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The original series

"Sometimes I wonder, if there is more to this game than everybody thinks there is. Like there is something bigger in all of us, just hiding out, watching us. Wouldn't you like to know?"
—Alpha's trailer of the remake.

Describeth TOME here? But of course! For I, NYLOCKE, DRAGON OF CAUTIONARY PAGE EDITION, will gladly oblige thee!

Originally called TVTome Adventures (full name rarely used), TTA is a Flash series created by Chris "Kirbopher" Niosi, using as inspiration a Self Insertion RP which took place on the TVTome.com forums (now TV.com).

The plot centers around a group of players of an MMORPG titled TOMEnote  and their fight against the D-Bug organisation, a group of hackers seeking a mysterious "Forbidden Power", sometime in the not-too-distant future.

TTA started as a humble amateur sprite-animation series, which gradually improved during its long run. The series is notable for its great length (a total of 73 episodes over 3 seasons and a four-part movie), especially for its medium.

During its somewhat sloppy early stages, the series used a unique combination of sprites and hand-drawn graphics, while the voice acting was mostly done by the writers of the original RP, each one voicing his or her own character.

The author has openly admitted he's had some heavy influence from .hack, Mega Man Battle Network, and ReBoot. References to Anime are also frequent, Dragon Ball Z being the most common—for example, the character of Zetto, fact which is frequently lampshaded by other characters.

After Niosi entered college, he had less time for the series (at first, the fourth 27-episode season was shortened to a handful of OVAs, then scrapped altogether). He continued it with smaller projects, such as the three-part Super Freakin' Parody Rangers, which features Expys of the characters Zetto and Ruri.

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Tome_remake_4705.png
The remake

On 11/11/11, a Continuity Reboot of TTA known as TOME: Terrain of Magical Expertise was released, this time with the internet equivalent of an All-Star Cast (including LittleKuriboh, ShadyVox, D-Mac Double, and Jon St. John, among others), an original soundtrack composed by Kajmaster Kajet (best known as the creator of the OVER 9000! meme) and The Living Tombstone, and completely original animation mostly done by Chris Niosi himself.

The remake features a unique style of animation reminiscent of video games such as Mega Man Battle Network and The World Ends with You, and it looks just that cool. The series spans Fifteen episodes (plus the special prequel episode "/File:Zero"), seven shorts, and an April Fool's Special, the first ten of which are considered to be the show's first season (along with the shorts, which are actually notably important to the plot). The latter five episodes (and the prequel episode) are considered to be its second season (due to the fact that they were funded separately via a successful campaign on GoFundMe), with Episode 15 being considered the show's Grand Finale.

For most of its lifespan, TOME had an somewhat interesting upload cycle, due to the fact that it continued for over three years uninterruped (resulting in an even longer run than its predecessor, which only lasted about two and a half years before its cancellation). Although the remake's first four episodes were funded by Newgrounds (and were at first exclusive to it), the series stopped posting new episodes to Newgrounds after Episode Nine and eventually expanded onto YouTube (although the YouTube uploads were taken down for a time before being re-uploaded in two parts via Channel Frederator). The series eventually received its own website (which used embeds of versions of the episodes uploaded to Blip) before finally finding a permanent home on YouTube, where Chris Niosi uploaded complete versions of all sixteen episodes, seven shorts, and the April Fool's Special to his channel (along with special commentary videos previously only available on Soundcloud, blooper reels, and interesting Fact Bubble Specials inspired by Avatar: The Last Airbender with trivia about the show found nowhere else), which replaced the old Blip uploads on the official website.

A Kickstarter for a Video Game adaptation (a game about a game!), set in its own universe, has begun, featuring new versions of the characters and a "White-Hat Hacker" Player Character, a Canon Foreigner to the previous two web series. The project was funded 48 hours after the campaign's launch. Tropes about said game can be found under the Video Game tab.

On November 11, 2017, in honor of the 6-year anniversary of the TOME series, the YouTube channel SiIvaGunner uploaded mashups featuring the soundtrack of the web series and upcoming game.

On December 14, 2019, due to the Adobe Flash shutdown at the end of 2020, Niosi uploaded remastered versions of every Tv Tome Adventures episode to a Google Drive, posting a video with a link to said google drive to YouTube. Despite his personal ire for the series, Niosi said that he would rather have every Tv Tome Adventures episode available for future fans rather than allow it to die completely, and initially could not upload the episodes themselves to YouTube due to the interactive element involved with each .swf file. These remastered copies featured modified avatars for the characters' speech boxes, slightly edited dialogue due to it's outdated and somewhat-inappropriate context that's occasionally shown, additional music and with the opening intro added.

Upon the announcement of the RPG adaptation, Niosi confirmed that the webseries would not see any more episodes, and that Season 2 would be the final season. This means that any entries referring to the Grand Finale or to the Season 2 finale are referring to the same thing, and that Episode 15 is not a Series Fauxnale, but the real deal.

In 2023, Niosi began uploading extended movie compilations of the 2011 web series with additional scenes that depict the events of the series from Zetto and Kizuna’s perspective.

On July 15, 2023, Niosi began uploading compilations of the remastered versions of the TV Tome Adventures episodes on his YouTube channel albeit in a higher-quality with the soundtrack being more clear than the original Flash files since they were imported directly from Niosi's asset files, additional captions depicting the episodes and selective episodes compiled into a compilation movie. Due to licensed music being used and due to the outdated dialogue/jokes, Niosi made a viewer's discretion introduction video and added in the videos' description that it's not monetized and it's strictly for archival purposes only. The first video uploaded was from episodes 1 through 9, and the credits were omitted for these compilations. The final episodes were uploaded on August 25, 2023.

