple others in the marketplace. Justified as the monk who sells them is a scam artist and almost admits what a piece of crap he's sold you if you cough up the money. |
| 296 | * OffToSeeTheWizard: Besides a signpost in the Dark Forest which reads "''I'd turn back if I were you''," and one villain's very familiar-sounding threat to the hero (and his little dog, too!), the entire game might be read as this. In both stories, a youth and a dog are swept away from their quiet American life into the throes of a mysterious fantasy world, in which they find three companions, free the inhabitants from evil influences, and seek the aid of a wizard-like figure to escort them home. |
| 297 | * OlderThanTheyLook: Technically all the leaders are, but Elizabeth sticks out especially, since she was a child when she first came to Evermore and NeverGrewUp. She should actually be in her mid-to-late thirties. |
| 298 | * OminousMultipleScreens: The final boss room. Blowing up all of the fans and speakers triggers a wall of monitors to rise up out of the floor, and familiar-looking robots start to emerge from it. |
| 299 | * TheOmniscientCouncilOfVagueness: Horace's Twin holds a conference call in one of the cinematics. At this point in the story, Carltron hasn't been identified as part of Ruffleberg's party, and his face is only vaguely-outlined. Horace's Twin keeps his back turned to the viewer. |
| 300 | * OptionalBoss: The Faces serve as a DualBoss and are the same sprite as the one used by Carltron when he communicates with Horace's Twin through a wall. They can be found in Omnitopia by inputting a code. It's randomly generated for each game, too, so the code from your last file probably won't work. Solving the three switches puzzle turns off the security system. |
| 301 | * OurGargoylesRock: Gargons are flying enemies that pester you in Gothica's woods. |
| 302 | * OverdrawnAtTheBloodBank: Some small enemies such as mosquitoes and Frippos die in a shower of blood. |
| 303 | * PeninsulaOfPowerLeveling: |
| 304 | ** For weapon grinding, the southern jungle in Prehistoria. Weapons gain experience based on kills, regardless of the enemy's strength. So the easiest way to grind the late-game weapons is to head back into the jungle, slay all the [[TheGoomba Goombas]] in sight, then leave and come back to respawn them. The Hero's weapons will hit level 3 within an hour. |
| 305 | ** Right outside Nobilia, the Hero encounters Bone Buzzards. They give 300 XP, way more than most enemies in the region, along with 40 Jewels. Their defense against alchemy is pitiful, so a Lv. 1 attack formula will take one out. The Hero just learned the Crush formula from Blimp one screen away, and he sells the ingredients for it. The math works out that casting Crush on a Bone Buzzard makes you more money than it costs to buy the ingredients, so he can power level Crush for profit. |
| 306 | ** The Sons of Anhur fought in the Pyramid leave behind 250 jewels. They are the most-profitable mob in the game in terms of money; no other enemy encounter drops that much cash outside of boss battles. This makes the Oglin Hideout the optimal place to grind for money late in the game: Sons of Anhur appear alongside Oglins, who also leave behind a lot of money. |
| 307 | ** In the early game, the first boss fight against Thraxx is a perfect spot to grind both characters. For the duration of the fight, four Maggots will constantly spawn as they are defeated. They award a decent amount of exp and currency, but the player will soon be able to one-hit them making them respawn very quickly. The only danger is from Thraxx casting Acid Rain, which will only do about 20 damage to the characters. The only limit to grinding the fight is the player's inventory of healing items, but Maggots will often drop a Petal upon death. An experienced Hero can easily use this opportunity to reach level 10 (or beyond) and gain a sizable amount of money. |
| 308 | * PermanentlyMissableContent: |
