"When it comes to Let's Play, you can find just about every color of the rainbow if you know where to look. You got your funny Let's Plays, your informative Let's Plays, and your narrative Let's Plays that make up all the colors found in Skittles. Unfortunately, if you look in the wrong places, you can find the shit-browns and vomit-greens of camcorder Let's Plays, self-proclaimed game reviewer Let's Plays, and singalong Let's Plays. ... If quality Let's Plays are what you're looking for, you're in the wrong place, because today... Retsupurae!"
If there's one place in the world where Sturgeon's Law is in full effect, it's The Internet. In an age where just about anyone can create content and post it for others to see, the online community can serve as a prime example of quantity over quality. This naturally extends to the Let's Play community as well, with new YouTube videos posted left and right filled with asinine commentary or played on release date, MacGyver-like technical solutions such as filming a TV screen on a camcorder, barely edited material with minutes upon minutes of filler, and worst of all, barely any quality control to sort out the good videos from the bad ones. One should take it as a rite of passage to view at least one video game walkthrough narrated by a squeaky-voiced white college student who imagines himself to be the next Bob Saget, and may the Lord help you if they try and sing along to the game's background music.This is where Retsupurae comes in: an experiment hosted by Something Awful regulars Michael "slowbeef" Sawyer and "Diabetus" (with recurring guest appearances by Proteus, Dave_o, and Psychedelic Eyeball, among others) where the two find the worst of the YouTube community (usually Let's Plays, but sometimes extending to webcam videos, game reviews, and television shows) and then mock the living shit out of them, though they do tend to mock LPers that are just sorta weird. As such, Retsupurae has become widely appreciated for putting terrible Let's Players back in their place, though some haters still persist — mostly the very same Let's Players mocked by them in their videos, or said Let's Players' fans.They have also expanded their range to include Flash submissions to Newgrounds (also known as 'Retsufrash') and amateur videos, as well as longplays (a.k.a. 'Wrongpuraes'), riffing on the game itself rather than the person playing it. This dates back to the pre-Retsu days, when slowbeef would commentate on the ridiculous plot or some such of a game a fellow LP'er played (i.e. Psychedelic Eyeball's LP of Prince Of Persia 2).Their videos can be found on YouTube as well as Viddler, and the team also has an offshoot feature on the Something Awful front page named Webcam Ward. The crew has made a number of Livestreams, many of which can be found here. The first was left unrecorded since it was merely meant to be a test, but a fan has recovered said test Livestream and uploaded it to Youtube.Aside from slowbeef and Diabetus' videos, many others have tried their hand at Retsupurae in light of their success, especially other Something Awful regulars such as Chip Cheezum and General Ironicus, whose videos can be found on the former's YouTubechannel. There's also a fair amount of overlap between accounts, and it's not uncommon to see slowbeef guest-commentate on Chip's channel, for instance. There's also several smaller Retsupuraers that have sprung up, such as LesBeardly, LargeMentalBlock, The Strawhat NO and VNDLP.'Beef and Betus have also started a podcast called Retsutalk, which can be found here.
Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: After Diabetus reads several of PewDiePie's other video titles, coming across things like "MY TOILET DIED ;_;," "LIBRARY OF NAKED MEN," and "WTF THAT VAGINA HAS ARMS," he comes across one titled simply "Siren: Blood Curse Part 2." It's brought up how weirdly normal that last one is in the Retsutalk about the video.
Chip Cheezum: "Name: Christopher. What can I say about myself? Um, dot dot dot. I like Yu Gi Oh, Pokemon... and vore. My dream (Ironicus's laughter) is to design the next Sonic the Hedgehog game."
In the second part of the Lechuza riff, Slowbeef takes special note of the "Thank You" part of the credits, which goes to Lasse Carlsson, Linda Wagnerius, and BloodbathGojira Pripps.
Captain Obvious: Lots of bad LPers point out things that are blatantly obvious as a substitute for worthwhile commentary. OKAY!
Diabetus also had a moment of this in Last Alert. In one cutscene, three characters are mentioned named Red, Blue, and Black. Diabetus' reaction? "Those are colors."
Mike Dawson: These pillars hold up the mausoleum. Diabetus: Wow! I know how things work! I understand basic architecture! Guess I learned enough for today, bye!
In "Retsupurae 3000" they manage to snark at the game protagonist being aDeadpan Snarker.
General Ironicus tends to be this as well:
whiplash308: Oh, that's a platform, not an enemy.
GeneralIronicus: Yeah, it's a platform. Good job, buddy. Stop trying to kill your only means of progress.
Probably the most deadpan of the R Pers was occasional guest Dave_o. As seen here
arm4g3dd0nx: I'm the Easter Bunny! (in a falsetto, making the character bunnyhop)
Dave_o: WHOA!
Diabetus: BRAID!
Dave_o: He turned into the Easter Bunny, did you see that? (seconds later, a Wall of Text appears and the L Per predictably starts reading it) Oh my god, you guys considered me! You did a video that takes into account that I can't read! Thanks!
In IWBTG:G - Proposed 2nd Draft, Slowbeef narrates over OMFGcata's original video in a calm, "more NPR-like" way, while still cracking wise at him.
Distracted by the Sexy: The Pew Die Pieepisode featured both Slowbeef and Diabetus on camera. In between PDP's fans and RP's fans arguing back and forth, a significant number of comments were about how hot Diabetus is.
Dull Surprise: Several characters throughout the flashes they've played as well as a few LPers.
Policeman [text]:Jack, we really need your help on this one!!! Policeman [voice]: Jack, we really need your help on this one. Diabetus: That was not a three-exclamation-points reading of that line...
Ending Fatigue: Invoked: One thing that they frown upon is Let's Players or self-proclaimed reviewers going on well after the video should end.
This is particularly notable in Transformers Review? with an elaborate skit based on destroying a Famicom game.
nacho where the "content" is done at the three-minute mark, but the player spends seven more minutes goofing around the level just to round out the YouTube time limit.
Slowbeef and Diabetus get very, very bored with the Marathon Boss fight with Crystal Boy at the end of Space Adventure Cobra.
Failed a Spot Check: Some Let's Plays make it painfully obvious that they were directly uploaded to YouTube without the LPer going over the video first (that or just having extremely low standards).
Kayin (of I Wanna Be The Guy fame) not noticing the giant mouse cursor in "Let's Point at Super Metroid".
GAK, where roughly two fifths of the video consist of a solid green rectangle due to an encoding error.
"Colonel, I didn't manage to avoid drowning!" has a non-technical variant: DarksydePhil is confused by an "M9 Bullet Full" message because he thinks he doesn't have the M9 — when it's clearly visible in the weapon menu. Both riffers are astonished.
Fat Bastard: HC Bailly is the target of several fat jokes. But BigMastadon really invokes this trope as he torments the Retsupurae gang with his vile eating challenge.
This guy, advertising a way to circumvent Wii Fit weight limits, with a skid of soda in the background. Courtesy of Chip and Ironicus.
Bad Michael Moore impersonation: Hey guys, I'm making a documentary on how much Bush sucks and how cool I am! Chip: What.
And in the Zelda BS RP...
Let's Player:Snakes on a Plane with Samuel L. Jackson. Diabetus:What. Slowbeef: He just did a Snakes on a Plane joke.
Cobra himself delivers one near the end of the Space Adventure Cobra Retsupurae upon learning that the Ultimate Weapon is an ostrich egg with an eye. That turns into a sword. And a gun. And a battleship. Yeah.
The original, somewhat unknown account was "retsupray"
The correct spelling would have been retsupurei (レツプレイ).
In the actual riff videos, the duo mock BurningHunter's overuse of the word "minna" (Japanese for everyone) and believe he's trying to impress a girl named Mina by making awful Mega Man Let's Plays.
Insult Backfire: There are numerous videos on Retsupurae's account of people objecting rather strongly to being RPed. Not only does this indicate Slowbeef couldn't be less intimidated, it lets more people see how weak they really are.
It's worth noting that Slowbeef essentially invented the hobby. And that's because it makes this all the more hilarious - two prolific LPers, including the man who effectively started it all, being told they should try to make Let's Plays and see how hard it is or somesuch.
Also, one of the Newgrounds comments for Metroid Elements brings up a lot of legitimate complaints about the Metroid Flash game, only for the author to respond with this trope.
the_exp: (in text) ok. How about i label all the code REAL well, then give you the FLA file AND YOU implement the changes and still have a game that runs.
slowbeef: (out loud) How 'bout you actually do that? I fuckin' dare you... I would love that. I'm sayin' that to him like he's watching this, but...
Diabetus has also done more traditional MSTing on the Battletoads animated pilot and the Mega Man series' infamous Bizarro Episode "Curse of the Lion Men" on retsupurae's YouTube channel.
Chip and Ironicus in turn have done traditional MSTings of several Newgrounds videos (including part of the Xin series) and the fanimeElemental Goddess along with their videos on YouTube LPs.
The 'Retsufrash' and 'Wrongpurae' videos from slowbeef and Diabetus are riffs on the games themselves; the former category targets Flash games and animations on Newgrounds while the latter provides commentary over longplays.