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    TTA (the original series) 
  • A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Kagemamoru.
  • All Your Powers Combined: Phaxal
  • Amazing Technicolor Population: While realistic skin colors are available, plenty of humanoid characters sport more wild colors.
  • Another Dimension: The Netking's server world, as well as the dimension containing Motherboard.
  • Anti-Hero: Zetto.
  • Arc Number: 1111
  • Artificial Limbs: Zetto, doubles as a Grappling-Hook Pistol and a Gatling Good Arm Cannon.
  • As Long as It Sounds Foreign/Gratuitous Japanese: Kalasu Angel does not mean "angel of death"note ; many characters use Japanese phrases like "Yoshi!" (Okay!) and "Shine!" (Die!); and don't get me started on "Kageryuken".
  • Author Stand-In: Almost all of the characters are based on "authors"—the creator of the series actually has two avatars, kirbopher15 and Zetto.
  • Awakening the Sleeping Giant: The D-Bug Dragon at the end of Season 2, although the good and bad guys don't so much join forces to stop it as they do just happen to both be trying to kill it for different reasons.
  • Badass Normal: Out of whom many consider to be the five most powerful players in the game, Nailock is the only one without any kind of game-breaking advantage; Alpha, Kirbopher and Gamecrazed were all influenced by powerful viruses, and Zetto is a Netking.
  • Benevolent A.I.: Motherboard.
  • Blood Knight: Many of the characters, but mostly Zetto.
  • Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Nailock. One of the more powerful and skilled fighters in the game, but also a Large Ham who sprinkles his speech with Gratuitous Japanese.
  • Butt-Monkey: Gamecrasher, Nailock and (occasionally) Kirb himself.
  • Captured Super-Entity
  • Casting Gag: In episode 2, a character who is identified primarily as the sister of another character is introduced. She is the sister of none other than (the Real Life) Kirbopher, Alison Fanelli - also known as Ellen from The Adventures of Pete & Pete.
  • Charged Attack: Rob*'s Asterisk Shield. Hit it enough times and then... "RELEASE!!!"
  • Chekhov's Gunman: Darkeyesofanubis, the villain of Season 4 makes a cameo appearance in Season 3, though Season 4's cancellation negates the effects of this.
  • Contrived Coincidence: The fact that Alpha's user ID unlocked the Forbidden Power and that one of his friends would wind up with the D-Bug attached to his model too.
  • Covered in Gunge: Splat and Bling Bling's attacks are slime based.
  • Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Nailock. He's off-the-wall, zany and doesn't seem all there at times, but he also defeated one of the main villains in record time, defeated the strongest of a group of the strongest players in the game, and is one of the only people to defeat Zetto.
  • Darker and Edgier: TTA Season 4 would have been this if made. The Big Bad, Darkeyesofanubis, would have actually kidnapped people in real life and forced them to play TOME, the game itself would have come crashing apart, and the series would've undergone a massive Tone Shift in general. More information can be found on Niosi's DeviantArt page.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Gamecrazed
  • Deadly Upgrade: The Forbidden Power makes Alpha near-invincible, but he's slowly losing control of it.
  • Deal with the Devil: Alpha took the offer of the virus frags out of a desire to become stronger.
  • The Ditz: Nailock Kotetsu Ryu
  • Dungeon Bypass: The Motherboard404 arc.
  • Energy Absorption: The items created by Rob*, as well as Zetto's arm.
  • Evil Plan Several:
    • When first facing Kirbopher 15 in his transformed state, EXE knew he had the D-Bug virus within him, and planned to make it his own. He convinced the Webmaster to make an '1111' item so Kirb could trigger the state, and would only do so if confronting his accomplice Zetto, by letting the heroes go covert at the D-Bug Org. II base while keeping the other Netkings ignorant. Absorbing too much viruses while transformed, Kirb unleashes the D-bug, that seeks to fight the strongest fighter in TOME, and eventually makes its way to EXE's room, which had a stash of 10 virus fragments, and manages to control the dragon by fusing it to the Super Computer.
  • Evil Twin: The "Shadow Users" are (mostly) nonsentient copies of every user of the system.
  • Expy: Zetto is one of Vegeta. He even has his hairstyle!
  • The Faceless: Voltarius in late season 2 (The Voice beforehand), and an unnamed season 3 villain...though Anidoug was the villain of Season 3.
  • Facial Markings: Alpha, as well as various other characters.
  • Fan Boy: Zetto is a Dragon Ball Z fanboy, and has an avatar and personality resembling Vegeta. This tends to annoy the other characters, even though plenty of them seem to like the show as well.
  • Filler Villain: The Flux Gang in the movie. Not quite. Flux himself was to make a reappearance in season 4 in a similar body to that of Neomutant's.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: Stated by the man who created the battle system to be "the game's top three elements".
  • Five-Man Band Concert: The album cover art for the soundtrack has Flamegirl on the electric bass, Nylocke on guitar, Gamecrazed on the keyboard, Kirbopher on drums, and Alpha as the singer. The Season 2 soundtrack re-iterates this theme, but with the Netkings, with Kindarspirit as the singer, Execk on bass, Rubirules on guitar, Webmaster as a DJ, and Bitshrum on drums. To allude to the second season's more techno-dubstep style (courtesy of The Living Tombstone), the Netking band uses electronic instruments.
  • Fusion Dance: (Alpha+Zetto = Alphazet (Composite), Alpha+Kagemamoru = Virus-fused Alpha (Power Booster))
  • He Who Must Not Be Seen: Voltarius, who is really Zetto.
  • Heroic Sacrifice: Season 4 was to have one of the Anubis Guild's members, Fauna, pull a Heel–Face Turn and sacrifice herself by overclocking her powers to destroy the barrier surrounding the stronghold so that the final assault could begin.
  • Hidden Agenda Villain: Voltarius, Phaxal
  • Humble Beginnings: Compare the first episode of TTA with the first episode of TOME.
  • An Ice Person: There are really too many ice elementals. Niosi likes ice.
    • Specifically, a lot of the the Player Characters in the RP that TTA was based on had ice-related abilities. "Shoot an icicle" seems to be a common low-level attack which a lot of characters use though, even if they are not ice-based.
  • Improbable Age: One of the game's programmers was a teenager. Lampshaded in the series itself.
  • It's Personal: Both viruses.
  • Jack of All Stats: Alpha is of a Neutral class, and has a variety mix of elemental attacks and non-elemental skills.
  • Knight of Cerebus: Zetto
  • Kudzu Plot: A number of dangling questions were left after season 3. Some of the answers can be found by trawling Kirbopher's DeviantArt account.
  • Large Ham: NAILOCK!!!
  • Left Hanging: Niosi ended season 3 fully intending to continue with a fourth season, but eventually abandoned those plans.
  • Long Runner: By the standards of the medium.
  • The Man Behind the Man: Had season 4 come to full fruition, it would've been revealed to be Darkeyesofanubis, who was responsible for the creation of the Kagemamoru Virus, the D-Bug Virus, and generally has masterminded the events of the series as a whole.
    • Also the climax of season 2: While Zetto was indeed Voltarius, the boss-man of the group, EXE was the one really in charge of the D. Bug (original and II) Organization.
  • Minor Injury Overreaction: Players often scream in agony even though they should not be able to feel any pain.
  • Misunderstood Loner with a Heart of Gold: Giga
  • MMORPG: TOME
  • Motive Decay (Tormentros goes from mercenary to self-proclaimed "Angel of Death", though this is largely due to a Psycho Serum overdose)
  • Noob: (Quite a bit of characters, but the most blatant ones are Raccoon and Sojojo. Their voices are even modeled after DBZ Dragon Villains Cell Junior and Kid Buu to drive home how childish they are.
  • Nostalgia Level: The Donkey Kong minigame in one episode, created by a character who is a Mario fanboy.
  • Official Couple: Alpha and Flamegirl.
  • One-Winged Angel: Zetto. Twice. Then there's Ravenfreak, Racoon, Sojojo and Simdragon. All have been subject to the Virus Frags at one point or another, and each has taken on a different form when they utilized one.
  • The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: (Zetto) and Tormentros/Kalasu Angel
  • Pastiche: The series is a pastiche of .hack and MegaMan.EXE.
  • Powers as Programs: Literally—Alpha even receives an antivirus which manifests as a "Vaccine Cannon" attack.
  • Psycho Serum: The virus frags, which grant users with great power, at the likely cost of their sanity, though.
  • Retired Badass: PaperAceChase and the other members of the "Ranks of Sanctuary"
  • The Rival: Zetto, to Alpha.
  • Sealed Evil in a Can: Kagemamoru in the Sanctuary Region and the D-Bug in Kirbopher.
  • Storming the Castle: Heroic and villainous uses.
  • Superpowered Evil Side: Alpha and Kirbopher.
  • Sword Beam: Kirbopher15 can fire icicles, tornadoes and lightning from his sword.
  • Transformation Trinket: Kirbopher15 goes superpowered anytime he cuts '1111'. The first time he did it when his EXP reached that number, and then used it again when facing Webmaster and his Deletion Beam (a collection of 1s and 0s), which he would later use to help Alpha beat Kagemamoru. In the second season, Webmaster gave Kirb a '1111' item that he could use in a pinch, but one time only. Kirb does so, but awakens the D-bug virus fully in the process.
  • Tournament Arc: The Z Tournament, as well as the X-Games.
  • Transformation Sequence: Zetto and Raccoon had these.
  • Welcome Episode: The first episode shows Alpha's first log-in, along with him meeting the other main characters. Oddly, Flamegirl first logged in that same day (August 23, 2020), but she's depicted as a veteran of TOME.
  • Your Mind Makes It Real: The viruses.

