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Stop Poking Me!

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To win against the terrorists, don't poke your units.
Image by Skunk-Works. Used with permission.

"Do that again and you'll pull back a stump."
Alleria Windrunner, Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal

Pointing at people is rude. So is poking them. So is poking them repeatedly for no reason when you already have their attention. Will you stop doing that already?! Sheesh, what's wrong with you, anyway?

In games that have units vocally acknowledge when you select them, clicking too often can make them annoyed or sarcastic, or both. Although a few games had used this trope earlier, Blizzard Entertainment is best known for using it in Warcraft: Orcs and Humans (the Trope Namer) and making it a standard feature of all their games; it has since spread to other companies and is now almost considered a mandatory feature for any Real-Time Strategy game. Because of the inherent nature of this trope, it is always a case of Breaking the Fourth Wall.

This is not strictly limited to mouse-clicking, but any repeated action (such as talking to a character) where the programmers thought to include an annoyed or comical reaction. For more general examples not related to multiple clicks/conversations, see What the Hell, Player?

See Torment by Annoyance for a similar trope not related to Video Games.


Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Blizzard Entertainment 
  • Blizzard Entertainment, after codifying this, raised it to an art form. StarCraft and all Warcraft games (including World of Warcraft) have characters getting angry, doing comedy routines, or just providing additional insight into their characters. The Trope Namer is the original Warcraft orc's "Stop poking me!"
    • Referenced in StarCraft: Brood War, with Artanis's "Stop poking me! What do I look like, an orc?", and with the Protoss Observer transmitting Neil Armstrong's famous "A small step for a man..." interrupted midway by "Stop poking me!" said by an orc over the radio.
    • In the first Diablo, clicking the town's cow would cause it to moo. Clicking it repeatedly would make your character start commenting on it. "Yup, that's a cow all right..."
    • The Valkyries in StarCraft provide a Shout-Out to Young Frankenstein.
    • Warcraft: Orcs and Humans's Human Footman class would quip "Why do you keep touching me?" while Warcraft II's would quip "Are you still touching me?" The former of which was used in the disco-y hidden music track on the expansion CD.
    • Along with the page quote, clicking on Alleria Windrunner would occasionally get you the line "You never touch the other elves like that."
    • In Warcraft II's case, even the setup program got annoyed if you kept clicking the sound test button.
      "Your sound card works perfectly! Your sound card works perfectly! Your sound card works perfectly! Enjoying yourself? Your sound card works perfectly! Your sound card works perfectly! Your sound card works perfectly! It doesn't get any better than this."
    • In Warcraft II, poking a critter enough times will result in lots of little animal sounds and finally the critter will just... well... BOOM! and a small bloody mess is all that's left.
    • The StarCraft critters do it better: Click them enough and they explode in a nuclear explosion. It doesn't do any damage to other units, but can potentially scare the heck out of another person in casual multiplayer.
      • Warcraft III takes the poking further by having various Monty Python and the Holy Grail jokes being said among the human units, and veiled pokes at the Church of Happyology among the Scourge's more intelligible units. Also, several rare/unique units have some massively long "annoyed" quotes. The Pit Lord gets even more egregious with line with him publicly coming out to his girlfriend as a demon over a daytime talk show.
    • The Thor unit in StarCraft II combines a fourth wall break with a Shout-Out, "I am here, click me!"
    • And so the tradition continues in Heroes of the Storm, where every hero has a great deal of quotes. More than you'd ever have any chance of hearing during an average match. So much so that the best way to hear them without leaving your hero sitting like a lemon in the middle of a battle is generally to "try" heroes in the shop...for the sole purpose of clicking on them.
    • "Darkness called... but I was on the phone, so I missed him." This Running Gag of a popular personage named Darkness who apparently really needs to get DSL began with the Demon Hunter and Dreadlord in Warcraft III, then continued on with the demon hunters in World of Warcraft: Legion and even some non-Azeroth Blizzard characters in Heroes of the Storm.
    • In World of Warcraft, some of the city guards also sass you if you ask them for directions too many times in a row: the Sentinels in Darnassus take it a step further by accusing you of flirting with them. Many NPCs also have annoyed quotes they say if you click on them (attempt to talk with them) too many times (which can happen due to many players all trying to turn in quests at the same time, or because the NPC keeps moving). Most of the time though, NPCs just sass you for no reason at all.
    • Behold the ULTIMATE Stop Poking Me, courtesy of King Ymiron!

