History Main / BackFromTheBrink

* UsefulNotes/TheRomanRepublic during the UsefulNotes/PunicWars, especially after Cannae. This catastrophic loss drove people to such despair that the Romans actually performed acts of HumanSacrifice to appease the Gods who seemed to have abandoned them. They then spent the next few years steadily supporting and helping their clients in a war of attrition, enjoying a lucky break with Hannibal not marching straight to Rome[[note]]or so it seemed to them at the time; Hannibal had no practical way of breaching the city walls, and didn't have the numbers or supplies to maintain a siege while the other Italian cities remained loyal to Rome[[/note]]. Thanks to generals like Scipio Africanus and Marcellus, eventually the Romans out-strategized the Carthaginians, turned their Numidian cavalry against them, and came out on top at the Battle of Zama.

* ''VideoGame/{{Nectaris}}'' takes place on the moon. Before the opening mission, the entire moon has been taken over and, in the opening mission, the player commands the last survivors of the Union army (little of this is mentioned in game though; mainly, it's AllThereInTheManual).

* In the second half of ''VideoGame/FireEmblemGenealogyOfTheHolyWar'', the player takes control of Seliph and a ragtag band of rebels, starting in an obscure corner of an entire continent that the villain took over during the first half of the game.
* ''VideoGame/FireEmblemRadiantDawn''. The player starts with the control of Daein's [[LaResistance Dawn Brigade]], and in the only run the country really is restored; however, in Part III, when you play part their side part (as [[DealWithTheDevil pawn]] to TheEmpire) their opponents', they're steadfastly losing, and their LastStand ends as a dramatic defeat. It's also averted with the enemy country, Crimea; Crimea was the attacker in the conflict with TheEmpire, and was not losing in any sense of the word. It's played straight if you think of Crimea's [[TheWomanWearingTheQueenlyMask queen]], though, who in Part II was under fierce criticism and had faced a rebellion in her own country, and whose position in Part III is much more established.
* In ''VideoGame/DarkWizard'' the player, as the latest successor to King Armer VIII, starts with the tiniest, most-defeated remnant of the Holy Army (three unnamed units) that's been squirreled away in the far-off wastelands of Quentin. While a professional army made up of the [[LinearWarriorsQuadraticWizards much-stronger]] equipment-wearing, magic-using units is impossibly expensive for your tiny starting tax base, you can still fight using a never-ending stream of [[SummonMagic summoned]] {{Mon}}, just like all of your opponents.
* ''VideoGame/YggdraUnion'' begins with the nation of Fantasinia all but conquered by an invading empire, with the army in ruins, the capital captured and the royal family killed, with the exception of a survivng princess being hunted down. Then she meets a noble thief and a surviving knight...

One particular demographic that was thankful for Russian intervention were Syrian Christians, who had been getting slaughtered with little media coverage. The major reason was because American airstrikes selectively hit only ISIS (with the occasional al-Nusra target), and [[SelectiveObliviousness refused to acknowledge]] the fact that plenty of the so-called "moderate" anti-Assad groups (such as Ahrar ash-Sham, Islamic Front, and some factions of the Free Syrian Army) were butchering Christians as well. The Russian forces had only one simple rule: [[ShootEverythingThatMoves terminate everyone who was against Assad.]] It should come as no surprise that Syrian Christians had been some of the most loyal Assad supporters long before the Russians entered the picture due to the SAA being the best hope of protection they had.

* ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'' starts off with the Reapers' invasion of Earth, crushing all resistance in their path. Commander Shepard is forced to flee the planet in order to gather allies and resources to take back Earth.

** David Petraeus lead The Surge that significantly reduced the violence in Iraq. He did this using his reinforcements to implement a strategy of counter-insurgency. Coalition troops lived among Iraqi civilians and protected them rather than sortieing out from massive secured compounds outside Baghdad. After a brief spike, fatalities fell by nearly a third and continued dropping until the total withdrawal was complete. Given that events are still in motion in that nation, [[RuleOfCautiousEditingJudgement it is debatable whether he was really successful in the long run.]]

