History Main / LockedDoor

** Locked doors are frequent in the ''VideoGame/YoshisIsland'' and ''VideoGame/WarioLand'' series. In the former case, it'0s not limited to fortresses and caves - some of the minigame huts have their entrance doors locked and need a key to be opened.

* Doors in ''VideoGame/JetForceGemini'' are usually locked in one of the following three ways: By the life force of all the Drones and Airborne Squadrons that have to be dispatched beforehand, by requiring a key (in this case, a colored electronic card that matches the color of the seal that acts like the door's lock), or by requiring a specific item that is exclusive in access and use to one of the playable characters (a crowbar so Juno can enter the trap doors, a traditional key so Vela can open the door that leads to a mine in Rith Essa, a pair of goggles so Lupus can open a door that leads to a very dark room, or simply the presence of Floyd so he can allow the current character to open a door leading to a minigame dedicated to Floyd himself).

* There are numerous locked doors throughout ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros2'' mostly within the castles and dungeons. Getting the key to the door is a challenge in of itself, because [[FloatingMask Phanto]] will continuously hound the characters as long as they have the key.

* ''VideoGame/JaggedAlliance 2'' has a number of locked doors, sometimes leading to important objectives but morte often just barring access to useful loot. The keys can occasionally be found in the possession of dead enemies, but more often than not you're going to have to force it with a crowbar (heavy, takes up inventory space), lockpick kit (better hope you've got a team member with relevant skills) or if all else fails explosives (expensive to ship in and hard to find). You could also attempt to ShootOutTheLock, but this rarely if ever actually worked. The v1.13 mod makes this process a bit less painful by adding a combat knife that doubles as a crowbar and a multi-tool that can be used for lockpicking, both of which are smaller and lighter than their vanilla counterparts, and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hatton_round specialist door-breaching ammunition]] for shotguns that can OneHitKO any mechanical lock.

* The ''Franchise/FireEmblem'' series has locked doors in nearly every game. Typically, a key is required to open them, but in most games a thief can open doors without the need for keys (In some games they require a lockpick to do this, but most of the time thieves can do it without needing any items at all). Sometimes doors will open on their own due to events, and sometimes enemies or [=NPCs=] will open doors by themselves. [[VideoGame/FireEmblemTellius Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn]] also allowed you to bash doors down with your weapons, but this could take several turns depending on how much HP the door had.

* Podcast/DiceFunk: The party spends an inordinate amount of time trying to get through the service entrance of the Pickman Academy.

* In ''VideoGame/FTLFasterThanLight'', upgraded doors have in IFF system which forces hostile {{board|ingParty}}ers to waste time {{shoot|OutTheLock}}ing them while still allowing friendlies to waltz through. Hacking a system reverses said IFF system for all doors leading to its room, allowing boarders to pass freely while the crew has difficulty entering or leaving. Hacking a door system allows for temporary reversal of IFF for ''all'' doors on the ship.

* Parodied and [[DefiedTrope defied]] in ''VideoGame/DiscworldII''. Rincewind, upon encountering a locked door, launches into a tirade about how he'll be expected to go on a series of {{Fetch Quest}}s to persuade a character to give him the key, and eventually demands that the bearer of the key just hands it over to him. He does, only for it to be revealed that the locked door was on a false wall around which Rincewind could simply have walked.

* AfterTheEnd [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt of the world]] in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVI'', every single door in Narshe is locked... even though there are only two people left in town at all. You can't even [[InterchangeableAntimatterKeys find keys for them]], but you ''can'' look for a master [[strike:thief]]treasure hunter to pick them for you.

* ''Franchise/MassEffect'' frequently has these, but usually no keys. Some doors have {{Plot Lock}}s, while others are opened with Shepard's hacking skills.

[[/folder]]

[[folder:Stealth Based Game]]
* In ''VideoGame/SplinterCell'', while many locks can be picked or forced, there are some doors which won't open because they are "jammed".