    Action Adventure 
  • In Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow, if you talk to Arikado enough times after fighting Graham, he will get angry with you and change his dialogue to "GO NOW!".
  • Vateilika in Iji, after you see her in the final Tasen hideout and poke her repeatedly, she eventually completely breaks down and talks about how her relationship with her boyfriend fell apart because he kept poking her. With the Scrambler enabled, she starts narrating the legend of the missile pony instead.
  • In The Messenger (2018), there's a cabinet on the left side of the shop, but the Shopkeeper will not let you open it. Keep trying and he'll tell you to not touch the cabinet in a variety of ways, including even faking a dialogue reset. Do this long enough and he'll go on a philosophical talk that you can't fast forward through. You need to do this for an achievement.
    • Later in the game when the Shopkeeper wants you to open the cabinet, the same thing happens if you keep trying to talk to him instead. This is how you get another achievement.
  • If you call Mei Ling in Metal Gear Solid too many times without saving, she gets annoyed and sticks her tongue out at you. Before that, she realizes partway through that you're messing with her and gets a hilarious look on her face that seems to say "...Oh, you dick."

    Action Game 
  • In Banjo-Kazooie, Bottles offers to give you a tutorial of the game. Should you choose to reject his offer, and but still attempt to talk to him, he will refuse to speak with you. Bother him enough times, and he will threaten to erase your game pak. Banjo pleads with him though, and he stops.
  • There's a talking door in Zeno Clash that demands a password by posing you a short riddle. If you approach it multiple times, it will repeat its riddle, becoming increasingly annoyed with each repetition. In the Steam version of the game, there's even an achievement for doing this.
  • In God of War Ragnarök, ringing the bell to summon Ratatoskr while he's already there will have him first tell you that he's already there. Ringing the bell even more will get increasingly frustrated dialog until he angrily snaps at you, at which point his dialog will loop.

    Action RPG 
  • You can pester Dervahl in Horizon Zero Dawn after he has been imprisoned. First he will declare that he'll escape. Then he begins to mock Aloy, then threaten her. In the end he begs her to leave him alone.
  • In the later Mega Man Star Force games, you can poke Omega-Xis with your stylus, resulting in him getting annoyed, and closing the menu. In Star Force 3, however, if you poke him enough, he vanishes, and the game appears to have frozen. Waiting a couple of seconds will have him come back, mocking you.
  • One Step From Eden: The Shopkeeper, when poked in the shop screen has different things to say depending on which version is selling things. The basic version says things happily:
    I'm... not for sale.
    Yes.
    No.
    Poke
  • In Pyre, your carriage has a bell that's meant to be rung whenever it's time for dinner, but you can ring it whenever you want by clicking on it. If you do it too many times in a row, Rukey will get furious about it and yell at you, with the narration noting he'll never forgive you even after he plays it off as a joke. If you do it too much after that, he'll remove the hammer inside the bell so it can't ring anymore.