* Somewhat [[JustifiedTrope justified]] in ''VideoGame/{{Drakengard}}'', as the main reason [[TheFederation the Union]] comes back from the brink of destruction despite your character having been around the whole time and [[BadassNormal whooping ass]] is that he's just gained the allegiance of ''a dragon.'' The second level which you play involves [[KillEmAll killing the entire besieging army with the dragon.]] Not content to be one-upped, TheEmpire deploys some interesting SchizoTech during a later [[FinalBattle climactic battle]], and when even that fails, just [[DeathFromAbove screws everyone over]].

* ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft: Wrath of the Lich King'' basically has the good side start with a few cities where the player (almost singlehandedly) takes back huge sections of regions and fights and kills thousands of overratedly-overpowered undead, all the way to the Lich King's throne.
** Furthermore, when you fight and get the Lich King down far enough in health, he instantly kills your entire raid, at which point the LK's ghost father conveniently comes out of nowhere, resurrects everyone, and then stunlocks the Lich King long enough for your raid to leave, have tea and biscuits, and finish him off.

** In ''VideoGame/StarFoxAssault'', the Cornerian fleet is about to be decimated by Andrew's forces before the Great Fox suddenly warps in, whereupon Star Fox basically wipes out most of Andrew's army in a matter of minutes.
*** Later on, [[spoiler:the Aparoids attack Corneria itself and even nearly assimilate [[ReasonableAuthorityFigure General Pepper]]]] in Star Fox's absence. As soon as they arrive to take care of business, the crisis is quickly averted.

** During the opening cutscene, ''VideoGame/AceCombat5TheUnsungWar'' kills off every pilot on the base except for the player, his squadron and their commander. To be fair, however, there's never really a BackFromTheBrink point within the game itself.

*** Which is a perfect demonstration of why the trope is necessary: The first mission is laughably easy ButThouMust retreat anyway. Even though the player could (and eventually does) almost single-handedly wipe the floor with the entire Estovakian military.

** In the second half of ''VideoGame/FireEmblemGenealogyOfTheHolyWar'', the player takes control of Seliph and a ragtag band of rebels, starting in an obscure corner of an entire continent that the villain took over during the first half of the game.
** Played straight, subverted and averted in ''VideoGame/FireEmblemRadiantDawn''. The player starts with the control of Daein's [[LaResistance Dawn Brigade]], and in the only run the country really is restored; however, in Part III, when you play part their side part (as [[DealWithTheDevil pawn]] to TheEmpire) their opponents', they're steadfastly losing, and their LastStand ends as a dramatic defeat. It's also averted with the enemy country, Crimea; Crimea was the attacker in the conflict with TheEmpire, and was not losing in any sense of the word. It's played straight if you think of Crimea's [[TheWomanWearingTheQueenlyMask queen]], though, who in Part II was under fierce criticism and had faced a rebellion in her own country, and whose position in Part III is much more established.

** Extra points because the first enemy you fight is a glorified warrior unit called "Warlord," who is the weakest spell-caster and summoner out of all the enemy generals.

* The ''VideoGame/JaggedAlliance'' series has a sort-of-justified version of this trope. Being that your troops are a band of mercenaries - essentially a new infusion of ace personnel into a war presumably already won - the enemies start out easy because they're routine patrols that get surprised by people who can actually shoot them. In Jagged Alliance 2 specifically, [[BigBad Queen Deidranna]] is a [[BadBoss vain, cruel, and egotistical dictator]] who nevertheless keeps a goodly portion of her guard around the things that actually do matter - her gold mines, her towns filled with either smarmy sycophants or cowering subjects, and her SAM sites. The first secures the economy and allows her to maintain her expensive and well-equipped army, the second secures her status as ruler and dissuades open rebellion, and the third forces any would-be saviors to hoof it unless they can destroy or take over the sites.

