Lands of Lore - Television Tropes & Idioms

A series of three first-person perspective Western RPGs with adventure game elements developed by Westwood Studios, building on their work on their Dungeons & Dragons Eye Of The Beholder series. The first is Lands of Lore: The Throne of Chaos, released in 1993. In 1997 came Lands of Lore II: Guardians of Destiny, and in 1999, a game called simply Lands of Lore III.

The series provides examples of:

Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Beneath Gladstone. An entire guild has its headquarters there.
All-Powerful Bystander: The Draracle in LOL 1
A Winner Is You: The good ending of LOL 2 is INCREDIBLY underwhelming.
Big Boo's Haunt: The Dark Halls, the Underworld.
Biological Mashup: The winged spiders.
Chainmail Bikini: The amazons in the White Tower.
Commonplace Rare: The silverleaf in LOL 2, my goodness, the silverleaf.
Deadpan Snarker: Luther, protagonist of LOL 2.
Demonic Spiders: Many in every game. The Pentrogs in Opinwood and the snakelike apparitions in the White Tower in LOL 1, those freaky neon-pink spider thingies in LOL 2...
- Technically those snakes are magical spells cast by the ghosts themselves, which the PCs can never locate, but as the whole level is full of ghosts that can cast this spell, one could say the whole level is that one level, filled with demonic spiders. But it's not like you're not warned first...
Devil in Plain Sight / Obviously Evil: Chancellor Geron, an Obstructive Bureaucrat and (in the 3rd game) open racist, is pretty clearly secretly allied with the Evil Army in the first game and obviously does not have the Kingdom's best interests at heart in the remaining two games. However, neither the heroic King Richard or the powerful sorceress Dawn ever suss onto the fact the man is clearly up to no good ( although you finally get a chance to get even with him at the very end of the 3rd game).
Difficulty Spike: If Kikoskia's Let's Plays are any indication, the first game has lots of them. The Urbish Mines and floor three of the White Tower being the most prominent examples.
- The third level of the White Tower is hilariously easy in a second playthrough if you remember that the Vaelan's Cube that you find that is meant for breaking open Yvel can also be used to nuke ghosts, like the spectral Cabal Warriors or the Wraiths, ad infinitum...
Evil Costume Switch: Dawn gets one in the evil ending path of Lands of Lore 2. However, she hasn't actually turned evil; she's just wearing a dark and seductive costume to lull Evil Luther into complacency so she can assassinate him.
Familiar: You can have one accompany you in the third game.
Faux First Person 3D: The first game.
From Nobody to Nightmare: Jakel goes through this in the 3rd game, after spending the first two games as a minor secondary supporting character.
Game-Breaking Bug: In LOL 1, a common bug in the Urbish Mines permanently disables the stairwell to level 2. In LOL 2, the automatic save feature has a tendency to "save" your game at extremely inopportune moments.
Goddamned Bats: Those winged spiders and plague rats in the Draracle's Cave.
Half-Human Hybrid: Copper, LOL 3's protagonist, is human on his father's side and dracoid on his mother's side.
Heroic Bastard: Copper again.
Intercontinuity Crossover: The last world Copper visits in LOL 3 is that of Command & Conquer (the Tiberian series), another game by Westwood.
Involuntary Shapeshifting: Luther's curse, causing him to change into a lizard or a huge beast at random. You later get some measure of control over it.
Jack-of-All-Stats: Conrad.
Large Ham: Patrick Stewart — yes, that Patrick Stewart — as King Richard, and he does it very well. And the Draracle. The series had excellent voice acting for the most part.
Lethal Lava Land: Volcania, home of the dragons.
Little Bit Beastly: The Huline tribe in the Huline Jungle.
- Petting Zoo People: The Hulines known as the Wild Ones, another tribe living in the Savage Jungle.
Mars Needs Women: The Ruloi. Yes, they have this trope in a Fantasy series!
Meat Moss: Belial's laboratory.
Mook Maker: if you don't immediately immolate the avian worms' nests in the Urbish Mines, this is what you'll get.
Multiple Endings: LOL 2.
Save Scumming: May be your only hope in certain places, especially if you have no manual to help you.
Schrödinger's Player Character: In LOL 1. The second game seems to hint that the Huline player character is the "canonically" hero of LOL 1.
Sprite Polygon Mix: LOL 2 and 3.
Squishy Wizard: Ak'Shel.
Super Drowning Skills: In LOL 1.
That One Boss: The Larkhon. The weapon you're supposed to use on it is not nearly efficient enough and eats the characters' mana; magic-challenged players may have to resort to just chucking items at it until it dies.
Thieves' Guild: The Bachanal.
Trial-and-Error Gameplay in certain areas unless you constantly consult the manual.
The Underworld: Visted in the third game.
What Could Have Been: Dawn, the mage that got trapped in a crystal ball within Castle Cimmeria, was originally meant to be playable from the point you rescue her. She's still in the code, just not implemented.
Womb Level: The Mother Beast.