| 309 | ** There's a lot the Hero can miss in this game without even realizing it. Probably the worst offender is Gothica as a whole: the alleyway shops close once the Hero kills Mungola, the castle doors lock once he returns the worker's key, and if he opens the wrong chest in one of the houses, he won't meet Lance or get the Alchemy formula of the same name. |
| 310 | ** The more desiarable charms can be acquired in multiple places if you miss them, but it's still very easy to accidentally trade the wrong item and never see it again. The merchants around the world who trade those items will offer you something different if the Hero already has what they'd normally offer. So not only can certain trade items be lost forever, but which ones you can lose depends on which ones you already have. A merchant in Ivor Tower will sell back all of the charms the Hero traded in Nobilia for reasonably cheap. They're only lost forever if the Hero doesn't pick them up before finishing Gothica, whereupon the citizens move back to Ebon Keep. |
| 311 | * PerversePuppet: Mephista and Old Nick, a pair of enormous, staring marionettes from the land of Gothica. The King just loves to watch them dance... |
| 312 | * PlatformBattle: Sterling isn't an evil dragon, just an oversized guard dog. He'll continually hurl the Hero off of Gomi's Tower. And if that isn't bad enough, he'll keep pelting the Hero with fireballs as he climbs back up. |
| 313 | * PointOfNoReturn: When the Volcano erupts after you beat Magmar, it causes an earthquake which floods out the swamp. When you return to Prehistoria later, the swamp is inaccessible. As for the Volcano Crater, it's now a bubbling pool of lava, so the alchemist is long gone. |
| 314 | * {{Prehistoria}}: The first world you explore (actually the TropeNamer, in fact), a jungle region full of dinosaurs and other prehistoric critters. |
| 315 | * ProducePelting: |
| 316 | --> '''Pompolonius:''' And introducing the challenger... Some loser with a stick!\ |
| 317 | ''[the crowd hurls garbage at the Hero]'' |
| 318 | * QuicksandSucks: |
| 319 | ** Bugmuck has reappearing wormholes that spit you backward if you get sucked in. Harmless but aggravating. |
| 320 | ** There is another instance in Antiqua which is an {{easter egg}}: There's an invisible, slow-moving whirlpool right outside Nobilia. The Hero finally gets sucked underground, where he inexplicably finds 99 bags of rice and 99 bags of spice. More than enough to clean up at the market [[MiniGame mini-game]] coming up next. |
| 321 | * RapidAging: Naris, possibly the strangest alchemist in the game. He's a prodigy who's working on an alchemy formula to age things, and if you leave and reenter his room, he's replaced by the old guy [=NPC=] (complete with facial hair). |
| 322 | * RaptorAttack: Prehistoria's South Jungle, which throws you right in the thick of it with hungry raptors. They appear as standard mooks later in the region, albeit still lethal due to their erratic pounce attacks. |
| 323 | * ReactorBoss: In an inversion, the Hero fights Magmar in the Volcano Core, which consists of a mess of pipes and a boiler. Elizabeth's Twin threatens to turn off the heat and trigger an ice age in Prehistoria. After she loses, the twin turns up the heat in frustration, and volcano blows up, anyway. But the temperature on the plateau stays the same, and the Hero and his Dog are blown out the volcano cone to safety. |
| 324 | * RecursiveCanon: The theater marquee lists a showing of ''The Secret of Evermore'' in the ending, but some lingering electricity suggests that Prof. Ruffleberg's device is responsible for putting it there. We never find out if there's an actual movie with that title in the game's world. Also notable: Though the Hero ends the game by suggesting that Evermore was merely a dream, his dialogue is followed immediately by a reflective conversation between Elizabeth, Horace, and Camellia. Given the Hero's absence during this conversation, there is a definite suggestion that Evermore was ''not'' merely a dream in the mind of protagonist. Altogether, it's mostly left up to the player how to interpret the adventure. |
