Genre Savvy / Video Games

• Both Ben and Dan in Ben There, Dan That! and its sequel are aware at all times that they're in a point-and-click, and specifically that it's one of the LucasArts school which doesn't punish the player with deaths or Unwinnable situations. This is frequently used to justify their more dangerous antics and their lack of any fear of death, as well as Ben's kleptomania and deliberately trying to come up with convoluted ways of doing simple things. The aliens, however, reveal at the end of Ben There Dan That that their abduction of Ben and Dan and forcing them to go through a point-and-click adventure game was just there to keep them clicking about long enough for the aliens to enact their real evil plan.
• In Brütal Legend, Eddie shows a degree of genre savvy right off the bat when he sees a Twisted Coil Battle Nun from behind. "All right. I'm supposed to think you're a nun, but I know you're really some big ugly demon, so let's have it! (she turns and roars in his face) HAH! I knew it! Big, ugly demon."
  • Eddie is definitely among the best examples of this trope in any video game story, quite fittingly as he is sort of Trapped in TV Land, except it's Heavy Metal Land and he likes it there far better than his original world.
  • Eddie's whole personality through most of the game is built around this trope, since he interacts with all the other characters acting as if his supposed inside knowledge of the world is enough of an advantage for him to overcome anything. He turns out to be correct... most of the time.
• Almost all the characters in the Disgaea series, particularly Etna. Mao from the third game is dangerously so, concluding that the quickest method of kicking his dad off the throne and rule with his own iron fist is to actually become the hero of the game.
  • One example from Disgaea 2 that particularly stands out: Etna figured out that the Overlord Zenon she just defeated was a fake. How? The title of Overlord is transferred by Klingon Promotion, and she points out that her title on her status screen doesn't read "Overlord".
  • Also from Disgaea 3, after you have defeated Super-Hero Aurum he says "Wait! In these games the final boss always has to take his final form before you can truly defeat him!", to which Mao replies "Ah! Curse you, using that convenient Game Mechanic!"
  • Melodia from Disgaea 6 is a textbook example of the Princess Classic, and since fairy tales tend to end with the princess finding her Prince Charming and living a Happily Ever After, she uses that as an excuse to be selfish.
• In Dot's Home, Dot unknowingly time travels to the past, when her grandmother Mavis and her husband Karl were buying what would become her home. Upon encountering them, Dot calls out to her grandma, but she doesn't recognize her. This makes Dot realize the time period she's in, so she tries keeping her time traveling a secret and maintaining a Stable Time Loop to prevent a time paradox.
  Dot: Okay, I've seen this happen in the movies. Just gotta play it cool.
• In Dragon Age: Inquisition, Varric repeatedly demonstrates in dialogue that he has a keen understanding of how stories work and lampshades a number of different parts of the game through this.
  • If you side with the mages and confront Alexius, at one point Alexius' son asks Alexius if he knows what he sounds like. Cue Dorian: "he sounds exactly like the sort of villainous cliche everyone expects us to be."
• In Final Fantasy XII, Balthier lives and breathes this trope to the point he's practically the Trope Codifier for the series. He instantly believes Basch's story that he has an Evil Twin, he's perfectly aware that the Ancient Tomb will contain Demonic Spiders and Booby Traps, and that The Emperor will be awaiting them on The Bridge. He also constantly claims he's "the leading man" and as such may be called upon to do a Heroic Sacrifice eventually. When he eventually does invoke said trope, well...
  "Princess! No need to worry. I hope you haven't forgotten my role in this little story. I'm the leading man. You know what they say about the leading man - he never dies."
• Zoey of Left 4 Dead is a prime example — as a college student, she's seen a lot of zombie movies, and often spouts out lines relating to their current situation.
  "I can't get over how fast they all are! It's not even fair, I'm calling zombie bullshit on that, you know? They're not... allowed to be so fast!"
  • Tragically deconstructed in the comic. Zoey's mother turned into a zombie and managed to bite Zoey's father before she died. Zoey's father knew that he was next and had Zoey mercy kill him to prevent this from happening. As Zoey later learns from a military doctor, this was entirely pointless. The carrier virus that Zoey and the rest of the group have is inherited from the male line, meaning that Zoey had to have inherited it from her father, meaning that he never would have turned.
• Monkey Island: Guybrush Threepwood occasionally points out a trope during his adventures and tries to take advantage (generally by refusing to do something stupid).
• The Neptunia series has No Fourth Wall, so everyone is this to some extent, but the most blatant example is Neptune, who Lampshades all the cliches they come across and knows that as the main character that most events are scripted to favor her.
• Henry of No More Heroes is made of this trope. He correctly identifies himself as main character Travis' mysterious foil and just goes on from there.
  • Travis picks up some of it once No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle starts, but the king of the trope is the final boss. When Travis can't figure out his motives, the boss snaps, pointing out that You Killed My Father is a staple of every genre known to man.
  "Shakespeare, for God's sake!"
• Wishbone and the Amazing Odyssey: Wishbone, being as well-read as he is, knows there's always a catch when he's offered a way home.
• Geralt of The Witcher. He's well aware of traditional fantasy stories, and of course being the kind of person he is, sarcastically brings them up from time to time.
  • And they occasionally invert and/or subvert it.
    • Like the time a guy mentions having a "terrible secret", and Geralt assumes he's talking about being a werewolf, and starts offering to try and break the curse... "What!? Werewolf!? No! I'm just gay!" "Oh. Ok."
    • And in the Blood And Wine quest "Paperchase", Geralt is entirely unprepared for navigating the Cianfanelli Bank's bureaucracy. ("Sir must understand, I can't possibly issue Permit A38 until Sir submits Form 202." "Ok, where do I get Form 202?" "Window 1, of course." "I was just there, they sent me here!" etc.) Geralt clearly has not read Kafka.
• In Zettai Hero Project, pretty much everyone is aware of what cliches to keep track of, apparently because Henshin Hero shows are based on real life for them. But Darkdeath Evilman unleashes a series of energy blasts that land in countless cities across the world, causing mass destruction. Each and every one of those locations was evacuated, because they were all the buildings and landmarks that are always destroyed in movies. There were no casualties at all.