Vivisector: Beast Within is a First-Person Shooter by Action Forms, released for the PC in 2005. It puts the player in the boots of Kurt Robinson, who's tasked to seek out what happened to a Navy Seals squad that went gone missing investigating a volcanic island in the Pacific. Said island turns out to be overrun by Mad Scientist-made Beast Men and other genetically enhanced animals. Reimagining The Island of Doctor Moreau as a bomb-fest ensues.note
Has nothing to do with the character from X-Statix.
The game provides examples of:
- The '80s: The game is set in 1987.
- A God Am I: When Dogstone declares that creating the Humanimals goes against "the very ways of God", Morhead naturally responds with this trope — specifically, "I am the god!"
- Animorphism: Most of the game deals with Doctor Moreau-like half-human animal cyborgs, but there's also hints that their creators also did something to the game's protagonist as a kid, which manifest during the events of the game.
- Artificial Animal People: The Humanimals from the second half of the game are human-animal hybrids created as soldiers by the renegade geneticist Dr. Morhead.
- Badass Bandolier: Doubly so if a half-lion hybrid is wearing these, to boot.
- Bears Are Bad News: Especially when they are adorned in armor and rocket launchers.
- Beast Man: Who you fight through from the mid-point of the game, as well as Lion.
- Big Damn Heroes: Lion pulls this off twice — first by saving Kurt from the Overbrute Panther, and second by arriving at the Airship (with the bomb from the previous encounter still being attached to him) to confront Dogstone.
- Bottomless Magazines: Surprisingly for a game released in the mid 2000s, there is no reloading. The Sniper Rifle seemingly doesn't even have a reloading animation.
- Bug War: The game has a normal marine fighting against a legion of cybernetically and genetically enhanced Mix-and-Match Critters at war with your fellow soldiers... though the trope is subverted, not only due to the fact that the marine switches sides to fight with the beasts against the humans, but the creatures you're fighting were created for your XO (some of which he promptly sends after you when you defect), and you're fighting them to help him regain control of them.
- Bullfight Boss: Courtesy of the one armored Rhino.
- Cartwright Curse: Melisa seemingly gets ambushed by a Hyena very early in the game. Presumably subverted when it turns out that she was just rendered unconscious and ends up late in the game, with Morhead even stating "
She's just sleeping." - Conflict Ball: The plot starts out with a General Ripper hiring an Evilutionary Biologist to create an army of Half Human Hybrids, only to split into a civil war over disagreements over how the army should be utilized. Okay, that's reasonable. Then the General decides to nuke the biologist's soldiers for no good reason, and when he tricks the player character into coming to their island hideaway, he conveniently forgets to inform his own soldiers that he required your help, turning them against you for no reason other than to add more enemies for you to fight. It gets worse, though; later on, the General kills your only ally in the game for absolutely no reason but to get you to abandon him for the doctor's side, and then you learn that the beast soldiers are pre-programmed to hate humans on sight, forcing you to fight your new allies, even though there really should be no reason for that to happen. In essence, the only reason why you have to fight any enemies in the game is because But Thou Must!.
- Critical Existence Failure: Kurt remains in top shape performance-wise until his health goes to zero. Same applies to the Beasts that keep their combat potency even after losing chunks of their flesh.
- Dull Surprise: Kurt hasn't been graced with the most emotive facial animation out there.
- Enemy Chatter: Downplayed. Only some versions of the human enemies and the Black and White Wolf Overbrutes have some form of distinguishable enemy chatter; the rest can only growl and make other animal noises. This is, for the most part, explained away as the animalistic enemies not being taught human speech by their creator, with the exception of the Humanimal leader Lion.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Dogstone turns out to be not exactly approving of Morhead experimenting on people, which included Kurt since his infancy.
- Face Death with Dignity: Dogstone says this verbatim, to Lion, who replies with "As my brothers did!".
- Fall Damage: The game handles this rather strangely.