    TOME (The Remake) 
  • Action Girl: Flamegirl
    • Kizuna counts as well, considering she's the leader- or, rather, the administrator- of the hackers.
  • Actor Allusion: In episode 4, Rockoon, in exasperation after having been constantly misidentified as a rodent, exclaims "Do I look like a lab rat?" His voice actor, Deven Mack Jr., played the character of Lab Rat in Grossology. In addition, while taunting Nylocke's dramatic tone, Mack performs a voice similar to the one he uses to perform DotDotDot, complete with kinetic typography.
  • Adaptation Name Change: Most of the cast, though the changes are usually similar to their original names.
  • Adaptational Heroism: Execk, by virtue of his villainous characteristics being transferred to Rubirules. Zetto is also much more sympathetic in the reboot, being transformed from a power-obsessed Anti-Hero to a Hero Antagonist with a close personal relationship to the main characters (largely due to his character being fused with Kirbopher).
  • Adaptational Villainy: Neomutant and Rubirules, who were an unrelated Anti-Villain and Big Good respectively in the original series, are now The Dragon and The Man Behind the Man. Neomutant in particular actually seemed to care about Flamegirl in the original, eventually deciding I Want My Beloved to Be Happy, but in this version he's a Manipulative Bastard Dragon with an Agenda who thinks more along the lines of a Yandere.
  • Adapted Out: Anidoug, Torben, Phaxal, Gamecrasher, the Ranks of Sanctuary (except for ChaseAce), the human player behind Gamecrazed, Will, Sephie, Ohma and any characters that would have been introduced in Season 4 of TTA are absent from TOME.
    • Canon Immigrant: On that same note, Bishipp is an entirely new character with no TTA counterpart. Armoora seems to be the TOME equivalent of Ichinar, but this is later subverted when it's revealed that "Armoora" is a generic model used by multiple admins, making her this.
    • Anidoug, Phaxal, and Torben's TOME counterpart Torchure make cameo appearances in the 2023 compilation movies.
  • All There in the Manual: Information about the game of TOME itself is provided in this bonus video. There's also a lot of useful information contained on Niosi's DeviantArt page and in the Fact Bubble Specials.
  • Alliterative Title: Some episodes, like "Mansion Midnight", "Minigame Madness", and "Dragon Drama".
  • Angrish: Granda's yelling in Episode 4.
  • Animesque
  • Anti-Villain: Demonking. He just wants the money to go back to school, okay? Also, ultimately, Kizuna.
  • April Fools' Day: Short 00: "The Tome Adventure". Actually a cartoon made In-Universe by Rockoon which contains many shout-outs to the original incarnation of TTA, including bringing back the voice actors for Alpha, Gamecrazed, and Nailock to parody their old characters.
  • Arch-Enemy: The third TOME Short (Nylocke's Day Off) invokes this trope when it introduces Nylocke's Villainous Rival, the Sinister Serpentine!
  • Art Shift: TOME uses a different art style for every situation.
    • The "character sprites" are used for walking through the landscape of TOME, and sometimes for fight scenes
    • TOME switches to using "talking avatars" when characters are speaking.
    • The art style switches to paper, and pencil sketches, during Flashbacks, or when a character is role playing.
  • As Long as It Sounds Foreign/Gratuitous Japanese: Averted compared to the original. In particular "Nailock Kotetsu Ryu" became "Nylocke, Dragon of the Cold Steel", trading his Fanboy Japanese for Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe.
  • Battle Couple: Alpha and Flamegirl, especially in the Gemini tournament.
  • Benevolent A.I.: SOFDTI. She is also a rare example of a benevolent Master Computer.
  • Berserk Button: Rockoon is NOT a rodent, ok? Heck, even ask him and he'll go in a long-winded rant about how a raccoon is more closely related to a bear than a rodent, if you could actually catch up to what he's saying at least.invoked
  • Big Bad: D-Buggers.org. Or so it seems. In fact, the hackers are just trying to stop the true big bad- The Forbidden Power.
    • Played straight, however, with Rubirules, the true mastermind of D-Buggers.org. Rubirules, however, is more of a Greater-Scope Villain than a true big bad, as he only manipulated Zetto and Kizuna and wasn't an active force until the Grand Finale.
  • The Big Damn Kiss: Alpha gives one to Flamey at the end of Season 2 to neutralize the Antivirus.
  • Big Good: SOFDTI. She's the core of the game and is the good counterpart to the Forbidden Power's evil.
    • The Netkings as a whole except for Rubirules count as this too, especially Webmaster.
    • To a lesser extent, Nylocke is said by Niosi to represent everything good and heroic in the show. Plus he started the quest to defeat the hackers.
  • Bittersweet Ending: Alpha and the gang defeat Rubirules, the Virus and the Antivirus are finally destroyed, and the group even gets the chance to meet up in real life. However, due to Rubirules's actions, the Government may have to shut down TOME to prevent an incident like what had happened from ever occurring again, and due to their differing opinions on SOFDTI, Zetto and Kizuna's relationship is also heavily fractured. In addition, Gamecrazed, being an artificial intelligence, can never truly join their friends in the real world (Although Word of God confirms that Zetto/Kirbopher filmed the rest of the gang's real-life encounter to show it to them).
  • Bragging Theme Tune: One between Alpha and Kirbopher in TOME's "Battle On!"
  • Breather Episode: "Fraggedquest", a light-hearted filler romp about The Power of Friendship, with Rockoon as the antagonist, comes in between two darker episodes of the series, "Highest Form of Flattery" and "Awaken the Beast".
  • Break-Up/Make-Up Scenario: This was an ongoing plot between Alpha, Kirbopher and Flamegirl. It started when they had an argument in Awaken the Beast, and it continued when they were shown to be avoiding each other until Season 1's conclusion, after which they appear to be on good terms again.
  • Butt-Monkey:
    • Kirbopher. Who's very often the subject of the group's jokes, because he's easily provoked, often has an attitude/ overreacts to things, and because his friends like to tease him about his friendly rivalry with Alpha. Special mention goes to Nylocke, for while he calls his friends "Sir" or "Lady" in addition to their name, he dubs Kirb the unique title of "Squire", and even gets his name wrong in the first few episodes.
    • Skeight to Rockoon, who being agitated by his imitations of himself, and by the "funny" way Skeight talks makes constant jokes at Skeight's expense.
  • Call-Back: The opening scene from "Awaken the Beast" is one to the beginning of the first episode.
    • Parodied with the opening to Episode 11, which features an opening scene similar to the first episode... using a Decoy Protagonist that has no bearing on the rest of the plot at all.
    • The first and last credits themes contain these lyrics:
    Battle On!: Though I may have a skeleton or two tucked away in the dark...
    Heroes Don't Ask Questions: My skeletons have escaped my closet, and they're out to let you know...
  • Calling Your Attacks: (Lampshaded by Alpha in episode 1) "About how you find screaming at the top of your lungs to be an effective opening attack."
    • Lampshaded again in Episode 5 and justified (In Kirb's opinion) as giving the attack extra "oomph".
  • Catchphrase Interruptus: Nylocke's Character Catchphrase is usually interrupted by events about Once an Episode, though since it's a Mad Libs Catch Phrase, he'll just insert the nature of the interruption into it instead.
  • Character Blog: The character Kirbopher has an official tumblr Ask him anything!
  • Cluster Bleep-Bomb: Doubling, does this. His sister, Splat, prefers the Precision F Strike version.
  • Color-Coded Characters: For the cast silhouettes in the credits for Season 1, Alpha is red, Kirbopher is blue, Nylocke is green, Gamecrazed is purple, and Flamegirl is orange. Starting in Season 2, their new character models are predominately the colors associated with them.