| 325 | * RedEyesTakeWarning: The Diamond Eyes glow like fire when inserted into the Dog statue, turning it into the red-eyed furnace monster Aegis. |
| 326 | * ReptilesAreAbhorrent: The Vipers of Prehistoria are hostile to the people of Fire Eyes' Village. According to the one friendly Viper you meet inside the volcano, they used to be peaceful but became violent and land-hungry due to outside manipulation, most likely by Carltron. |
| 327 | * RegeneratingHealth: The Regrowth formula. It restores 1 HP per second, but wears off if the target gets attacked, so you're not supposed to use it while fighting. |
| 328 | * RibcageRidge: Bugmuck Swamp is named after a giant exoskeleton buried there. |
| 329 | * RidiculousFutureInflation: The Omnitopian Credit is the least valuable currency in the game via the exchange rate between civilizations. But to offset this, the goods in Omnitopia are lot more exorbitant. |
| 330 | * RoboticReveal: |
| 331 | ** Queen Bluegarden leaves behind a sprocket following her (apparent) demise. |
| 332 | ** Each area has its own distinct lifeforms, which are unique to the region and do not appear in other locales except as traps set by Carltron's friends. However, it appears that at least some of these enemies are robotic in nature, as you can find blueprints on monitors in Omnitopia detailing their construction. |
| 333 | * RodentOfUnusualSize: The Verminator, who perches on a stack of crates inside Ebon Keep and acts like he's taken ownership over the delinquent castle. |
| 334 | * RollingAttack: |
| 335 | ** Vipers are covered in some kind of spiked carapace. They will suddenly turn into a wheel and juke around the battlefield, mowing down anyone who comes near. |
| 336 | ** Elizabeth's "pet rock", Magmar, is some kind of lava golem who can roll into a ball and careen around the pipes. It makes it difficult to land a shot when he reverts back and starts spitting fireballs. He also rolls into the lava pit periodically to recover HP. |
| 337 | * RuinsForRuinsSake: Antiqua, a land based on a pastiche of AncientEgypt, {{Mayincatec}}, AncientGrome and pirate times, is created from Horace Highwater's ideal world which is based around archaeology. |
| 338 | * RunningGag: |
| 339 | ** "This is my dog. He hasn't been himself lately". |
| 340 | ** The Dog chasing cats. He does it in Podunk and almost every region of Evermore, including shooting lasers at one in Ruffleberg's lab. |
| 341 | ** In Antiqua, mummified cats. They're part of the desert "tour", they're on tapestries, in juggling acts (to the degree that juggling cats had to be outlawed), and in the Great Pyramid they even show up as enemies. |
| 342 | * SceneryPorn: The game is surprisingly beautiful in certain places, particularly the landscape around Gothica. The music, the very first commercial score composed by a young Jeremy Soule, certainly helps add to the atmosphere. |
| 343 | * SchizoTech: Evermore was specifically designed for this trope, and the game wouldn't be as memorable as it is if not for the silly and insane juxtapositions, e.g. the robot toaster dog with the laser cannon on his back. |
| 344 | * SealedEvilInACan: Aegis is the big boss of the second world, unleashed by the Fake Horace who assembles the pieces needed to activate it. |
| 345 | * SequenceBreaking: |
| 346 | ** At the beginning of the game, the Hero can walk east of Fire Eyes' Village, but [[NPCRoadblock he will be blocked by a villager]] unless he talked to her first. By standing near the guard, the Hero's AI-controlled Dog will wander past the checkpoint. Press Select when the dog is on the other side, and the Hero will skip to the next screen. This trick also works near the entrance the cave north of Horace's Camp. |
| 347 | ** The Hero can skip the obnoxious rat king fight. When he first emerges in Ebon Keep, the path linking the Chessboard to Ivor Tower will be gone--but the one to Ebon Keep will be visible. (Caemilla's Twin sent the Hero to her sister city to lower the drawbridge. The game assumes that the Hero has already met the real Caemilla once he leaves Ebon Keep.) By ignoring Verminator and heading straight back to the Chessboard, the Hero can enter Ebon Keep from a side entrance and speak directly to Caemilla and Tinker. The downside is that he can't go through the atrium where Verminator is, since crates still block it, plus the game might freeze if the Hero tries to enter the BossRoom. |