    Adventure Game 
  • Variant in Chzo Mythos game 5 Days a Stranger: Trilby gets progressively more snarky if the player keeps commanding him to look at doors.
  • In Discworld, examining Rincewind too many times causes him to temporarily steal the mouse cursor.
  • In Lamplight City, during the game's Prologue chapter, it is possible to make Detective Fordham ring the counter bell in the flower shop several times after already having used it to summon Mrs. Hanbrook. Mrs. Hanbrook will get increasingly annoyed by Fordham's repeated use of the bell the more he does it, eventually culminating in her letting out a scream of frustration. Fordham's partner, Detective Leger, though amused by his friend's antics, will step in and tell him to give it a rest at this point.
  • In The Longest Journey, if you click April enough times, she will usually say, "April Ryan, you have got to get over yourself.'' Even funnier after the first scene before she puts on clothes.
  • Monkey Island:
    • In The Secret of Monkey Island, there is a rat you can pester by hovering your mouse over him. Doing this repeatedly will cause it to run away, and a nearby group of pirates will get mad at you.
    • Using the duck in Escape from Monkey Island outside its intended use in a certain puzzle would cause it to quack. Use it enough times, and then it'll moo instead, leading to a confused Guybrush Lampshading this by wondering what kind of duck it is.
  • Knock on the door of the crazy hermit in The Omega Stone enough times, and he'll slip out of character to chew you out.
    • Knocking on the trapdoor of the druid tower's upper level when he's inside will eventually cause him to open it and yell at you to leave. The first few times he does so in melodramatic, archaic terms ("Begone, or suffer!"), but if you keep it up long enough, he breaks character and tells you "They don't live here, they're next door!" in modern-day accents.
  • Space Quest IV: Roger Wilco and the Time Rippersnote  has an interesting example. If you ask a character the same question three times in a row, you get the following:
    Roger: What's goin' on in there?
    One-eyed Alien: The two geeks from Andromeda are in there signing copies of their latest release!
    Roger: What's goin' on in there?
    One-eyed Alien: I JUST TOLD YA! The two geeks from Andromeda are in there signing copies of their latest release!
    Roger: What's goin' on in there?
    One-eyed Alien: Beat it jerk!
  • In Starship Titanic, the parrot objects to being prodded. This quickly becomes a more strenuous objection if you click and drag, effectively abducting him from his cage.
    • And "prodding" the Maitre'd-bot enough times or trying to go to one of the tables provokes him into fighting you.
    • But the one that takes the cake is the Smart Bomb, voiced by none other than John Cleese. Just one click or use of a hammer you find later makes him lose track of his countdown and forces him to start over. He eventually breaks down in tears.

    Edutainment Game 
  • In the Living Books version of the Arthur novel Arthur's Computer Adventure, there is a lamp that gets irritated at you for clicking on it. If you click too many times, it'll leave in a huff.

    Platform game 

    Puzzle Game 
  • Richard Gray is a character in both the Grim Tales and Detectives United series of hidden object games. He is a ghost bound into his own skull, which appears on the inventory bar. Clicking on the skull when it's lit up and dancing causes Richard to provide some helpful advice as well as some fun snark. Clicking on the skull when it's silent will often garner a reaction along these lines, sometimes with the exact phrase.
  • Gruntz has the titular gruntz eventually become annoyed if clicked repeatedly.
  • Mole Mania has Grandpa Mole, who seemingly waits for Muddy at various spots in each of the levels. Talking to him once causes him to heal Muddy, but each subsequent attempt to chat/heal makes him increasingly irritated - eventually erupting in a Non-Standard Game Over.
  • In Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2: March of the Minis, repeatedly closing the DS to put it in sleep mode will make Mario stop saying things like 'I love-a this game!' and 'Bye bye!' and start shouting 'Hey, come back here!'. Keep doing it and he'll despairingly cry 'Not again!'

    Rhythm Game 
  • Love Live! School idol festival shows a portrait of your main team's lead member, with them making a random quip or two. If you touch the portrait, you'll get a variety of reactions, such as asking if you need help, to accusing you of being a pervert, or teasingly threatening to touch you back.
  • In maimai games from maimai MilK onwards, you have a partner who speaks to you in the menus. If you tap on them, they will get angry at you.

