Line #2 VideoGame/TheSecretMonsterSociety


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/the_secret_monster_society_header.jpg]]
2	''The Secret Monster Society'' is an [[EpisodicGame episodic]] PointAndClick AdventureGame, set in a world of monsters. It was developed by Deceptive Games Ltd, using the MediaNotes/{{Unity}} engine. The first chapter, ''Monsters, Fires and Forbidden Forests'', was [[http://store.steampowered.com/app/495960/The_Secret_Monster_Society/ released]] on July 28, 2016 for [[Platform/IBMPersonalComputer PC]] through Platform/{{Steam}}. Chapter 2, ''Time, Dreams and Underwater Travel'', followed on January 31, 2017. The release dates of the final two chapters are still TBD.
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4	Blithe Dalrich is a dream monster from the 'Underworld'. Together with his best friend Aphonic, they travel across various destinations (and even through time) in order to stop an evil genius from destroying the world.
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7	!!This game makes use of the following tropes:
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9	* AnimateInanimateObject: Used to make the world seem even more zany. For instance, Blithe's alarm clock, Grumpy, has a pair of eyes set in a permanent frown, while his toiler is named Edgar and has vampire-like fangs and a long green tongue. Same applies to every other clock and toilet in the game, as well as other objects like fur rugs.
10	* ArtisticLicenseSpace: Invoked in-universe. One of the tasks of the Theatre of Dreams is to get information about the real world through studying humans' dreams, but they don't do it too well. For instance, a book on the "Human Planetary System" states that they straight-up analyzed the dreams of astronauts, yet they still came away with an impression the solar system consists of three planets - first a red one, then a blue one, and then a purple one.
11	* CastOfSnowflakes: Every single character has a unique appearance, and if Blithe has to talk to them, they'll have a separate VA as well.
12	* DialogueTree: Blithe often gets to ask the other characters questions through these.
13	* EinsteinHair: Blithe's Father has a full red head of such hair.
14	* FetchQuest: The first two chapters often rely on these. Chapter 1 has a painfully straight optional example where Blithe simply needs to deliver a ring found by Aphonic from her locker to their rightful owner, the two-headed Mrs. Gong in Ch.1. Chapter 2 first has Blithe find Stable Owner's Wife, who somehow got teleported to the past, in order for him to write an authorization letter permitting Blithe to get to the Theatre of Dreams. Once inside, there are requests to bring superior contact lenses to Mally the magic researcher, or to bring the cookbook to the theatre's chef.
15	* ItsAllAboutMe: Sotto Ventura, a celebrity archeologist who keeps talking up his sentence, and ends his response to literally every single dialogue prompt by asking if you would like to get his autograph.
16	* LabcoatOfScienceAndMedicine: Mally at the Theatre of Dreams wears an immaculate one. Subverted in that he's actually analyzing magic, which according to him is the same thing as science as far as underworld is concerned. In fact, he outright says even a three-year old should know this, and then asks for Blithe's name - to which he responds with Volant, the name of the uncool kid at school.
17	* LeaningOnTheFourthWall: You can learn of the controls by having Blithe examine a piece of paper on the floor of his room titled "Game Instruction Manual". While he claims that it's actually for an in-universe game "The Booger Games: Pick and Flick", they are obviously about the actual game you are playing.
18	* LeftHanging: The series currently ends with Blithe entering a submarine to travel to the Land of the Dead at the end of chapter 2, with the main plot thread meant to be resolved in two further chapters. However, more than two years have passed since then.
19	* MultipleHeadCase: Mrs. Gong is a two-headed character who is treated as two people in one body by the dialogue. Their only involvement in the plot so far is losing their ring, thus giving Blithe an opportunity to return it.
20	* {{Mummy}}: Theatre of Dreams' janitor is one. He is also the one character unable to speak, and only grunts in response to Blithe's questions.
21	* ObviouslyEvil: The game barely even bothers to pretend that Principle Grandle, an authority figure with an ominous voice who straight-up compares himself to the figures of legend may ''not'' be evil in chapter 1. Halfway through Chapter 2, Blithe's Father outright reveals that he's been surveilled for months, and produces very recent tape footage of him boasting about his evil plan to his henchman.
22	* PracticalCurrency: Inverted: here, the currency is nail clippings, of all things. The fact that a lot of the characters are a various form of cephalopod and thus should not even have any nails to clip probably serves to constrain monetary supply.
23	* ScientificallyUnderstandableSorcery: In the Theatre of Dreams, magic has been officially researched by a wizened fellow in a lab coat named Malley for the past twenty-two years.
24	* StupidityIsTheOnlyOption: You have to set the rubbish bin in the school toilets on fire (seemingly to spite a note reminding of how the last student to have tried this was expelled), which appears to have also started a much larger fire on school grounds, in order to progress through chapter 1. Even Blithe isn't sure why he did it besides being stupid; gameplay-wise, this just serves as an excuse to throw him and Aphonic in the woods outside, and then to discover the time-travel device.
25	* TalkLikeAPirate: Captain Blub, the purple octopus who pilots what he claims is the fastest submarine in all the Underworld, sure loves his "ahoy!" and matey!"
26	* TeleportersAndTransporters: Here, sentient toilets are the preferred means of transportation: when Blithe needs to get to school, he simply feeds mud cakes (stored in a locked chest in his bedroom) to his fanged toilet named Edgar, and in return it grabs him with its slime-green tongue and pushes inside, with Blithe then immediately emerging from a school toilet on the other end.
27	** The end of chapter 1 also introduces a handheld time-travel device. For something this powerful, it is discovered rather unceremoniously laying on the road in front a huge boulder at the end of Chapter 1. Apparently, it was invented by Principle Grandle, but somehow lost by his henchman, which is the only thing frustrating his evil plan.
28	* WholePlotReference: A lot of the work can so far be summarized as "What if ''WesternAnimation/MonstersInc'' were a PointAndClickGame?''
29	* WorldOfWeirdness: This is a place where the dream generators live, so not only does every inhabitant has to look bizarre, and many of the everyday objects have blinking eyes and so are clearly animate, but there are also things like Anti-Soap that keeps users dirty, and toilets that snatch up people with tongues of slime to deliver them at any other toilet of their choosing if they get fed with mud cakes beforehand.

Context VideoGame / TheSecretMonsterSociety