| 348 | ** There's a dangerous gate glitch in the Great Pyramid extension with Tiny. This room can only be visited once, when the Hero shows up demanding the Diamond Eyes. Once he's e opened the gate leading to Tiny, if he tries to leave at any time before beating winning, the gate will slam shut permanently. Meaning the Hero won't be able to get the Diamond Eyes from Tiny. Which means he cannot beat the game since the Diamond Eyes are essential to completing Tinker's rocket ship--unless the Hero exploits another glitch: collecting the Gauge (another component for the rocket) from the Volcano, then leaving the area. If the Hero returns to the Volcano, there will be another Gauge waiting for him. Even more oddly, this Gauge actually acts as if it were the Diamond Eyes, thus circumventing the Tiny fight. |
| 349 | * ShiftingSandLand: The Quicksand Field in Prehistoria and the Desert of Doom in Nobilia. |
| 350 | * ShapedLikeWhatItSells: |
| 351 | ** Water and Clay are cheapest when bought from the man who gives you Acid Rain, and he lives next to a river. The alchemist in the Bugmuck has the cheapest Oil, Crystals, and Wax, and he lives next to tar pits full of bugs and skeletons with crystal formations in the tar. Ash is cheapest when purchased from the alchemist who lives on the Volcano, naturally. Strong Heart lives in the jungle and has the cheapest price on Roots. |
| 352 | ** Bone and Limestone can only be bought from Blimp, and he lives near what looks to be a limestone cliff and is implied to have kept the remains of Salabog as a trophy. Aside from Omnitopia, the best price on Ethanol is a merchant who lives near Crustacia, a city of pirates (ethanol is used to make alcohol). |
| 353 | ** Aside from Omnitopia, the only merchants who sell Mushrooms and Acorns live in Gothica, where their homes are adjacent to forests. |
| 354 | * ShoutOut: |
| 355 | ** When the Hero and his Dog are exploring the Rufflebergs' dilapidated mansion on the hill, he finds "a chainsaw, a mummy, and a balloon animal!" A chainsaw and mummy are also found in ''VideoGame/ManiacMansion''. |
| 356 | ** The Hero's outfit bears sharp resemblance to Marty [=McFly=]'s clothing from ''Franchise/BackToTheFuture''. Given the theme of the game, it doesn't seem coincidental. |
| 357 | ** After being "chosen" by the "Sacred Dog" to fight Vigor in the Coliseum: |
| 358 | --->'''Hero''': "Well, [Dog]. [[Creator/LaurelAndHardy This is another fine mess you've gotten us into."]] |
| 359 | ** The developer mentioned in the blurb also mentioned that the fake Queen Bluegarden's demise was a rather obscure reference to ''WesternAnimation/CountDuckula'', specifically to the Crow Brothers. The four criminals were always trying to climb to the castle hoping to steal anything of value but FailureIsTheOnlyOption. A running gag was that every time they fell down, we heard three thuds and after a {{beat}} a fourth. The fake Bluegarden does the same, only replacing the four thud with an explosion. |
| 360 | * ShowWithinAShow: The main character is a big fan of pulp movies that sound terrible, or possibly great. |
| 361 | * SimpleScoreOfSadness: The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NfuAb8ysO-Y original theme]] for Ebon Keep. |
| 362 | * SortingAlgorithmOfWeaponEffectiveness: The Hero starts out in Omnitopia, but his bazooka is destroyed in the shuttle crash, forcing him to make do with blunter instruments. As he trek across the prehistoric, Bronze Age, and Medieval worlds, his weapons and armor improve. |
| 363 | * SpaceZone: The theme for Omnitopia, which Prof. Ruffleberg created for himself as the pinnacle of scientific and human achievement. |
| 364 | * SprintShoes: The Jaguar Ring allows the Hero and his Dog to sprint instead of walk, but at the cost of stamina. |
