Calling Your Attacks / Video Games

Calling Your Attacks in video games.

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• Notably, many Japanese 2D fighting games, such as Street Fighter and The King of Fighters feature characters that shout the names of their signature attacks, famous examples from both being the Hadouken and the Genocide Cutter, respectively.
  • The voice quality sometimes lead to amusing mishearings (Sonic Boom/Alex Full! Tiger Uppercut/Tiger Robocop!).
  • Naturally, this was done in the Marvel vs. Capcom series of fighting games, which features Western superheroes shouting out their attack names even when they never do so in the comics.
    • FOOT DIVE! HIGH KICK! HIDDEN MISSILES! PLASMA BEAM! MOLECULAR SHIELD!
    • Speaking of Marvel, even the X-Men Legends games and Marvel Ultimate Alliance, which are developed by Western companies and are not fighting games, had the characters call their Xtreme super moves' names. Even more ridiculous when you consider that none of the Marvel moves in MvC had names as silly as Deadpool's "Merc's Revenge" in the latter game. And yes, he shouts it in a serious manner. Well, as serious as Deadpool gets, anyway. Sometimes the same attack would change names between Legends 1, Legends 2, and MUA, though some characters did get new ones.

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• In Ace Combat, true to Real Life, every air fighter (or your AWACS if you're the one firing) will call out "Fox Two!" when launching regular missiles, "Bombs Away!" when dropping bombs, "Fox One!" when launching SAAMs, or "Fox Three!" when launching radar-guided missiles.
  • Ace Combat 5: The Unsung War: Thunderhead calls out an electronic counter-countermeasure ("ECCM! RESTORE COMMUNICATION LINK!") when communications systems are being jammed.
• Arc Rise Fantasia: A number of spells and excel acts just have the characters saying the names of their spells/attacks when initiating them, while other times they just make up their own names for attacks that already have their own names.
• Every playable character in Arc the Lad: Twilight of the Spirits does this. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. A few preface the attack name with a little verse: "O Wind, Grandpa's sword the power of Justice! Windslasher!" "Feel my RAAAGE! Firestorm!" "O Icy Blizzard, rage of the Storm! Blizzard!"
• Despite being practically an Interactive action anime, for the most part, this is surprisingly avoided in Asura's Wrath with the exception of Wyzen, who tends to yell out KURIKARA FUDO UCHI when using an attack where he falls from the sky massive arm gauntlet first. He's the weakest overall of the 8 Guardian generals, in a bit of Brutal Irony.
• In Atlantica Online, all player characters call their magic skills every time they use them, on the lines of "[Enemy's name]! Take this! [Magic's name]!". Even with healing spells.
• In Azure Striker Gunvolt Series, player characters and bosses all shout the names of their special attacks, complete with a character portrait cut-in, a haiku (except in Luminous Avenger iX 2), and the name of the special attack hogging the screen.
• Baten Kaitos: In the GC version, before every finishing move.
  • In Eternal Wings, Xelha and Mizuti, your magic-users, call every spell they use. Which gets very, VERY annoying when you get to the point where you can make them cast eight or nine spells in a row.
• It's a Fighting Game, so one would expect characters in BlazBlue to call their attacks. Many do so, and do it well ("Baden Baden Lily!" should sound silly, but it works ^note It's Rachel. She can make ordering tea the most badass thing ever.). Special mention goes to Hot-Blooded Highly Visible Large Ham Bang Shishigami, who often calls out more poetic names than his moves actually have and even goes so far as to announce "This is an ukemi!" That's right. He yells loudly to let his opponent know he's getting up after being knocked down.
  • Sometimes, the names Bang calls out for his attacks aren't even the right names. Ex. "Critical Super Crash!" for "Bang's Unstoppable Double Palm Thrust." He even has two slightly different names for an attack based on whether it is being used on the ground or in the air.
  • Against personal rivals, the voices change to something relevant to the character pair.
    • "Baden Baden Lily!" becomes "Kneel before me, Ragna." (Rachel vs. Ragna)
    • "Fenrir, don't fail me! Nemesis stabilizer!" becomes "You're no longer my superior Jin Kisaragi. You're under arrest!" (Noel vs. Jin) or "Ragna the Bloodedge... YOU'RE STUPID!!" (Noel vs. Ragna)
    • "Arctic Dagger!" becomes "Red Devil my ass!" (Jin vs. Tager)
    • "Optic Barrel" becomes "Hands off the panda!" (Noel vs. Litchi) It Makes Sense in Context.
    • Even Makoto has this. Particle Flare alternates between two lines normally, but there are five variants.
      "Watch this, friend! This is my... BEST SHOT!!" (Noel)
      "I'll show you... everything... that I've learned!" (Jin))
      "Tsubaki!! Please wake up... with this one last blow!!" (guess)
      "'Superior' my ass! You're lower than dirt! It's time for a mutiny!!" (Hazama)
      "You're a colonel, and I don't give a crap! EAT IT, CREEPER!!" (Relius)
• Parodied in Bloody Roar, wherein the Mad Scientist Busuzima has one attack in which he simply kicks his opponent while shouting "Kick!" Otherwise played straight by a few characters, with Busuzima himself having another combo wherein he punches his opponent four times, shouting each syllable of his name in time with them.
• Brütal Legend: DECAPITATIOOOON!