This came full circle with the Wrongpurae of Shinobi-X; the longplay footage is mostly comprised of cutscenes telling a typical ninja-movie story.
Likewise with Metroid: Other M, in which the duo riffs the game's "Theater Mode" rather than the gameplay itself, since their focus is on the abysmal story.
My Name Is Not Durwood: Gaming In The Clinton Years host George Wood is erroneously referred to by the duo and the RP community alike as "Navgtr", after the irrelevant YouTube account that archived his series. Same goes with amateur voice actor Edwyn Tiong being known as "Dan McNeely", thanks to his most infamous role in The Trapped Trilogy Retsufrash.
No Ending: A common staple in the featured LPs, where some don't bother to finish their recording proper and end up with them being cut off mid-sentence.
Ferr: ...Wait, he's saying something! Shhh!—Oh wait, it ended.
Some LPers have expressed regret for their featured LPs:
During Let's Freak Out!, Slowbeef remarks that the teenager who made the video will regret it in two years. Not only did the original author, violinbow3, comment on the video that he DID regret it after two years, he and another guy made a video response praising the RP - he says it's his favourite! - and mocking the original video.
Violinbow3: I was such a little faggot...
effruman: "Was"?
Queenie Z also apologizes often for her infamous Eternal Darkness LP, claiming that she didn't know much about how Let's Plays worked at the time she started it.
Ramey Elalei, the author of the flash game Death Trap, has praised the respective RP and agreed that the game deserved this treatment.
PizzaTrophy, who did the original Earthbound video, says in his comment that he found out about the Retsupurae a while after deleting his videos, and says that the RP is the only good ten minutes to come out of the hours of videos he uploaded.
Sonik Dude 101 has admitted he thought his LP of The Unfair Platformer was horrible. He even forgave Retsupurae for having to sit through his LP.
Velos ultimately apologized for his death threat video, calling it "retarded".
The commentators themselves have some regrets, such as the following:
Slowbeef says that he does feel uncomfortable mocking videos done by younger players (such as the Star Fox one) and that he tries to avoid that now when possible.
Proteus: I'm not gonna fucking pretend like this video's okay 'cause the kid's fucking retarded and seven years old.
On Facebook, Diabetus noted that one of the Retsupurae videos he didn't like was The Nostalgia Critic RP because they simply used their first and only take, which he didn't think was "very funny in retrospect". In the podcast, slowbeef agrees, and states that PsychedellicEyeball did a better parody.
Chip Cheezum put the "AMY ROOOOSE!" video on private, later revealing he did it as he felt bad mocking someone that was clearly... not right in the head.
On his Formspring, Diabetus admits that some of the older content, such as making transgender jokes during the "wario" video wasn't very funny and not the type of humor they'd like to do anymore.
Orwellian Editor: Threatened (probably jokingly) in "The Marios":
slowbeef: Luwigii Master, why? Why is no one going to hear this when the video mysteriously cuts off at the five minute mark?
Slowbeef also edits out a part of the Darkseed 2 longplay where Mike finally wins the ring toss game, because they would never allow it.
Several Lets Players have taken down the Lets Plays or outright closed their account after getting mocked by Retsupurae.
David John-Bores (the person who recorded Meet'N'Fuck Kingdom for slowbeef and Diabetus) commented on the video that he censored the king's erection with a picture of slowbeef's face. This ended up being covered up by a user review.
Parody Retcon: Whenever a new Retsupurae video is uploaded, chances are the original LPer will later state that he was this bad on purpose and that Retsupurae fell for it all!
Even more sadly, there has been the occasion where it was actually done on purpose. Let's Play *incomprehensible* was pulled from retsupurae's account because Slowbeef and Diabetus agreed that purposefully being bad for the sake of being retsupurae'd was "pretty fucking gay".
Reading the comments provides further evidence that it was indeed not a parody at first.
Red Oni, Blue Oni: What they speculate how a team-up between Billy MC and Musclebomber would be like, with Musclebomber being the Red Oni and Billy being the Blue one.
The main two themselves. Slowbeef is quick to upset and can get passionate when he criticizes someone or something, while Diabetus almost always stays collected, and is noted as being near impossible to anger. Diabetus even mentions this in Retsutalk #17 (calling himself the superego and slowbeef the id)
Chip and Ironicus could also count; Ironicus is usually calm and deadpan, while Chip tends to be more energetic.
Rouge Angles of Satin: Frequently in Newgrounds reviews. To add to the hilarity, the riffers usually pronounce the typos when they read it aloud.
Deep Fear has many doors to "STRAGE" rooms, and later on, there's a door to a "NAVEL WEAPONS" room. And those are just the examples that are commented on.
Chip and Ironicus start on a Minish Cap LP, but when the LPer says his cat is addicted to human sweat just one minute into the video they immediately give up.
Small Name, Big Ego: Many LPers respond badly to being Retsupuraed, with reactions ranging from angry threats to flagging the videos for copyright infringement.
A few of the flash authors on Newgrounds, who respond to any criticism with mocking insults or challenges to make something better.
This trope is inverted by S So HPKC when he said in a Vlog that he enjoys Retsupurae, and saw it as sort of an honor to be Retsu'd.
One of the videos RP'd by Slowbeef and Diabetus consisted of this as well, where the author made a deliberately awful video just so that they could be retsupuraed (the terrible commentary and clipping audio, contrasted with the fantastic picture quality, is already a big hint). This video was removed from their account, because the pair agreed that having someone make a horrible video just so that they could be retsupuraed is "really gay". (For the curious, it's still available here.)
There's also this video, a parody of the video responses calling out Retsupurae for making fun of LPers.
PsychedelicEyeball, in response to the RP of The Nostalgia Critic, created an LP of Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels as the Nostalgic Balls mocking Doug Walker's Angrish and his fans. It can be viewed here.
Pin and Kit did a Pokemon Stadium 2 Let's Play in order to parody users like Trooper S 96 and others who do bad camcorder Let's Plays.
Take That: Aside from the concept of being a gigantic Take That to Youtube Let's Plays, there are quite a few aimed at other sources.
From Let's Play *incomprehensible*: "He's still not as bad as Chip Cheezum."
From Death Trap:
slowbeef: Well what do you expect? It's Death Trap, AKA Saw for idiots! I mean, even more so than usual.
slowbeef: No, no, no. Drop this guy, end of proposal. That's all I have. My PowerPoint's one slide... Diabetus: Slowbeef, why do you have a 25-slide presentation? slowbeef: Because it's the same thing copy-pasted. Diabetus: Oh, you copy-pasted it 25 times. slowbeef: Yes, that's right. Diabetus: Including your title slide and conclusion slide. slowbeef: I am the Tim Buckley of proposals.
During their Earnest Evans video, one of the game's anime cutscenes features a camera angle centered on the corner of a jail cell, and the angles of the floor and walls appear to be way out of whack...or, as Slowbeef puts it:
slowbeef: "Jail", by Tim Buckley.
In Retsupurae 3000, Slowbeef comments that a logo on a secretary's desk resembles the Ctrl+Alt+Del logo. His next sentence begins with "Speaking of bad art..."
Their Metroid: Other M Retsuwatch is quite possibly one of their most scathing commentaries yet, mostly directed at Yoshio Sakamoto and the various Unfortunate Implications.
After making several largely-positive references to movies in Let's Play IMBD, Slowbeef throws this in during the final boss fight:
The Slender and HappyWheels videos that slowbeef uploaded to the account are not only blatant potshots towards the games themselves, but to Youtube users that almost exclusively LP said games.
Viewing the original version has now been classified as procedure 111-Montauk, and is now how we traumatize that girl from SCP-231 instead, because that whole entry was terrible. Seriously, this wiki was supposed to be creepy horror stories, right? That one was just gross.
Arise 4 begins with the message "I see you are surviving quite well. My next installment will make you want to DIE". He's not kidding.
"The LP is terrible... I hope it doesn't last" starts with slowbeef stating that he had only seen 3 seconds of the original video. We then see said three seconds...
teddybearmassacure: Okay! Welcome back to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Part FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVE! Diabetus: Ooh, you weren't kidding.
The Unintelligible: The source of humour for several of the LPers they mock, usually due to strong accents.
Viewers Are Morons: Justified in Nightmare House where the solution to a puzzle is blatantly told to you on a nearby note, due to it being another Moon Logic Puzzle. Which kind of defeats the purpose.
slowbeef: Now, seriously—you remade the game and you kept these shit puzzles in? Like, you had the whole opportunity! GeneralIronicus: It would be really clever and keep people out if he didn't just tape the instructions to the wall right next to it.
Luwiigi Master: *laughter* Oh my God, I'm sorry, people, it's just that I keep thinking about all these other Let's Players who, like, got made fun of by Retsupurae... slowbeef:Aww, shit! *commentary proceeds to derail entirely*
The Ace: Parodied with "JacobMC", who according to Slowbeef and Diabeetus is BillyMC's older brother, a Harvard graduate, beat Ninja Gaiden 2 with his eyes closed, and registered Hypercam2.