    Role-Playing Games 
  • Empress Himiko, one of the playable mercenaries in Atlantica Online will occasionally say this after being selected.
  • Baldur's Gate has something similar. Including comments such as "I do not understand this "mouse magic" that makes me do your bidding!" (incidentally, said by a character with an inhuman intelligence, which arguably allows him to see through the fourth wall) and the classic "Elminster this! Elminster that! Give me 2000 years and a pointy hat and I'll kick his arse!"
    • Xzar, who's like, crazy awesome, actually at one point says "STOP POKING MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEH!" as a Shout-Out to Warcraft.
    • At the other end of the spectrum, is the just plain crazy Tiax, who informs you: "One day, Tiax will point and click!".
    • A possible third occurs when you click on Jaheira; one of her selection lines is, "Yes, oh omnipresent authority figure?"
    • Easier to miss, if you right click on Dunkin at Feldepost's Inn in Beregost he will straightly shout "Hey don't click me! I don't want any trouble!"
  • Chrono Cross has a similar secret item early in the game: if you keep trying to open the chest in Karsh's room while he's present, he tells you to leave it alone and counts how many times you attempt it until he finally gives up after 20 attempts, allowing you to have the Dragoon Gauntlet inside instead of having to wait later in the game.
  • In the second through fifth Disgaea games, you can occasionally find friendly NPCs in Item World provide various services. If you talk to some of them too many times, they'll get annoyed and fight you, which may or may not let you reap some additional benefits by defeating them. The friendly-NPCs-turned-bosses tend to be quite powerful relative to the enemies of the Item World you're in; depending on the game, this may trap you in an unescapable battle as well, costing you your hard-earned progress!
  • Characters in Dragon Age: Origins have Stop Poking Me lines if you select/unselect them too many times in the party selection screen. Shale says the trope namer line.
    • If you repeatedly try to have your main character do something they cannot do (e.g. open a locked door) they will call you out on it.
      Warden (Aggressive): Can I get you a ladder... so you can get off my back?!
    • In Dragon Age II, Hawke will get irritated and snap at the player if they click on him/her too many times. (This is only present in the PC version, however, as console players don't have the option.)
  • In The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion's Shivering Isles expansion, you gain the ability to summon Sheogorath's chamberlain Haskill. Do it repeatedly and he'll start complaining.
    "I was right there. You could have just walked over to me."
  • A hilarious variation occurs in Fallout. Speaking to people multiple times will result in them saying different things, and trying it on a Brahmin yields this:
    Brahmin: Moo.
    Brahmin: Moo, moo.
    Brahmin: Moo, I say.
  • Fallout: New Vegas takes a similar tack, as repeatedly giving a follower the same instruction leads to snarking.
    Veronica: [after being told "stay close/keep your distance three or four times by a male player character] I don't get any closer until you turn into a leggy brunette!
  • In Fate/Grand Order, some characters react as if you are poking them annoyingly when you tap them in the My Room screen. For instance, Alexander says it tickles, and Zhuge Liang complains that you're playing with his hair. However, they just do it randomly, rather than after too much tapping.
  • Final Fantasy:
    • Crisis Core does this at the very beginning of the game. Kunsel tells you to open the supply pod and see what Shinra gave you. However, if you keep checking the pod 20 times, he gives up and gives you the Cursed Ring he got (raises all your stats by a lot, but disables your DMW, which means no level ups or Limit attacks).
    • Final Fantasy IX:
      • If you call the moogle who acts as your save point on the world map without saving enough times, he gets angry and threatens you, first by stating that he's "sharpening his knife, kupo..." before ultimately his dialogue devolves into "STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT! KU-PHEH!!" In the Steam version, there's an achievement for this, "One Nag Too Many." The description reads "Cause Moguo to have a tantrum."
      • Answering the question your boss gives you in the beginning (whether to kidnap the ugly queen or the princess) wrong (as in, "we'll kidnap the queen") 64 times will lead to a female thief storming into the room to tell you to stop messing around already and answer the question correctly.
    • In Final Fantasy X, if you press X to talk to Kimahri on the ferry too many times, eventually an animation triggers showing Tidus bugging him, Kimahri shoving back, and Tidus stamping his foot after getting pushed.
    • In Final Fantasy XIII, if you run characters left-right-left-right-left-right too many times, they have a frustrated "that's quite ENOUGH" animations.
  • In Fire Emblem Heroes, some characters have quotes expressing aggravation with you when you poke them on the status screen. Ayra in particular has a direct Shout-Out to the page quote.
  • Icewind Dale gives us various character voice sets with this feature. Most are annoyed, some start cursing the player, and one even plays along with the player and then mentions that he knows a druid that can "hook you up with some really good stuff".
    • And since you can make your own soundsets...
  • In Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, there's a Toad by a fountain on Peach's Castle Grounds who asks you if you're looking to learn about Action Icons, starting a brief tutorial if you agree. If you repeatedly talk to him and decline his offer five times in total, he stops making the offer and tells you to just look at the instruction booklet (in the GBA version) or e-manual (in the 3DS version) instead, since you refuse to let him explain.
  • Mass Effect:
    • A character from Mass Effect located on Noveria will cycle through lines every time you speak to him, until reaching his breaking point.
      Inamorda: If you don't stop poking me, I'll throw you off that balcony.
    • A scientist on the salarian homeworld in Mass Effect 3 would really like you to stop poking the console he's working on. He'll eventually suggest you get your own feces analyzer and stop playing with his.
      Scientist: Further manipulation of that object is grounds for further admonishment. [...] Really! You must stop touching that!
    • The gag is repeated in the Citadel DLC, with a waterfall in the Silver Coast Casino.
      VI Announcer: You know what? Fine. It's a hanar urinal. Knock yourself out.
    • Shows up yet again in Mass Effect: Andromeda in a hidden Outlaw base on Kadara, playing very similarly to the Sur'Kesh one in Mass Effect 3.
  • Mother:
    • In Earthbound 1994, there's an NPC in the Twoson hotel who will pay you to leave him alone if you talk to him enough.
    • The first time you meet Bud and Lou in Mother 3, Lou will ask you to "stop pressing that thing", but, of course, you have to keep doing it if you want to get out of the dialogue window.
  • In the first Paper Mario, in the prologue, the guard who keeps you from going into Peach's room will give up if you talk to him enough times.
  • Pillars of Eternity has them when you rapidly click the character portraits of anyone besides the Watcher (the main character). Each character has multiple lines, and most are even in-universe pokes by the Watcher, though Pallegina breaks the fourth wall once.
    Edér: This is why you were traveling alone.
    Pallegina: Do you think if you click on me enough, I'll lay an egg? Sorry to disappoint you.
  • Planescape: Torment likewise.
    Dak'kon: The reasons for your incessant clicking are not *known* to me.
    • The characters also have quotes for if you try to give them weapons they can't wield or remove items they won't take off.
      Morte (a floating skull): Sure, I'll just swing it with my arms!
  • Pokémon:
    • Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver lets the lead Pokemon follow the player around and lets the player interact with it. Doing this too much over a period of time leads to your Pokemon getting angry.
    • The Pokemon Amie feature in Pokémon X and Y has something similar — pet a Pokemon on a spot it doesn't like long enough and it'll get annoyed at you. You can also poke them, which either produces the same result or provokes an even more irritated response from certain species.
    • Annoy your Partner Pikachu/Eevee enough and they'll attack you out of the play mode and back to the menu screen.
  • Warhammer Online does this, not just with the NPCs, but also other player characters.