  • "FACE MELTERRRR!"
  • "BRING IT ON HOME!"
• Playing Bujingai involves GACKT calling his magics as he cast them.
• Castlevania
  • In Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin, when playing as Charlotte, she will call out the name of any spell if you super-charge it before releasing. Whenever you switch between Charlotte and Johnathan, the character shouts the name of the other character. Also, whenever you use a combination spell, both characters will simultaneously shout the name of the spell.
  • Both of these carry over into Castlevania: Harmony of Despair, although since Charlotte loses her spell charging ability, now she just yells out attack names whenever she casts something. Unless she's still yelling out the name of the last attack she did.
  • In Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, sometimes Shanoa will call her magic attacks, usually with simple words like "Flame!" or "Lightning!" When playing as Albus, however, he calls the name of almost everything he does as loud as one possibly can. And then there is of course Dracula himself: "Dark Inferno!" "Fatal Ray!" "Destruction Ray!"
  • Perhaps the earliest example under the franchise would be in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night with "SOUL STEAL!!!"
• You'd think a series as wonderfully OTT as Devil May Cry would exhibit this gratuitously. You'll be wrong. Averted in the first Devil May Cry and Devil May Cry 2, where Dante speaks only guttural warcries as he uses his moves. Subverted in Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening, where he gets them wrong. Quite wrong. Perhaps the most glaring example is the super-uppercut "Real Impact", where he ends up shouting "Rising Dragon", a differently executed uppercut for which he only spares said guttural warcry.
  • Similar to this trope, however, in Devil May Cry 4, Dante will call out the names of his styles as he changes to them if he's standing still ("Trickster!" "Royal Guard!" "Gunslinger!" "Swordmaster!") with an accompanying pose. If you use the style swap mid-combo (and you probably will), he says a cut-down version and skips the pose so as not to interrupt himself, i.e. "Sword!" When switching to Vergil's Dark Slayer Style, which he acquires late in the game, he calls out something other than the style's name. You still get a pose though.
• Some of main characters and cameo characters in the Disgaea series call their attacks (Though sometimes only with the Japanese audio on). Notable examples include Zetta's "ZETTA BEEEAM!" and Kurtis' "ROKETTO PAUNCH!"
  • In Disgaea D2, Flonne becomes "Pure Fallen Angel of Love, Flonne" during the penultimate chapter. She proceeds to constantly scream out her attack names or technique names in overly flamboyant ways. Laharl at one point asks if that is necessary, to which Flonne admits what she's yelling is actually completely irrelevant to the use of her powers. Laharl then yells at her to stop. Additionally, Laharl points out that most of the battles in said chapter were due to Flonne's flamboyant yelling which keeps attracting enemy attention.
• The Dissidia Final Fantasy series provides a dual example; when a character uses any attack, they call out something to do with the attack, or dare the opponent to dodge of withstand them (if not a simple kiai), and, whenever a character uses a HP attack, a little text box appears onscreen with the name of the attack being used, with the art style being the same as boxes used in the game the character originated from. Cecil and Kain are particularly elaborate offenders, being medieval-style knights.
  Cecil: [using Saint's Dive] Beneath the light... COMES JUDGEMENT!
  Kain: [using Rising Drive] Engrave! DRAGON'S FANG!
• In Dota 2, most of the Heroes (some more than others) often either say the name, effect of, or a slang term for their spells immediately after casting them, especially spells that are used specifically against enemies, as long as they don't just outright taunt them (or make an Incredibly Lame Pun at them).
  • Earthshaker is a pretty notable one.
    "Fissure!"
    "Enchant!"
    (casting Echo Slam:) "SLAMMIN'!" or "CHAOS DUNK!"
    • And some other variations.
  • Tusk will say some variation on Walrus PUNCH! ("x Punch!") accompanied by large red text reading "WALRUS PUNCH!" next to his target every time it's used on a hero. (On a creep, though, he'll say something like "Disappointing punch!" or "Moderately painful punch!" accompanied by small blue text reading "Penguin Punch!" next to it.)
  • Doom, upon casting his ultimate "Doom", will almost always say something along the lines of "YOU'RE DOOMED!"
  • Skywrath Mage often says the exact name of his abilities upon using them, most of which have low cooldowns, and all of which are castable spells.
  • Surprisingly not done for the loveable and extremely hammy Motor Mouth Storm spirit, despite saying something literally every time he uses his no-cooldown ultimate. Same thing goes for his other low-cooldown abilities.
  • Rubick can steal spells and has a bunch of lines recorded for when he's casting other hero's skills, potentially letting him call out attacks for just about every single spell in the game, only depending on how extensively Valve has recorded/will record additional lines for him in the future.
• In The Elder Scrolls series, most notably in Skyrim, this is Justified for users of the Thu'um, the draconic Language of Magic. Dragons, those who are Dragonborn, and other mortals who study for years to learn to use it use the Thu'um to do things like command elements into existence. By shouting the words for say, breathing fire, they are literally commanding fire into existence.
• All the playable characters do this in Eternal Sonata, although only after racking up twenty-four consecutive hits. Some (such as Beat or Polka) use simple phrases, others (Viola, Frederic) make slightly lengthier statements and some (Falsetto and March) almost hit full-on soliloquy territory. Compare these two:
  Beat: This is it for you! Fire Blast!