Actually Pretty Funny: Despite having mocked his video game for the whole video, slowbeef has to admit that kennsj made a pretty good crack at one of his negative reviews:
deathskul: u cant kill anything u shod make it easier to kill the crechers i attack the crechers as mush as i possibly can and they don't die kennsj: They should make English easier for you, too. I'll let them know.
Angrish: When a character is somehow locked inside a car during Pursuit, Proteus is reduced to a sputtering wreck:
Proteus: How... how did... how is she locked in... th... she j... ho... but tha... but... you can't... Slowbeef: I know you can't. Proteus: You can't—! Slowbeef: I— I know! Not in any modern car in the world!
In their Retsupurae of The Nostalgia Critic doing an LP of Bart's Nightmare, they speculate that he even writes in Angrish. In general, they frown upon this being used in LPs due to their dislike of exaggerated commentaries.
Armored Closet Gay: In "GOD HATES POOCHYENAS," the player uses a certain anti-gay slur so many timesnote to the point that the video counts how many times he uses it that he's suggested to be this trope.
Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Slowbeef and Diabetus are very disturbed by the "Users who liked this video also enjoyed" sidebar for Arrival in Hell 2. Featuring "Meet'N'Fuck Kingdom", "Bowser and Peach Hentai", and the Eddsworld flash "Dental Appointment".
slowbeef: But see, look at- is that a fourth wall?
Diabetus: "Bollocks"? Is that where you have the goofy sitcom music play? [hums goofy sitcom music]
slowbeef: On the next episode of Bollocks...
Diabetus: We'll be right back with more Arrival in Hell II!
The Atoner: Slowbeef jokes that Retsupurae is his retribution for being responsible for YouTube's terrible LPs in a Majora's Mask riff.
Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: In this video, Diabetus finally starts piecing together that the game is taking place in Nazi Germany, and questions whether or not it's a good idea to make jokes over such a touchy topic... until slowbeef points out the inflating and deflating cat in the corner of the screen.
It's also suggested as why the villains in Crime Patrol keep jumping out of cover to shoot you:
slowbeef: You know what it is? It's not that we're a great cop, we have this beautiful gun that everyone just wants to take a look at.
A Winner Is You: Most of the Flash games they riff on, but probably the worst offender is "Metroid; Beginings" [sic]. After possibly hours of struggling with frustrating controls, floaty mechanics, and a whole crapload of game breaking bugs, defeating the final boss, Dark Samus, causes her to explode... and that's it. No credits, No Ending, the game just sort of ends with Samus trapped in an empty room. (The poor guy who played the game for them actually went into the .swf file using a decompiler to confirm this.)
Big Guy, Little Guy: Speculating on what would happen if MuscleBomber2021 and BillyMC formed a superhero duo.
Big Lipped Alligator Moment: "How To Get A Raise" is full of these despite being allegedly educational. Besides the fact that you must earn a raise to pay for your cat's cancer treatment, the mouse in your boss's office can talk, and turning away when it tells you to will, in the words of one commenter, a "magic female rapist" to appear and begin stripping. And if one waits around for too long then, the cop from "How To Get Out Of Speeding Tickets" will literally appear from nowhere, call you a pervert, and arrest you. The whole sequence is tellingly rather low on commentary.note The "tip" the game shows if you die this way implies that all of this was a hallucination, because mice can't talk... which still doesn't explain the cop, but okay.invoked
Blatant Lies: slowbeef likes to tell Diabetus about ridiculous future events in whatever video games they're commenting on, which are obviously false. Subverted slightly in that sometimes he's telling the truth. This is brought up by Diabetus.
Diabetus: See, I can't tell if you're lying or not. slowbeef:[snickers]
Bold Inflation: Diabetus sometimes uses this to directly contrast with the ridiculousness of the video game.
Diabetus: (during the punching-bag minigame) DEAD TO RIGHTS! Diabetus: (while navigating the"Labyrinth of Bullshit") KING'S QUEST SIX! Diabetus: (during the "Dance of the Bones") THE QUEST OF KINGS! Diabetus: (when an ornate dragon statue rises to cover up a safe) RISE OF THE DRAGON! Diabetus: (after Mookie and Sharon play an April Fools' joke on John Mayor) DEEP FEAR!
Diabetus: We should try, like, savestating our commentary. Diabetus: We should try, like, savestating our commentary. Slowbeef: We should try savestating our commentary, you said? Diabetus: -ing our commentary -ing our commentary -ing our commentary.
Brooklyn Rage: MuscleBomber2021, whose almost cartoonishly exaggerated accent eventually draws comparisons to Bebop.
Brown Note: This video, entitled "Warning: Serious Eye Damage Hazard". It really is headache inducing.
This video, as well titled "Pure Strain Golden Axe" which really is pure strain for the eyes.
The guys also joke about this in their wrongpurae of Kings Quest VII The Princeless Bride, claiming that the reason Valanice cries every time the player uses the comb is because it reminds her that she's in King's Quest VII.
Buffy Speak: In this LP Diabetus gets rather irritated at the player for, amongstother things, using a legit strategy with a weapon and then forgetting about it in the middle of the level:
(Progressively increasing in irritation) "Just use the invisi-chameleon sting... charge up... thing! You know, you just used it BEFORE!"
But Thou Must: Happens so many times in Space Adventure Cobra that both slowbeef and Diabetus mention the trope namer word-for-word on separate occasions.
Butt Monkey: Tyler, ActionBastardAway's special guest in the video Monster, who spends the entire video rarely speaking, being berated, and being called "a petty douchebag." Diabetus has mentioned Tyler in multiple videos whenever a guest appears in a video for the sole purpose of silently remaining in the background to take the blame for the LPer's own mistakes.
Cassandra Truth: In the Metroid: Other M retsupurae, Slowbeef starts foreshadowing that the little furby-like creature is actually Ridley by giving it the Ridley voice from their Metroid Prime LP. After a few minutes of this, Diabetus responds with "I think I understand what you're inferring, but I have a hard time believing it."
Catchphrase: Slowbeef's "Oh my lord" and "God almighty".
In many Wrongpuraes, when there is an illogical puzzle, nonsensical plot twist, or something similar, Slowbeef will say something along the lines of "Oh, shut the fuck up!" or "Fuck this game!" There's also sarcastic praise like "This is the greatest game ever!" or "Stunning!" for moments that are particularly goofy or complete wastes of time.
Slowbeef also tends to say "Wait, was that editing?" when there's a sudden cut (mainly when it seems out-of-place given the rest of the video).
Diabetus seems to be fond of "Makes you think, doesn't it?"
Diabetus also frequently says "SPRING BREAK!" when pretending to be excited.
Diabetus also has "so, there's that" and "that <verb>s my <noun>!"
Chekhov's Gunman: Parodied in the Ninja Hayate video. One of the bottom scores was a player named Ninjawa, then it turns out that the current player was Ninjawa.
Cluster F-Bomb: While it's present in their commentary, they do NOT like it when it's used as a crutch for a lack of humor. Lampshaded at one point:
You know, I swear like a sailor, and even I think this is shameful.
Comically Missing the Point: In this video, it's ambiguous as to whether the trio realize that the point of the review is to show off an awful game, similar to The Angry Video Game Nerd. Granted, that doesn't make it any less funny.
Similarly, in this video they make fun of how slowly and poorly the L Per is playing the game, failing to realize that it's the entire point. As seen in pretty much all of his other videos, kazztawdal really doesn't make a serious go at any of the games that he plays, preferring instead to makes jokes and have fun with how bad the game is and how poorly he/the game is performing. YMMV as to how enjoyable this makes his videos. However, making fun of a video that's not meant to be a serious LP isn't as funny as making fun of an LP that attempts to be serious and fails in spectacular fashion.
The British humor of ElectricalBeast initially went over their heads, and they thought he was trying to be serious.
slowbeef thought Cr1tikal's Let's Play style was meant to be taken seriously. Once he learned his videos are meant to be bad, he removed the RP.
In Amnesia: The Dork's Descent, the guys argue that the LPer's over the top reaction to a monster encounter is worse than the recent Super Meat Boy LPs and more shameful than BigMastadon's pizza roll challenge and Big Al 2 K's Mugen videos.
slowbeef: I actually wish GameMaster would come in and deck this guy.
Diabetus:[groan]
slowbeef: ...Is that enough Retsupurae memes?
Diabetus: I think we covered just about everything.
Subverted eventually, in a video where Slowbeef and Diabetus guest-commentated on Vicas' playthrough of Super Mario 64 with his feet, on Tick Tock Clock, and specifically pointed out how they got through all of it without any Electrical Beast jokes.
slowbeef: Not everything can be about Retsupurae.
A minute into the first Darkseed 2 Wrongpurae video, Diabetus mentions that the only thing he knew about the game is that there was a head explosion at some point. note "every slowbeef LP has a head explosion" He also suggests that the painkillers prescribed to Mike Dawson are Shinobix.
Critical Existence Failure: Taken to a ludicrous extreme in It Came From The Desert, where the people being attacked by ants can lose several body parts including all their vital organs but will be fine as long as the player kills all the ants before they are completely eaten.