[[folder:Survival Horror]]
* The ''Franchise/ResidentEvil'' series is infamous for having maze-like layouts in every building imaginable, usually locked in surprisingly archaic fashion.
** The first game has doors that Jill, the MasterOfUnlocking, can open with her lockpick, but every other door requires a unique key since her lockpick apparently doesn't work on those types of doors. The novel handwaves it by stating the special locks are too complex for Jill to use her lockpick on. Jill can also pick open locked desks with ease while Chris is forced to find small keys to open the same drawers. The locked desk concept is also carried over to ''Resident Evil 2''. There, the locked door phenomenon is explained as a fad by the city developers for crazy games.
** Averted in ''Outbreak'', as some locked doors can be broken open after taking a good enough beating.
* In ''Franchise/SilentHill'', if a door is "locked", it can eventually be opened, if the lock is "jammed" or "broken", it's permanently locked.

[[folder:Third Person Shooter]]
* In ''VideoGame/{{Crusader}}: No Remorse'', all but the most heavily-armored blast-doors can be bypassed by applying enough high explosives. Doing so will, however, set off an alarm and send waves of foes your way - not to mention that you may well miss other important or useful things in the areas you thus bypass. But it's undeniably realistic...
* Since ''VideoGame/RedFaction'' allows you to destroy the walls, if you see a locked door, you can just blow a hole around the door and bypass it. In one scene, you are instructed to do so, but if you have trouble getting past it, the ReverseMole will unlock the door for you. In practice the big complaint levelled at the game was that so many doors, floors, and office cubicles were made of magic stuff that's immune to your earth-shaking rocket launchers, to ensure that the player couldn't break the key-fetch procedure or run away from a boss fight.
* Inverted in ''VideoGame/{{MDK}}''. Instead of flimsy locked doors that can't be blown open, even though you're armed with nuclear weapons, you'll find twenty-foot-tall, two-foot-thick steel monstrosities that can ONLY be opened with nuclear weapons.
* Doors in ''VideoGame/JetForceGemini'' are usually locked in one of the following three ways: By the life force of all the Drones and Airborne Squadrons that have to be dispatched beforehand, by requiring a key (in this case, a colored electronic card that matches the color of the seal that acts like the door's lock), or by requiring a specific item that is exclusive in access and use to one of the playable characters (a crowbar so Juno can enter the trap doors, a traditional key so Vela can open the door that leads to a mine in Rith Essa, a pair of goggles so Lupus can open a door that leads to a very dark room, or simply the presence of Floyd so he can allow the current character to open a door leading to a minigame dedicated to Floyd himself).
* In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil4'', padlocks can be removed with a swing of the knife and most fences can be jumped over, an exception being a certain InsurmountableWaistHeightFence with a Locked Gate.

[[folder:Turn-Based RPG]]
* In ''VideoGame/ShiningForceII'':
** Try to enter any house in Ribble besides the northernmost one. Any one at all. The citizens will not be milling about until you enter the mayor's house and go through the little cutscene. This is also the only way to open the [[SavePoint church]] and shops, as well as get a new [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters Force Member]].
** Inverted in battle: If out in the open, you cannot enter a town in order to get out of battle if one is nearby (Unless using Egress or Angel Wing). Similarly, if a battle is in town, in the second game, at least, no party member can leave the map to enter the castle, any house, or leave town.

