TVTropes Now available in the app store!
Open

Follow TV Tropes

Following

Is this an example?

Go To

Do you have trouble remembering the difference between Deathbringer the Adorable and Fluffy the Terrible?

Do you have trouble recognizing when you've written a Zero-Context Example?

Not sure if you really have a Badass Bookworm or just a guy who likes to read?

Well, this is the thread for you. We're here to help you will all the finer points of example writing. If you have any questions, we can answer them. Don't be afraid. We don't bite. We all just want to make the wiki a better place for everyone.


Useful Tips:

  • Make sure that the example makes sense to both people who don't know the work AND don't know the trope.
    • Wrong: The Mentor: Kevin is this to Bob in the first episode.
    • Right: The Mentor: Kevin takes Bob under his wing in the first episode and teaches him the ropes of being a were-chinchilla.
  • Never just put the trope title and leave it at that.
    • Wrong: Badass Adorable
    • Right: Badass Adorable: Xavier, the group's cute little mascot, defeats three raging elephants with both hands tied behind his back using only an uncooked spaghetti noodle.
  • When is normally far less important than How.
    • Wrong: Big Bad: Of the first season.
    • Right: Big Bad: The heroes have to defeat the Mushroom Man lest the entirety of Candy Land's caramel supply be turned into fungus.
  • A character name is not an explanation.


Other Resources:


For best results, please include why you think an example is iffy in your first post.

Also, many oft-misused tropes/topics have their own threads, such as Surprisingly Realistic Outcome (here) and Fan-Preferred Couple (here). Tropers are better able to give feedback on examples you bring up to specific threads. We don't discuss Complete Monster or Magnificent Bastard examples; please don't bring them up.

Edited by SeptimusHeap on Jul 17th 2025 at 8:59:01 PM

rjd1922 Best robot boy | he/him | Image Pickin' regular, from the United States Since: May, 2013 Relationship Status: Love is for the living, Sal
Best robot boy | he/him | Image Pickin' regular,
#8901: Jun 16th 2019 at 9:21:57 AM

I meant to ask if handheld ports count as Video Game Demakes, not Video Game Remakes. Don't you hate it when a one-letter mistake gets a response you weren't looking for?

Keet cleanup
crazysamaritan NaNo 4328 / 50,000 from Lupin III Since: Apr, 2010
NaNo 4328 / 50,000
#8902: Jun 16th 2019 at 9:56:40 AM

The handheld port of a computer/console game shouldn't automatically count as a Video Game Demake. Computer technology has improved so much, old console and computer games can now be run on cheap $10 devices. Some handheld devices can stream to your television, making it a controller. Your average phone that came out a year ago has the hardware to handle any software that was made twenty years ago, assuming it was rewritten with compatible code.

Edited by crazysamaritan on Jun 16th 2019 at 12:57:02 PM

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.
rjd1922 Best robot boy | he/him | Image Pickin' regular, from the United States Since: May, 2013 Relationship Status: Love is for the living, Sal
Best robot boy | he/him | Image Pickin' regular,
#8903: Jun 16th 2019 at 11:10:56 AM

[up]I'm talking specifically about the examples I brought up two pages ago, not old games being ported to modern handheld/mobile devices.

Edited by rjd1922 on Jun 16th 2019 at 1:12:14 PM

Keet cleanup
crazysamaritan NaNo 4328 / 50,000 from Lupin III Since: Apr, 2010
NaNo 4328 / 50,000
#8904: Jun 16th 2019 at 11:44:26 AM

You mean this post? The only one I can confidently say yea/nay on is Rockman Battle & Fighters because it has enough context to say "yes, it is an example". The rest I don't know enough to make any specific statements.

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.
Unicorndance Logic Girl from Thames, N.Z. Since: Jul, 2015 Relationship Status: Above such petty unnecessities
Logic Girl
#8906: Jun 16th 2019 at 12:30:05 PM

Fox Mulder from The X-Files is listed as The Sleepless, but as far as I know, he's a human and humans need to sleep so...

For every low there is a high.
WhirlRX Since: Jan, 2015
#8907: Jun 16th 2019 at 12:40:52 PM

[up][up]Was it marketed as a kids book because the content themselves are not kid friendly.

crazysamaritan NaNo 4328 / 50,000 from Lupin III Since: Apr, 2010
NaNo 4328 / 50,000
#8908: Jun 16th 2019 at 12:41:57 PM

[up][up][up] Lord of the Flies being a "children's book" is tricky. It quickly became required reading in schools, but so are many William Shakespeare plays, and they were performed for adults, not children.

Edited by crazysamaritan on Jun 16th 2019 at 3:42:15 PM

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.
MFLuder Since: Jul, 2012
#8909: Jun 16th 2019 at 2:24:52 PM

There's a pop culture cliché where I'm wondering if it was ever real or a Dead Unicorn Trope. It's that corny old sitcom cliché where a character says something like "That's our (name)!" after another character does/says something funny.

sgamer82 Since: Jan, 2001
#8910: Jun 16th 2019 at 3:20:27 PM

~MF Luder

Without a specific example in mind that may be more of a question for Trope Finder.