  Falsetto: By lightning and thunder will you be thrown. By wind will you be scattered! Heaven and earth! Howling Thunder!
  • The human villains of the game do it as well.
    Waltz: Ahahahaha! Ahahahahaha! What a joyous feeling! I'll let you have a taste of it as well! Apocalypse Fall!
• Most characters in Fatal Fury do this. Heck, Terry Bogard's guest appearance in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate even continues this by bringing in his "Power Wave!", "Crack Shoot!", "Burn Knuckle!", " Rising Tackle!", "Are you OK? Buster Wolf!" among others.
• In Final Fantasy XIV, players will often set up a macro to call their attack when they use a limit break or a particularly strong ability. And the final boss of the Alphascape raid, Omega, assesses whether or not yelling the names of it's attacks is necessary in battle.
  Omega: <Blip> Evaluating necessity of vocalization component. TREMBLE BEFORE MY COSMO MEMORY!
• Ability names are displayed when used in Final Fantasy Tactics, but occasionally the character using them will call them out with a descriptive preface. "Destruction of nature, gather in flame...Fire!" Removed from the English version of the PSP remake.
• Llednar Twem of Final Fantasy Tactics Advance pauses before his strike, but after charging energy, to say exactly what he is going to inflict upon the main character. The attack, Omega, is illegal to use in the area, and the Judgemaster takes the time when Llednar is reciting a descriptive poem to arrest him.
  • Llednar always calls his attack when using Omega, but the objective in all previous battles with him is to stay out of Omega's range.
  • In its radio drama, every character calls every ability they did but just plain "Fight", like in Final Fantasy Tactics.
• Owain, a character in Fire Emblem: Awakening, parodies this as all of his attacks are either a Title Drop of a past game or a Mythology Gag.
• Played for laughs in a cutscene in Flagstaff: Chapter One when the king, upset at having mud tracked all over his favorite rug by insane royal guardsmen, hits one that tries to attack him while yelling "Kiiiiing PUNCH!"
• Gears of War: Boomers call out "BOOM!", and so on. They achieve a sort of Narm Charm with their calls.
• Giga Wing: "REFLECTO FOOOOOOOOOORCE!"
• Many characters in Granblue Fantasy shout their Charge Attack's names out loud. If it is a unique skill or a Signature Move, expect that it will also be called out as well.
• Grandia: This trope is subverted and played straight in all games. Some spells and special attacks are just called by name, but with others, exactly what the castor says depends on his or her personality. For example, in Grandia III, these are what the following characters say when they use Heal or Healer on themselves:
  Yuki: I'll be fine.
  Alfina or Dhana: I call upon the healing power of the stars.
  Miranda: This should feel refreshing!
  Alonso: Time to juice up!
  Ulf: What would I do without this?
• Guilty Gear's biggest offender is Sol Badguy by far, but every character has one or two attacks they like to shout out in Gratuitous English, mostly their signature moves like Ky's "RAIDO ZA LAITONINGU!" or Potemkin's "HEAVENLY POTEMKIN BUSUTAAAH!"
• .hack does this of course. It's simulating an MMORPG so it's justified.
• The Halloween Hack: Unlike the typical Mother final boss, Dr. Andonuts announces his attacks in a dramatic fashion, telegraphing everything he does.
• Played for Laughs in Halo 5: Guardians's Firefight mode, where the Goblin's Grunt pilot will actually call out his attacks like he's in a Super Robot anime. ("Hyper Attack!", "Needle Blast!", "Robo Punch!", etc.)
• In the Head Sports series, all characters announce the name of their Power/Ability Shot before using it.
• All Valkyries in Honkai Impact 3rd have voicelines for performing certain actions, like using an Ultimate. Sometimes it really is a name of the attack ("Neko-Charm!"), but more often it's just some kind of catchphrase ("Now is the time of judgment.")
• In Hyper Princess Pitch, Final Boss Mecha Santa announces each of his combat techniques. Pitch herself announces her Finishing Move.
• In Jimmy and the Pulsating Mass, this is actually a gameplay feature: calling your attack will make it deal double damage on the next round, but you'll lose the buff if you're startled.
• Many of the characters in the Kingdom Hearts series will do this, especially boss characters, although series protagonist Sora seldom if ever calls out the actual name of the technique he's using ("Deepfreeze" for Blizzard, "Wind" for Aero, etc.).
  • For Sora and Donald it seems to be linked to using magic and thus could be a normal part of spellcasting.
  • In the opening of Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, when the group first enters Castle Oblivion and encounters the cloaked figure, Donald tries to cast Thunder and calls it out as he does so, but fails due to the Bag of Spilling. He calls out Fire and Blizzard also, but neither of these produce any effect either.
  • Optional Superboss Sephiroth's calling of his attacks was notoriously difficult to understand, leading to his most powerful technique "Descend Heartless Angel" being almost universally misheard as "Sin Harvest."
• Played straight in LBX: Little Battlers eXperience with double servings for each Finishing Move. The player calls out "Hissatsu function" and then the control device calls the name of the attack.
• The characters in The Legend of Dragoon call the names of Dragoon magic before hitting opponents with it. They also call the names of their regular Combos, albeit after having whacked the enemy with it.
