History Main / YouCantThwartStageOne

** In Part 6: ''Stone Ocean'', [[spoiler: Enrico Pucci succeeds in killing off most of the main cast and using his Stand to accelerate time, creating his ideal universe. The universe is only temporary until Pucci can reach the original point of acceleration, and he is killed by Emporio (the SoleSurvivor among the main cast) before then, [[RetGone erasing him from existence]] and undoing everything he'd done as a result.]]

** In Book 3, the Red Lotus successfully kills the Earth Queen, causing the entire nation to fall into anarchy.

** Happens twice in ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2006'': while trapped in the BadFuture, Sonic learns that Elise is going to die soon back in the present when Eggman's battleship crashes and explodes. He arrives back in the present too late, but thanks to Silver and the use of Chaos Control, he's able to go back a little further in time to save her. [[spoiler:Later, Mephilis kills Sonic, causing Elise to cry and unleash Iblis, thus causing TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt. It takes TrueLovesFirstKiss reviving Sonic and a subsequent CosmicRetcon to set things right.]]

** Happens twice in ''VideoGame/SonicTheHedgehog2006'': while trapped in the BadFuture, Sonic learns that Elise is going to die soon back in the present when Eggman's battleship crashes and explodes. He arrives back in the present too late, but thanks to Shadow and the use of Chaos Control, he's able to go back a little further in time to save her. [[spoiler:Later, Mephilis kills Sonic, causing Elise to cry and unleash Iblis, thus causing TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt. It takes TrueLovesFirstKiss reviving Sonic and a subsequent CosmicRetcon to set things right.]]

** No matter how quickly you get to the rocket launch station in Metal Harbor in ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure2'', it will always be 15 seconds from takeoff.
*** Also from ''VideoGame/SonicAdventure2'': [[spoiler:Eggman manages to get his hands on all seven Chaos Emeralds -- even swiping one from right under Tails's nose in the ending of the Hero story -- and powers up the Eclipse Cannon, as he had planned.]]

* ''VideoGame/Halo4'' practically runs on this. [[spoiler:First, you fail to escape the damaged ''Forward Unto Dawn'' before it is torn apart by the gravity well on Requiem, causing you to crash into the planet along with the wreckage, only surviving because you're a heavily-armored SuperSoldier. Later, you try to shut doen a relay station which is preventing you from warning the approaching ''Infinity'' against suffering the same fate. Not only do you fail to get the warning through in time, but in the process [[NiceJobBreakingItHero you also free]] [[BigBad the Didact]] from his [[SealedEvilInACan Cryptum]] at the station's core. Later, you fail to prevent him from leaving Requiem in search of his superweapon, the Composer, and after chasing him to its location you fail to prevent him from acquiring it and using it on the station's personnel. Pursuing him to Earth, you again arrive too late to stop him firing it -- and while you do manage to defeat him and destroy it, it's too late to save the population of New Phoenix, who were right in the firing line.]]

* ''Literature/TheBeginningAfterTheEnd'': Up until Volume 9, Arthur fails to stop Agrona from achieving any of his goals in the leadup to his war on Epheotus, not just because of him getting outplanned by Agrona but also due to Agrona and his servants [[NiceJobBreakingItHero exploiting some of Arthur's past actions]] without him knowing. When Agrona's agents instigate an attack on Xyrus Academy, Arthur is able to put an end to the attack but at great cost. He is unable to save several of his friends and classmates, in particular his best friend Elijah who is taken back to Alacrya to restore his original personality - Nico, the EvilFormerFriend of Arthur's past life King Grey. Making matters worse, in the aftermath he and his bond Sylvie are taken into captivity at the behest of the Council, who are being manipulated by Agrona into handing over Arthur and Sylvie to him. Only the intervention of the Asuras Windsom and Aldir in purging the Council of corruption prevents this from happening. In spite of being one of the strongest mages on Dicathen and having trained in Epheotus for years, he is ultimately unable to prevent the Alacryans from conquering his homeland, which is not helped by the fact that the Asuras end up abandoning the Dicathians after Agrona uses a failed sneak attack on Alacrya to assassinate him - one which they did without informing their Dicathian allies - as a violation of their treaty to remove them from the war. At the end of the war, Sylvie is forced to perform a HeroicSacrifice to save him, which in turn causes him to end up in the Relictombs. With Arthur out of the picture, the Alacryans are able to capture his LoveInterest Tessia and [[ReforgedIntoAMinion turn her into]] [[GrandTheftMe the vessel]] for a third reincarnate, the Legacy, who as it turns out is Grey and Nico's shared ChildhoodFriendLoveInterest Cecilia and Agrona's trump card for when he goes to war against Epheotus. It is not until Arthur CameBackStrong during his time in both the Relictombs and Alacrya that he was finally able to reverse part of Agrona's plan, including returning to Dicathen and undoing the Alacryan conquest in a matter of days. Ultimately, it turns out this trope is PlayedWith in that [[spoiler:Arthur and Tessia were ''not'' the originally intended vessels for their respective reincarnates. As it turns out, when Sylvie sacrificed herself, she was displaced across time and space to bear witness to Grey's life. When Agrona took Grey's soul for use in his plans, Sylvie was able to snatch the soul before it could be brought to the intended vessel and brought it to the unborn Arthur. This significantly altered his original plans, as Agrona was forced to look outside of Alacrya for a vessel for the Legacy]].