| 365 | * StationaryBoss: Thraxx/Choleoptera, Rimsala, Aegis, Aquagoth, Verminator, Mungola, and the Faces. They tend to attack with alchemy, and in Verminator's case, he stands completely out of reach of the Dog while rummaging through his ingredient bag. |
| 366 | |
| 367 | [[/folder]] |
| 368 | |
| 369 | [[folder:T-Z]] |
| 370 | |
| 371 | * TakeItToTheBridge: There's a battle where the Hero has to fight three clones of himself to cross a bridge into Ebon Keep. |
| 372 | * ATasteOfPower: The Bazooka is the first weapon obtained in the game, but the Hero only gets to use it once before it's destroyed in the shuttle pod crash. Cecil, of all people, recovers it during his travels and repairs it sometime before the Hero reaches Ebon Keep. |
| 373 | * TeamworkPuzzleGame: Downplayed, but there are certain areas where you're forced to play as either the Hero or Dog, areas only the Dog can reach and obstacles only the boy's alchemy or inventory can move aside. |
| 374 | * TemporaryBulkChange: The Atlas formula causes the Hero to spontaneously bust out in [[http://shrines.rpgclassics.com/snes/soe/images/atlas.gif ridiculous muscles]] for a moment. It's anyone's guess how his clothes survive. |
| 375 | * ThingOMatic: Prof. Ruffleberg invented a device called the Project-o-Matic [[NameTron Zaptron]] Simulator, which lets the Hero navigate Evermore from Omnitopia. Virtual reality within virtual reality! |
| 376 | * ThirstyDesert: The Desert of Doom. Without exploiting a glitch, the Hero will have to walk, which will take upwards of 15 minutes. 15 minutes of trekking across identical, flat plains of desert, fending off tumbleweeds while constantly healing to mend the desert's periodic health drain. |
| 377 | * ThoseMagnificentFlyingMachines: Tinker offers the Hero one he invented, the Windwalker, to revisit other regions. |
| 378 | * TimedMission: A non-lethal one as soon as the Hero sets foot in Nobilia. He only has a brief span of time to window-shop before the market closes for plot progression reasons. |
| 379 | * TooAwesomeToUse: |
| 380 | ** Brimstone is quite pricey no matter where you buy it, since of course no one can easily access it. There is one person who might be able to: the alchemist who works on top of the Volcano. But it's too early for it to be useful at that point. Dry Ice and Meteorites can't be bought at all, since how could a supplier logically have a steady supply of them? |
| 381 | ** Call Beads, so long as you don't exploit a glitch. |
| 382 | ** In addition to the aforementioned Call Beads, you'll be tempted to save your alchemy ingredients when weapons will do the trick just fine. Exceptions are AirborneMooks (which are way harder to hit), healing, and buff formulas for boss fights. Adversely, when it comes time use one of those attack formulas (lookin' at you, Verminator), they'll be woefully underleveled and you probably won't have the necessary ingredients at hand, preventing you from leveling them up. |
| 383 | * ToyTime: The Chessboard maze linking Ivor Tower with Ebon Keep. |
| 384 | * TubeTravel: Use the grid of pipes to get around Omnitopia. They are patrolled by a vigilant team of Raptors and Rimsalas, and some doors need to be opened by blasting a locking mechanism in the vacuum of space, which is where your robo-dog comes in. |
| 385 | * TheUnfought: The Hero never actually fights Carltron, or any of the Evil Twins. Instead, they each preside over a fight with a much-bigger monster. |
| 386 | * UnintentionallyUnwinnable: |
| 387 | ** Great Pyramid has a section filled with collapsible bridges. This is standard fare for video games; but once these collapse, they're gone -- forever. This leads to unwinnable situations if [[EscapeRope the Hero uses an item or formula to escape]] before defeating the dungeon's mini-boss; he'll be unable to retrace his steps, and thus locked out of completing the dungeon. If you're unlucky enough to save while outside, then your save file will be rendered useless. |