• Legend of Legaia: The three playable characters always shout out their attack names, but in Japanese, as there isn't an English language track. A few of the attacks have multiple incantations, though, and a very select few are in accented-English, such as Tornado Flame. The sequel has English voice-over work, and the characters also announce all signature moves.
• During a quest in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, a goron named Gonguron screams "GORON POWER, GOOO!!!" before starting digging like a maniac in a cave to reveal a shrine.
• Characters in Lufia: Curse of the Sinistrals have voice clips while attacking and using special attacks. Some attacks do have the characters call out the given name of the attack (Guy's Volcanic Impact, Selan's Ice Blade, Dekar's Exploding Fist, and Artea's Trident Arm and Javelin Rain).
  • When using third-level Charged Attacks, Maxim and Guy may shout "Phoenix Swing!" or "Blast Storm!" respectively. "Blast Storm" is the name of Guy's "Hurricane Hammer" in the Japanese version.
• In Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter and Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes the announcer will call your attacks. That is, if your Super Combo Finish connects. Abandoned in Marvel vs. Capcom 2, likely due to the sheer volume of audio clips required (usually 2-3 super combos per character, 56 playable characters in all).
  • In Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, you got the callout only if the super ended the fight (hey, old school!). The exception was Dan's Super Taunt, for obvious reasons. Marvel vs. Capcom only said "Hyper combo finish!", although you did get to see the name of the super on the screen.
    • Cyber Akuma didn't get his supers called. At least not in the PSX version. Instead we got "Hyper Combo Finish!"
  • Particularly jarring in the live-action So Bad, It's Good movie (the first one), where most of the actors are Western, and the only character who calls their attacks is (wait for it) British fighter Cammy, who inexplicably shouts "Front Kick!" when she does one of her special moves, which is... er, a front kick.
    • "Thrust Kick" was the name of her "Cannon Spike" technique in the international versions of Super Street Fighter II until it was changed back in the Versus and Alpha series. The "Front Kick" is most likely a Mondegreen on the actresses part.
  • In The King of Fighters Terry Bogard has his BUSTA WOLF!!!
• The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel III has Rean saying "Crimson Slash!" when he uses his Crimson Slash attack or "Second Form: Gale!" when he uses Gale. Otherwise, averted for most of the cast as they either do a Kiai or say something completely different.
• Mass Effect 3 on the Xbox 360 has support for Kinect voice commands, letting you invoke this trope by calling your attacks to use them. Or by using control panels by shouting "Activate!"
• In Mega Man Starforce 3, Geo calls out his Big Bang attacks: "Atomic Blazer!" "Elemental Cyclone!"
• Mega Man X will say "Hadouken" when executing the secret hidden instant-kill technique.
  • He'll also call the names of special weapons in X8 and Maverick Hunter X. I dunno why. He didn't in the previous 7 games.
    • Zero also does this in X8.
  • Likewise, when voice acting was added to the original series in Mega Man 8, every single Robot Master did this with their signature weapon, and a few did it for their other attacks as well.
    • Along with Mega Man himself. "Flame Sword!" "Tornado Hold!" Ad nauseum.
    • He only did it during the "[weapon] get" sequences. He never actually called them out while doing them (although he did in his Marvel vs. Capcom appearances).
    • BURN! BURN! BURN! Burn to the ground! BURN! BURN! BU-BURN! Burn to thBURN!
• Within Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker are several examples, most notably from the AI weapons in game which announce what weapon they are going to use. Or The special ending where Vladimir shouts "PEEEEEEAAAACE ROCKET!" Also seen in Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain with the Rocket Arm upgrade for Snake's bionic arm. When firing it, Snake will yell "ROCKET PUUUUUUNCH!!", among other phrases, which is especially humorous given that it's primarily a game about sneaking and staying quiet.
• Mischief Makers has THE Beastector, who call out the names of their respective vehicles, "Beast Change!" for them to transform, and Lunar also yells his vehicle's name when transitioning to the final part of his boss fight (and "You're mine!" for some of his melee attacks, making him the most vocal of the three). He also does the only sort-of calling the attack in the final boss fight, when THE Beastector is fighting in their combined vehicles. When the robot jumps into the background and performs the Mazinger-like chest beam, Lunar yells "Through fire, justice is served!".
• In Mitsumete Knight, two of the enemy Eight Generals, Borankio the Unshakable and Salishuan the Spy, are guilty of this with their respective Special Attacks, the "Hasai Senpu" and the "Precise Kill". Bonus points for Borankio, as he shouts "Hissatsu !" before "Hasai Senpu !".
  • And then there's Priscilla, who uses this trope in a comic way in of her Events, shouting "Flower Hurricane !!" when throwing flowers around her, and "Double Flower Hurricane !!" when the player joins her.
• In Namco × Capcom, some characters call their attack names when attacking.
• In the Nancy Drew game Danger by Design, you can pick up a book on the martial art "Ichi-do," where it details 9 attacks that each have their own battle cry. Knowing where your opponent is going to hit helps with defeating Minette.
• Some of the characters in No More Heroes, including Travis, play this perfectly straight… but more noteworthy is Destroyman, a send up of Toku heroes who deconstructs or parodies this — his weakness is specifically that his overblown posturing and egregious attack calling makes it easy to see his attacks coming, dodge, and counter.