* In ''Film/TheTerminator'', practically a trope namer:

* Somewhat [[JustifiedTrope justified]] in ''VideoGame/{{Drakengard}}'', as the main reason [[TheFederation the Union]] comes back from the brink of destruction despite your character having been around the whole time and [[BadassNormal whooping ass]] is that he's just gained the allegiance of ''a dragon.'' The second level which you play involves [[KillEmAll killing the entire besieging army with the dragon.]] Not content to be one-upped, TheEmpire deploys some interesting SchizoTech during a later [[FinalBattle climactic battle]], and when even that fails, just [[DeathFromAbove screws everyone over.]]

* In the second half of ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemJugdral Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War]]'', the player takes control of Celice and a ragtag band of rebels, starting in an obscure corner of an entire continent that the villain took over during the first half of the game.
** Played straight, subverted and averted in ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemTellius Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn]]''. The player starts with the control of Daein's [[LaResistance Dawn Brigade]], and in the only run the country really is restored; however, in Part III, when you play part their side part (as [[DealWithTheDevil pawn]] to TheEmpire) their opponents', they're steadfastly losing, and their LastStand ends as a dramatic defeat. It's also averted with the enemy country, Crimea; Crimea was the attacker in the conflict with TheEmpire, and was not losing in any sense of the word. It's played straight if you think of Crimea's [[TheWomanWearingTheQueenlyMask queen]], though, who in Part II was under fierce criticism and had faced a rebellion in her own country, and whose position in Part III is much more established.
** Also played straight in the prequel ''Path of Radiance'' for Crimea against Daein, is then TheEmpire.

** The UsefulNotes/ByzantineEmpire that followed later had a habit of this. While territory was lost multiple times, crafty Emperors found ways to come back from massive defeats and humiliations time and time again. While they eventually were conquered by the Ottoman Turks, by that point they had come back enough times from near destruction that historians ponder if they could have recovered just as they had against the Arabs and the Seljuk Turks with a comparatively minor change of events.

* In ''Halcyon 6'', the New Terran Federation is all but wiped out at the start of the game by a new powerful interdimensional enemy. In a YouAreInCommandNow manner, the NonEntityGeneral has been left in charge of the titular {{Precursor}} SpaceStation. It's up to you to upgrade the station, recruit officers, collect resources, rebuild the fleet, locate any surviving colonies and mines, and fight off any power that wants the station for themselves (they were formerly kept in check by the Federation fleet). And, of course, you have to eventually take the fight to the unknown aggressors.

* UsefulNotes/TheRomanRepublic during the UsefulNotes/PunicWars, especially after Cannae. This catastrophic loss drove people to such despair that the Romans actually performed acts of HumanSacrifice to appease the Gods who seemed to have abandoned them. They then spent the next few years steadily supporting and helping their clients in a war of attrition, enjoying a lucky break with Hannibal not marching straight to Rome[[note]]or so it seemed to them at the time; Hannibal had no practical way of breaching the city walls, and didn't have the numbers or supplies to maintain a siege while the other Italian cities remained loyal to Rome[/note]]. Thanks to generals like Scipio Africanus and Marcellus, eventually the Romans out-strategized the Carthaginians, turned their Numidian cavalry against them, and came out on top at the Battle of Zama.

* UsefulNotes/TheRomanRepublic during the UsefulNotes/PunicWars, especially after Cannae. This catastrophic loss drove people to such despair that the Romans actually performed acts of HumanSacrifice to appease the Gods who seemed to have abandoned them. They then spent the next few years steadily supporting and helping their clients in a war of attrition, enjoying a lucky break with Hannibal not marching straight to Rome. Thanks to generals like Scipio Africanus and Marcellus, eventually the Romans out-strategized the Carthaginians, turned their Numidian cavalry against them, and came out on top at the Battle of Zama.

* {{Homefront}} feels like this. North Korea has seized practically all of the United States, and you play as a recruit of a small resistance faction that eventually tries to meet up with the remains of the US military and start turning the war against North Korea, even though they have all but won already.