    Shooter 
  • Azur Lane gives each ship girl her own reaction lines if you "touch" her. Some will get upset about it, while the blatantly Yandere Taihou demands that you touch her more often (and never touch anybody else)... or else.
  • Dying Light has a pink teddy bear that'll eventually get tired of your nonstop poking. Go ahead and ignore its warnings, or its eyes suddenly lighting up, for the matter...!
  • In Half-Life, attempting to enter one of Black Mesa's locked doors enough times will annoy the automated security computer. The mod Black Mesa brings it back as an Easter Egg.
    This door is locked.
    You. Do. Not. Have. Access. To. This. Facility.
    Will we do this all day?
    No, no, and
    NO.
  • In Halo 2, your allies will have increasingly comical and fourth wall breaking responses to idling nearby them ranging from an Elite nervously telling the Arbiter that he thinks he is cute too to an ODST soldier breaking into a spirited rendition of Edwin Starr's "War" before eventually say that you should have just paused the game. They also have various comical responses to you shooting them non-lethally.
  • If you tap the Fiend's Cauldron enough times on the difficulty menu in Kid Icarus: Uprising, it'll get annoyed with you and turn around. If you continue, it'll look back at you to see if you'll stop, before turning back around again.
  • In the single-player campaign of Splatoon 2, if the player speaks to Marie in the overworld enough times, she'll stop talking to them directly, but her thoughts will appear in the dialogue box, among them complaints about the player character's persistence.
  • In Trouble Witches, you can place your cursor over the shopkeepers and press the "fire" button to try to get them to react. Do this too many times, however, and you get thrown out of the store.

