Line #34 VideoGame/YoungMerlin


1	A Zelda-styled video game. Released for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in late 1993, ''Young Merlin'' showed the titular Arthurian icon as a blonde-beefcake in his younger years. As the game begins, Merlin spies a woman (Melody, the daughter of Sterm) drowning in a river near his home to which he plunges in after her only to be swept into a mysterious land overrun by the Shadow King and his army of cussing [[{{Mooks}} David the Gnome]] look-alikes (the Meanies) that tend to join together to create other monsters.
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3	Along the way, Merlin enlists the aid of the Lady of the Lake, gets items of power, meets friendly characters, traverses dungeons, and, yes, he skates on a minecart or two (or three... ).
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5	The game's dialogue is carried out by odd noises, gestures, and pictographs - so no reading's involved.
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7	The game was developed by Creator/WestwoodStudios and published by Creator/VirginInteractive. Frank Klepacki composed the music.
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10	!!This game provides examples of:
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12	* AllJustADream: [[spoiler:The ending.]]
13	%%* AmbidextrousSprite
14	* AmbiguouslyGay: Everybody seems this way. Have Merlin use the Golden Comb. Nearly every enemy stops what they're doing and gawks at him with hearts above their heads as he combs his hair of "hawtness".
15	* ClairvoyantSecurityForce: The Stone Knight and the Shroom Goons.
16	* CombiningMecha: Sort of. The Meanies, small as they are, generally band together to form larger monsters like Oinkmers, Meanie Trees, and homicidal Snarl Shoots.
17	%%* CutAndPasteEnvironments
18	* EnemyChatter: The Meanies do a lot of this.
19	* ExcusePlot: You get the feeling the designers wanted to just put Merlin in some random location for the sake of it.
20	%%* EventFlag
21	%%* EveryBulletIsATracer
22	* FakeDifficulty: Save for the minecart-skating and puzzle spots, the only difficulty seems to arise from knowing what to do next. The items have no real obvious use.
23	%%* FlashOfPain
24	* ForebodingArchitecture: Those black flags with red eyes painted on them in the last stage.
25	* GuideDangIt: Without a {{walkthrough}}, you'll more than likely play it, get stuck, and never play it again.
26	* GameWithinAGame: The minecart rides.
27	* GravityBarrier: Most notable under water.
28	* HealingSpring: Several. In fact, the only body of water you ''can't'' get it from is the water around you when you dive below the surface.
29	* HeartContainer: There are 13 of them scattered throughout the world map. Collecting all of them before beating the game in the old days could earn the player a chance to enter the Young Merlin Contest [[https://www.retrogames.cz/manualy/SNES/Young_Merlin_-_SNES_-_Manual.pdf as described in the instruction booklet]].
30	* InformedEquipment: Until you use it, naturally.
31	* MimeAndMusicOnlyCartoon: Some of the confusion arises from this, making it even more difficult to understand what the items are to be used for or even where to go next in some cases.
32	* MercyInvincibility: [[AvertedTrope No such thing here.]] The way Merlin's health rapidly depletes while his "damaged" voice clip repeatedly loops over itself when touching an enemy to a point it sounds like beatboxing certainly demonstrates that.
33	* MoodWhiplash: You spend most of the game in a generic fantasy setting until you go through the gateway in Pinedale. Welcome to your game on drugs where [[MindScrew rainbows, Cinders, Ahnts, Shroom Goons, and ladders popping up out of the ground and turning into Trolls at any moment are the norm.]] :)
34	* OnlySmartPeopleMayPass: Only in the first dungeon. Block puzzles ahoy.
35	* {{Overheating}}: Several items do this. The Snowflake. The Medallion. Even the Match.
36	* OxygenMeter: In the Underwater Grotto, you get this in the form of three bubbles, and each bubble lasts up to five seconds before depleting. Only a kiss from a mermaid in each cave will replenish your oxygen supply. The Air Bubble you later get can double up your oxygen supply so you can stay underwater a little longer.
37	* PointOfNoReturn: The last minecart segment counts as this.
38	%%* RespawnPoint
39	* SaveThePrincess: Merlin tries to do this at the beginning only to find that Princess Melody is fine later... then has to do it for real in the climax.
40	%%* ScriptedEvent
41	* StoryDrivenInvulnerability: That GiantSpider called Spyder? You can't touch her until the rematch. Same with the Shadow King.
42	* TeasedWithAwesome: The [[SymbolSwearing $@#in']] Lightning Bolt.
43	* TemporaryBulkChange: When you use the balloon item to climb up cliffs and get out of the ocean.
44	%%* ThreeQuartersView
45	%%* TopDownView
46	* TotallyRadical: Merlin treats skating on his... mining... cart as such.
47	* UndergroundLevel: The dwarven mines are a sinister maze that will get old very quickly.
48	* VisualPun: In the uderwater level, you see a ''literal'' cat-fish being chased by a dog-fish.
49	* VoiceGrunting: All characters "speak" this way. Sometimes to an unsettling extent.
50	%%* WarpZone
51	* WhatKindOfLamePowerIsHeartAnyway: The Bubble Wand.

Context VideoGame / YoungMerlin