History Main / PowerCreepPowerSeep

**** ''[[InjusticeGodsAmongUs Injustice: Gods Among Us]]'' received much grousing from fans when it was initially announced, mainly because some people found the thought of characters like Comicbook/HarleyQuinn and {{Nightwing}} being able to punch out Superman and Wonder Woman to be absurd. Of course, nobody really plays fighting games for the plot or realism, do they?
***** Actually AVERTED in ''[[Video

* Upcoming fangame VideoGame/MyLittlePonyFightingIsMagic will probably have this. Say what you will, but it's pretty hard to imagine the physically weak Fluttershy taking on a superstrong, superfast powerhouse like Rainbow Dash, or a fashionista like Rarity defeating magical prodigy Twilight Sparkle, who as a child suffered from a bout of PowerIncontinence strong enough to instantly overwhelm several teachers at the most prestigious magical school in the kingdom, and attract the attention of the immortal god empress of Equestria who then made Twilight her personal student. And that's when she didn't know what she was doing.

** ''Movie Wars 2010'' has Double's power at sane levels, but its villain gets the Shadow Moon treatment: Doras, like Shadow Moon, was a strong major opponent of the one SuperMode-less Rider in his story, the movie ''KamenRiderZO.'' Decade's Doras easily clobbered all the main Riders from Kuuga through Kiva ''plus'' the Riders original to Decade in their base forms ''all at once'' (''really think'' about the best non-Super-Mode CrowningMomentOfAwesome material from those series and imagine the kind of power that takes) and they don't beat him until ''all ten Riders go SuperMode,'' with Den-O and Kuuga breaking out Super Climax and Rising Ultimate, respectively - their Decade-only supermode-of-a-supermode forms. Once again, when you consider the greatest feats of the Riders, and how dangerous the never-seen maximum power of certain Riders is said to be, if it requires all ten, we're talking Doras going from being ''almost'' as strong as ''one'' Rider to "god of destruction" territory. Take the movies at face value, and PowerLevels in KamenRider, from greatest to least, would be as follows: Double with his basic forms > Shadow Moon > Doras > {{God}} > Decade and Rising Ultimate Kuuga perhaps tie > Everybody else ever. That is... not reflected in the series, to put it mildly.

!!Examples:

* In one issue of ''Amazing Spider-Man'', [[Comicbook/SpiderMan Spider-Man]], who's strong (lifts ten tons) but not one of the big hitters of the MarvelUniverse, beat the ''cosmically'' powerful Firelord in a hand-to-hand duel. On comic boards this trope is often named Spider-man vs the Firelord.
** Then again, when SpiderMan fights SilverSurfer, he tends to smack him around pretty well. He often fights beyond his limits. The same can be said for the likes of {{Wolverine}} or CaptainAmerica as well. Sometimes, WolverinePublicity does that with characters who are popular but not very powerful.

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** And finally presenting both Luffy and Toriko with similar power-levels to those of Son Goku. Luffy and Toriko are able to fight with Goku on even footing (though Goku, as opposed to his opponents, wasn't fighting seriously 'till the very end, and the fight was most of the time Luffy ''and'' Toriko vs Goku, instead of a [[MeleeaTrois Mêlée à Trois]]. Luffy, Toriko and their allies able to last against an enemy Goku and the Z-Fighters had difficulty against. Luffy and Toriko are also able to damage the Akami whereas Goku needs his planet-busting Super Saiyan forms to do so. Hand Waved by showing Goku as the most powerful of the three (if only marginally so) and saying that he's already fought some creatures and saved the Earth prior these fights.

** And finally presenting both Luffy and Toriko with similar power-levels to those of Son GOku. Luffy and Toriko are able to fight with Goku on even footing (though Goku appeared he didn't tried 'till the very end, and the fight was most of the time Luffy ''and'' Toriko vs Goku, isntead of a [[Mêlée à Trois]]. Luffy, Toriko and their allies able to last against an enemy Goku and the Z-Fighters had difficulty against. Luffy and Toriko are also able to damage the Akami whereas Goku needs his planet-busting Super Saiyan forms to do so. Hand Waved by showing Goku as the most powerful of the three (if only marginally so) and saying that he's already fought some creatures and saved the Earth prior these fights.

* The ''SuperMarioBros'' spin-offs have this a lot. In the main series, Yoshi can only run faster than Luigi when someone is riding him. If not, he's just as fast as Mario, which is still SuperSpeed, but not as fast as Luigi. Mario, in the main series, is perfectly capable of lifting a castle and throwing it to the side, but is the JackOfAllStats in the spin-offs.
** ...since when is Luigi faster than Mario!? I guess his high floaty jumps and slower running from ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros2'' have been completely forgotten by Nintendo...