* In ''Franchise/TheElderScrolls'' series, this is the case for the [[OurElvesAreBetter Dunmeri]] [[TheClan Great House]] [[ProudWarriorRace Redoran]]. House Redoran was almost completely destroyed during the [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion Oblivion Crisis]] after they rallied to defend against the invading [[LegionsOfHell Daedra]]. ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim Skyrim]]'''s ''Dragonborn'' reveals that Redoran has recovered quite well in the [[TimeSkip 200 years]] that followed, organizing most of the relief efforts following the [[ColonyDrop Red]] [[ChekhovsVolcano Year]] and raising a [[BadassArmy standing army]] to fight back against the [[LizardFolk Argonian]] invasion. Now, they're the current leaders of the Dunmer Council and their city of Blacklight has become the capital of Dunmer controlled Morrowind following the Argonian sacking of Mournhold.

One particular demographic that was thankful for Russian intervention were Syrian Christians, who had been getting slaughtered with little media coverage. The major reason was because American airstrikes selectively hit only ISIS (with the occasional al-Nusra target), and [[SelectiveObliviousness refused to acknowledge]] the fact that plenty of the so-called "moderate" anti-Assad groups (such as Ahrar ash-Sham, Islamic Front, and some factions of the Free Syrian Army) were butchering Christians as well. The Russian forces had only one simple rule: [[KillEmAll terminate everyone who was against Assad.]] It should come as no surprise that Syrian Christians had been some of the most loyal Assad supporters long before the Russians entered the picture due to the SAA being the best hope of protection they had.

* UsefulNotes/WorldWarI. By early 1918, the GermanEmpire had practically conquered Eastern Europe, were about to come to a permanent peace settlement that would give them most of their conquests, all the Central Powers were- while shaken- still in the fight, and the Balkans front had been effectively pacified with the fall of Romania and Serbia. The Germans and Austro-Hungarians were shifting forces for two massive simultaneous assaults to try and destroy the Western Allies by striking both in France and Italy- and would drive so far that they began minting medals in preparation for the falls of Paris and Venice, all while the Entente could not even divert needed units from Africa because of Von Lettow's actions and the Senussi rebellion. The only GOOD news for the Western Allies was that the US had now entered the war, but it was stuck with a seriously under-strength, under-equipped, undertrained, and under-experienced force on the wrong side of the Atlantic Ocean. Then came the Balkan offensive, the Turkish surrender, Diaz's reforms and "three great campaigns" to anihilate the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Belleau Wood, Amiens, the Hundred Days, and finally the October mutiny that struck at the heart of the Kasierreich.

** [[UsefulNotes/{{Baseball}} The 2004 Boston Red Sox]] were the only Pro NA team ''not'' in the NHL to accomplish this. After losing the first 3 to [[TheRival their hated rival]], the New York Yankees,[[note]]including a rally that fell short in Game 1 and an out-an-out {{Curb Stomp|Battle}}ing in Game 3,[[/note]] they had a brief HopeSpot when they took a 1 run lead in the Bottom of the 5th in Game 4, but were then down 1 after the Yankee's next at-bat. It wasn't until the bottom of the ninth,[[note]]with Mariano "Sandman" Rivera on the mound to finish the Sox off,[[/note]] that the Red Sox were able to tie it again on a stolen base and a double; the game ended in the 12th on a David Ortiz homer. It was also up to Ortiz to end Game 5 ''in the 14th'' after the Red Sox had to rally in the 8th to counter the Yankee's 6th inning rally. After that, though, the Red Sox took and kept the lead in Games 6 & 7, and the St. Louis Cardinals became nothing more than an afterthought, though Sox 1st Baseman was [[GenreSavvy wary of this Trope]] and encouraged his team to not let the Cardinals win that Game 4 lest the Cards BeatThemAtTheirOwnGame.

* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaI'': The previous legendary hero was slain long ago, Ganon's forces have ravaged Hyrule, the Triforce is shattered, and all that remains of the kingdom are a few random old people hiding in caves. And then Link appears.
* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTwilightPrincess'': By the time Link starts fighting back the twilight, it's taken over all of Hyrule apart from Link's hometown, Ordon Village. In fact, they would have gotten that area too had Link not come back at just the right time to kill off the Twilight Beasts.
* The second part of ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'' begins with Ganondorf in almost complete control of Hyrule.