| 388 | ** The room before Verminator is inescapable and inhabited by nothing but rats that are worth [[AntiGrinding a piddling 4 EXP each.]] If the Hero is underleveled, and you saved right before this boss, then this fight is as good as unwinnable. Funny enough, this boss can be skipped altogether by utilizing a glitch in the previous area; but if the Heto enters his room, then the game will lock the door and will not open it until the code signifying that he's beaten the boss goes through. Since the Verminator doesn't appear if you've used the glitch, it will be impossible to initiate this code and thus unlock the door, and the player will be forced to reset. |
| 389 | ** It's possible to get stuck in the third realm, Gothica, after exiting a cave and reaching the desolate Ebon Keep. Climb up Gomi's Tower, and at the top you will be airlifted by Sterling back to the populated Ivor Tower, where you are expected to fight a boss in the castle. Go back through the cave again, and you'll be stuck in the desolate town because your airride won't come back. |
| 390 | ** US version only: After Tinker hands you a plane to seek out parts for his rocket ship, it is possible, via an obscure glitch, to land back outside Tinker's lab--without the aircraft. This happens if you try to land on a nondescript island in the vicinity of Ivor Tower. If the player hasn't completed this fetch quest, then the game is now unwinnable because you can't return to old areas and thus can't journey into space. And it is possible to save here, thus ruining the player's progress with only a quarter of the game left. |
| 391 | * UselessItem: The Magic Gourd, acquired at the end of the Nobilia market segment, serves absolutely no purpose other than to deprive you of a valuable Chocobo Egg which increases your Max HP by 45. You can at least trade for another Chocobo Egg further down the line, and it does allow you to have [[HundredPercentCompletion all of the charms on a single save file,]] if that's important to you. |
| 392 | ** In 2021, it was found via a RAM viewer that the Gourd does something: it increases the amount of Jewels (the currency in Antiqua) you obtain from Ceramic Pots from Nobilia's marketplace. While Ceramic Pots can be traded for other things, but it's primarily used as a loot box. However, the amount of Jewels you get is still pretty small so it doesn't make it any less useless. |
| 393 | * UselessUsefulSpell: A couple: |
| 394 | ** Reflect: It reflects magic. The problem is, by the time the Hero gets it, it's only useful on an optional boss. He can learn Barrier not long before Reflect becomes available, and Barrier negates all damage anyway. |
| 395 | ** Nitro: The most powerful attack formula in the game. The problem is that by the time the Hero gets it, he's a half-hour away from fighting the final boss, tops. Rendering it even more useless is that the ingredients needed to use it can only be bought from two separate merchants in two different regions, so the game is actively discouraging you from using it too much. |
| 396 | ** Miracle Cure: It combines Cure (removes status ailments) and Heal (restores HP), however by the time you get it, status ailments don't pose much of a problem and Super Heal (completely restores the HP of both characters) has been a staple alchemy formula. |
| 397 | ** Two alchemy ingredients can't be bought normally: Dry Ice and Meteorite. Meteorites are traded by the shady figure in Antiqua who tried to hawk you an Amulet of Annihilation. There is a set amount of Dry Ice planted throughout the game, and the Hero can't replenish it. However, the funny thing is that they're used only for the Call Up formula, which produces a Call Bead. |
| 398 | * TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon: Omnitopia is the oddly not the final map in the game, as the Hero needs to leave and then return with a battery needed to [[LockedDoor recharge the transporter to Carltron's room.]] Luckily, the Professor provides the Hero with a shuttlepod which docks at the lab, so there is no need to traverse the station twice. |