Deep South: Diabetus gets some stick for being from Alabama. Especially here.
He has since come to embrace the stereotype for the sake of comedy at times.
Mini-Boss: (In an overblown redneck accent) HEE-HEE, GUY, AHM GUNNAH DESTROY YEW!
Daft53: Ketsukov, it's the guy who invented Tetris.
Slowbeef: NO IT ISN'T, IT'S ALEXEY PAJITNOV, YOU FUCK! ...Oh why did I say that on camera?
Didn't See That Coming: Slowbeef, upon learning that ElectricalBeast never finished his Super Mario 64 LP.
Cue the Flying Pigs: He finally finished it during Christmas 2010, the justification being that Bowser erased his and Mario's memories, and they didn't remember that they had to defeat Bowser until his painting appeared in his Minecraft LP and taunted him about it. Time will tell if Slowbeef will revisit ElectricalBeast one last time.
Does Not Know His Own Strength: Said of King Graham from King's Quest V when he tries to tap a staff on the fortress door to open it, but ends up shattering it.
Narrator: The staff lies in several broken pieces on the steps.
Dumb Muscle: Their interpretation of MuscleBomber2021, based primarily on his voice.
Easy Mode Mockery: Played with. Both Slowbeef and Diabetus have said that they'd rather watch a competently done Let's Play on an "easy" difficulty than one at "normal" or "hard" difficulty where the LPer spends most of their time getting killed. That being said, they won't hesitate to mock an LPer who chooses the easiest setting of a game that's regarded as being pretty easy to begin with.
Just about every minor NPC in Cobra: Space Adventures. But especially Rock Knight.
In King's Quest VI, Jollo, hands down. They even spend the last seven minutes of this video quoting Dr. House in his voice.
Made all the more amazing by the fact that Jollo ends up saving the day at the last second.
Exact Time to Failure: Slowbeef on Arise 3: You know what I really hate? When you're at the doctor's office and he says 'You have exactly ten minutes to live.'
Exactly What It Says on the Tin: "Meet 'N' Fuck Kingdom". slowbeef uses this as his justification for essentially ignoring the playthrough entirely and reading reviews instead.
slowbeef: You meet her, you fuck her. It's Meet 'N' Fuck Kingdom! slowbeef: We met her. That means we all know what's gonna happen next.
Fail O'Suckyname: Hammerbolt Joe and Crystal Boy, from the Space Adventure Cobra longplay.
slowbeef: Is this supposed to make me afraid of Crystal Boy? Because his name is still Crystal Boy.
Soldier Boyz has squad members Butts, Lamb and Brophy.
Fake Nationality: Despite their heavy criticism of Death Trap, they had to admit that the creator/voice actor succeeded in one aspect. They would have never guessed that he was Australian.
Fan Disservice: The general reaction to seeing Luke McCabe at the end of the Crime Wave RP in nothing but a speedo. But just to subvert things, the president's daughter then sits up from behind him in a bikini.
Utilized shamelessly in the Space Adventure CobraSega CD game longplay. Then again, if you're familiar with the manga, this is to be expected.
A rather blatant display of such in the Crime Wave RP, where McCabe's crime computer displays an animated model of the president's beautiful daughter nude (but cropped), whereas the male villains are only displayed as a few static photos, fully clothed.
Meet 'N' Fuck Kingdom has about as much of this as you'd expect. However, to fit YouTube's policy, all of it is omitted or censored (once with Rock Knight, later with a review).
Flying Car: Diabetus sometimes mentions "flying cars" when he's trying to refer to a "futuristic era"...like 2002.
Foreshadowing: In their RP of a Deceased Crab video, they say that you could take the audio from any video of his and put it over a different game, and there would be no way to tell.
Slowbeef: If you get one and a half stars on the fuckin' internet, that's like being at the Special Olympics and having them tell you, "you have to leave".
They've also noted on several Retsufrash videos (most notably in the Trapped series) that games on Newgrounds will often get a very high score (if not a perfect 10) even if the people giving the ratings have a lot of complaints about the game, had nothing good to say about the game, completely hate it or never even finished the game.
Bizarrely inverted with one Jack French review which described the game as "one of the best detective games" while giving it a score of a half star out of five.
One of the insults slowbeef hurls at Space Adventure Cobra is that IGN would probably give it a 6.
Fridge Horror: In-universe, halfway through the final episode of Webcam Ward, Diabetus realizes Chris-chan's not wearing a shirt. It's much, much worse than it sounds.
Friend to Bugs: Graham from King's Quest V can talk to ants and helps the colony, and Slowbeef points out the use of this trope.
Funny Background Event: "Serious Dad" has a child repeatedly walking throughout the video in the beginning, which the RPers notice immediately. This is subverted when the LPer shows his kid how to play the game, then triple subverted when he leaves and never shows up again.
GIS Syndrome: Pointed out in the Lechuza RP. In the respective Something Awful thread, the goons went out of their way to find almost every single image asset used in the game from across the internet, using Google Image Search.
Pretty much every Jump Scare in the Arise series is a Halloween mask lifted from GIS. Yes, even the John McCain head.
The end of the RetsuBlitz was ceremoniously ended with a spoof of the long-requested Meet 'N' Fuck Kingdom.
Gratuitous German: A toy shop owner in Kings Quest V Absence Makes The Heart Go Yonder uses a stereotypical German accent and a few, incredibly butchered, German words. slowbeef seems to have some basic knowledge of the German language, as he sounds in pain after hearing the butchered pronounciations.
Guilty Pleasures: The Apocalypse video is no doubt this for slowbeef and Diabetus. Despite all the bad puns, barely paying any attention to the longplay, and slowbeef actually apologizing in the video tags, they both genuinely have a lot of fun firing pop culture reference after pop culture reference.
Mike Dawson:(in a disappointed tone) I don't think Ik and Uk are going to molest me anymore.
Have a Nice Death: During their King's Quest V wrongpurae, they joke about the game's death messages and come up with their own. Diabeetus later jokes that the narrator is incapable of feeling empathy towards Graham.
Narrator:(after Graham falls off a branch and breaks his neck) Thanks for playing King's Quest V!
slowbeef: That's the death message? That's like, "Thanks for buying our product, here's a bullshit death."
Diabeetus: "You wasted money on this. So here you go! Have some bullshit!"
Mario, Party of One? has some strange noises coming from the background of the Let's Player's video. Slowbeef and Diabetus think it sounds like dishes.
The overly loud, almost unsettlingly cheery town music, and to a lesser extent the calmer remix used in shops, from Kings Quest V has this effect on them.
Diabetus: Kuroinokaze recorded this just for us... to kill us!
LP Mario 64... very slowly have them worried for the computer the LP was played on due to the fact that it sounded like it was just roaring to keep up with the emulator.
The most prevalent being "Meet N' Fuck Kingdom", which managed to show up in the list for three RP subjects (Hug Me To The Skies, Arrival In Hell II and Metroid Elements). ChipCheezum announced he's doing a Let's Play of it here. Though he could be joking...
Slowbeef beats him to it.
Hiccup Hijinks: Diabetus gets the hiccups around the second half of the Dark Seed Wrongpurae. Some YouTube comments were all too eager to share their remedies, such as ingesting a spoonful of peanut butter. Of course, slowbeef lampshades it a few times.
Hidden Depths: When slowbeef and Diabetus attended The Runaway Guys' panel at PAX 2012, which was a video game "game show" hosted by Proton Jon, the capture software kept crashing in full view to the audience, causing a lot of awkwardness on Jon's part. Of course, slowbeef recorded it all on camera and MSTed the entire debacle with Diabetus for all to see on YouTube. However, despite such, slowbeef adds at the very end of the video that he felt sorry for him as he considers Jon to be one of the nicest LPers he knows and told him he felt the panel to be a success despite the technical difficulties.
Proteus has demonstrated acts beyond his apparent jerkassitude. One notable example is in his return in "Lavos, You Can Go Ahead and Get Started". One YouTube comment expressed his disdain for Proteus, to which Proteus himself commented back to everyone to not flame the guy for expressing his opinion.
Hilariously Abusive Childhood: They theorize SergmanX has an abusive father who forces him to make Let's Plays. They also have similar theories about BillyMC.
The game Apocalypse, starring Bruce Willis, was subject to a few dozen bad Puns based on Bruce's movie titles. They finally ran out at about 18 minutes, and just start with random names of movies and TV shows. For the entire rest of the video.
Hypocrite: Watch slowbeef's LP of Metroid Prime 2: Echoes and count how often he does things that he complains about the most as a part of Retsupurae.
In Space Adventure Cobra, the main character's internal monologue calls Crystal Boy a chicken-shit due to his apparent tendency to shoot when your back is turned. Immediately after this text appears, the longplayer selects "Flee" from the dialogue tree, prompting Slowbeef to ask who the chicken-shit was here.
Slowbeef, during the retsufrash period, repeatedly mocks Newgrounds as a site for degenerates with a penchant for scatalogical humor. But he has no problem buying The Binding of Isaac, a game created by Newgrounds users, which even displays the Newgrounds logo in the intro. Not to mention the content of the game itself.