  • Combat Pragmatist: Gamecrazed.
  • Combined Energy Attack: What ultimately causes Demon!Rockoon to kick the bucket in episode 4.
  • Composite Character: A lot of characters and character arcs have been combined into single characters instead of TTA's large cast, although often it involves a new Plot Twist. One of the most significant differences between TTA and TOME is that Kirbopher and Zetto are now a single human being using different accounts. In addition, Gamecrazed is now the avatar of the AI core of the game, and Rubirules has had all of the original EXE's villainous characters transferred over to him.
  • Cooldown Hug: Flamegirl gives Alpha one to stop him from using the Forbidden Power to kill Ravenfreak.
  • Continuity Reboot: TOME, which starts the story over from the beginning.
  • Contrived Coincidence: The likelihood that the person who discovered the Forbidden Power would wind up being the eventual boyfriend of Neomutant's intended victim is very low, and it's even less likely that the random player that wound up with the character model Rubirules hid the Dragon Bug head inside (per Word of God) would wind up being their mutual friend. The chances that SOFDTI's alter-ego and Zetto's alter-ego would also end up being part of this friend group are near zero - but surprisingly, it works.
  • Corrupt Corporate Executive: Surprisingly not Execk, who is literally the textbook definition of a Corporate Executive. Instead, it's Rubirules, who wishes to use SOFTDI as the foundation for a new technological age. Not only does this bring up major ethical questions about the morality of stripping down a sentient being that can feel real sensations (such as pain), Rubirules also uses an actual human being as the crux of an antivirus program (who may be unconscious or even brain dead thanks to what he did to her). To be fair, Rubirules wasn't fully aware of what had happened to Flamegirl (thanks to Neomutant throwing an "If I Can't Have You…"-motivated tantrum), but then again, once he finds out what's going on, he basically says that he doesn't care.
  • The Corruption : Every aspect of the Forbidden Power.
  • Couch Gag: Most of the early episodes begin with a view of the Fantasy World Map of TOME, before zooming into a specific region as one of our Five-Man Band logs in and arrives there.
    • Though "Fraggedquest" opens as usual, we don't actually see Gamecrazed logging in; he's already there when the episode begins. (Note that we don't see him logging out in "Mansion Midnight", either.) This turned out to be foreshadowing for when Gamecrazed was revealed to be SOFDTI in the Grand Finale.
  • Covered in Gunge: Splat and Doubling's attacks are slime based.
  • Curb-Stomp Battle:
    • Nylocke, in episode 4 of the reboot, gets utterly wasted by a vengeful Granda. Entirely Played for Laughs.
    • Alpha inflicts them on everyone in his path when he uses the Forbidden Power.
      • Demon!Alpha himself receives one from Zetto to end one of his rampages.
  • Deal with the Devil: Alpha becomes a part of this only through his naivete. It comes back to bite him in a huge way in episode 5.
    • Inverted in the final episode, where Alpha convinces the Forbidden Power to make a deal with HIM for the chance not to die as a weakling. This leads to the creation of Virus Fusion Alpha.
  • Decomposite Character: Ichinar, the admin for Mecha Valley in the original, has been retooled into Armoora. However, rather than Armoora being a simple Gender Flip of Ichinar, her character model is used by multiple moderators.
    • Because Kirbopher and Zetto have been merged into one person using multiple accounts (see Composite Character above), a lot of characteristics that could only work when they were separate people have been transferred to other characters. For example, in the original TTA, it is Kirbopher that tries to help Zetto put the game into perspective during the Tournament, in TOME, Nylocke does this instead. Likewise, Nylocke is also the one to absorb the Forbidden Power out of Zetto during Demon Zetto's battle with Alpha (in TTA, it was Kirbopher who did this). Some characteristics that Zetto had in the original were also transferred to other characters - in TTA, the armored hacker master was Zetto's alter ego Voltarius, while in this version it's Kizuna's alter-ego Tigerlilly. Finally, Zetto's status as The Dragon to the Big Bad has been transferred to Neomutant, since here he is more of an Unwitting Pawn.
  • "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune: The lyrics were written and co-performed by Niosi himself.
  • Early-Bird Cameo: Saturndiva, Whyti, Granda, T-Bones, and Elecscope all appear in Episode 1 during Nylocke's speech.
  • Early-Installment Weirdness: The earliest episodes (01, 02, and Short 01) all have this, to varying extents - Niosi took a lengthy break between episodes 02 and 03 to work on fundamentals, and it shows. Among the major differences:
    • In "You've Gotta Virus", Alpha, Nylocke, Gamecrazed, and Rockoon all sound different from how they would in later appearances, despite all being voiced by the same actors. Rockoon also acts quite differently, because Deven Mack began writing his own character's lines from "Hackers" onward.
    • The "talking avatars" were drawn more roughly; Niosi actually re-edited the episodes upon uploading them to Blip (and later YouTube) to insert the newer, more refined versions.
    • In "You've Gotta Virus", the battlegrid exists only along the vertical plane, has no "floor", and does not appear to have definite boundaries within the playing field; all of this was changed starting in "Mansion Midnight", and the notion that players can still affect the environment from within the battlegrid was also introduced.
    • The original version of "Mansion Midnight" re-introduced Kirbopher, Gamecrazed, and Nylocke by displaying their vital statistics; viewer complaints led Niosi to stop doing this from "Highest Form of Flattery" onward (using it only for initial appearances), and he even removed them from the Blip and YouTube re-uploads.
    • The original version of "You've Gotta Virus" had the show's lead actors also providing additional voices for minor characters. This violates the subsequently established "one character/player per voice actor" rule, so in the reuploaded version he had all of these minor characters re-dubbed to avoid this (often with the actors who would wind up playing them, thus also maintaining continuity).
  • Everyone Can See It: Alpha and Flamegirl; even Flamey seems to be aware that Alpha likes her (though she halfheartedly denies this in the company of her friends), but Alpha appears genuinely uncertain about Flamey's feelings.
  • Extremely Short Timespan: Every episode so far takes place over the course of only one "session" of gameplay each. The shortest so far is "Mansion Midnight", which depicts about one hour (in a fifteen-minute episode).
  • Face Fault: Hilariously lampshaded by Kirbopher and Gamecrazed in Episode 2.
    Gamecrazed: Why did you fall?
    Kirbopher: I DON'T KNOW.
  • Facial Markings:
    • Alpha in the form of an I shape over each eye.
    • Tsuzuku and Shogun have spike-like ones.
    • Zetto seems to also have one in the shape of a Z under his left eye.
  • Female Gaze: Possibly an unintentional result of avoiding or balancing putting too much Male Gaze in the show; we get a lot of focus on Nylocke's crotch bulge to the point that it's become a gag among the audience and TOME's staff. Plus a man in a skirt and belly shirt in Ravenfreak, and a Walking Shirtless Scene with Demon King.
  • Five-Second Foreshadowing: The password that Rubirules types into the terminal to see SOFTDI in the final episode spells out "Gamecrazed," which foreshadows her true nature moments before the big reveal. It also suggests that SOFDTI used the password as the inspiration for her character's name while it also working as a nod to the viewers who correctly guessed that SOFDTI and GC were one and the same.