  • Destroyman can't help it, even if he knows it's the flaw in his battle strategy. His weapon, the SFX Converter, is made so that it'll automatically do an attack by calling the attack. He needs to call out the attacks or he can't use any attack except his melee attack.
  • Travis seems to have stolen some of his attack names from the Show Within a Show anime he's fond of, given that its main characters are Blueberry, Cranberry and Strawberry...
  • Shinobu does this too with attacks like "Sonic Sword!", "Bloody Sundae!", and "Black Tuesday!".
  • Dr. Letz Shake gets in on this a little in the sequel, despite the Robo Speak. "BATTLE CRY!"
• Bungie's heavily anime-influenced game Oni, which greatly encourages fisticuffs over gunplay and does its best to run the gamut of Asian sci-fi's most entertaining tropes. Both the protagonist Konoko and bad guys call attacks. Konoko (voiced by Anime regular Amanda Winn Lee) has "Devil Spin Kick!" and "Rising fury!", and even low-level mooks, Strikers in the nomenclature of the game, have "Strikerrrrr-SLAM!". Everyone gets cool reverb effects, particularly the Furies (female strikers) with "Tennnnnn-SHADOW!" punch combos.
• Spoofed a few times in Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan: the ramen chef in the "Linda Linda" stage of OTO1 has "Ultimate Secret Techniques" for cleaning, cutting vegetables, and making noodles, while the barber in the "Julia ni Shoushin" stage of OTO2 calls out the hairstyles he's doing.
• Overwatch: All characters (except Winston) call out their ultimates when using them. This is partially for game balance and teamwork (allowing enemies to hear the callouts means they can react to it, allies hearing them means they can combine ultimates together).
  • Ana: "You're powered up! Get in there"
  • Ashe: "Bob?! Do something!"
  • Baptiste: "Light 'em up!"
  • Bastion: *series of beeps*
  • Brigitte: "Rally to me!"
  • D.Va: "Nerf this!"
  • Doomfist: "Meteor Strike!"
  • Genji: "The dragon becomes me!"
  • Hanzo: "Ryū ga waga teki wo kurau!"
  • Junkrat: "Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines!"
  • Lucio: "Let's break it DOWN!"
  • McCree: "It's high noon."
  • Mei: "Dòng zhù! Bùxǔ zǒu!"
  • Mercy: "I will watch over you!" (formerly "Heroes never die!" when her resurrection ability was her ultimate)
  • Moira: "Surrender to my will!"
  • Orisa: "Cease your resistance!"
  • Pharah: "Justice rains from above!"
  • Reaper: "Die! Die! Die!"
  • Reinhardt: "Hammer DOWN!"
  • Roadhog: *maniacal laughter*
  • Soldier 76: "I've got you in my sights."
  • Sombra: "Apaganda las luces!"
  • Symmetra: "Yahí param vaastavikita hai!"
  • Torbjorn: "Molten COOORE!"
  • Tracer: "Wait for it..."
  • Widowmaker: "No one can hide from my sight."
  • Wrecking Ball: "Area denied."
  • Zarya: "Ogon' po gotovnosti!"
  • Zenyatta: "Pass into the iris."
• Phantasy Star Online 2 has an odd example in the form of the Dragon EX, who's much more talkative then the other boss dragons, as it telepathically calls out the fancy names of some of its mostly mundane looking slashing attacks that it performs using its sword/shield arms.
• Inverted in [PROTOTYPE], where Cpt. Cross's calling out of his need to reload, and hence inability to attack, shows to the player when to start counterattacking.
• Psychonauts parodies this, in its Godzilla pastiche level "Lungfishopolis", with a boss named Kochamara who is a master of this technique. His shouts include "Mighty RAM!, "Mighty ram GROUND VERSION!" "Hard to avoid AREA ATTACK!" and the notorious "Overly intricate COMBINATION!" Also "Deadly TRIANGLEBEAM!"
• Disco Kid in Punch-Out!! for the Wii will shout "Here it comes!" before making swipes. It's almost easier to list the fighters who don't call their attacks when it comes to the Wii version.
• A short story on the Rift website describes historical warrior Won Odego yelling "Strike like iron!" and "Way of the Mountain!" when activating paragon abilities.
• Romancing SaGa 3 invokes this by having the attack's name in a speech bubble above the character's head before they initiate the attack. However, this also occurs when a character gains a stat bonus.
• RuneScape is mostly free of this trope, but certain Dungoneering bosses will call their attacks, warning players of what is coming. To'Kash the Bloodchiller is the first one players are likely to encounter, with three calls for his special attack: "Sleep now... In the bitter cold" a few seconds beforehand, "DEEP FREEZE!" as he encases the player(s) in ice and "I will shatter your soul!" when he smashes said ice. Experienced players use this against him and leave the room until after he's finished the attack. Har'Lakk the Riftsplitter will also call his portal attacks, with "A flame portal will flush you out!", "Taste miasma!" and "This will cut you down to size!", summoning an area of flame, poison or stat-reducing goop.
• The Persona series:
  • Averted in the original Persona, but played straight for the ultimate techniques in both installments of Persona 2, and for the ultimate Combination Attack that is a result of said ultimate techniques coming together. Particularly amusing in the Japanese versions, since they were all (sometimes silly sounding) English names.
    Bubbry Lovah!
    Uh Broody Honeymoooon!
