Line #42 VideoGame/WindAndWaterPuzzleBattles


1	[[quoteright:320:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/windandwatertitle.png]]
2	''Wind and Water: Puzzle Battles''[[labelnote:*]](simplified Chinese: 时空五行-风水大战; traditional Chinese: 時空五行-風水大戰; pinyin: Shíkōng Wǔxíng - Fēngshuǐ Dàzhàn, lit. "Wu Xing Space-Time - Great Feng Shui War")[[/labelnote]] is a 2007 [[MatchThreeGame block-matching puzzle]] game developed by Yuan Works, a company based in Costa Rica. It was originally released for the portable [=GP2X=] and got a 2008 port for the Dreamcast and a 2011 port for PC.
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4	The general rule in the game is to swap the element-themed blocks around and match a minimum of 4 of the same color in a diamond shape, clearing any gems of the same color next to them and opening the way for chains to rack up more points. The game can be played in three modes with different ways of scoring large combinations and chains.
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6	The game has a robust story mode involving a girl named Amy on [[ExcusePlot a quest]] to recover the five elements and recruit people for a puzzle tournament, while the developers' avatars try to keep her from finding the game isn't [[ObviousBeta quite feature-complete yet]]. It also has a puzzle mode in which the player must clear the board in a limited amount of moves.
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8	The freeware PC version of the game [[http://www.indiedb.com/games/wind-and-water-puzzle-battles-online/downloads/wind-and-water-puzzle-battles-online can be downloaded here]].
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10	It had a successful Greenlight campaign for a 2017 re-release on Steam with an online versus mode.
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12	!!This game features the following tropes:
13	* AccidentalPervert: Hao removes Amy's clothes by accident while trying to fix her graphical glitches and gets some energy blasts shot at him for his troubles.
14	* ArtShift:
15	** Aiba is a 8-bit character looking around for armors that expand the wearer's color palette. After a few changes he finally gets rendered in the same style as Amy.
16	** Amy has an unfinished dialogue portrait that's still in a chunky 8-bit style.
17	* AwesomeButImpractical: Full screen clears require you to obtain and keep both the wind and void blocks and then set them on a 7-block hexagon containing one block of each color. It's quite the difficult thing to set up, but if done on the [[DifficultButAwesome Time Chain SP mode]], it starts a special mode where the combo timer barely ticks down when you're not making a move.
18	* AudienceSurrogate: The protagonist Amy is a gamer who, like the player, is learning to play a puzzle game designed by Yuan-Hsi and Yuan-Hao.
19	* AuthorAvatar: The brothers Yuan-Hao (programmer) and Yuan-Hsi (artist, composer) are recurring characters, bosses and also playable.
20	* BigCreepyCrawlies: When Hao tells Amy to bring (programming) bugs to him, [[FriendToBugs she instead]] brings a large beetle and freaks him out. Yuan is rather grossed out as well and tells Amy to let "Timmy" go back home.
21	* BilingualBonus: Later on the story, a shadowy figure starts ominously talking in Chinese to Yuan and Hao while also throwing threats [[GratuitousEnglish in English]]. Players who can read kanji will know in advance that [[spoiler:he's actually their grumpy father and is simply scolding them]].
22	* BodyHorror: Amy's sprite begins glitching up early on and not much later she tuns into a mixed mess of tiles.
23	* BrutalBonusLevel: The levels unlocked after clearing special objectives in some of the normal ones. And also the levels after the second ending, which according to the characters actually haven't been tested properly.
24	* {{Bookends}}: One of the first and last cutscenes quote from ''Castlevania: Symphony of the Night''.
25	* ColorFailure:
26	** Hao freezes once he notices Amy is ignoring his programming lecture.
27	** Amy turns to stone when she realizes the brothers have somehow deleted her clothes while restoring her graphics.
28	* ConsoleCameo:
29	** The portable [=GP2X=] is seen at several points and is also a secret character.
30	** The Dreamcast's VMU is one of the story's bosses.
31	* CreditsGag: The game first ends with [[InterfaceSpoiler half of the map unexplored]] and AWinnerIsYou cutscene with engrishy credits. Amy chews the developer brothers about it and goes on with her quest.
32	* DevelopmentHell: Invoked and discussed, as a couple of characters are from projects that the developers lament not having been able to realize.
33	* ExcusePlot: The AuthorAvatar brothers send Amy on a quest to restore the elements and gather people to play the game to keep her from finding out they're not done working in the game yet. It's only after the second ending that an antagonist comes up threatening to break the timeline or something.
34	* FakeLongevity:
35	** The game imposes several limits on the player's Yuan Points wallet, so you have to spend all your points several times [[WalletOfHolding just to expand it]] instead of unlocking stuff.