  • Floating Continent: TOME itself, against a backdrop of the (real) Fantasy World Map.
  • Foreshadowing: TOME displays the "Forbidden Power"'s ability to physically harm players from episode 1.
    • The Gemini Tournament, formally introduced in "Awaken the Beast", is first foreshadowed several episodes prior in "Mansion Midnight". Where Asterob says, the Mansion was being used to test a tournament feature for "a bigger event coming up". In "Fraggedquest" players are also seen using the Mansion for tournaments.
    • Kirb's line of "Don't tell me how to play my game!" in the first episode hints at him being a former Netking.
    • Each of the Netkings' matches during the Challenge of the Netkings defines their character, and Rubirules is no exception, as it hints at him being the true mastermind behind the events of the series. He first appears at the end of Episode 11 as Zetto simply to elicit a reaction of out the heroes, is easily the most egotistical of the Netkings (though Bitshrum is a close second), incredibly prideful in his work, and hypocritically believes that nothing in TOME has any intrinsic value to the players, except what he himself claims as being his own work. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that he is willing to deceive and manipulate his coworkers and friends in order to get an uncorrupted version of SOFTDI's core so he can start a new age of technological achievement, and get rich and famous off of the success.
      • Flamegirl recalls one of the Netkings paying a visit to her high school once when the heroes meet them in person, though she doesn't know who specifically. It turns out to have been Rubirules, and Neomutant (previously established to be Stephanie's classmate) later gloats that he impressed the Netking with his programming skills and was taken on as his protege and partner-in-crime.
  • Friendless Background: Alpha, most definitely, but there are also signs that this is true of Kirbopher, Gamecrazed, and Nylocke as well. Even Flamegirl, when she mentions her "friends", is usually talking about other players of TOME. This may be the reason that The Power of Friendship is such a key theme of the series.
  • The Friends Who Never Hang: For the most part, this trope is averted. Every possible combination of two out of the Five-Man Band have one-on-one interactions at some point during the series... except for Kirb and Flamey, who are well-established as With Friends Like These..., as well as the following trope.
  • Friend Versus Lover: The crux for the Break-Up/Make-Up Scenario described above. Kirbopher says Flamegirl is Alpha's Fangirl and Flamegirl argues that Kirbopher won't leave Alpha alone, and that he "jumps on his balls every time he logs on". In actuality though the reason they argue constantly is because they're both jealous of the other for having Alpha's attention. Nylocke even implies this jokingly.
    • Zetto faces this predicament between Kizuna and Gamecrazed in a much darker way at the end of the Grand Finale. When Kizuna tries to kill SOFDTI because she doesn't want Zetto to get hurt again, Zetto is forced to shoot her in the back to save his friend (as SOFDTI and Gamecrazed are revealed to be one and the same at this point). Luckily, it's just a video game (meaning Kizuna is still perfectly fine in real life), giving her and Zetto a chance to reconcile in the future.
  • Four-Temperament Ensemble: Nylocke is Sanguine, Kirbopher is Choleric, Flamegirl is Phlegmatic, and Gamecrazed is Melancholic. Alpha is Supine, a very rare type indeed for a protagonist.
  • Freeze-Frame Bonus: In episode 08 if you pause at just the right time you can see a sprite of Demonking and his partner in the tier list for the quarter finals, foreshadowing his appearance toward the end of the episode. Several cameos appear in the tier list as well such as Red Meat, and Mace from Super Freakin' Parody Rangers. Episode 10 also has a whole bunch when The Forbidden Power possesses Zetto and the fight that follows.
  • George Lucas Altered Version: All existing episodes of TOME were uploaded to Blip at the end of July, 2013, converted from .swf format so that they could be shown in HD. However, the earliest episodes ("You've Gotta Virus", "Hackers", and "Mansion Midnight") also had the original talking avatars re-animated to match the newer versions, and certain lines were re-recorded to maintain continuity with later episodes. At some point, the live-action scenes from Episode 15 and AvZ were removed. The removal from AvZ was done with minimal editing, using the YouTube editing tool, resulting in the video suddenly ending.
    • In the 2023 Compilation Movie, TOME: 2 Lives, the scene in episode 5 where Zetto encounters a pair of players while hunting down the virus possessed Alpha has been altered, replacing the players with expys of Anidoug and Phaxal from the original TTA series.
  • Green Hill Zone: One of the three regions of TOME, ;Sanctuary. Because battles aren't allowed there (it's exclusively dedicated to social networking), it's been very scarce so far, appearing for the first time in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it cameo in "Dragon Drama".
  • Ham-to-Ham Combat: Episode 12, Nylocke vs. Rubirules.
  • Hub City: The region of ;Mechcity, first appearing in "Highest Form of Flattery". It places greater emphasis on social networking than ;Lavendera, and is a far more visually interesting and diverse setting.
  • I Have Many Names: NNNYLOCKE!! Dragon of constantly increasing titles!
  • In-Series Nickname: Of the five main characters, four are often referred to by derivatives of their usernames: Kirbopher is "Kirb", Gamecrazed is "GC", Nylocke is "Nye", and Flamegirl is "Flamey" to most, aside from Saturndiva, who calls her "Flames".
    • Nylocke addresses his friends as "Sir" or "Lady", except for Kirbopher, whom he always calls "Squire".
  • Instrumental Theme Tune: Not normally, but Episode 6 featured for the ending an orchestral version of "Battle On!"
  • Ironic Echo: A frequently-used device:
    • "Well, it's about time!" Used by Kirbopher, voiced by himself, in the episode just before he jumps Alpha, and used by Zetto, also voiced by Chris Niosi, in his debut in Episode 5. Bonus points that its used for both their respective Establishing Character Moment.
    • "Quit screwing around and show me the real deal!" Used by Kirbopher in his fight with Demon Alpha, and used by Zetto in his fight with regular Alpha. This later serves to clue Alpha in on The Reveal near the second season's finale.
    • "I will help you like no one else possibly could", first said by the Forbidden Power in the first episode and later said by Alpha to the Forbidden Power when he convinces it to help him.
    • Doubling's line to Rockoon in the "Hackers" short ("I don't like this job, I don't like TOME, I don't like you") is echoed by Rockoon to Skeight in "Rockoon's Modern Strife" (paraphrased as "I didn't need him, I don't need friends, I don't need you"), maintaining the triplicate and even using the same editing and sound effects. It turns out that Skeight is really Doubling in disguise, meaning that Rockoon is effectively throwing his words back in his face - though without knowing it.
      • An action-based example in that throughout the series there's always a scene which involves Alpha in some form jumping over a character's head. Alpha jumps over Kirb, Demon Alpha jumps over Zetto, and Rubirules (as Alpha) jumps over Alpha himself.
  • Irony:
    • Part of Rubirules' plan was to end TOME. After the events of the finale, it is entirely possible that this will happen, although not for the reasons he hoped for.
    • In episode 4, Nylocke proclaims that TOME is his "birthplace" and he can't cross into the real world to meet his friends in-person. While Nylocke is actually from England and is merely The Roleplayer, this turns out to be precisely the reason why Gamecrazed can't make the journey either.