  • In Persona 3, the character will occasionally shout out the names of their personas when summoning them. Which makes sense for the main character, who can change personas at will, but why would the other shout them out? Occasionally the characters will say something other than their persona's name during a Critical Summon, but a few are annoying.
  Yukari: I SWEAR ON MY LIFE!!!
  • This applies to Persona 4 as well. The only attack call that's 100% consistent is the obligatory shout of "PERSONA!", which is both noncommittal and quite effective. Also, the whole attack calling thing is kind of awkward if you have Satan or Lucifer equipped at the time...
  • While calling the actual names of the attacks used is averted in the RPGs, it is played straight in the 2D Fighting Games, Persona 4: Arena and Persona 4: Arena Ultimax. Special and super moves based on skills in the RPGs sometimes have their names called out by the characters when used.
  • Persona 5 again has characters shout "Persona!" or the actual name of their Guardian Entity when summoning them, and they'll sometimes call out their Combination Attack (which applies to previous games as well). The main character will also use some of the lines of characters from previous Persona titles if using one of the DLC Persona taken from their game. Also, the first Boss Battle, Asmodeus, will tell you he's about to use his "Super Death Spike" exploding volleyball attack the turn before he actually hits you with it. Finally, the final boss Yaldabaoth calls particular attacks related to the Seven Deadly Sins with a couple sentences, keywords depending on the individual sin.
• Pokémon Trainers need to do this in order to issue commands but there are some subversions, such as Gym Leader Sabrina who's said to use her Psychic Powers to telepathically give orders or Trainer Red who's said in Pokémon Masters to have an unspoken bond with his team that allows him to give commands nonverbally.
  • Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX: Pokémon shout the name of their attacks when using them. If using a linked attack, they say a more generic line like "Take this!" instead.
• In Puyo Puyo, it's routine during competitive puyo matches for characters to shout specific magic spell names after they have completed a chain, and sometimes during the chain. This can actually prove useful to a player; if your opponent starts to repeat a voice clip, that's your cue to watch for large amounts of garbage puyo about to fall into your playfield. Besides that, different characters have different spell themes, with these being just some of them:
  • Klug, in Puyo Pop Fever, has mostly space-themed attacks in Gratuitous Latin, such as "Nebula!"
  • Ms. Accord originally had music-themed spells such as "Allegro." and "Adante." before they changed to a school theme in later games.
  • Popoi also has space-themed magic like "Galaxy, meow!" and "Shooting star!"
  • Sig is made to represent the blue puyo and has spells themed around the color as a result ("Cyan!" "Lapis lazuli!" "Cobalt!").
  • Ringo spouts math terms such as "Sine!" and "Cosine!"
• Skies of Arcadia: Most of the techniques used by the heroes and some of the bosses use their name or a form of it in a phrase during the attack itself. They also call attacks made by their ships.
  Vyse: MOON STONE CANNON, FIRE!
• Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus has the Panda King doing this with his Flame-Fu ("Fiery Wheel!", "Paaalms of Thundah!" etc.).
• Sonic the Hedgehog:
  • Shadow (and/or Sonic) shout "Chaos Control!" in order to warp with the Chaos Emeralds. It's not sure if they even have to.
  • Sonic shouts "Speed Up!", "Sonic Wind!", and "Time Stop!" when he uses these moves in Sonic Adventure 2.
  • Rouge shouts "Hip Drop!", "Black Wave!", and "Charm Ray!" when she performs these moves in the same game.
  • Tails does this with his Laser Missile, Rocket Launcher, and Power Laser moves in the same game, saying "Firing" before each move.
  • Sonic Colors has Sonic shout the name of the powerup each Whisp gives as he activates them.
    • "Laser! Drill! Spikes! Cube! Rocket! Hover! Frenzy!"
    • And at the end of the game: "Final Color Blaster!"
• In Space Channel 5, Ulala and her enemies say their cues. If they didn't, the game would be unbeatable.
• This happens in Star Fox Zero of all games during a secret mission in which you play as Peppy. He yells out "BARREL ROLL!" whenever he performs the evasive maneuver.
• Star Ocean. Practically all voiced characters in the series do this. Like Tales below, such calling of attacks has been in Star Ocean since the humble beginnings on the Super Famicom.
  • Star Ocean: The Last Hope: Everyone in the cast does this. Sarah... tries to do this.
    Lighting, uh, uh, something!
• Super Mario Bros.:
  • Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars has a status condition called mute, which prevents affected characters from using special attacks. They are also shown with a bandage over their mouths, suggesting this trope.
  • In Super Mario 64 DS, Wario does this with a simple punch. "Punch! Punch! Yah!"
• Being an amalgamation of a great many Humongous Mecha anime, Super Robot Wars has more of this than even entire series of fighting anime. Although just about everyone does it, Original Generation character and Ascended Fanboy Ryusei Date has a particular joy for doing this, even when simply letting off a couple shots in a Real Robot, to the point where he initially gets some funny looks from the other characters. It seems to be infectious, as those same characters end up using this trope more and more as the games go on.
  • Also, Irm in Grungust. "CALAMITY SWORD -- DARKNESS SLASH!"