- General Ripper: The unnamed General is obsessed with the Humanimals, first as a source of disposable Super Soldiers, then as a force to control and exterminate after they rebel against his cruel treatment. He goes as far as to nuke the rebelling hybrids' village and allow a train-full of them to be destroyed to keep them in line, and even kills the protagonist's friend to ensure that he helps him corral the beasts.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Lion defeats the Overbrute Panther, which results in him getting a Sticky Bomb attached to him and telling Kurt to leave him. Then he shows up in the Airship — with the Sticky Bomb still being attached and beeping — to confront Dogstone, who finally has Lion blow up in front of the windshield of Dogstone's mecha suit.
- Heinous Hyena: Especially as such are adorned with electricity and teleportation abilities. Later on, you also get to fight these toting guns as well.
- His Name Really Is "Barkeep": Lion, who is half human, half Exactly What It Says on the Tin.
- Idiosyncratic Difficulty Levels: In order from easiest to hardest: Inspection -> Therapy -> Surgery -> Vivisection.
- Implacable Man: The later section of the game features the Overbrute Panther, which cannot be killed by usual means and takes on Kurt through using its cloaking abilities and planting a Sticky Bomb on him.
- Inescapable Ambush: The first half of the game is defined by this; not only are you forced to trip one each time you activate a checkpoint, but said checkpoint is usually situated in another cage that springs up, usually much smaller so that you're literally a sitting duck for the enemies you're supposed to clear out to be released.
- Late to the Tragedy: The game is set up to be this, but eventually subverted for a while, as Liam Quaid and his squad are alive despite being stranded on this island for two weeks.
- Life Drain: In addition to the usual medkits, Kurt also gains a bit of health for every enemy killed.
- Ludicrous Gibs: The titular "vivisection points" allow massive chunks of flesh to be ripped away from an enemy with little more than a pistol, and even the basic knife or scalpel weapon can completely gib an enemy without much difficulty under the right circumstances.
- Locomotive Level: The game features one.
- Mad Scientist: Morhead fits this trope.
- Mini-Mecha: Dogstone is inside one fighting you in a Final Boss fight.
- Mission Control: Kurt goes through a few of the characters in this role, starting up with Melisa, then Liam Quaid, then eventually Lion.
- No Fair Cheating: A possibly unintentional example as this could be a programming quirk, but as Civvie 11 has found out, if you have the God Mode on when an Overbrute Phanter plants a Sticky Bomb upon you, the player will just keep on exploding every single frame until the cheat is disabled.
- Only Idiots May Pass: You progress through the first half of the game by activating a series of checkpoints in order. Your radar can only pick up on the next checkpoint by activating the previous one. Almost every checkpoint in the first half of the game is situated in a clearing usually lined with hidden fences or other barriers, obviously setting you up for a trap. Therefore, you have to trigger the trap to progress.
- Panthera Awesome: The game features plenty of genetically enhanced big cats capable of breathing fire and shooting fireballs, and that's without taking Lion into the account.
- Pregnant Badass: At most, subverted, as Melisa goes unconscious after a contact with a Hyena early on in the game. At least she and the child have seemingly survived.
- RPG Elements: The player gains points for exploring the level and killing enemies that one can spend for upgrading his speed, resistance, aim stability and health limit.
- Shows Damage: The game had quite the gore system, allowing you to literally peel the fur and skin off of the Humanimals with each hit. However, since killing them falls into the Critical Existence Failure category, the damage won't actually affect their performance until the killing shot.
- Stripped to the Bone: Thanks to the gore system, you can literally reduce you enemies to skeletons through sustained firepower.
- Super-Soldier: The Humanimals are an animalistic take on this trope, having been created as warriors for the main antagonist's private army. Doubly intimidating, as they have both animal and cybernetic elements to augment their fighting prowess. Kurt also happens to be one.
- Teleporting Keycard Squad: The first half of the game tends to be egregious about this. It's a miracle if you can walk a few feet without a handful of Humanimals teleporting right in your view and roasting your ass.
- Token Good Teammate: Lion gets to be the one Beast Man to assist Kurt in his quest.
- Turned Against Their Masters: The Humanimals are like this, though with a mild subversion: their creator actually supports the rebellion, and the guy they're rebelling against — the General Ripper who ordered them made — uses their Overbrute superior cousins to fight against them along with his human platoon.
- Tyke Bomb: Kurt was meant to be this, having been experimented on since he was a child.
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Invoked by Lion on his introductory cutscene."Who are we? There are five fingersnote in our hands, and yet we're not human."