  • Item Get!: Flamegirl, and Kirbopher have one of these moments when finding their respective pieces of the shadowguard idol, complete with fanfare, an item glow while they hold it to the audience, and a "FRAGMENT GET" prompt for their effort. Subverted with Gamecrazed however. When he gets his piece we only see him reach for it.
    • Part of the charm of it is that the original version of Kirbopher's character in TTA is based on Sword Kirby, who's an Expy of Link. For TTA fans it can be loosely considered a Mythology Gag.
  • Kissing Discretion Shot: A scene in episode 7 suggests that Alpha and Flamegirl kiss, but it fades to white, and we don't see it happen.
  • Large Ham: NYLOCKE! Dragon of loud exclamations!
  • Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The end of episode 2...
    Nylocke: NYLOCKE! Dragon of the Rolling Credits!
  • Leitmotif: A number of characters and settings have one, unsurprising given the RPG Elements of the game.
  • Let's Duet: Judging by the animation, Starlight Speedway, the song that plays in the credits of episode 7, appears to be a duet between Alpha and Flamegirl, although they got a different person to sing for Flamegirl. The lyrics don't particularly relate to TOME due to being a version of Starlight Speedway, a song originally was featured on the creator's first ever EP, specifically created for TOME. The TOME version is no longer available outside of the animation since the creator removed it from Bandcamp along with the EP featuring the original Starlight Speedway because of the EP's Early-Installment Weirdness.
  • Limited Animation: When walking around and talking, the characters are typically rendered as "sprites," or have character portraits.
  • Meaningful Background Event: In episode 3, a cat can be seen passing by Flamegirl and Ravenfreak. Later on it's revealed that this cat is actually Tigerlilly, the leader of D-Buggers
  • Meaningful Name: D-Buggers.org is looking for a virus in TOME's code, and was founded by Netking Software's Bug Testers.
  • Medium Blending:
    • The closing moments of the final episode depict the four human members of the Five-Man Band in live-action, meeting in person for the first time. Kirb is played by his voice actor and Real Life inspiration Chris Niosi, Nye is played by his voice actor Martin Billany, Flamey is played by Emily Nicolas (a friend of Martin's), and Alpha is played by his Real Life inspiration Mike Luckas.
    • The A2Z movie has a moment in live-action where Zeke the real-life player behind Kirb and Zetto, is contacted by Webmaster over a webcall, expressing his remorse over the events of the finale, which eventually leads to him battling Alpha again in a friendly fight.
  • Mercy Kill: Flamegirl does this to Neomutant, forcing him to log out, so that Alpha's virus powers don't hurt him in real life.
  • MMORPG: TOME is the in-universe game that the characters are playing.
  • Mythology Gag:
    • Rockoon briefly refers to Doubling as "Blingbling" (his name in the original series) to which he responds "That's a dumb name."
    • He also says this Unusual Euphemism to Skeight: "Who in the Purple Caves are you?" Bonus points that they're having this conversation in ;Lavendera (the reboot's version of the Purple Cave region).
    • Rockoon calling himself Raccoon in the Gemini Tournament. Bonus points for actually looking like the TTA character as well.
    • The Arc Numbers 15 and 1111, both extremely significant in the original story, make cameo appearances here and there in the reboot. The episode count goes up to 15 (although there are actually sixteen episodes because one of them is "Episode 0"), and the time 11:11 is seen fairly frequently throughout the series when major events happen.
    • Although both Execk and Zetto are hit with Adaptational Heroism in the reboot, Word of God confirms that they have a relationship similar to father and son, referencing their mutual affiliation with the hackers in the original. It's also a case of Actor Allusion, as Zetto and EXE were voiced by Chris Niosi and his father in the original.
    • During Bitshrum's fight with Kirbopher, he at one point tells Kirb to "Open the Box". In TTA, "OPEN THE BOX!" was one of his attack lines. He used it a lot.
  • No Indoor Voice: Nylocke is very prone to shouting, especially his Mad Libs Catchphrase.
  • Non Sequitur, *Thud*: Nylocke, just after the Curb-Stomp Battle he had just been on the end of...
    Nylocke: I...I am Nylocke...Horrendously-violated dragon...With split ends. (thud)
  • Not Named In Closing Credits: Deven Mack, Jr., though he is listed as part of the crew for the episode "Awaken the Beast", is not credited as part of the cast for his appearance as Rockoon in The Tag.
    • In an attempt to help preserve the shocking twist of The Reveal in "The Warring Demons", Chris Niosi is up until that episode credited under a pseudonym - Tony A. Campbell - as the voice of Zetto. The same happened with Casey Mongillo in Episode 0, who was credited as "Ryan Gillmoon" to preserve the character reveal of Gamecrazed and SOFDTI being the same character in the Grand Finale.
  • Official Couple: Alpha and Flamegirl.
  • Oh, Crap!: Demon Alpha, when the forbidden power is deflected by Zetto, which causes him to lose the battle. Alpha has another one of these, in his regular form, when Zetto absorbs the forbidden power and it corrupts HIM.
  • On the Next: Added to the YouTube uploads of the second part of each proper episode, these feature yet another version of the "Battle On" theme as background music, with the primary character of the coming episode doing the narration (Kirb narrates the "Mansion Midnight" teaser, Flamey narrates for "Highest Form of Flattery", etc). This practice stops in Season 2, because the subsequent episode hasn't already been animated.
  • One-Shot Character: Most of the villains are these, except for Rockoon who loves his hacking job, Demonking who is redeemed by Nylocke and appears again in a short later, another nameless character that appears in both "Awaken The Beast", and "Dragon Drama", and of course The Big Bad, D-Buggers.org, who leads the hackers.
  • One-Winged Angel: Rockoon in the reboot has the dubious honor of being the first antagonist to do this, thanks to his hacking of The Shadow Guard Beast.
    • Both Alpha and Rubirules do this in "Truth. Tears. Ambition." with Kajet and the anti-virus respectively. Strangely enough, Alpha transforms first.
  • O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Nylocke has such a breakdown in episode 6, though in private to Gamecrazed. He does it again twice more, once while facing Zetto in the Gemini Tournament and once at the very end of the series, where he thanks the Netkings for creating TOME.
    • Rockoon also gets one of these when he curses at skeight in episode 13
  • Police Are Useless: Minigame Madness reveals The moderators are unwilling to do anything to stop Alpha's virus powers hurting other players, as they don't think it's a "REAL Problem". That probably means they don't do anything about players hacking the game either. They will ban the occasional scammer though, but even that is ineffective as said scammer is known to have made multiple accounts.
    • Jusified. Rubirules was deliberately feeding the mods false information to keep them off of Zetto and Kizuna's backs.
  • The Power of Friendship: A central theme of the series.
  • Production Throwback: One of Nick Oleksiak's songs in the series is "A Battle of the Grandest Proportions," which is a remix of his previous composition "A Battle of Grand Proportions" (for SiIvaGunner, one of the channel's few original compositions not tied to the SGFR branch) that replaces all of the non-unique melodies with original segments.
  • Pyrrhic Victory: Nylocke lets Zetto win the gemini tournament's final match to teach him that winning isn't everything. This was after he pretty much absorbed all of Zetto's Ki energy, and was in a position to finish him off with his own Ki, making Zetto's win feel undeserved.
  • Rearrange the Song: Several examples.