** This also applies to the VillainOfTheWeek many times per part, albeit on a smaller scale: the villain is usually able to gain power and control until they can make the best possible use of it that the setting allows before they're finally defeated. A straightforward example is Sports Maxx in ''Stone Ocean'', whose Stand lets him make zombies out of corpses. He first uses a taxidermied bird at the heroes, then a crocodile, but the fight is eventually taken to the nearby crypt, where he makes a zombie out of every corpse buried there. Another is Angelo in ''Diamond Is Unbreakable'', whose Stand lets him manifest in water. He begins with a small glob of water, which Josuke easily traps in a glass bottle, though he later escapes. By the time Josuke has to finish Angelo off once and for all, it's raining outside, and Josuke is trapped in his own house where all of the faucets, showers, and bathtubs are on full-blast, filling the house with mist that Angelo can also manifest in. In a sense, this also makes the heroes even more impressive, as the villains get to their absolute strongest but are ''still'' defeated by the heroes.

* ''VideoGame/NineMonkeysOfShaolin'': The first stage, your DoomedHometown, can be completed within two minutes, concluding with you getting mortally wounded by the marauder captain who killed your grandfather and have your village burned down. You are then rescued by several Shaolin monks who nurses you back to health and trains you for your revenge, kicking off the main plot of the game.

* ''VideoGame/{{Loopmancer}}'' sees you defeating the Big Guy, the easy first boss, and automatically dying in the next cutscene because your arch-enemy, Wei Long, has a sniper on standby. Your loop then resets itself, leading the main plot.
* ''VideoGame/NewLegends'' opens with the raid of the Soo Kingdom, and regardless of your performance, you ''will'' be captured by enemy lieutenants, witness the death of your father the Emperor, and be MadeASlave and thrown into the enemy labor camp. The following stage is a prison escape where you meet the LaResistance.
* ''VideoGame/{{Shantae}}'':
** In ''VideoGame/Shantae2002'' and ''VideoGame/ShantaeRiskysRevenge'', Risky gets away with the ArtifactOfDoom no matter what, and your only reward for beating the first boss is not dying.
** ''VideoGame/ShantaeAndThePiratesCurse'': This happens twice. First, you can't stop Ammo Baron from making a mess of Scuttle Town because [[spoiler:he is still legally the town's owner.]] Second, [[spoiler:even though you spent the entire game trying to prevent the Pirate Master from rising from his grave, he does it anyway.]]
** ''VideoGame/ShantaeHalfGenieHero'': The first boss is a DoubleSubversion. Shantae's ArchEnemy, Risky Boots, gives up the stolen blueprints to Mimic's Dynamo device after being defeated. However, it's a BatmanGambit on Risky's part, since she swapped out the blueprints for fakes.

* Almost a little ridiculous in the ''Franchise/SuperMarioBros'' games, where Bowser will always succeed in taking over most of the kingdom and Mario won't find out about any of it until he kidnaps Princess Peach. Actually averted in ''VideoGame/SuperPaperMario'', where Mario and Luigi go to rescue Peach from Bowser [[NotMeThisTime before Bowser ever did anything]], leading to quite a bit of confusion on the part of both parties as to who did it.
* In an amusing example, one speedrun of ''[[VideoGame/SuperMarioRPG Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars]]'' features beating the boss Punchinello on the first turn using Mario's Super Jump attack to cause more damage than the boss has HP. Punchinello normally goes through "stages" where he summons and throws bombs of increasing size; when killed early, he runs through all of his bomb summoning animations sequentially and then goes right into his death animation.
* In ''VideoGame/SuperPaperMario'', you can't stop the annihilation of all worlds. In fact, you get caught in the middle of one being annihilated! [[spoiler:Everything is remade at the end, however.]]

* ''VideoGame/Borderlands2'': For almost the entire game the [[PlayerCharacter Vault Hunter]] is trying to stop Handsome Jack from [[SealedEvilInACan awakening the Warrior]], but he still manages to do it in the FinalBattle. But the [[PlayerCharacter Vault Hunter]], being the badass that they are, [[DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu ends up killing it anyway]].

** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaSkywardSword'' has a rather strange twist on the trend: After the first three dungeons, you effectively have thwarted the villain at Stage 1 once Zelda and Impa escape through a time gate and blow it up behind them. It's only because [[spoiler:Old Impa, presumably at the behest of Zelda/the Goddess]] insist you build a new time gate so you can hear an explanation and plan that she could have given you herself, that TheDragon can [[NiceJobBreakingItHero travel back in time]] to release the SealedEvilInACan at the end. [[StupidityIsTheOnlyOption Had you not been forced to unthwart Stage 1]], [[spoiler:Demise would never have been released, and his curse that brought Gannondorf in existence wouldn't have happened. So ''Skyward Sword'' effectively is the unthwarted Stage 1 for every game that features Ganondorf as BigBad, which means [[HijackedByGanon most of them]]]]. Oops.

** You cannot prevent [[spoiler:Lord Godwin from taking over the castle with Nether Gate, the King and Queen being assassinated, or Lymsleia being kidnapped and eventually forced into [[PuppetKing puppet-queendom]]]], no matter what you do.]]

** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTearsOfTheKingdom'': Midway through the story, the New Champions realize that [[spoiler:Ganondorf has been using Phantom Zelda to stall for time while he gradually recovers the strength of his body, having been desiccated after millennia being sealed underground. He finishes rejuvenating himself back to full strength just as Link arrives in his lair for their climactic duel. Even if the player skips every dungeon and just goes straight for Ganon at the earliest opportunity, Ganondorf will always regain his old body right as the hero arrives.]]

** ''VideoGame/HyruleWarriorsAgeOfCalamity'' is an AlternateTimeline retelling of ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaBreathOfTheWild'''s backstory where the heroes get advanced warning about the return of Calamity Ganon, and thus begin work far ahead of time to stop it from happening, while ''another'' entity who also has this advanced knowledge starts working double-time to make sure it does come to pass. [[spoiler:They succeed in thwarting it.]]