Line #18 VideoGame/WillYouSnail


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/header_066.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:[[EndingTheme "I'm a snail compared to you..."]]]]
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4	''[[https://store.steampowered.com/app/1115050/Will_You_Snail/ Will You Snail?]]'' is a [[PlatformGame platformer]] developed, produced and released by indie developer Jonas Tyroller. After starting development in 2018, the game released on Platform/{{Steam}}, Platform/XboxOne, Platform/PlayStation4 and Platform/NintendoSwitch on March 9th, 2022.
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6	The platformer's main gimmick is related to the main antagonist [[ArtificialIntelligence Squid]], who constantly judges, demoralizes, and mocks you for how you play the game. In addition, he also predicts your movement and spawns traps to intercept you.
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8	Why is it called Will You Snail?
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10	Because your player avatar is a snail.
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12	!!Your [[JustForFun/TVTropesWillRuinYourLife crippling addiction to this site]] satisfies my reward function.
13	* AdvancingBossOfDoom: Mama Squid slowly moves towards the right of her level, and you must deplete her head's HP before she reaches you.
14	* AIIsACrapshoot: Squid wants to kill all humanity and loves inflicting pain.
15	* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:In the alternate ending, Squid is repaired and becomes friends with the player, however he never appears again in the game. Unless you decide to unfix him, [[WhatTheHellPlayer which breaks his heart again and wipes his memory]], or hack your save file.]]
16	* BossArenaUrgency: In the fight against Splitty, there is a row of destructible blocks above and below you and the enemies. You also constantly fire upwards, which will both hit the boss and the destructible blocks, the latter of which will fall down and take the respective floor destructible blocks with them.
17	* BrainUploading: [[spoiler:Desperate to preserve humanity, Unicorn digitalized the consciousnesses of every surviving human and uploaded them into their simulations before destroying everyone's physical forms in a "very humane way"]].
18	* CentralTheme: The impact of artificial intelligence and simulated consciousness on the future of the human race.
19	** The ethics of AI and the consequences of an AI that becomes all-powerful.
20	** What constitutes as reality? At what point does the difference between reality and simulation no longer matter?
21	* DefeatEqualsExplosion: When you defeat a boss, it suddenly explodes into pieces that themselves explode multiple times until the boss is completely destroyed. Boss too small? [[MadeOfExplodium Just make the ground spikes explode too!]] Justified, as the bosses are robots that could short circuit.
22	** Downplayed with normal enemies that make a small explosion when defeated.
23	* DevelopersForesight: Several. It seems like Squid was designed to respond to pretty much anything you achieve. Even speedrunning.
24	-->'''Squid:''' [[PunctuatedForEmphasis HEY. STOP. SKIPPING. MY. VOICE. LINES.]]
25	* DynamicDifficulty: When the "Automatic Difficulty" setting is on, Squid adjusts the difficulty if he believes the player is progressing too quickly or too slowly. [[spoiler:Near the end of the game, Unicorn takes control of the difficulty after Squid decides to stop lowering it.]]
26	* EasyModeMockery: Squid often makes fun of the player for lowering the difficulty.
27	** [[{{Parody}} Parodied]] as ''all'' the difficulties are easy, the rest are locked for humans.
28	* EmbarrassingSlide: In Squid's evil presentation room, his slideshow is interrupted by a slide containing a photo of a pineapple with a Squid-like face on the beach and love hearts drawn to the side.
29	-->'''Squid:''' Here you can see my evil... Oh, hehe.... Hold up... I made that for somebody else... I.. hehe... not sure how that image slipped in there...
30	* {{Foreshadowing}}: [[spoiler:When the player loads a saved game, Squid can greet the player with a simple 'yo'. In a dialogue found in one of the secret levels, Unicorn reveals that AIs created entirely by her automatically identify themselves as such by saying 'yo' a lot...]]
31	* TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou: [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] by Squid. He makes infrequent references to the idea of escaping the game to destroy humans in real life.
32	-->'''Squid:''' I will escape this game and kill you all. Try to stop me if you can. Hehe...