[[folder:Other]]
* Podcast/DiceFunk: The party spends an inordinate amount of time trying to get through the service entrance of the Pickman Academy.
-->'''Austin:''' Foiled by a door!
* ''VideoGame/JaggedAlliance 2'' has a number of locked doors, sometimes leading to important objectives but morte often just barring access to useful loot. The keys can occasionally be found in the possession of dead enemies, but more often than not you're going to have to force it with a crowbar (heavy, takes up inventory space), lockpick kit (better hope you've got a team member with relevant skills) or if all else fails explosives (expensive to ship in and hard to find). You could also attempt to ShootTheLockOff, but this rarely if ever actually worked. The v1.13 mod makes this process a bit less painful by adding a combat knife that doubles as a crowbar and a multi-tool that can be used for lockpicking, both of which are smaller and lighter than their vanilla counterparts, and [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hatton_round specialist door-breaching ammunition]] for shotguns that can OneHitKO any mechanical lock.
* The ''Franchise/FireEmblem'' series has locked doors in nearly every game. Typically, a key is required to open them, but in most games a thief can open doors without the need for keys (In some games they require a lockpick to do this, but most of the time thieves can do it without needing any items at all). Sometimes doors will open on their own due to events, and sometimes enemies or [=NPCs=] will open doors by themselves. [[VideoGame/FireEmblemTellius Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn]] also allowed you to bash doors down with your weapons, but this could take several turns depending on how much HP the door had.

[[folder:Web Original]]
* Parodied in [[http://www.duelinganalogs.com/comic/2007/05/10/smashing-good-time/ this]] ''Dueling Analogs'' strip.
* ''[[Creator/BobChipman TheGameOverthinker]]'': Uses these as an example of how realism isn't always the best thing in games.
* In the ''WebVideo/TheLegendOfZeldaTheAbridgedSeries'', after getting the Mega Crush Hammer, Link and Navi skip all of the puzzles and just bash open the doors with it.

* The ''FireEmblem'' series has locked doors in nearly every game. Typically, a key is required to open them, but in most games a thief can open doors without the need for keys (In some games they require a lockpick to do this, but most of the time thieves can do it without needing any items at all). Sometimes doors will open on their own due to events, and sometimes enemies or [=NPCs=] will open doors by themselves. [[VideoGame/FireEmblemTellius Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn]] also allowed you to bash doors down with your weapons, but this could take several turns depending on how much HP the door had.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Miitopia}}'', the Miis can encounter these in the overworld. These doors require specific key items to open. In the post-game, they can still run into these in quests (these require single-use keys found inside particular treasure chests), though depending on the dungeon's layout, a door there can either be ignored entirely or are mandatory to be open to proceed to the dungeon's end.

[[folder:Stealth Based Game]]
* In ''VideoGame/SplinterCell'', while many locks can be picked or forced, there are some doors which won't open because they are "jammed".
[[/folder]]

** The first game has doors that Jill, the MasterOfUnlocking, can open with her lockpick, but every other door requires a unique key since her lockpick apparently doesn't work on those types of doors. The novel handwaves it by stating the special locks are too complex for Jill to use her lockpick on. Jill can also pick open locked desks with ease while Chris is forced to find small keys to open the same drawers. The locked desk concept is also carried over to ''Resident Evil 2''.

* TheGameOverthinker uses these as an example of how realism isn't always the best thing in games.

* ''Franchise/StarWars: VideoGame/JediKnightJediAcademy'': at one point, when faced with a LockedDoor, Kyle Katarn, who hastarred in this sort of game before, [[LampshadeHanging snidely comments]] to the player character, "They always lock the doors. You'd think they'd've learned by now." and later, "The console for opening the door is probably hidden in some room twelve floors up ... how does ''that'' make sense?" He also says in the tutorial level that "When you're out on a mission and you find a locked door, [[GenreSavvy look for the guy in charge. He usually has a key.]]"

* ''Franchise/DragonQuest'' series is known for having locked doors and chests. Different kind of keys open different kind of doors, and the highest level key can open all doors.

-->-- [[http://cdn-www.cracked.com/phpimages/photoshop/1/2/1/3121_slide.jpg?v=1 This picture]], from Website/{{Cracked}}.com

* In ''[[ShiningForce Shining Force II]]'':

** In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil4'', padlocks can be removed with a swing of the knife and most fences can be jumped over, an exception being a certain InsurmountableWaistHeightFence with a Locked Gate.

** In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil4'', padlocks can be removed with a swing of the knife and most fences can be jumped over, an exception being a certain InsurmountableWaistHeightFence with a Locked Gate.