    Simulation Game 
  • Talking to villagers in Animal Crossing repeatedly within a short amount of time will cause them to request that you give them their personal space.
  • Hulk in Avengers Academy will occasionally shout "STOP TAPPING HULK" when you select him.
  • The main mechanic in Ganbare Neo Poke-Kun is to open a door to spawn characters that interact with the protagonist. However, if you open the door five times in a row it is blown off and you'll have to waste time getting it repaired.
  • Not "clicking"-related, but keeping a guest's view window open long enough in RollerCoaster Tycoon will cause him to say "I have the strangest feeling that someone's watching me..."
    • Played straight in the third game, the first click after opening the window will prompt them to notice your cursor and follow it, the second will quote the trope name word for word sometimes.
    • Animals in the Wild! expansion also react each time you click on them.

    Sports Game 
  • In Nstorm's Elf Bowling, you click on a little Easter egg in the corner to view pictures of the developers. If you mouse over three pictures in succession, it says "Stop. Poking. MEEEEEEEE!"

    Stealth-Based Game 
  • The World of Assassination Trilogy:
    • Much of the dialog for doing weird things in front of civilians and guards (such as bumping into them, knocking them out, or pointing a gun at them) is quite varied, to the point that it avoids falling into the Welcome to Corneria trap. Impressive, as there are multiple spoken languages across the games, with various British English, American English, Mexican-Spanish, Colombian Spanish, Indian, and Chinese voice actors with different accents, colloquialisms, and dialects specific to their respective levels, Notably, in "The Undying/ Returns", which features Sean Bean, the developers went out of their way to record this kind of extra dialog so they wouldn't replace his voice with generic dialog.
    • In Hitman 3's Mendoza level, 47 can interact with Diana and one of the targets, Tamara Vidal, using his Tobias Rieper alias. The more times he talks to them, the more suspicious Tamara becomes, and the more Diana will try to shoo him away. Eventually, Tamara becomes fed up and leads 47 into a trap with five bodyguards ready to kill him, as she's figured out his true identity. This is actually an opportunity to assassinate Vidal (along with the five bodyguards) as the room they're in has no civilians and 47 must kill everyone in the room, leaving no witnesses.