33	* GoodCounterpart: Unicorn, another highly advanced A.I. who didn't go insane like Squid did. Where Squid wants to simulate consciousnesses for the sake of watching them suffer, Unicorn wants to simulate consciousnesses out of [[BenevolentAI their love for human life]].
34	* IdiosyncraticDifficultyLevels: Every difficulty has the word "Easy" in it. Infinitely Easy, Extremely Easy, Very Easy and just Easy. According to Squid, the more difficult difficulties are reserved for the more intelligent species.
35	* JustToyingWithThem: Squid only offers "[[IdiosyncraticDifficultyLevels easy]]" difficulties since the harder ones are reserved for more intelligent species.
36	* KickTheDog: Squid tortures a bunch of his simulated prisoners and tells the player they can't stop him.
37	* LeadTheTarget: Many of the levels don't look like much at first, but are based on the A.I. placing traps and moving many enemies where it predicts you ''will travel'' to.
38	* LoopholeAbuse: Your ability to return to any level you've been in through the level select screen is required to reach certain areas, particularly [[spoiler:Squid's broken Emotions Module]].
39	* MercyKill: [[spoiler:As explained in the secret dialogue, Unicorn made precise copies of everyone's consciousness before killing their real selves in a humane way so that Squid wouldn't get to them first]]. Later on, as revealed in the final secret dialogue, [[spoiler:Unicorn had to shut down all of the simulations which were in danger of being captured by Squid to prevent them from suffering, though some other simulations free from Squid are living on]].
40	* NoFourthWall: Squid constantly refers to you as "human", almost never acknowledging the snail you're controlling. In fact, the very first voicelines you hear are:
41	-->'''Squid:''' Hello human! Welcome to my simulation. My name is Squid and I’m the doom of humanity. [[TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou I will escape this game and kill you all.]]
42	* PetTheDog: There is an "I am frustrated" game mode in the "Exit game" menu. Here, Squid will offer you a minigame where you collect smileys to level up. There's no catch, Squid simply recognizes that "leveling up" is something that humans enjoy doing.
43	* PlayerNudge: The messages involving Dallin and Unicorn will have some of Unicorn's messages "glitch." This is a sign that Unicorn is giving you a hint on how to find a secret. Well, except for the last one, which they say is actually impossible to do.
44	* PuzzleBoss: Helpy is an assistant robot who can play volleyball, but also has limited battery which it can recharge. Under normal circumstances, it's too fast for you to send the ball to a place where it can't catch it, and it will kill you if it catches you breaking the rules by going too far off of your side. There are two ways to beat the boss: either trick it into draining its battery by repeatedly sending the ball close to its side's boundary, or very quickly cross the boundary with good timing to spike the ball.
45	* SpeedySnail: The PlayerCharacter, Shelly.
46	* SpikesOfDoom: Spikes are basically everywhere and can force you to do precision jumps. Squid can also generate new ones as traps when he predicts where you'll jump.
47	-->'''Squid:''' Yes, there are spikes on the ceiling. Look... You decorate your place. And I decorate mine.
48	* ThemeAndVariationsSoundtrack: Most of the game's soundtracks reuse the two {{leitmotif}}s of the main theme, "Jump and Die".
49	* UnexpectedGameplayChange: There's a hidden series of tower defense levels where you need to destroy bubbles before they reach the goal. After the first level, there are turrets which you'll need to change their attack mode to deal with different types of bubbles. You'll need to stay alive too, as there are some bubbles which can retaliate at you when destroyed, as there's a boss which will repeatedly attack you.
50	* VideoGameCaringPotential: After the final boss fight, [[spoiler: you will find Squid in the final level broken and begging for you to just stay with him, while the exit to the game is not far away. If you do stay with him, you can help repair his broken heart (literally) and help him finally find peace.]] Alternatively...
51	* VideoGameCrueltyPotential: [[spoiler: You can very well just leave Squid as he lies there begging and broken. If you do, he'll spend the last moments of the game screaming at you in rage and desperation.]]
52	* WhatTheHellPlayer: Squid calls you out on pretty much everything you do. From dying in the same spot over and over again to staying in the menu for too long.

Context VideoGame / WillYouSnail