During OMF Gcata's I Wanna be the Guy: Gaiden LP, cata wonders why the player character instantly dies when he touches the water. Slowbeef then mocks him for believing that video games should mirror real life. This despite the fact that slowbeef himself often nitpicks at common video game mechanics. (Diaries with only one entry, gaining ammunition from corpses, predetermined pathing, etc.)
Hypocritical Humor: Hard to tell if it's intentional or if this just slipped slowbeef's mind, but in the Deceased Crab video, one of slowbeef's criticisms is that he "can't believe actually let's played the same game twice." Slowbeef Let's Played Snatcher twice.
At the end of a Pokemon retsupurae, after slowbeef complains about how the L Per is just spewing nonsense and memes, Diabetus does the usual "Dead to Rights" ending which has become a meme in their own fanbase. Slowbeef immediately points out the hypocrisy of this, then says it himself.
Diabetus: I need more alcohol. slowbeef: We all do.
In "Pinball Wizards' Growing Pains," Diabetus has to do commentary alone for a brief period during which Slowbeef gets up to make a drink.
In "Adults React to PewDiePie," one of the viewers says nothing and instead pours a drink and face palms.
I Need to Go Iron My Dog: At the end of "Mario, Party of One?", when talking about nice comments they should leave Joshey164, this exchange happens:
Diabetus: "Please invite me to your next party." slowbeef: Don't go that far, I'm not coming. Diabetus: No, no, I got a thing actually. During his next party I have a... I'm busy. slowbeef: I've got a really cool Wario Party to go to.
Slowbeef: Yeah, dude, what do you have against cats?
In the "True Shit" Wrongpurae, when Diabetus comes up with the alternate title "BillyMC the Kid" for the "game", Slowbeef immediately goes into Sincerity Mode and claims that Billy (or anyone else for that matter) could have made a better game.
He has a similar comment after mentioning someone calling Mike Dawson a "grown up Billy MC".
During the Metroid; Beginings [sic] retsufrash, slowbeef says he can't make a "better than Other M" joke, because that's an insult to Other M. Keep in mind his scathing wrongpurae of Other M, and you'll get an idea of just how bad Beginings is.
It's Personal: One reason for the Resupurae of the Policenauts review was that it was apparently posted on a thread regarding slowbeef's translation hack which he was still working on at the time, even worse was that it was apparently full of spoilers in the gameplay shown such as solutions to puzzles during the video these moments are blacked out by slowbeef.
It Is Pronounced Tro-PAY: Slowbeef deliberately pronounces "Mario" as "Mary-O" - to the point of actually correcting himself after using the proper pronunciation. Then again...
Jason White: A See-ko Chronograph diving watch. They come expensive those watches.
slowbeef: I think that's Say-ko, chief.
In Super Bummerman 2, musclebomber2021 pronounces 'throw' as 'fow', 'bomb' as 'bum', 'enemy' as 'amy', and numerous others. The Retsupurae duo have a field day with him.
Slowbeef:Fow his bums? At his amies?!
Slowbeef catches himself on almost mispronouncing H. R. Giger's name ("gee-ger") as 'geiger' in the Dark SeedWrongpurae, which Diabetus is quick to comment on:
Diabetus: I've checked his volume of work, his Giger counter...
He does so a few more times in the DarkSeed 2 Wrongpurae, though he again corrects himself every time, this time without any jokes from Diabetus. He also refers to Mario a few times throughout it, sometimes as "Mary-O" and sometimes normally.
The Eternal Darkness RP, Queenie Z pronounces the subtitle "Sanity's Re-KWEE-um, placing heavy emphasis on the second syllable.
slowbeef pronounces horrible with a long "A" sound at the beginning, making it sound more like "har-ible".
Squick: Retsupurae's (and the viewer's) reaction to the video.
Slowbeef: This is like a snuff film, somehow! Look at the camera angle! It's like you're in his lap! And he's eating the pizza rolls off you!
Proteus: You're balanced on his PENIS... that he hasn't seen in YEARS...
Jitter Cam: "Skyrim's Enigma Mod" has this effect, caused by the player using YouTube's camera stabilization feature on gameplay footage recorded from Fraps. It leaves slowbeef absolutely stunned and demanding an explanation, and draws comparisons to The Office.
Lame Comeback: When a Newgrounds user left a harsh review on Pursuit, Godlimations called him a 'poo poo head'. Slowbeef and Proteus don't address it, because, really, what needs to be said?
The events of their livestream test late in March 2010 were never recorded since Slowbeef either forgot or didn't bother to have them archived. Thankfully, a YouTube user by the name of dainegai saved the livestream retsupuraes on his channel.
The RP of UltraJMan may not be completely lost, but is at least hard to find.
A recent RP of the two riffing on a video of the Battle Subway in Pokemon Black And White was up for only a few hours before suddenly disappearing, with posts referencing it gone due to the original LPer kindly requesting all traces of the riff removed in order to not harm his community. As there's no mirror upload of it as of now, you had to be lucky to catch it while it was up.
Loads and Loads of Loading: thehof's LP of Half-Life: Blue Shift consists of nothing but this and blindingly bright graphics, probably due to the fact that he's playing this on the never officially released (i.e. hacked) Dreamcast version.
Manipulative Editing: In their Retsupurae of Dark Seed 2, Slowbeef edits out the main character finally winning at the ring toss carnival game, replacing it with a clip of one of his earlier failures. He claimed Mike Dawson would never win under their watch.
Meanwhile, Back at the...: slowbeef is fond of parodying this trope when MSTing video games with silly or nonsensical plots. In fact, he mentions in "Resident Seavil 2" that several comments on the previous installment actually complained that he was using the joke too much. He then attempts not to say it throughout the rest of the video, only to grow increasingly frustrated with himself as he repeatedly does sowithout meaning to.
Memetic Badass: In a parody of such, JacobMC, the fictional brother of Billy MC is said by Slowbeef and Diabetus to not only have a Harvard degree, but is also able to finish Ninja Gaiden Black with his eyes closed AND actually register his hypercam. invoked
Rock Knight from the RP of Cobra's Space Adventures, who barely shows up in the game at all, but is the Batman of the game universe in terms of skill according to Slowbeef and Diabetus. invoked
Missing Episode: A handful of Retsupuraes that have been uploaded in the past few years are no longer on the channel. Luckily, some of them can be watched on the Retsupurae Blip page.
Slowbeef mentioned in a Retsutalk episode that they have and will remove a video if the person they're RPing comes to them privately and asks them politely.
Mondegreen: A few non-musical examples from the Rise of the Dragon RP:
Chang Li: It is also known by my humble self, and others, that you are investigating this affair.
Blade Hunter: What others?...
Diabetus: "Whatevers"? ...Did he just say "whatevers"??
[...]
Blade Hunter: ...It seems he gave her some bad juice.
Diabetus: Some bad Jews?
Blade Hunter: ...It's bad with a capital 'B'.
slowbeef: I think "juice"... Wait—"bad with a captial 'V'?"
Diabetus: No, no, I think the game's just really racist.
They themselves have one of these moments, when they mishear Electrical Beast's introduction as "The Giant of Let's Plays" rather than "The Jolteon of Let's Plays."
Diabetus: You're Buddhist? I don't see how that's relevant.
...
LPer: This part is kinda easy for me.
Diabetus: This part is Chinese for you? Muse isn't that hard to understand.
Also occurs in the riff on HarmfulGravemind, who has a Luxembourgish accent:
HarmfulGravemind: Now comes... Wendy Koopa!
Diabetus: Friendly Koopa?
slowbeef: (imitating the LPer's accent) Friendly Koopa!
Diabetus: That's a misnomer, sir.
In A Public Service Announcement For Let's Players, one of the lines Slowbeef says, "Second he was going to towel himself- Please Stop Lets Playing I Wanna Be The Guy." The word "towel" is frequently misheard, misread and miswritten as "tell" thanks to some unfortunate comedic timing of the situation. He's actually reading the first chapter of American Gods, at the point where Shadow considers taking a bath and toweling himself off.
Morality Chain: BillyMC quickly becomes this to the notoriously vitriolic Proteus, who describes him as his "one soft spot."
Proteus: Somebody's gotta care about Billy, why not me.
Motor Mouth: Aside from Memetic Badass Cornshaq, Slowbeef himself becomes one during his playthrough of the timed Arise 3, much to the confusion of Diabetus - and the viewers.
Proteus4994 also did his version of this in a response to the Cornshaq video.
slowbeef does it again in "Let's Pl-.............aypokemonwithnoaudio," where his narration has to race to cover the dialogue before it vanishes from the screen — and often fails. For bonus points, he sometimes has to pause mid-sentence due to the video lagging.
Ms. Fanservice: Brittany Cole in the Crime Wave Wrongpurae. The blatant fanservice is repeatedly mocked by the duo, who interpret it as a sleazy porn flick going on throughout the game.
Name's the Same: In "It Came From the TurboGrafx," the duo runs into this when they notice one of the graphics artists is named "Paul Ryan," the same as a candidate for Vice President of the United States in the year it was recorded.