    • The theme song has been rearranged twice: first the instrumental chiptune version at the end of "Minigame Madness" (later used for the end credits added to most other shorts on Blip), and then an orchestral version at the end of "Dragon Drama".
    • The leitmotif introduced for Nylocke in the first episode was re-arranged and became his theme song.
      • His leitmotif was also given a chiptune remix which can be heard in the end credits added to the Blip upload of "Nylocke's Day Off".
    • The frequently-heard tune described by Niosi as Flamegirl's Theme was given the Softer and Slower Cover treatment by TheLivingTombstone, as part of the prelude to Alpha and Flamey's Relationship Upgrade.
    • "Survive The Drama", the tune that plays as Zetto fights Demon Alpha in Mechcity, was rearranged with "THE VIRUS", the theme of the Forbidden Power, and became "Surive tHE VIRUS", the theme of Demon Zetto.
  • The Reveal: Episode 0. The Forbidden Power was a prototype boss that absorbed the negative emotions that SOFDTI couldn't handle, causing it to experience nothing but negative emotion (pain, fear, suffering, etc.). Both SOFDTI and the Forbidden Power were locked away in TOME, only for the power to finally find Alpha and start the events of the series.
  • Red Herring: Execk. He's a creepy three-eyed Cyborg executive in black and grey clothing who handles the business side of TOME, and treated the Challenge of the Netkings as an obligation, while the others all had fun with their matches. Furthermore, during Episode 00, he rarely joined in or weighed in on the discussions regarding SOFTDI with the other Netkings. Combined with the fact that his TTA counterpart, EXE, was evil in the original, when the reveal came that there was somebody even higher up in D-Buggers than Kizuna, he was the perfect detractor away from the REAL villain - Rubirules, who was secretly manipulating the hackers from behind the scenes ever since the very beginning. The symbol Rubirules uses to communicate with Zetto and Kizuna even resembles Execk's third eye.
  • Red Oni, Blue Oni: Kirb's the red; Alpha's the blue (however, they are identified by the opposite colours in-game).
  • Rewatch Bonus: All of Gamecrazed's scenes become this on rewatch with the knowledge that they're SOFDTI's shadow.
  • Rhymes on a Dime: The Quest Giver combines this speech pattern with Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe.
  • Sensitive Guy And Manly Guy: Kirbopher is Manly Man to Archy's Sensitive Guy. At the beginning of the series, it can be argued he also has this dynamic with Alpha.
  • Shipper on Deck: Nylocke, Whyti, and Saturndiva for Alpha x Flamegirl.
  • Shout-Out:
    • The shadow guard idol was drawn to look like the silver monkey in Legends of the Hidden Temple. The head attaches to the other pieces with a spike, and despite it's simple configuration the team spends longer than needed assembling it.
      • Said idol also looks very similar to Kagetou from TTA, making its appearance a Mythology Gag.
    • The scene in episode 4, where Rockoon mocks Nylocke for always being in character, was a reference to DOTDOTDOT, narrated by Deven Mack Jr. (voice of Rockoon) and animated by Mick Lauer (voice of the quest giver).
    • Nylocke's "Hoo!, ha!, parry!, dodge!, spin!, thrust!" in episode 5 is this to an episode of Looney Tunes called "Robin Hood Daffy".
      • Rockoon can be a shout out to Looney Tunes himself sometimes.
    • Also in episode 5, Nylocke describes the Gemini tournament as "a showcase of bonds beyond time and space!". LittleKuriboh and ShadyVox played Yugi and Jaden in Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged: Bonds Beyond Time.
    • The Minigames in Minigame Madness are shout outs to real phone apps. Specifically, Bejewled, Fruit Ninja, and Angry Birds.
    • Nylocke's Wall Jump in episode 6 is in reference to the Mega Man X series.
      • Nylocke and Kirbopher's "damaged animations" for when they get hit by an attack are both based on the hurt animations from Mega Man Zero and Mega Man X, respectively.
    • During Nylocke's fight with Rubirules, he says that while his body may be fabricated, his heart and soul are real, referencing the ending of Mega Man Zero 3.
    • This gem in episode 7
    Kirb::"Look Kid!? Have you ever heard of the word Espionage?"
    Archy::"What? you mean like a Chameleon?"
    • An unintentional one (as far as Niosi says), but in the beginning of episode 11, we are introduced to two one-shot characters named Justin and Bailey.
    • Zetto himself is an Affectionate Parody of Vegeta and shonen anime characters in general, as evidenced by his "impossibly designed hairstyle", ability to shoot ki attacks from his arm, and smug attitude. In several flashbacks, he's shown with hair that's in a style even closer to Vegeta's, bangs aside. The armor he wears in season 1 is loosely based on the default Saiyan Battle Armor that Vegeta wore at the beginning of Dragon Ball Z, whereas his outfit in season 2 is Vegeta's battle armor given to him by Bulma in the Cell Saga (without the shoulderpads). His name also calls to Dragon Ball Z's japanese pronounciation, "doragun boru zetto".
    • Gamecrazed resembles an anthropomorphic Nintendo GameCube controller.
    • The hypothetical future Rubirules speaks about in his Motive Rant is essentially the setting of Mega Man Battle Network.
  • Sickly Green Glow: Whenever someone is using hacking powers.
  • Sissy Villain: Ravenfreak, one of the hackers, has feminine features, and wears a crop top and a skirt.
  • Slasher Smile: Zetto sports one of these almost non stop in episode 5.
  • Superpowered Evil Side: The Forbidden Power that Alpha acquires in episode 1 gives him one. It comes back to bite him big time in episode 5.
  • Stealth Hi/Bye: Elescope gets freaked out by Nylocke leaping at him... But is truly shocked when GC warps up behind him to chat.
  • Storming the Castle: Neomutant recruits Alpha, Flamegirl, and Nylocke to do this in Episode 13, and assault the hackers at their home base.
  • Take That!: Rubirules's Motive Rant in the final episode has segments which are almost word-for-word identical to a scathing review Egoraptor left on the first episode's Newgrounds upload. Niosi later admitted he regretted including this in the final script, as he came to feel that it was petty.
    Egoraptor: Take a step back and realize that there are some people who deserve to be listened to because they know what the fuck they're talking about.
    Rubirules: Maybe, just maybe, you should take a step back and realize that I deserve to be listened to, because I actually know what the fuck I'm talking about!
  • "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Flamegirl and Kirbopher throw one at each other in episode 5, Flamegirl's is about how Kirb always hangs around them even though they piss him off and that he's more obsessed with Alpha then anyone. Kirb claims that all Flamegirl happens to be is Alpha's fangirl and takes everything in a video game (like fighting hackers) too seriously.
  • There Are No Police: Or in this case, admins and mods. The hackers seem to have been allowed to run amok with impunity, with only the Five-Man Band to stop them.
    • Finally averted with the "Minigame Madness" short, in which an (unnamed) admin or mod is seen taking reports from players (following up on the events of "Awaken the Beast"), and then banning a known troublemaker.
    • Actually Played for Drama in Episode 11, as the moderators' inattentiveness to hacker activity is called out upon by Flamegirl in her speech to ChaseAce.
    • Justified at long last in episode 15, where Rubirules reveals he was deliberately keeping the moderators in the dark to give D-Buggers.org free reign on their mission
  • Thing-O-Meter: GC's "AWKWARD-O-METER" in episode 4.