If the key is a PlotCoupon, you've got a BrokenBridge. If the key is actually present, but TheKeyIsBehindTheLock, the PaperKeyRetrievalTrick may be called for.

Compare SolveTheSoupCans. May require the attention of a MasterOfUnlocking, but if even ''he'' can't get past it without the key then you've got a PlotLock. Subtrope of LockAndKeyPuzzle.

* Doors in ''VideoGame/JetForceGemini'' are usually locked in one of the following three ways: By the life force of all the Drones and Airborne Squadrons that have to be dispatched beforehand, by requiring a key (in this case, a colored electronic card that matches the color of the seal that acts like the door's lock), or by requiring a specific item that is exclusive in access and use to one of the playable characters (a crowbar so Juno can enter the trap doors, a traditional key so Vela can open the door that leads to a mine in Rith Essa, a pair of googles so Lupus can open a door that leads to a very dark room, or simply the presence of Floyd so he can allow the current character to open a door leading to a minigame dedicated to Floyd himself).

** ''Every'' dungeon (except the first three of ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'') has several doors which can be locked by [[InterchangeableAntimatterKeys any one of several keys]]. There is also generally a "Boss Key" leading to the room which will contain the BossBattle. And in ''[[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaPhantomHourglass Phantom Hourglass]]'' and ''[[VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaSpiritTracks Spirit Tracks]]'', the Boss Key is so huge that it actually slows Link down as he has to lug it all the way to the door.

* ''VideoGame/HalfLife'' tended to [[LampshadeHanging hang a lampshade]] on the second variety by mentioning a backstory in which protagonist Gordon Freeman and Barney Calhoun usually competed for who could find the most interesting way to retrieve Dr. Kleiner's keys when he locked himself out of his office in ''VideoGame/HalfLife2''. It also had the former category as well, with some doors locked with retinal scanners Freeman himself isn't cleared for.
** Parodied brilliantly (along with the InsurmountableWaistHeightFence) in ''[[http://www.screencuisine.net/hlcomic/index.php?date=2006-07-17 Concerned]]''.
*** 'White picket fence' (and 'tuft of grass') being, of course, a reference to [[EverythingTryingToKillYou Smurf Rescue]].
** However, while doors are indestructible, tiny padlocks ''can'' be shot or bashed.

* ''VideoGame/DeusEx'': Many locked doors have a strength value along with a lock value. Strength value determines how much punishment they can take before breaking, whereas lock value determines how many lockpicks you'll need to open the door. You could also just find the key to the door to open it as well. There are some doors that are unpickable and indestructible, and require a key to open, or for the player to find an alternate route.

* ''Franchise/StarWars: VideoGame/JediKnightJediAcademy'': at one point, when faced with a LockedDoor, Kyle Katarn, who hastarred in this sort of game before, [[LampshadeHanging snidely comments]] to the player character, "They always lock the doors. You'd think they'd've learned by now." and later, "The console for opening the door is probably hidden in some room twelve floors up ... how does ''that'' make sense?"
** He also says in the tutorial level that "When you're out on a mission and you find a locked door, [[GenreSavvy look for the guy in charge. He usually has a key.]]"
** In ''VideoGame/JediKnightDarkForcesII'', there is a locked door that Kyle cannot open at all, even with a lightsaber. But a random citizen of the town comes out of the door. If timed right, it is possible to get into the house when the door is opened, [[spoiler:leading to a room where Max from ''Sam and Max'' can be found hanging out holding a blaster. If attacked, Max will go beserk and chase Kyle endlessly firing the blaster like crazy.]]
* Lampshade Hanged in ''VideoGame/SeriousSam'' and ''Serious Sam 2''. NETRICSA sometimes makes references to this.
** In ''Serious Sam 2'', Sam, after encountering another locked door and after NETRICSA's announcement of that, says "If I had a dime for every key I found.".

