"You" have been attending a magic act with the intention of stopping the magician from harming any animals in the course of it. However, two paths lie ahead, one of which leads to mischief in the form of Mysterio's bag of magic tricks, and the other of which involves figuring out a way to free his captive audience — all the ghosts of people who took part in the act and failed to impress him.
Hocus-Pocus Horror provides examples of:
- Animal Lover: Your character, who has a soft spot for dogs. Your motivation for stopping Mysterio's act stems from wanting to prevent the mad magician from harming more animals after witnessing Mysterio electrocute a puppy on stage. In the book's best endings, you get to keep that puppy, Ralph, as a pet after defeating Mysterio.
- Bad People Abuse Animals: You started realizing something is amiss when Mysterio starts electrocuting a live puppy on-stage, which the audience cheers without realizing anything wrong. This prompts your investigation and sure enough, Mysterio is evil as you found out later.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: In one ending, you can wish for a ton of gold, which the genie makes appear directly above you, so it kills you when it falls.
- Death Dealer: Some of the bad endings reveals Mysterio's ability to throw cards with razor-sharp precision, enough to cut into flesh and slice up ropes (which drops a sandbag on you to your death).
- The Dog Bites Back: One storyline involves you trying to help a dog that was being used in an evil magician's stage act. At one point, should you try to run away and leave the dog to its doom, it attacks you while invisible and you get killed.
- Exact Words: Early in the adventure, Mysterio declares that you're in an act that you'll remember for the rest of your life. Given that he intends to kill you in a deadly magic act minutes later...
- Failure Is the Only Option: Trying to flee from the magic act in the second storyline will get you bad endings, regardless of your choice.
- Forced Transformation: Mysterio's magical powder can transform either you and your friend Zack, or his puppy Ralph, into monsters. The cover art depicts either you or Ralph in one of these scenarios after being monsterized. There's also an ending where a run-in with a witch turns you into a rat.
- "Freaky Friday" Flip: In one of the bad endings due to Mysterio botching a body-switching spell (without asking your consent, as always), you may end up switching bodies with Mysterio's puppy Ralph.
- Gamebooks
- Hoist by His Own Petard: More often than not, you are able to defeat Mysterio by using his tricks against him, with spectacular results. For instance, using Mysterio's Vanishing Powder to banish him instead, stealing the magician's wand to defeat him, or being able to overpower Mysterio because he turned you into a monster... but couldn't figure out how to control you.
- Karmic Death: Choosing to wish for "a ton of gold" rather than wishing to save your friend causes the gold to fall on you, and kill you. Laser-Guided Karma indeed.
- Killer Rabbit: One of Mysterio's "summons"; if you escape the magician and flee into an alleyway, Mysterio will summon a literal killer rabbit to devour you.
- Knife-Throwing Act: You can be forced into this. The trick is designed for you to get your hand chopped off in front of the audience, but you're decapitated when you sneeze and move your head.
- Muggle in Mage Custody: In one of the bad endings, you end up on an eternal probation with Mysterio. In another, you are enslaved by a Jackass Genie.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: In one part, you're running from an evil magician who plans to use you in his stage act. You think that a dog he was holding captive is now hidden inside his bag of tricks; but you decide not to take the bag with you, because you believe it's wrong to steal. This punishes you with a bad ending by having the now-invisible dog attack and presumably kill you — even though you were trying to do the right thing by not stealing, and you didn't even know for certain that the dog was in the bag.
- Stage Magician: Mysterio the Magician appears to be one, but after dragging you into becoming a volunteer for his tricks, you then realize something is amiss.
- Video Game Cruelty Punishment: If you try to abandon the dog you were supposed to rescue and save your own skin, the dog will attack and kill you.
- Wishing for More Wishes: Your character attempts this after summoning a genie. It doesn't work, as the genie refuses to grant the wish, stating that it's the first thing they warn you about in Genie School.