| 399 | * VideoGameCrueltyPotential: The Revive formula can be hard to level up since it requires the Dog to be KO'd and you hardly get any occasions to use it as his level grows higher and higher, eventually reaching a point where it becomes impossible for regular enemies to even hurt the Dog. Thankfully, there is a fast leveling method available: Turn on the lights in the Omnitopia Greenhouse, go there, allow the Dog to get eaten by a Flowering Death, use Revive, and then repeat until you run out of ingredients or the spell is maxed out. |
| 400 | * VideoGameCrueltyPunishment: |
| 401 | ** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HDmSUMD32Q Go ahead.]] [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5ulqdDq4Vs Taunt those chickens.]] |
| 402 | ** The Hero can interrupt the philosoper's rant by turning him into a "basket-case", literally. The basket will remain like that ''forever'', and his captive audience will applaud the Hero for getting the old guy to shut up. If the Hero spares him, the philosopher offers [[VideogameCaringPotential a nice present,]] instead. |
| 403 | ** Getting the Lance formula requires the Hero to enter an otherwise nondescript room and leave without opening the chests; which he'd know if he spoke to Lance's wife downstairs, and didn't just loot the entire house in haste. |
| 404 | ** In a rather funny twist of events, if the Hero 'kills' the cleaning robot during the final showdown, he'll face a Dark Spider as the next wave of monsters spawn, with an additional spider each time a cleaner is destroyed. These little bastards will ignore Bug Repellent and kill the Hero with a vengeance. |
| 405 | * WakeUpCallBoss: Thraxx. Up until the Hero meets him, every enemy attack can be dodged. Thraxx will hit you for 5 HP and massive recoil each time the Hero damages his heart. (So using alchemy at a distance won't protect the Hero or his Dog.) He'll also use three attacks that can target both characters anywhere in the arena, two of which are unavoidable, and each deals high damage. To top it all off, the Hero can only carry 6 Healing Leaves, and he probably cpuldn't afford get a full load of dog Biscuits in town. |
| 406 | * WarmupBoss: The initial Raptor boss battle. If the Hero is successful in fending off the Raptors at the crash site, he'll win some free stuff, but if he fails [[EarlyGameHell (and he very likely will),]] he'll get dragged to safety by the Dog and continue on with the plot. |
| 407 | * WeWillSpendCreditsInTheFuture: Omnitopia's local currency is the credit. |
| 408 | * WeirdCurrency: Prehistoria's Economy runs on Talons. Not a metaphor: they're the claws of various animals. |
| 409 | * WhereItAllBegan: The Hero is jettisoned from Omnitopia by Carltron, and it takes him the entire game to get back. |
| 410 | * WorldOfPun: |
| 411 | ** All four regions. Antiqua is both a pun on "antique" and {{UsefulNotes/Antigua|AndBarbuda}}. |
| 412 | ** The two castles are separated by a vast chessboard and are named Ivor and Ebon, meaning [[ChessMotifs Ivory and Ebony.]] |
| 413 | ** The Footknight, one of Gothica's bosses, is a literal foot wearing a knight's helmet. |
| 414 | ** The Omnitopia robots, who come with code names like I8-PI and IM-L8. |
| 415 | * YearOutsideHourInside: Evermore is a world constructed from the imaginations of four people living in 1965 who created these worlds based on their own personal interests. Thirty years later, when the Hero finds them, they're not any older, and comment in the ending that life will be much different now. |
| 416 | * YouALLLookFamiliar: |
| 417 | ** Get ready to see a lot of Strong Heart. As early as the Mammoth Graveyard, he's being recycled. In Antiqua, the tunic is [[PaletteSwap recolored]] to resemble a toga. His sprite gets used again for Horace's aide, Madronius, who looks like an alchemist the Hero recognizes in the Hall of Collosia... who is conveniently not Madronius but his brother. |
| 418 | ** "Caemilla" holding court with someone from Nobilia named Eronio, who uses the same sprite as Pompolonius. This is never explained. |
| 419 | |
| 420 | [[/folder]] |
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FollowingContext VideoGame / SecretOfEvermore
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