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Nightmare Fuel / Shovel Knight

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https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/teethalon.png
Take note, this isn't even the level boss.

Shovel Knight may be a cute throwback of a game, but it also has the less cute parts of NES era games.

  • The Lich Yard, Spectre Knight's stage, is a touch darker than the rest of the game, being very dark and having some creepy enemies, and lots of spikes everywhere. And, as with the rest of the game, the spikes aren't for show. If they collide with you, you die instantly.
    • Even worse, you can see abandoned buildings in the background, and one NPC confirms that the Lich Yard is the remains of the previous Village they lived in, until Specter Knight attacked it. In the epilogue of Spectre of Torment, you actually witness said raid.
  • Spectre Knight himself, being an Expy of Death is somewhat scary. He can teleport, wields a massive scythe, which he uses as a boomerang, and he will kill an unsuspecting player easily.
  • Pictured above is the Teethalon, a monster from Treasure Knight's stage, the Iron Whale. Noticeably, the rest of the stage isn't that scary, but it stands out from the rest of the game.
  • Plague Knight. He wears a plague doctor suit, throws bombs at you, and is completely unpredictable.
    • And that's not the worst yet! In his DLC, he not only tries to make himself perfect via the "Ultimate Potion", he beats the rest of the Order to get his hands on it. And when he makes the potion? It forms into the "Plague of Shadows", the Final Boss of his campaign, which starts as a Mirror Boss of his original fight, and then transforms into an Eldritch Abomination in its second phase. Plague Knight's deeds, however, are softened by his motive: he's in love.
    • Even with this motivation, the issue of the battle could have been tragic. If you remember the cutscene before the battle, you see Plague Knight losing control on the distillation of the potion and Mona running towards him. Then the potion falls, the screen fades to black for a second and when the light comes back, the "Plague of Shadows" is standing in Mona's place...
    • Though the entire fight with the "Plague of Shadows" and the "Corrupted Essence" is a nightmare Plague Knight is having thanks to the potion's power, it doesn't exclude the Fridge Horror of the situation: there's an unstable potion of unfathomable power that has enough power to level the Tower of Fate and has a high chance of exploding...
  • The Lich Yard's first stinger? Hilarious. The second one? Spectre Knight rushes to the chest with his relic, and digs through it, realizing that the Phase Locket is missing. He breaks composure, and lifts the chest, before slashing it in half, enraged. The third? The village there is attacked by a legion of undead, with the villagers fleeing for their lives. Phantom Striker appears and attempts to hold them off, but he doesn't succeed.
    • The story implications of Specter Knight's campaign causes a gargantuan Cerebus Retcon for that second one - that amulet is the last keepsake Specter has of his time as a human, so what was originally a funny moment of rage abruptly turns into a fit of genuine, if violent, anguish.
  • The Enchantress. She's an absolute Knight of Cerebus, who is never played for laughs, and is very dangerous and willing to hurt people to achieve her goals. She's the reason that the Order's in control of their respective areas, and she is not to be underestimated. Oh, and she's also hijacked Shield Knight's body.
    • Specter of Torment also gives you a front row seat to how depraved she really is. She blackmails Specter Knight into serving her twice over, turns Reize Brainwashed and Crazy just to replace a Dark Acolyte, effectively forces the Order of No Quarter to serve her on pain of death, later turns Reize into a monster to punish Specter Knight for getting cold feet, and see that whole "depopulated village" thing above? The Stinger shows that while Specter Knight was just running the villagers out of town, the Enchantress was actively nuking people and ordering her minions to attack civilians.
  • The final boss of Specter of Torment. It's a brainwashed Reize turned into a gargantuan knight monster (appropriately named "Nightmare Reize"). The tortured face it makes during the fight and especially when you defeat it implies the transformation is very painful.
  • In the epilogue of Specter of Torment, when the screen pans over the Clockwork Tower, we get to see where the Electrodents came from. They're not just mechanical constructs, they were actually made from living rats being carried over to a machine and undergoing Unwilling Roboticisation, so they're actually Cyborgs. You can even see their skeletons in the machine through flashing lights as they're being mechanized, so the process must be painful. Given the fact that we also see some Wizzems going through the same process (albeit seemingly willingly) to become Gear Wizzems, it's not unfeasible to think the rest of Tinker Knight's mooks could have gone through similar processes in some way.
  • While ultimately a Clipped-Wing Angel, the Grand Triumvirate's second form is not a pretty sight. Beneath the likeness of King Pridemoor lies a decomposing skull, with bulging eyes and a wide grin full of rotting teeth. The details on this new face also make the boss' golden sheen appear much more sickly.
  • The ending of King of Cards. Shovel Knight's and Plague Knight's campaigns occurred after the Order of No Quarter was founded, Specter Knight's campaign occurred after the Enchantress already established her dominion, but King Knight's occurs as the very first campaign, just before it all goes down— and the player gets to see it happen. After establishing King Knight as her figurehead, the Enchantress insists he issue a decree for her to send her troops out with, and on his careless wording, the kingdom is razed. From the Enchantress (and Propeller Knight again) gleefully bombarding the Pridewing, to the Troupple King arriving at the pond to hide from the danger, to all the betrayed NPCs taking shelter in the first village, to every Joustus house being firebombed with Plague Knight at the helm, it is a grizzly Mood Whiplash and a sobering realization that, despite this having been easily the most comical campaign, it always was going to end this way.
    King Knight: SILENCE!!
  • Reize's ending in Showdown. His adventure has been an upbeat jaunt, complete with him adopting the Baz as his mentor. In his ending, once the mirror is broken, he reunites with the Baz, who suddenly vanishes in front of him. As does everyone else he comes across as he goes running, including his own father and his father's friend, while the land goes dark around him. None of what happened is real, and he is promptly forced back under the Enchantress's control.

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