  • A somewhat odd example exists in that there is technically an attack that everyone calls out, no matter their predilection to doing so normally. The infamous Gespenst Kick seems to cause pretty much anyone who uses it to suddenly become markedly Hot-Blooded and scream the name of the attack at the top of their lungs. Hilariously, the anime suggests that the reason everyone does this is that they actually have to shout it out in order to execute the Gespenst Kick properly.
    SHOUT NOW!!
  • The more comedic characters occasionally get the attack names wrong, or just make something up because they don't remember.
    Ryoko Subaru: GEKIGAN FLARE! Wait, what the hell am I saying?
• Super Smash Bros.:
  • Captain Falcon — originally of the F-Zero racing titles — calls out his painfully slow (but extremely powerful) signature move, the "Falcon... PUNCH!!!" (He also calls a faster "Falcon Kick" attack.)
  • Also, in Brawl, when Snake fights Falcon and uses his codec, he and Otacon lampoon this by saying they've always wanted to do something...unlike what you're thinking, they do a laudably over-the-top "FALCON PUUUUUNCH!" "FALCON KIIIIICK!".
  • Ness and Lucas call out their PSI moves: PK Thunder, PK Fire, PK Flash, PK Freeze, and PK Starstorm.
  • When Kirby copies a fighter who calls out their neutral special move, he does the same, but in his insanely cuter, higher-pitched voice. "Fawcon Punch!"
  • In a strange example, if Kirby copies R.O.B. he'll yell out "BEEEEP!" when firing his laser eyes.
  • Ike sometimes announces, "Aether!" and "Great... AETHER!", and Byleth occasionally announces the weapons they wield (Failnaught, Aymir, and Areadbhar) when performing specific attacks with said weapons. They don't announce the Sword of the Creator, though.
  • Robin the tactician mage announces the names of their spells.
  • Many Final Smashes involve calling the attack's name.
  • Ryu and Ken call out several of their moves, true to Street Fighter tradition. Same with Terry Bogard.
  • Palutena says the names of certain attacks, but in a pleasant calm voice: shoutouts go to "Autoreticle" and "Angelic Missile".
  • Shulk calls out several of his attacks, including any Monado Art he activates.
  • Wii Fit Trainer says "Salute the sun!" when using Sun Salutation. They also give fitness advice when using other moves or taunts — all in a calm, instructional tone. "Let's stretch our legs."
  • In Little Mac's character reveal trailer, Doc Louis calls Mac's attacks for him.
  • The Heroes are a variation; they only announce the names of their neutral, side, and up specials in Japanese. In other versions they simply grunt, probably because the spells have different names in other languages.
  • Sora announces the spells he casts in his neutral special. In a subversion, his up taunt also has him cast another spell, but it's aesthetic.
• Every game in the Tales Series uses this whenever a character uses a special move. In case of spellcasters, high-level spells often include a lengthy chant during the casting. And yes, that includes Tales of Phantasia on the SNES, courtesy of the Flexible Voice Driver.
  • INDIGNATION!
  • Fasuto Eido!
  • Tales of Destiny 2 (the actual Japanese-only Destiny 2 for PS2, not the renamed Eternia) spoofs this practice by giving Loni Dunamis a Limit Break consisting of 15 kanji, which also has the unique property of having the ingame title pop up one kanji at a time when it is used.
  • In the same game, Barbatos Goetia has this has an incredibly hammy art form ("SHAKUNETSU NO BURN STRIKE!" "GENOCIDE BRAVER!"), but aside from that, when fighting him, the usual arte name tag at the top of the screen will also display sentences and phrases presumably shouted by Barbatos mid battle depending on what arte he used or how the player acted against him (Such as "Eat this, my Tres Assault arte!" or "Don't try running away from me!") Naturally if you used an item, he'd immediately hit you with a spell while the arte tag instead said "Don't use items!" And one thing led to another and that particular phrase became a Mystic Arte all on its own.
    • The same move would later be given to Malik Caesar in Tales of Graces f, where it's made even more over the top by changing the camera angle as each part of attack's name is announced. It's known as "Tremorous Celestial Sundering Shredding Light of Cyclonic Butchery" in the English version. Or "Tremorous Celestial etc." for short, because the full name is too long to fit in the artes menu.
  • To reduce redundancy, Tales of Vesperia introduced more than one shout for artes, and Raven completely averts this trope with most of his melee artes. Destiny Remake and Hearts likewise have characters say different things for every use of an arte beyond the first (usually a grunt or a simple battlecry), since their systems allowed freestyle comboing, including spamming, something most games in the series don't have.
    • I'LL BLOW YOU AWAY! DESTRUCT-DESTRUCT-DESTRUCT-DESTRUCT-DESTRUCT-DESTRUCT-DESTRUCTION FIELD!!! If that doesn't get your blood boiling, nothing will.
    • Repede is a badass dog and cannot talk, but his artes still have names. The first time he does his Mystic Arte, it shows up as ???. This triggers a skit where the other character debate over what to name the move. They settle on "Slash!" and this becomes its new title.
  • Hermana of Tales of Innocence actually yells "Puuuunch~" and "Kiiiiiiick~" for some of her moves.
  • When Kohaku's Spiria isn't fully fixed yet, her attack callouts are fittingly monotone.
• Team Fortress 2: Saxton Hale lives and breathes this trope, though he usually prefers to yell his own name rather than the name of his attack.