    Strategy Game 
  • Age of Empires: some units will say lines including "Quit touching me!" and "Don't point that thing at me!" when selected.
  • In Bloons Tower Defense 6 and Bloons Adventure Time TD, hero characters become annoyed when you tap them too many times in a row.
  • Civilization V: Chatting to another leader enough times in a turn will prompt a response, which for leaders who dislike you will be something like "I wonder if you have anything better to do than talk to me all the time. Although I suspect you don't."
  • Command & Conquer has a few examples, such as in Tiberian Wars if one man in the GDI sniper team is shot, the acknowledgement will be much more strained and panicky.
    • In Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight all units have different responses depending on whether they are in combat or not, and then if they are winning or not while in combat.
    • Also from Tiberium Wars on, units give different responses depending on if they are moving towards your own base or towards the enemy.
  • Units in Company of Heroes will get annoyed whenever you repeatedly select them, and they'll get really annoyed if you do it in the middle of combat. Not all units had a quote, but those that did generally had lots of profanity as they swore at the player. Some units had more witty responses, though, such as the British commandos breaking of the fourth wall by asking if one of them can range that camera hanging up there...
    • "You click me one more time and I'll fuckin' smoke you."
    • "Oh goodie, we got one of THOSE players."
    • "SARGE, ARE YOU HIGH?!"
    • "In case you haven't noticed, THERE'S A FUCKING WAR GOING ON OVER HERE!!!"
    • "We're fucked, crew! Command is drunk again!"
    • "Hey... uh, new mouse?"
    • "Yes sir, yes sir, yes sir, FUCK OFF, SIR!"
    • "We're Jagdpanzer, goddamnit. And we hate you."
    • "Ignoring the kommandant! He appears to be the victim of some sort of enemy nerve gas!"
    • "Bren Carrier here! HERE! HEEEEEREEE!!!"
    • "Clickety-click. Clickety FUCKING CLICK! Fucking Scheiße!"
    • "Who is doing that incessant button-tapping?"
    • "Reinhardt! Fart into the radio." "Yes sir." [fart noise]
    • "Go back to the main menu, and try out the tutorial."
  • Dota 2 has an uncommon use of this. Usually, the heroes have no "Awaiting Orders" quote at all if clicked once or twice. Poke them a lot of times and they will let out Rare Quotes.
    • Ordering them to use an ability that is on cooldown or costs more mana than they have left will cause them to tell you "Not yet." or "Out of mana." Doing this a lot will give you an angry "Not! YET!" or "Not! Enough! MANA!" And some heroes get a bit creative...
      Troll Warlord: Now I'm ready. To stab you.
  • In Halo Wars, one of the selection acknowledgements for the Grunt squad is "Yee! Tickles!"
  • Endless Space 2: Making excessive offers on the diplomacy screen will result in some of these. Here are some from Jenestra of the Lumeris Syndicate.
    "This isn't social media."
    "Are you just lonely?"
  • Halo Wars 2 has squads acknowledge when they are selected, with a variation depending on their health. For instance, Yapyap THE DESTROYER's unique infantry, Cannon Fodder:
    Cannon Fodder: Something just poked me!
    Cannon Fodder, low health: Uh, I hit my head... but I can still thunk real good...
  • Heroes of Newerth includes these for all of its heroes, except the ones who can't talk. This also includes some Shout Outs such as the Pyromancer who shouts "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!" then chuckles and notes that "...I've always wanted to say that."
  • League of Legends has the original version of Mordekaiser, who had one of his sound clips while moving as "You only need to click once, fool!"
  • Medieval II: Total War plays with this. If you click on your own units, they'll say things like "Yes, Sire?" as one would expect. Click on another faction's units, and they'll say things ranging from "I'm a warrior. Speak to our diplomats." (Actually, your diplomats can speak happily to any army-type unit on the campaign map.) to "Begone! You are not my liege!" and "You wish I was one of your own armies?", though exactly what they say depends on both their Character Alignment and whether the faction is allied, peaceful or at war. Click on an an army of a faction you've just beaten in a battle and they'll say things like "Was that your best shot?".
    • In the same game, when you click a hostile imam: "If Allah is willing, you will leave me alone!"
    • Of course, perhaps the most epic is clicking on a Scottish unit you're hostile to. "AH'LL RIP OFF YER HEAD AND SPIT DOON YER NECK." Or, slightly less awesome: "I gotta claymore for ye here, Jimmy..."
    • Empire: Total War has a Deadpan Snarker admiral voice for the British. Clicking on a land square after selecting a fleet results in a delightfully snarky "Ships sail on water, milord..."
    • The Total War: Warhammer trilogy has a wide variety of these whenever you select an enemy on the campaign map, with Lizardmen spouting Black Speech. Notable is this standard Skaven response:
    "No-no! NEED my warp-token stash!"
  • Sacrifice: As with Blizzard, the Stop Poking Me quotes are rife with puns and Shout Outs to other media.
  • Your units in Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds generally remain respectful no matter how much you prod them, but a few units offer some more colourful dialogue:
    Boss Gallo: "Yousa givin' me an order?"
    Darth Vader: "I hope, for your sake, this is important."
    Gungan Boss: "Stop pokin'!"