*** Discussed in [[http://www.gamesradar.com/video/v-85137209670371698 this hilariously uber-nerdy Gamesradar video]] about how ridiculously Capcom overcompensated the power levels of their characters to match the Marvel characters on their character profile pages. While some of the featured Cap Com characters are a lot stronger than many fans assume, if [[http://marvel.com/universe/OHOTMU:Power_Grids the official standards set down for reading the power charts]] and these levels are to be believed, Tron Bonne is an omniscient world-consuming EldritchAbomination who crushes worlds with a flick of her pinky.

* Comicbook/{{Batman}} has got to be the most notable example. He has appeared for decades simultaneously both in his own magazine, struggling against fairly normal muggers and crooks, and in ''JusticeLeagueOfAmerica'', battling cosmic foes like {{Darkseid}}. This has been dealt with in various ways over the years, sometimes successfully, sometimes not. The default SilverAge solution seemed to be using the Bat-Anti-Cosmically-Powered-Villain Spray, while the default ModernAge solution tends toward emphasizing his willpower and intelligence, often in a MissionControl role.
** In 2002, it was announced that there was a ''Batman Vs. Superman'' film in the works (like most Superman-related projects, it ultimately ended up in DevelopmentHell and was abandoned), which provoked great uproar in the fan community about the inherently one-sided nature of such a conflict. Conan O'Brien put it best, saying "Superman is, well, ''Superman''. He can fly, lift cars, shoot lasers from his eyes, go back in time, all that. Batman... Batman works out a lot."
*** Though in that script, Batman used his CrazyPrepared-ness intelligently, with Kryptonite armor and arrows, and a sonic whistle to paralyze Superman due to the latter's super-hearing.
*** Though in the ''Batman: Hush'' comic books, Batman DOES wind up fighting the Man of Steel, who is under Poison Ivy's control due to kryptonite added to her mind-control lipstick. He still might have little chance in a straight fight, but in that story, he does manage to fight off Superman long enough to break him out of the trance. At one point, Batman states that he would have long been dead if Superman hadn't been resisting Ivy's control.

*** Batman v. Superman again in Frank Miller's TheDarkKnightReturns. Justified in that Superman had recently almost died and lampshaded by Batman testing him with a few missiles. Also, Batman uses kryptonite and power gloves and Gotham's entire electrical grid. And the fight's more or less a draw (though the bat would have won).

* ''[[InjusticeGodsAmongUs Injustice: Gods Among Us]]'' received much grousing from fans when it was initially announced, mainly because some people found the thought of characters like Comicbook/HarleyQuinn and {{Nightwing}} being able to punch out Superman and Wonder Woman to be absurd. Of course, nobody really plays fighting games for the plot or realism, do they?

***** [[UpToEleven It was only done to match with the over-the-top and frantic gameplay]] that has been present since ''[[VideoGame/XMenChildrenOfTheAtom X-Men: Children of the Atom]]'', with the exception of ''CapcomVsSNK'' and ''VideoGame/StreetFighterXTekken''. It mainly applies for the Street Fighter characters.

*** A similar thing happens in ''WesternAnimation/TheBatman'', where Supes is again under mind control (this time by Ivy's Mind Control Spores laced with Kryptonite dust). Batman not only cheats, he tries using a chunk of Kryptonite stolen from Lex Luthor, and when ''that'' doesn't work, he evens the odds a little by breaking out his [[PoweredArmor Bat-Mecha]] and is ''still'' on the verge of losing, but Robin breaks Superman out of the trance.

* In ''WesternAnimation/YoungJustice'', pretty much all of the heroes and villains (including the Justice League) were noticeably weaker than their comic incarnations. WordOfGod from GregWeisman is that this made the [[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacter huge amount of super-powered characters]] more manageable.

** Loki. In ''Film/Thor'', the guy survived the huge Bifrost explosion. In ''Film/TheAvengers'', Hawkeye's grenades-on-a-stick and Iron Man's repulsors got an "ow" reaction out of him, he's lethally threatened by a fall from the helicarrier at terminal velocity (though whether it could ''actually'' kill him or Thor is up in the air), and he is taken out of commission by being slammed into a floor by the Hulk.