  • It's possible that the Pyro is calling out the name of the Hadoken in its taunt kill, but since it's The Unintelligible all anybody ever hears is a muffled yell.
  • The Engineer announces himself whenever he's building a Teleporter, Dispenser, or Sentry (and also cries out if any of them get sapped our destroyed).
  • All of the Mercs also call out the names of any spells they acquire while playing in Helltower (the Halloween Payload Race event).
• Them's Fightin' Herds: Some of the fighters do this with a few choice attacks. We have Oleander's "Shadow Spark!", Tianhuo's "Smoldering Kick!" and Velvet's "Snoooooooooooow NADO!".
  • In the tutorial section, Oleander indulges in some Hypocritical Humor when she calls out Tianhuo for such a "rookie mistake" of saying attacks out loud before using them.
• Fifi in Tiny Toon Adventures: Defenders of the Universe calls out her special attack whenever she uses it. "Le Odor of Love!"
• The Touhou Project series is pretty unique among shmups in that most of the bosses' attack patterns are all different named attack spells, with the spell name displayed onscreen when it is cast. In-universe, declaring the name of your attack before you use it is one of the rules of Spell Card duels, the primary means of resolving conflicts in Gensokyo.
  • Utsuho Reiuji uniquely adds bright yellow CAUTION! signs and a warning klaxon.
• Player characters in the MMORPG Tree of Savior vocally announce what skill they're casting — though this is more common among the Cleric and Wizard class families than it is the Swordsman and Archer ones, who are more given to Kiai and battle shouts when using skills.
• The sword techniques used by the Takamachi family in Triangle Heart 3: Sweet Songs Forever also have the names appear in lettering for the audience.
• ULTRAKILL:
  • A trait common to the Prime Souls is that they have specific, threatening call-outs for each individual attack (even if it's not exactly an attack name). You will need them as warnings, because each and every attack is singularly fast and brutal, and some in particular (like Minos Prime's "JUDGEMENT" dropkick and "DIE" meteor-stomp, and Sisyphus Prime's "BEGONE" Shockwave Clap and "THIS WILL HURT" explosion) will end you if you don't see them coming.
  • Less seriously, the Mysterious Druid Knight (& Owl) secret (joke) encounter has the Knight calling his attacks out with "Full Auto" and "Fuller Auto".
• In Uncommon Time, the Limit Breaks all involve the characters doing this, along with an additional dramatic line.
  Alto: The hatred, the hope... All of it is my power! Disappear!! Grand Concerto!
• In Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria, all characters call out their Finishing Move at the end of their little speech while performing it. For mortals and einherjar, the speech ends with "Finishing Strike: (name of attack)". The gods finish with the shout "Divine Assault: (name of attack)".
  • This is also done in Valkyrie Profile, with the addition of Suo's call of 'Ougi!', Badrach's 'Deathblow', and Jun's "Mugen no kensen, Blade Art, Senko-Jin!" Not to mention the mages who call all their spells... and go into a full invocation for Great Magics...
  • Ditto Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume too.
• In Vattroller X, most characters summon a creature when they use their Smart Bombs. Zoro however, having nothing to summon, just has a bunch of text appear over his head instead.
• In Viewtiful Joe, the first time you fight Captain Blue, he shouts, "Captain Blue kick!" For some reason, he does not do this in the next battle. Other characters get into it, too. Joe calls out his "Red Hot Kick!" move, while Alastor calls out almost all of his moves.
• In the Wing Commander franchise, fellow pilots often announce torpedo attacks. Judging by Real Life example below, that's a decent imitation of standard dogfighting protocol.
• The Wonderful 101: Wonder-Red does it constantly. It's even parodied in the final attack where he starts to recite his ridiculous super extra long attack name. Wonder-Blue tries to get Red to attack already but only gets punched in return.
• In World of Warcraft, bosses tend to do this — mainly the reason is to give the player some time to dodge a devastating attack.
  • For example: BOOOOOOOONNEEEEEE-STOOOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRMMMMM!
  • Nefarian is notorious for this, having short speeches for his attacks. His gimmick is that he will target the players of a certain class and turn one of that class's features against them (for instance, he could inflict Shapeshifter Mode Lock on Druids). It was so beloved that Blizzard gave him new ones for each new class added by expansions, with the Death Knight one being an Ascended Meme. ^note  Death Knight players had a tendency to macro Death Grip with "Get over here!", Nefarian's Death Knight call is "Death Knights, GET OVER HERE!"
• Xenoblade Chronicles 1 and Xenoblade Chronicles X have any allied team member yell out the name of the Arts that they use (assuming that they aren't in a Skell and not responding to a Soul Voice). It actually serves a purpose; since you can only control one party member at a time, it helps coordinate combo attacks with allies such as Toppling enemies.
  • Some villains to do this as well, notably Ryyz and Dagahn when in the Zu Pharg.
• The first two games of the Xenosaga series did this, but only for the tech attacks in Episode I and the double attacks in Episode II. In Episode III, however, the attack names are replaced with a nice little phrase before the attack. Ex: for KOS-MOS's D-TENERITAS attack, after she is fully awakened as Mary Magdelene, she says, "Relinquish your pain unto me."
• In Yu-Gi-Oh! Reshef of Destruction, Yugi, Joey, and Kaiba order their signature cards to attack if they manage to summon them.

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