Diabetus: Wow! Humble beginnings for a political career.
Nazi Gold: Slowbeef speculates that this is how NAVGTR's company was funded.
Never Live It Down: An early scene in Space Adventure Cobra gives the player the option to look at the female lead's feet. Retsupurae's In-Universe characterization of Cobra immediately became that of an obsessive foot fetishist who may or may not actually care what the feet are connected to. Of course, it didn't help that Cobra described them as "A work of art".
The duo is certainly not letting Proton Jon forget that he was tricked into doing an LP of a Super Mario World romhack because he heard that the maker was dying of Leukemia (which he faked). Every video that he's commentated in features this as a punchline towards the end of the video, with two of said videos being nothing but the punchline.
Nightmare Face: Generally averted in the Lechuza RP, which the pair summed up as essentially being Arise without the pop-scare JPGs. But ironically, the title screen may unintentionally startle some viewers (Like it did to Diabetus. Twice.) as it depicts the protagonist of the game wearing a wide-eyed expression, pouting fish-lips, covered with dirt and wearing slovenly clothes.
Slowbeef: OK, so he called it "Let's Play" but he's not really talking. He called it Worms but it's not Worms. So "Part 1" is maybe the only truthful part of this except there's no "Part 2" yet and I guess judging by that, there never will be!
No Indoor Voice: Shmorky, another one of their fellow goons who has guested on some early RPs.
"Not Making This Up" Disclaimer: The YouTube annotations appearing in "Adults React to PewDiePie" while Diabetus reads a list of PewDiePie video titles.
Not Safe for Work: Discussed in the "Meet 'N' Fuck Kingdom" retsufrash:
slowbeef: It's all censored, so you can watch this at work...although, I wouldn't recommend... Diabetus: Are you sure about that? "Johnson, what are you doing over there? Oh, that looks fine." slowbeef: I'm watching Meet 'N' *erp* Kingdom!
Not So Stoic: Diabetus is known for being one of the calmest of slowbeef's co-commentators. When he breaks, something has gone very wrong. For example, in the Darkseed 2 Wrongpurae, when the longplayer traverses through a boring mirror maze for the umpteenth time:
Diabetus: Wait, was there editing there? slowbeef: Yes. Diabetus: ...Editing what?! More mirror maze? "Wow, I got through that a little too quickly that time."
Obvious Beta: Metroid; Beginings [sic] stuns the duo with how outrageously buggy it is, which provides much of the video's humor.
Oh Crap: During the RP The Marios, this is the trio's general reaction when the creator of the bad LP in question, LuwiigiMaster, disses Retsupurae during his LP. Diabetus later comments that he should pre-screen LPs before bringing the gang over to riff them. If one reads the comments, the guy apparently was trying to purposely make a So Bad, It's Good video just to get RPed.
Made even more hilarious due to their depiction of said LPer as part of The Mafia.
Older Than They Sound: Noted in ZoopSoul's LP of Mega Man 9, Diabetus asked if this guy is older than 14 only for Proteus to tell him, "He's like 35".
Once per Episode: If doing a Gaming In The Clinton Years Retsupurae, Diabetus starts with a Double Entendre related to the game George Wood is reviewing in his best Bill Clinton impersonation. It gets to the point where Slowbeef is completely astounded by how many Clinton jokes he can come up with, considering the subject matter:
"Are you ready to contend with? what's in my pants?" "After I play Buster Brothers I'm gonna bust a nut!" "I'll show you why they call me Big Dong Donkey Kong." "Look in my pants and I'll show you why they call it the Playstation."
The legend continues with the new playlists Retsupurae have made on Youtube, with the description for the "Gaming in the Clinton Years" playlist as:
"When you hit my playlist you'll always wanna select repeat, baby."
Also, starting with the Wrongpurae of Last Alert (and intially meant as a one-off reference to their LP of Dead To Rights: Retribution where they did the same thing), every episode now ends with them both saying "Dead to Rights."
There's also his cajun brother, BayouBillyMC, and the "Hollywood Squares" episode introduced his sister, LaurenMC.
In the Space Adventure Cobra videos, they speculate on the existence of other music genre/medieval title combo characters in the vein of Rock Knight, such as Rap Duke and Country Squire.
slowbeef: And that's the end of Cobra... Diabetus: All right. slowbeef: ...Episode 5. Diabetus: Shorter let's play than usual but glad the good guys won this time.
Overly Long Gag: The beginning of Pursuit, where slowbeef and Proteus get stuck in Dialla's apartment for several minutes.
Diabetus drawing out an "Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..." during a particularly long stretch of nothingness in their Darkseed 2 wrongpurae.
Perverse Sexual Lust: In So there's that, MageKnight404 reveals that he has one for Linoan. The duo react the way you'd expect.
After RPing Joshie164, slowbeef encouraged his fans to give the original video several likes as it only had one dislike. Three days after the RP, the original video had 1,940 likes, and many very enthusiastic comments.
When one of Joshie's friends complained about RP mocking him, the commenters started asking him why he wasn't playing with Joshie. He said they all had lives.
lotrdude13: Too busy to hang out with your best friend? You're not very good friends.
Poe's Law: The guys have a little trouble with this sometimes. For instance, in The Marios they mistake a troll for an actual moron. They decide to start pre-screening videos beforehand after realizing they'd been fooled. In Amnesia: The Dork's Descent, Diabetus and Slowbeef argue about whether or not the LPer's hysterical terror is staged - Diabetus is positive that it is, while Slowbeef merely hopes so. The fact that the LPer in question, Jenomorph, favorited the video just hours after it was uploaded may support that theory.
They also occasionally have trouble accepting that Gaming In The Clinton Years was a "legitimate" video game show, as opposed to a very elaborate parody.
Power Trio: Slowbeef, Diabetus and Proteus, most commonly.
Slowbeef, Diabetus and Dave_O is also quite common.
"Even British people are saying 'I can't believe how British this guy sounds.'"
Their ElectricalBeast retsupuraes have even created all-new English stereotypes between the group: Specifically, the English can now travel through toime and telepor'.
Fake Brit: What they (and several of their fans) theorize ElectricalBeast is.
Railing Kill: Double Subverted. Diabetus remarks that Crime Patrol didn't have one of these, only for one to happen a second later.
"Shut up! There are no viewers. No one watched this to the end except me. It is a seriously horrible video, Quadraxis14. There is no skill inreplaying the same thing over and reloading save states over and over again. A monkey could do this. A kid can do this. It doesn't matter I don't know what the point of the video is. I don't know know why you're doing it. It will not make you popular in school. It will not get you girls or anything. It's a waste of time. I'm sorry. I'm taking away from 'On Liberty.'"
Reality Subtext: In one Restufrash, a reviewer gets way too excited that his name is Mike, same as one of the characters in the game. slowbeef makes fun of him, saying "Who the fuck is named 'Mike'?" (slowbeef's real name is Mike)
Diabetus: What does E.P.I.C. stand for again? Proteus: Epic... something, something, something. slowbeef: It's a recursive acronym.
Reference Overdosed: The guys try to take this trope to the absolute limit in their RP of Apocalypse dropping Bruce Willis movie references (since he starred in the game) for around 20 minutes until they give up and start referencing pretty much anything from pop culture by that point.
Rescue Sex: At the end of Ninja Hayate, after saving the princess, Diabetus tells it as it is.
Princess: My hero! Diabetus: "I'm gonna get laid, hyuh!"
Revenge Fic: The duo theorize that Mike Dawson must have done something to get Cyberdreams mad at him, considering Darkseed 2 portrays him as the most obnoxious man alive who even the characters in the game can't stand.
slowbeef: Amy must be like this bookworm chick who's into Let's Play, so he's trying to get his nerdy friends to help him do one, so he chose Super Bummerman! Diabetus: That sounds like the makings of the perfect teenage romantic comedy.
Running Gag: When making fun of adventure games, announcing an abrupt end to character interaction with variations of "Okay, bye!"
When a character opens their mouth ridiculously wide, Diabetus starts holding a note as if he were an opera star.
The Ridley voice, which becomes the voice of almost any reptilian enemy.
Diabetus often lampshades the seeming inability of video game characters to speak at a distance. Even when they're standing only a few feet from each other.
King Graham addressing some thugs: Gentlemen, please excuse me, I didn't mean to interrupt you. One thug, standing across a counter two feet from Graham, walks around the counter to Graham. Diabetus: [...] I will come over here and we will resume this conversation. Thug: Da inn's full! Ain't got no more rooms. Diabetus: ...I had to come over here to tell you that.
Diabetus's mentioning of different themes of music (eg. the "return the book to the library theme" in Dark Seed), usually during games that were lucky to have a dozen songs.
Slowbeef's using a Mentok-esque "bweeeeee-oop" during teleportation of rapid camera movement.
Around the time when they started Retsutalk is when "I have no X, and I must Y" became one of these. It eventually lead to their pseudo-wrongpurae of the game in question.
Referring to "the Youtube Emperor" to whom they can supposedly report bad LPs. Sometimes identified with Deceased Crab.