* An interesting example is Hank [=McCoy=], aka The Beast. If you pick up a comic in which he is in the ComicBook/{{X-Men}}, the writers tend to focus mostly on his intellect while his actual powers are secondary. When he was a member of ComicBook/TheAvengers, his strength and agility were the main focus and his intellect was rarely brought up. This was because the Avengers had plenty of geniuses: Hank Pym, IronMan, The Vision, BlackPanther, etc. and didn't need another. Hank was a LightningBruiser so his abilities were bumped up to the point where he was nearly as strong as IronMan and could move so fast that CaptainAmerica had trouble following him. When he went back to the X-Men, there were already a couple strongmen (Colossus and Rogue) and agile people (Nightcrawler, Gambit, Longshot, etc.). Even his animalistic nature was covered by {{Wolverine}}. They didn't have any geniuses, though, so Beast became TheSmartGuy nearly on the level of [[ComicBook/FantasticFour Reed Richards]].

** ''Marvel vs. DC'' also had Storm besting WonderWoman. Storm has a greater attack range, so this might have made sense if they hadn't actually shown her shrugging off a punch from Wonder Woman. (For reference, Storm's pretty toned for a being that's just one step above a baseline human, but Wonder Woman wasn't human to begin with.)

** It's even worse in the earlier games in the series, where freakin' ''Apocalypse'' and ''Onslaught'' were the final bosses, and yet the likes of Chun Li and Ryu were able to take them down.

*** Then, there's the inclusion of [[DimensionLord Dormammu]], [[EldritchAbomination Shuma-Gorath]], and the like as playable characters. In their own continuities, they could just blink once and delete all of their opponents from existence. Which makes it kinda of funny when you see humans with no superpowers like Chris Redfield or Hawkeye [[DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu beat the snot out of an ultra-powerful, reality-warping god]].

** Loki. In ''Film/Thor'', the guy survived the huge Bifrost explosion. In ''Film/TheAvengers'', Hawkeye's grenades-on-a-stick and Iron Man's repulsors got an "ow" reaction out of him, he's lethally threatened by a fall from the helicarrier at terminal velocity, and he is taken out of commission by being slammed into a floor. It was TheHulk doing the slamming, but the fact of the matter is that he was still 'just' being smacked against a marble floor, which shouldn't have done anything to a guy who can probably survive a MOAB explosion.
** Iron Man is the second worst offender. In his first movie, he got shot by a tank and got right back up with only minor damage. He proceeded to one shot the tank and then keep up with F-22 fighters in flight. While this durability is consistent in The Avengers (Chitauri weapons do crap against him and he survives several hits from Thor), it is thrown out the window in his own sequels. There, he is heavily threatened by a minigun and is unable to out-speed Extremis-advanced humans, who were definitely ''not'' faster than sound. Sort of justified by the fact that he's using different suits in between the movies, but that just creates a VoodooShark of why he would use inferior suits.

** Loki. In ''Film/Thor'', the guy survived the huge Bifrost explosion. In ''Film/TheAvengers'', he withstands a hefty amount of abuse but is still "only" taken down via a combination of Asgard-derived human weaponry and a beating by the Hulk.
** ''Film/TheIncredibleHulk'', fitting the comics, is wildly inconsistent across the movies in terms of what he can take, which fits the nature of his character in that his strength is dependent on how angry and in control he ris. In his first movie was knocked out by a tank round and at least was hurt by grenade rounds. The Hulk in ''Film/TheAvengers'' shows only annoyance to being shot by aircraft-mounted cannon; it takes Thor to give him a serious challenge and only a concentrated barrage by dozens of Chitauri aircraft to even give him a bloody nose.

* This trope is in full effect in ''Film/TheAvengers'', and a few of the other MarvelCinematicUniverse films.
** Loki. In Film/Thor, the guy survived the huge Bifrost explosion. In The Avengers, he gets thrown around and hurt by tiny grenades and IronMan's repulsors, is lethally threatened by a fall at terminal velocity from the Helicarrier, and is taken out of commission by being slammed on a floor. It was TheHulk doing the slamming, but the fact of the matter is that he was still 'just' being smacked against a marble floor, which shouldn't have done anything to a guy who might be able to survive a MOAB explosion.
** Iron Man is the second worst offender. In his first movie, he got shot by a tank and got right back up with only minor damage. He proceeded to one shot the tank and then keep up with F-22 fighters in flight. While this durability is consistent in The Avengers (Chitauri weapons do crap against him and he survives several hits from Thor)
** TheHulk in his own movie was knocked out by a tank round and at least was hurt by grenade rounds. TheHulk in The Avengers shows no reaction to being shot by air craft mounted cannon.

* Film/KingKong was enlarged several times his size and given electricity powers to match Franchise/{{Godzilla}} for their crossover fight.