* ''VideoGame/PAYDAYTheHeist'' has a few doors that can only be opened with a key or key card. The majority of the doors are locked and cannot be opened. Other doors or barriers require a bigger tool like a drill.
** ''PAYDAY 2'' retains the trope, but also introduces doors that can have its locked picked open. Other doors can also be blown off their hinges by using C4 and other doors can have their [[ShootOutTheLock locks shot off]].

** ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3'' has a similarly tricky door. Just remember to disguise yourself as a scientist before attempting it. Or hide.

* There's a lot of Locked Doors in ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'', mostly dungeon doors. Those require specific keys to open, which are obtained from various sources, such as quests or loot from mobs. Alternatively, most of them (but not all) can be opened by a Rogue with high enough Lockpicking skill, by a Blacksmith's Skeleton Key, or an Engineer's Seaforium Charge. Also, in order to prevent people from not being able to resurrect, dead players' ghosts CAN walk through these doors, which makes it possible for some dungeons to be accessed without a key, blacksmith or engineer.
** All of these doors also have a lever on the opposite side, allowing a non-rogue, engineer or blacksmith to leave. On busy days, and especially before expansions when it could take ages for people to gather for a dungeon, it was sometimes possible to get in by just waiting around at the door until somebody else wanted to leave.

* Averted in ''VideoGame/NetHack'', where any skeleton key can be used to unlock any door, and any door can be bashed down if the character is strong enough, chopped apart if they have an axe, or splintered with a Force Bolt spell (though any of these makes noise which can alert nearby monsters).
** Note that it is generally a bad idea to break down doors to shops. The shopkeeper does not like it at all.
** In ''VideoGame/SlashEM'', one of the three items necessary to complete the game is behind a series of unbreakable doors which can't be opened by ordinary skeleton keys, requiring the player to possess two out of the three artifact keys to get past them.

** ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIDaggerfall Daggerfall]]'' locked doors could always be bashed open, usually to the cacophony of "[[MemeticMutation Halt Halt Halt]]" if your character was in a city or house at the time. It couldn't be helped, though, because your lockpicking skill was crippled and there were no keys in the world.
* Mostly averted in the ''VideoGame/UltimaUnderworld'' games. Sturdy doors can be bashed, lockpicked or opened by magic, bypassing the need for the key. Massive doors cannot be bashed, but only a few cannot be lockpicked or magically opened.

* In the ''VideoGame/{{Avernum}}'' series almost all locked doors could be picked open, naturally or magically, or bashed open. Some, however, required a lever/switch/button to be pushed/pulled, or a special item to be unlocked. The levers were usually in a place that makes sense, close to the door with easy access for those who should be there, but hard to get to if you shouldn't be.

* Mostly played straight in the ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'' series, which often makes it infuriating when coming across doors you cannot lock pick. Instead, you have to find the key for the door, which may be located in a completely unmarked area on the map, if the NPC decided to get themselves killed wandering around out there. In most areas of the earlier games, explosives are a good alternative. Looking to get the T-51b armor in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}''? You're going to need 3 keys to access it.

** However, many doors can be 'opened' with brute force and FireBalls.
* ''DragonQuest'' series is known for having locked doors and chests. Different kind of keys open different kind of doors, and the highest level key can open all doors.

** Slightly averted in Outbreak, as some locked doors can be broken open after taking a good enough beating.

* In ''[[VideoGame/ResidentEvil4 Resident Evil 4]]'', padlocks can be removed with a swing of the knife and most fences can be jumped over, an exception being a certain InsurmountableWaistHeightFence with a Locked Gate.

* In ''[[ShiningForce Shining Force II]]'', try to enter any house in Ribble besides the northernmost one. Any one at all. The citizens will not be milling about until you enter the mayor's house and go through the little cutscene. This is also the only way to open the [[SavePoint church]] and shops, as well as get a new [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters Force Member]].

** In ''[[VideoGame/ResidentEvil4 RE4]]'', padlocks can be removed with a swing of the knife and most fences can be jumped over, an exception being a certain InsurmountableWaistHeightFence with a Locked Gate.