In the Negotiator/Ambition serious, Slowbeef is repeatedly surprised that the flash games had an executive producer.
Some videos incite giggling fits in the commentors at points later in the video. Earnest Evans is the greatest example of this, since the game simply becomes exponentially ridiculous as time goes on.
Sarcasm Failure: "I am sure that someone wants me to come up with something witty to say to this guy, but he is just faaaaat."
Diabetus: This just presents a slew of pun opportunities! I don't know where to start! So I won't.
Scenery Porn: In SnakemanMN Wants to Be the Guy, Slowbeef and Dave_O begin to marvel at the amazing detail of the background of I Want to Be the Guy when SnakemanMN pauses the game for two minutes to answer his phone.
Dave_O: You see there's purple bricks; but then there's also... hold on a second... grey ones. slowbeef: Woah, you're right! I would never have noticed that if he hadn't paused the game for a full minute to pick up the phone.
Scotireland: Diabetus and Slowbeef have no idea whether the LPer in this video is Scottish or Irish, so they split the difference.
Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Diabetus does this to an extent in part 4 of the "I have no mouth and I must scream" wrongpurae. He is implied to have turned away from the screen during the elevator sequence.
Self-Deprecation: In their RP of Policenauts, Diabetus comments that the only thing sadder than reviewing the game would be hacking it. Slowbeef, who was working on a translation patch for the game at the time, commented "I'll sa—fuck you."
Diabetus and his family are occasionally made the butt of jokes. In the RP of Nostalgic Rage's Mario 3 LP, they go on a tangent about if the LPer (who has a thick southern accent) is actually Diabetus' Dad. In another video, The self-titled "Worst Retsupurae Ever", Diabetus wishes the Pokemon LP would evolve into pornography, adding that he meant HUMAN porn, not Pokemon porn.
slowbeef: Look, I know you're from the south, and you don't understand how evolution works, but still... Proteus: He's from the South, so he understands having sex with animals, but these aren't real animals. Diabetus: I'm from the South, and evolution is what happens when Pokemon evolve into the Bible, right?
Near the end of the Nocturnal Letters Retsuflash, Diabetus comes to the conclusion that the titular game was made in the South due to its terrible graphics and Brother-Sister Incest subplot.
Proteus also mocked Slowbeef for basically being responsible for most of these:
Separate Scene Storytelling: Slowbeef and Diabetus play with this trope by acting as if the video game narrator for King's Quest V is really reading a book to his grandson. The "grandson," who the duo names Billy, then proceeds to ask questions to his grandfather about the oddness of the story.
Shaggy Dog Story: In the Cobra wrongpurae, slowbeef and Diabeetus sit through seven hours of the titular character's space adventures, only for it to end with a hurried sequence of events that the pair summarize thusly:
slowbeef: "Your two sisters died for a weapon I just shot...!"
Diabetus: "Well, that was all pretty pointless, wasn't it?"
Shout Out: Quite a few, including No Hope, which quickly turned into our boys systematically running through every single line from Star Wars that had been subject to Memetic Mutation.
slowbeef: This is the September 11th of Let's Play.
Later on his Formspring account, slowbeef actually said he owed Doug Walker an apology after watching Pew Die Pie.
Later on, he claimed Tobuscus was even worse than PewDiePie; in the Retsutalk after "Adults React To PewDiePie" he apologized and retracted the statement (though he maintains the opinion that Tobuscus is almost as bad).
In this Formspring post, slowbeef offered an apology to QueenieZ upon hearing that she apparently still receives hate mail and death threats over her Eternal Darkness LP.
During the Retsufrash of Exmortis, after going through another incredibly long journal, they suggest that the creator write novels or short stories.
Slowbeef: You guys got somethin' other than glass breakin' and fartin'? ...Think I got a siren. Proteus: I don't know, let me see what I can get on freesoundeffects.com. Diabetus: I'm gonna behead a chicken, you got one of them Yak Bak machines?
"Test Your Mig--oh it's over" features a random, TV-style bleep in the middle of the source video. The duo makes fun of this both when it happens and in the post commentary.
Soundtrack Dissonance: Space Adventure Cobra doesn't have that many music tracks, resulting in some wildly inappropriate music at times. Of course slowbeef points this out at every opportunity
The soundtrack of Deep Fear, which is actually quite good, is spoiled by the dullness of the situation.
Spin-Off: Webcam Ward, a video series on Something Awful with Slowbeef and Khad (Diabetus took Khad's place from When Fur is Rubbed the Wrong Way on) commentating on various other Youtube videos.
Stealth Pun: In this vid, Diabetus suggests that instead of hanging out with Solar Man and getting blazed, he and Slowbeef should simply chill, man. Just chill, man. Chill Man is the Robot Master weak to Solar Blaze in Mega Man 10.
Another, less subtle one shows up in the "Let's Rock Out" video with Diabetus commenting "I wonder how long he had to Muse over the song choice before he felt ready." The LP was of Knights of Cydonia, a song by the band.
Suspiciously Specific Denial: The "Meet 'N' Fuck Kingdom" video has all the sex scenes censored out, with the player adding in text lying about what the character was doing.
Narration: And then they drank tea. They certainly didn't engage in six incredibly frustrating, boring, and shameful sexual minigames that were so needlessly complex, these three girls are essentially the final bosses of Meet n' Fuck Kingdom. Nope.
slowbeef:: Maybe he was playing Chrono Trigger and doesn't realize when one game ends and the other begins? Diabetus:: Nah, I think he's just crazy. Beat slowbeef: Can't it be both?
slowbeef: Okay, this is Xenogears. So there's no fucking way you have a Bill Clinton joke. Diabetus:[In faux-Bill Clinton accent] I'll show you something that's Weltall. [beat] slowbeef:[astounded] Shit. Diabetus: Sorry.
In Let's Point at Super Metroid: "I propose this video cannot get worse from this moment. Seriously." Somehow, it did.
During the Escape RP:
slowbeef: Now to solve this puzzle tout suite. [places sink handle on faucet and turns it on] First we turn on the water...
Proteus: This might be the least retarded solution for any puzzle in this game yet. slowbeef: And we're going to stop up the water with the silver coin... Proteus: Never mind... spoke too soon...
During the Arise 4 RF, slowbeef mentions the how easy it is to accidentally click off a window during the game's awful combat sections, while he's fighting one of the enemies. No points for guessing what he dows almost immediately afterwards..
slowbeef: *Sigh* Y'know, maybe I'm making to much of this, maybe it's not that bad. I'm sure it has some appeal and there's probably nothing that terrible in these videos I mean you know -
Pew Die Pie: Look! He's raping her, he's raping her!
slowbeef: I'm sorry, what was that?
The Tape Knew You Would Say That: Invoked. In Worst Retsupurae Ever, Slowbeef remarks on the laziness of the Pokemon animators, saying "They won't care, they already spent their 100 yen!" Later the guys are joking about Kabuto:
Proteus: Kabuto? Isn't that the Japanese theater with all the face paint and shit? slowbeef: Might as well be. Proteus: And I know someone's going to comment on this, yes, it's Kabuki, I know, shut up. slowbeef: It's probably going to be the same guy who says, "You know, slowbeef, 100 yen is not a lot of money." In fact he's probably going to make it before he gets to this part; "LOL, great video guys, but seriously, 100 yen isn't a lot of money."
The "That's So Kaizo!" videos gave us this gem:
slowbeef: Now maybe I'll two-star this video instead...I know someone in the comments is gonna say the stupid thing—alright, fine, thumbs down, or whatever they do on YouTube. Diabetus: Middle finger, actually.
As the Wrongpurae of the Jurassic Park arcade game draws to a close, slowbeef realizes he's been referring to the Triceratops as a Stegosaurus for the entire game, and suspects everyone will leave comments to correct him. They did.
This Is for Emphasis, Bitch!: In the animation Refund, the character screams in a monotone "BITCH, GET THE FUCK OFF ME. DIE, BITCH, DIE. GO TO HELL, YOU LITTLE BITCH, DIE." Later in the video, it provoked the following discussion.
slowbeef: I— maybe it was, like, how to get a refund... Like, "Don't be afraid to take back your pumpkins." Diabetus: "This is an example of a defective product. Here's what you should do in this situation, bitch."
They also did it before that.
slowbeef: Why didn't he just put a text that said I WAS DISPLEASED and save some animation? Diabetus:MY SHOPPING EXPERIENCE WAS SUBPAR. slowbeef:Bitch. Diabetus: Die.
From the Zelda video: "I like to throw in curses every so often, bitch."
Narration: Why do I feel so... trapped? Proteus: Oh, I see what you did there. slowbeef: I can't believe that they actually did that.
Later, during the third game of the series they throw in forced title drops to all three games in the series—Trapped, Pursuit and Escape—in immediate succession.
Dialla: Why do I feel so... trapped? slowbeef: W-why do I feel so trapped?! Proteus: I feel trapped! Trapped in this pursuit— both: —and I have to escape!
Strangely averted in the Satanorium Retsufrash, which causes slowbeef to repeatedly mispronounce it as "sanatorium."