36	** All the minigames are mandatory in Story Mode, but beating their hellish Hard modes there for whatever reason doesn't mark it as done in the minigame menu proper.
37	* FreewareGames: The original PC version.
38	* GuideDangIt: Versus mode in its entirety. How does scoring affect the attack and defense stats? How are those stats actually converted into damage to the opponent's field? What triggers the danger gauge and what breaks it? "Stances"?? The game's list of tutorials have ''nothing'' on this mode for some reason!
39	* IdleAnimation: If left idle on the map screen, Amy pulls out a [=GP2X=] and starts playing with it.
40	* LazyArtist: In-universe, Yuan-Hao and Yuan-Hsi are in a constant hurry to get the game done before Amy comes across glitches and unfinished content. Amy often catches them loafing around and making half-assed excuses for anything that looks cheap.
41	* LeaningOnTheFourthWall: The characters don't actually address the player over the screen, but the story mode is about the developers showing off both the game and the troubles of a game creator to Amy, and by extension [[AudienceSurrogate the player themself]].
42	* LuckBasedMission: Falling block puzzles and miscellaneous objectives with strict time limits remain a match made in Hell.
43	* [[MatchThreeGame Match Four Game]]: A "Swapping" type with 5-7 block colors and a diamond-shaped cursor to rotate them.
44	* MercyMode: You can buy Cheese items to skip levels if you('re) s(t)uck on them. And although the game claims nobody but you will know whether you've chessed any levels, the game does keep track of that on your status card.
45	* {{Metafiction}}: The plot is a making-of of the game and the past works of the developers.
46	* TheNudifier: When Amy's graphics turn garbled beyond recognition, Hao does some fine tuning and fixes her... only for her to be left in her undies. Hao assumes he accidentally "reset her clothes", but judging from the in-universe logic, it's more like Yuan drew her like that for the [[{{Fanservice}} heck of it]].
47	* ObviousBeta:[[invoked]] Parodied. Amy heckles the developers about the cheapo feel of the story mode and the brothers themselves admit to not testing things throughly and consider just making post-release patches as they go along.
48	* PaperThinDisguise: Hao puts on a flimsy disguise to play a shopkeeper and a [[Franchise/MegaMan "Dr. Left"]] scientist role because he has no supporting cast. Yuan also plays a samurai in one minigame. Both brothers vehemently deny their real identities in front of Amy, even placing the other brother in disguise or a dummy so both people are seen at the same time.
49	* SequenceBreaking: Some levels have secret objectives that open alternate routes that sometimes skip large chunks of the game. The requiriments are generally high enough that novice players would only clear them out of sheer dumb luck.
50	* ShoutOut:
51	** Some dialogue ("I've come to put an end to this", "But enough talk, have at you") references ''Castlevania: Symphony of the Night''.
52	** Hao plays the role of [[Franchise/MegaMan "Dr. Left"]] the scientist at certain points, referencing Dr. Light's appearance in holograms during the ''Mega Man X'' series.
53	** A Dreamcast VMU working for "SOGA" appears during story mode. He displays ''Pong'' and a close-up of Sonic's face while introducing himself to Amy.
54	** Yuan, er, [[PaperThinDisguise "Genji"]] quotes the "all your base are belong to us" line from ''VideoGame/ZeroWing'' at one point.
55	* SNKBoss: The final boss, Shinji. [[ComputersAreFast The guy makes dozens of chains and amazing combinations with]] [[PerfectPlayAI every. single. move. he makes]], making defeating him all but completely impossible. He collects an average of 10000 points per minute and even [[BeatingADeadPlayer keeps going for as long as possible]] after stomping you under his feet.
56	* SomeDexterityRequired: The game is easy enough to pick and play, but figuring out how to properly score points for those seemingly impossible secret goals and levels takes more than a little bit of training, planning and lightning-fast reflexes. And then there's the hard mode for each minigame, which can be a larger hurdle than the main game missions following them.
57	* TimedMission: Some missions require you to perform some task on a minute on two.
58	* TitleDrop: Played with in that near the end Amy drops a variation of the Chinese title that the average player [[LostInTranslation wouldn't have known about]]: "Wind and Water: the Five Ancient Elements of Space and Time".
59	* TrialAndErrorGameplay: About half of the minigames on hard mode, ''especially'' the memorization madness that are Digipet Roller and Sunset Driver.
60	* UnexpectedGameplayChange: The player must clear some reflex-based minigames over the course of the story mode.
61	* YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe: Aiba speaks like this. And when Amy tries to do the same...
62	-->"Oh, mhy name is Amy! Nice to meet thyou!"

Context VideoGame / WindAndWaterPuzzleBattles