History VideoGame / Penumbra

* AnAesop: [[spoiler:[[SpaceWhaleAesop Work together or alien hiveminds will kill you in Greenland?]]]] An {{anvilicious}} aesop, considering the [[spoiler:Tuurngait come right out and make you jump through morality hoops and encourage your selflessness]]. Unless you consider the end of ''Black Plague'' to be positive. Then it's just a [[BrokenAesop broken one]].

* ImprovisedWeapon: You don't DropTheHammer, you swing an actual hammer. Later on you find a small pickaxe (or ice-pick), but you're still pretty heavily outclassed. Then along comes the second game, which offers you no straightforward weapons at all. As in ''Overture'', you can still stun enemies by throwing objects at them, but other than that, you can only rely on your own feet and the patient use of stealth this time.

* AncientConspiracy: [[spoiler:The Archaic, a secret society attempting to research the Tuurngait and mainly getting itself slaughtered. They're extremely corrupt, and willing to sacrifice the lives of lower-ranking members to protect the upper echelons. An out-of-the-way note in ''Black Plague'' reveals they were founded by Leonardo Da Vinci and are a private organization dedicated to researching and exploiting supernatural phenomena, who pre-date the [[Website/SCPFoundation SCP Foundation]] by several years.]]

* AncientConspiracy: [[spoiler:The Archaic, a secret society attempting to research the Tuurngait and mainly getting itself slaughtered. They're extremely corrupt, and willing to sacrifice the lives of lower-ranking members to protect the upper echelons.]]

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

** Tom Redwood, a.k.a. [[EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep "Red"]]. He constantly insults, amuses and helps you in ''Overture''. All ''[[MissionControlISOffItsMeds at the same time]]''. He's both an unusual guide and a very memorable character, to say the least. When you finally manage to reach him, you have to [[spoiler:unwillingly partake in [[DrivenToSuicide a rather gruesome]] TwistEnding]]. After that you finally discover the secrets of Red's past and explore the isolated and squalid living spaces he had to occupy ''[[spoiler:[[TheAloner for thirty extremely lonely years]] ]]''. Cue TearJerker. No wonder the poor sap [[SanitySlippage went gradually insane.]]

* JerkassHasAPoint: [[spoiler:The Tuurngait states that selfishness in human would be catastrophic and that all humans pull in different directions. Well, the Tuurngait is no saint, but it does have a point. People were supposed to selfless and kill themselves or lock themselves up if they became infected. Many people didn't and turned into monsters that proceeded to kill or infect everyone else. The problem compounded itself until approximately 99.22% (100% minus the odds of survival given by the computer in Dr. Swanson's office) of the staff were dead.]]