Toilet Humor: A Running Gag in their Rise of the Dragon Wrongpurae involved the inexplicable fart noises the machines made. A door in the dark world of Dark Seed 2 had a similar sound effect that they commented on as well.
Troll: "The Marios", which they discover that the LP was intentionally made to be horrible. The total derailment of their commentary is hilarious.
There was another troll video RP at one point. It was an absolutely atrocious Mario 64 LP by "SuperCrazyHealthBar", but this time, when Slowbeef and Diabetus realized that he made it intentionally bad to be RP'd, they immediately privitized and cut all ties to it. It's a shame too, since it was a pretty good riffing. (Reuploaded here)
Mostly likely taken down because, while the aforementioned "The Marios" was cleverly done and entertaining to watch on its own, the Mario 64 LP went on for over thirty videos, all of which were nigh-impossible to watch due to the horrific screechy audio.
slowbeef: It seems like it's a troll, except it went on for 33 videos. Like, he thought this was really funny. Diabetus:No one carries on a joke that long.
Troperiffic: How slowbeef and Diabetus describe Jimmy from Dark Seed 2, very nearly right down to the name:
Diabetus: I'm sure the guy who calls himself 'the local wiseguy' is, in fact, the local wiseguy. slowbeef: "By the way, I'm quote-unquote 'mobbed up'!" Diabetus: "I'm a bit of a 'loose cannon', they would say!" slowbeef: "If you've ever seen The Sopranos, maybe? I'm like the guy on DVD 2" Diabetus: "You'll find me all over TV Tropes!"
Upon watching the intro movie to Evil Zone, they deduce that the game will feature just about every anime trope possible. Their hypothesis turns out to be more or less accurate.
The Unfavorite: BillyMC whose older brother, JacobMC, is much more liked by his parents. To the point where Billy's Christmas present is two McDonald's French Fries that a hobo rubbed on his armpits. And the dog ate one. "You got JacobMC an Xbox 360!" "Well he's much better at Mario than you, and he's a Harvard graduate."
Conveniently enough, there is a jacobmc channel on Youtube which contains a few regular videos. Nevertheless, every comment section of his videos and profile is filled with avid BillyMC supporters yelling their abuse at the inactive Jacob.
Narrator: Alexander pulls out his "Magic Map". Diabetus: Yeah, that's a euphemism if I've ever heard one. slowbeef: Every time he says that, I'm expecting something horrible!
Diabetus really likes to say "Battletoads", by the way - he does it several times completely unprompted during both his Battletoads LPs and his MST of the Battletoads pilot.
As mentioned above, slowbeef demonstrated in "Resident Seavil 2" that his habit of narrating illogical or abrupt story transitions with "Meanwhile, Back at the..." is more deep-seated than he realized when he unsuccessfully attempted to not say it throughout the whole video.
slowbeef: We use the matches with the deodorant to get a flamethrower, to kill the beast with the burning flesh!
What Did I Do Last Night?: According to Slowbeef, he and Diabetus got drunk and woke up to find that they had recorded an hour and a half retsupurae on an LP of Last Alert with no player commentary.
Diabetus: Uh, a drunk British person trying to sound American?
slowbeef: Sounds to me like an American who burned his tongue on soup trying to sound British.
They also have trouble with the main character's accent in Arrival in Hell. They eventually conclude that he's Australian.
Most viewers' reaction to PsychedelicEyeball's accent. note He's French Canadian, if you're wondering.
Their reaction to Mrs. Ramirez in the Wrongpurae of DarkSeed 2. They eventually narrow it down form "European Mish-Mash" to "Vaguely Irish/Swedish", but have definitely ruled out any sort of Hispanic accent.
The Worf Effect: The first scene with the titular character in Psycho Killer involves the protagonist kicking him in the head, knocking his machete out of his hands.
slowbeef: But we beat up the killer. He's not threatening anymore. He's really more just like a Psycho Jerk.
World Of Pun: Let's Play IMDB was chock full of lame Bruce Willis puns. Eventually they just end up using random movie/TV show titles.
You Didn't See That: In Billy MC's Christmas Adventure, both Slowbeef and Diabeetus are shocked when it seems that Billy has used a savestate to fix a mistake. They both admonish him and tell him that they'll look away this time... note It was actually a strangely-placed edit.
You Keep Using That Word: in the KaizoMario 64 videos, they jokingly use "kaizo" an awful lot in many varying contexts. (For the record, it just means "hacked", which nobody can really deny the game in the videos is, no matter how poorly.)
slowbeef: I like how he stole 'kaizo', like that's the ubiquitous term for bad romhacks that are more annoying to play than anything.
Your Head A Splode: This recurring trope of slowbeef's LPs has finally made its presence in Retsupurae in the form of the Dark World counterpart of Mike Dawson's mother, serving as the Dark Seed 2 longplay's only FunnyMoment Of Awesome.
Retsutalk
Absentee Actor: Slowbeef is not present in episodes 3 (or its extension, episode 3.5), 12, and 13. Diabetus was away for episode 16.
Episode 23 does not feature Slowbeef or Diabetus, but is done by Ironicus, his fiance, and Chip Cheezum about C2E2.
Badass Boast: Dave_o makes one for slowbeef when discussing how dangerous Camden, New Jersey is, complete with an action voice.
dave_o: Slowbeef works out there.
Bait and Switch: Milked for all its worth whenever there's a big issue.
Genre Killer: In episode 14, Slowbeef claims that Let's Players like PewDiePie and Tobuscus are going to lead to the downfall of LPing as a whole.
In episode 24, he mentions that L Pers who make the "Lets Play" videos that focus on themselves with the actual game as white noise, and Lets Players who more or less just churn out whatever new or popular without any preparation are this and what he thinks is one of the main reasons companies like Nintendo actively started to claim the ad revenue from Lets play videos.
Hilarity Sues: In Episode 15, their discussion about Sega turns into this.
The Jersey Devil: Dave_o theorizes that slowbeef is this in episode 8.
Lower Deck Episode: The "theme" of episodes 3 and 3.5, where Diabetus and General Ironicus talk about being "LP sidekicks" to slowbeef and Chip Cheezum respectively.
A Rare Sentence: Slowbeef says he has trouble believing that he's saying the phrase "ProtonJon was tricked into doing a Super Mario World ROM hack LP."
Running Gag: Transitioning with "so there's that."
The Breaking Bad comparisons in Episode 2, and Diabetus fixing things in post in episode 8.
Diabetus mentioning that he'll fix or edit entire chunks of the recording out in post.
Shout Out: Episode 9 has a segment where Slowbeef and Diabetus give shout outs to some Let's Plays on the forums that they enjoy.
Values Dissonance: Discussed in the 16th episode regarding how the Japanese handle spoilers compared to North America. Basically, spoiling something in the Japanese section of the internet blackballs the user and Japanese forums can have separate threads on a game: one where people are starting the game and one where people have finished the game and can freely reveal spoilers. invoked
Vulgar Humor: Discussed in Episode 10, where slowbeef argues that PewDiePie is overtly bringing this up in regards to rape and other vulgar jokes in a misguided attempt to be funny.
Be Careful What You Wish For: In Retsupurae Sonic Advance 2, after sitting through two-and-a-half minutes of repetitive commentary about the level, Ironicus asks for the LPer to say something new. Less than 15 seconds later, he unfortunately gets his wish. note The LPer starts thinking that Eggman kidnapped Cream's mother to be a sexual object
Filler: Remember, kids, having long videos is not the same thing as having lots of content. Particularly evident in nacho, where the host is already done three minutes in, but stays in the level for seven more minutes, doing absolutely nothing so he can fill up the YouTube time limit. With this in mind, it's no surprise that he's spent over a year LPing Banjo-Tooie.
Foreshadowing: In ChipCheezum's riff on the first episode of Elemental Goddess, he makes a random joke about how much he hates Jews, followed by Ironicus telling him "we're not doing that episode yet." Flash-forward to several months later and the riff of The Special Episode and, well...
Freudian Slip: Chip joked that the guy who did an LP of Pong was only allowed to watch news broadcasts from decades ago. After accidentally saying he had to watch nude broadcasts from decades ago.
GeneralIronicus: This is the world's best argument against girl on girl action! [...] ChipCheezum: I feel weird right now! This is wrong! Usually, I'd be like "YEEEEAAH!", but right now, right now...
Lazy Artist: Chip calls out the author of The Mike Weiss Show for this.
Brother-Sister Incest: Blazzerdragon tells a story about how a lesbian friend of his slept with her brother because she thought he was his boyfriend... or something.
Rapid-Fire Comedy: His take on one of qzecwx's videos (back when annotations could be added by anyone) ends up turning into this, as the voiced annotations often overlap one another.
(The player hits a P-Switch, causing the music to change into the famous Super Mario Bros theme) dbzisdakrunk:I have no idea where he got that! LesBeardly: Keep working on your sarcasm, buddy. I'm sure it'll improve with time. Guest Commentator: Well, if you look at it, it's either the Mario 1 music, or - LesBeardly: No, I take that back. It actually worked on his guest commentator there.
as well as Viddler
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