  • Tone Shift: Season 2 is simultaneously Darker and Edgier and Lighter and Softer than the first ten episodes. While the plot is not as serious due to the fact that the Forbidden Power is "somewhere out there" and therefore removing most of the major conflict; swearing in the show is no longer censored, blood is visible (although this is probably meant to be a joke or a Take That! at someone, as the only time blood has been used this way is when Odboll crushes Bailey Smith 13 and Justin with his Hacked Battlegrids), and the show seems generally less kid-friendly.
    • However, as of episode 13, the plot is starting to get as dark as it was in Season 1, with all of the above as well, making it darker than Season 1.
  • Totally Radical: Hyprelynx, in episode 6.
    "Who cares? That was righteous!"
  • Tournament Arc: The Gemini Tournament, in which players must form pairs and fight alongside each other. The shown pairs are: Alpha/Flamegirl, T-Bones/Granda, an unnamed pair, Saturndiva/Whityl, Kirbopher/Archy, Raccoon/Skeight, Tsuzuku/Shogun, Zetto/Kizuna, Nylocke/Gamecrazed, Hyprelinx/Elescope, another unnamed pair, an unnamed character/Demonking, yet another unnamed pair, one last unnamed pair, Dustbunny/Neomutante, and Sniperwheel/Asterob.
    • As of Episode 08, Alpha/Flamegirl and Zetto/Kizuna are in the semifinals, while Nylocke/Gamecrazed, Demonking/partner, an unnamed pair (Parody Rangers expys), and Sniperwheel/Asterob are in the quarterfinals.
  • Transformation Sequence: Rockoon gets this when he merges with The Shadow Guard Beast.
  • True Companions: The Five-Man Band. An entire episode is devoted to all of them realizing this of themselves.
  • 20 Minutes into the Future: Background information consistently describes TOME as being set in 2020, less than one decade from the premiere date of November 11, 2011.
  • The Unreveal: Gamecrazed confides in Nylocke in "The Infiltration Mission" as to why he can't participate in the Final Battle with the Hackers - only for a gust of wind to conveniently drown out what he's saying to the audience. Judging by how shaken Nylocke is in the subsequent scene, however, it was every bit the shocking revelation everyone's been expecting. The Reveal in Episode 15 strongly implies that it had something to do with Gamecrazed's dual identity as SOFDTI.
  • Unusual User Interface: The precise nature of the technology being used to play TOME is unspecified - and Niosi plans on keeping it that way. Episode 00 and the special AvZ strongly imply it is a form of real-life virtual reality technology like the Oculus Rift, although again, that wouldn't explain away everything, as it seems characters are fully immersed in the game to an extent not yet possible in real life.
  • Valley Girl: Flamegirl is literally one of these - she hails from Burbank, California. However, personality-wise, the trope is subverted.
  • Variations on a Theme Song: There have been several variations of the theme song, "Battle On":
    • the instrumental version, identical to main theme but without the lyric. First appeared in promotional trailers predating the launch of the series, but not on the show itself until short 02;
    • an instrumental chiptune arrangement first heard in short 04, but then later edited into earlier shorts when end credits were added to them upon the Blip reupload;
    • the Orchestral arrangement at the end of episode 06, arranged by Steven M. Kelly;
    • the rock and roll version in the end credits of episode 08, arranged by Yoav Landau, and performed by Blake Swift alone (the "Yin" version);
    • the Smooth Jazz version in the end credits of episode 09, arranged by John Robert Matz, and performed by Chris Niosi alone (the "Yang" version);
    • another orchestral version, used for the On the Next segments in the YouTube uploads.
      • The season 2 theme, "Heroes Don't Ask Questions" also has multiple versions: The regular version, the instrumental version, an acoustic version, and a chiptune version.
  • Vocal Evolution:
    • Alpha has a flatter, more deadpan affect to his voice in the first episode. In his subsequent appearances, he starts with a more delicate and tentative pattern, probably to help contrast with his Let's Get Dangerous! moments and later, his Demonic Possession.
      • Could also count as Fridge Brilliance, since Alpha is shy and wasn't that open when he appeared in Episode 1.
    • Nylocke has a high-pitched and breathy voice at first, but starting in the second episode it has a deeper, booming timbre, which better portrays his No Indoor Voice Large Ham qualities.
  • Wall Jump: Demonstrated by Nylocke to reach the top of a building in ;Mechcity.
  • We Can Rule Together: Serpentine to Nylocke in Nylocke's Day Off,
    "FOOLISH! You should cease your stupidity, and step over to the side of the serpent! JOIN ME! and we shall rule TOME like the regal creatures we really are!—- Serpentine, TOME, Nylockes Day Off
  • Wham Episode: There are several:
    • Episode 05: "Awaken the Beast".
    • Episode 10 (the first Season Finale): "The Warring Demons".
    • Episode 12: "Secret of the Netkings".
    • Episode 00: "/FILE:ZERO".
    • The most whammy of the bunch is Episode 14: Monstrosities. It's the penultimate episode of the entire series, and features Kajet finally being released from its "egg form", attempting to destroy the world of TOME as the true shadow guard beast. When the only thing that was supposed to be able to stop it- the Dragon Bug- is finally completed, it ALSO goes haywire and becomes almost as bad as Kajet. In addition to THAT, EVERY SINGLE MEMBER of the main cast was either logged off, incapacitated, or possibly even killed, except for the Netkings, (who are helpless to stop either monstrosity), Kizuna, who's status is unknown, and Alpha, who, after realizing all of his friends are gone, goes through a Heroic BSoD, letting loose a Skyward Scream. Only Gamecrazed's status is left unknown...
  • Wham Line:
    • At the end of "Rockoon's Modern Strife", Rockoon is saved by Skeight, a seemingly random player who takes a liking to Rockoon. Rockoon waves off his help as a lucky shot and leaves. Skeight then says, in a completely different voice, "Lucky shot my dick." Revealing that he's actually Doubling using a new character.
    • From "Secret of the Netkings," we learn a little more about Zetto and Kizuna.
    Execk: "Well, let's just say it's kinda ironic you five would be the ones to do this whole "Challenge of the Netkings" thing, considering you already fought against two other Netkings well before you set foot in HOME."
  • What Measure Is a Non-Human?: At the end of Episode 00, Webmaster explains to the government agents that they can't simply delete SOFDTI, because she's like a daughter to them (and capable of thinking and feeling). He begs them by explaining the game can be completed as planned, with her kept safe, and that the players would be safe as well. They come to an agreement that she can survive as long as she's kept a government secret. Of course, Rubirules has other plans...
  • With Friends Like These...: Kirbopher and Flamegirl bicker constantly, and really don't seem to like each other at all. This comes to a head in "Awaken the Beast", when the two get into such a heated argument that Alpha (who only joined TOME in the first place to make friends) becomes quite upset. The same episode also half-jokingly suggests a potential reason for their squabbles: both of them are interested in Alpha, and are jealous of the other.
  • Xenafication: The end result of Niosi turning Flamegirl into an Action Girl in the remake. She's been upgraded from the sweet, and polite, Damsel in Distress she was in TTA, into a warrior with a no nonsense attitude in the remake.
  • Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe: Nylocke/and the Quest Giver; at the latter's insistence, anyone seeking a quest must also address him in this fashion. Both Flamegirl and Rockoon pull this off with aplomb.
  • You Monster!: Played with in the season 2 finale, when Rubirules and Alpha have this exchange:
    Rubirules:"You're some kind of monster!"
    Alpha: "Which one of us is really the monster here?"

Alternative Title(s): Terrain Of Magical Expertise, TV Tome Adventures

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