    Web Game 
  • In Crush Crush, if you try to extract hearts out of a girl by poking her after you've already acquired enough to move to the next relationship level, you'll get different lines depending on how far you've "advanced" with her. Trying this before you reach the Friend Zone with a girl will get you yelled at, but once you cross that line, the responses gradually become more playful and flirtatious.
  • A flash game called Get Off My Lawn (2009) involves a store owner who, if you tickle him (by clicking on him) enough times, will call the police. This nets you the Restraining Order award.
  • In KanColle there are a variety of different lines depending on who's chosen as the secretary ship. Some ship girls will tell you to quit, while others say to wait until they're off-duty to "poke" them.
  • The Flash game Poke the Penguin may be a reference to the exploding critters in Blizzard's games.
    • There's also a "Poke the Bunny" which is somewhat less extreme; it just sinks its razor-sharp teeth into the finger and doesn't let go.

    Virtual Board Game 

    Other Softwares 
  • The free speech synthesis program ReadPlease 2003. The current voice is associated with the speaker's portrait. Hovering the mouse on the portrait brings up a tooltip that says "Please do not click on face", and clicking on it results in the selected voice complaining about the user clicking on their face.
    Complaint 1: Ouch! That hurt. This is [voice], speaking, and I would appreciate it if you don't click on my face again. You have clicked on my face [n] times. I have been talking it over with the others in here, and they don't much like it either.
    Complaint 2: Ouch! I told you before, that really hurts. I have already asked you [n] times to stop clicking on my face. How would you like it if someone kept clicking on your face? It is bad enough that we are all trapped inside your computer. I will not ask you again. Thank you very much.
  • aptitude, a tool in Debian Linux, insists it doesn't have Super Cow Powers when you type "aptitude moo".note 
  • The weather app YoWindow has this as one of its Easter Eggs. The weather "map" is an interactive view of a farmhouse, with surrounding fields, barn, dirt road, etc. Usually grazing in the field is either a cow or a horse. When you roll your pointer over the animal once, it tells you its name. Roll over it again, and it will tell you "Cows/horses do not fly." If you click on it, the animal will hover in the air. The more times you click on it, the higher it will go. When you move your pointer to click on it while in mid-air, it repeatedly asks you to stop what you're doing and return it to solid ground.
  • This thread here contains a lot of these quotes for fan-made RTS units. This includes a lot of characters, vehicles, and other beings from a large number of fiction works:
  • Discord: if you left-click your username in the bottom left-hand corner, a green tooltip will appear saying "Copied!" If you click your username again when the tooltip fades, another tooltip with a different message will appear. You can continue this process for a series of mildly amusing messages.


 
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"Please do not click on face"

A gimmick of an obscure text-to-speech software from 2002 involves the selected voice complaining about the user clicking on the face.

How well does it match the trope?

5 (4 votes)

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Main / StopPokingMe

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