4tell0life4 Since: Mar, 2018 Relationship Status: Giving love a bad name
#8911: Jun 16th 2019 at 3:34:25 PM

Arbitrary Augmentation Limit seems to be specifically talking about physical augmentations.

However, someone thinks of "augmentation" as "gameplay-related upgrades", like so:

  • Honkai Impact 3rd
    • Available skill upgrades are tied to the individual character's current level and rank, which means you have to level up your Valkyries to improve their current skills and increase their rank to unlock more from their skill trees.
    • Valkyries also have "load points" for equipping weapons and Stigmatas.

Does this count for that trope, or maybe another trope?

We can never truly eradicate the coronavirus, but we can suppress its threat like influenza
Pichu-kun ... Since: Jan, 2001
...
#8912: Jun 16th 2019 at 5:15:44 PM

I don't think I got an answer on whether Sabre from Dinosaur Planet being a brown wolf counts as Amazing Technicolor Wildlife or not.

[up](x5) It seems kid-friendly to me. I'm using "kid friendly" by book standards. It's not any worse than other Middle Grade Literature like Warrior Cats, Old Yeller, or Bridge to Terabithia. Considering it's a deconstruction of kid-aimed literature from the era, I'd say it's a kids book and should instead be under What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?.

rjd1922 Best robot boy | he/him | Image Pickin' regular, from the United States Since: May, 2013 Relationship Status: Love is for the living, Sal
Best robot boy | he/him | Image Pickin' regular,
#8913: Jun 16th 2019 at 5:26:51 PM

[up]Considering Amazing Technicolor Wildlife has a "Subtle and Minor Acceptable Breaks from Reality Examples Found in Specific Animated Works" section, I think Sabre counts.

Posting this again since I haven't gotten a response: Do handheld ports count as Video Game Demake? I don't think so, as they are (or at least were) pretty common; I think the trope is pretty much exclusively a fan phenomenon, except for Dark Void Zero and the April Fool's 8-bit Bayonetta game.

  • Originally, Resident Evil for the Game Boy Color was going to be a demake of the Play Station version. They scrapped the idea when they thought they could use Nintendo Game Cube for the remake and then made Resident Evil Gaiden for Game Boy Color. Only the Prototype 1 and 2 are left now.
  • Hyrule Warriors Legends is an official one, downsizing the original Wii U game to work on the 3DS.
  • Rockman Battle & Fighters is an official example: a version of Mega Man: The Power Battle and Mega Man 2: The Power Fighters for the Neo Geo Pocket Color. Since the system couldn't obviously replicate the specs of the arcade boards, the visuals are completely redone in a simpler and smaller style, almost akin to the 8-bit days of the series, while not sacrificing the gameplay. Notably, they were the only way to play those games on a console until the release of proper ports of the arcades in 2004.
  • The licensed Game Boy Advance version of Max Payne is a 2D overhead isometric shooter that tries to follow the original game as closely as possible. Not only is it official but it came out practically alongside its counterpart.

Keet cleanup
Twiddler (On A Trope Odyssey)
#8914: Jun 16th 2019 at 11:09:52 PM

Does a Pre-Mortem One-Liner have to be followed by the death of the opponent, or is a sound defeat enough? I'm thinking of a moment from the end of season 1 of Attack on Titan: Titan Annie is trying to climb the wall and escape. Mikasa swings in and cuts her fingers, making her lose her grip. Then she tells her, "Annie. Fall." in the seconds before Annie does fall, leading directly to her defeat.

4tell0life4 Since: Mar, 2018 Relationship Status: Giving love a bad name
#8915: Jun 17th 2019 at 4:25:27 AM

[up] Downplayed example, then

We can never truly eradicate the coronavirus, but we can suppress its threat like influenza
DEIDATVM from East Fishkill, New York Since: Dec, 2016
#8916: Jun 17th 2019 at 6:28:26 AM

[up][up][up]The description specifically mentions interpretations of a game if it were released for an older generation console, so I don't think a handheld port of a game originally released on a same-gen or older-generation console would count (assuming the port is done in the style of that generation's games and not that of an older gen). It does say demakes are usually fan-made, but doesn't seem to say anything stronger than "usually".

Edited by DEIDATVM on Jun 17th 2019 at 9:34:51 AM

4tell0life4 Since: Mar, 2018 Relationship Status: Giving love a bad name
#8917: Jun 17th 2019 at 8:13:28 AM

Can anyone answer my question (about Arbitrary Augmentation Limit)?

We can never truly eradicate the coronavirus, but we can suppress its threat like influenza
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#8918: Jun 17th 2019 at 8:16:43 AM

[up] As written, the trope seems to be focused on external augmentation, not merely a cap on spending character points or experience points. The line can be blurry if, for example, some characters enhance themselves by training really hard and others graft on cybernetics, but they all have similar caps.

I feel like, to be a meaningful trope, there must be some narrative structure around it rather than just mechanics. "Your skill point cap increases by 1 per level." Great, is it tied to any in-universe explanation or is it purely for balance?

Edited by Fighteer on Jun 17th 2019 at 11:18:44 AM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
HighCrate Since: Mar, 2015
#8919: Jun 17th 2019 at 8:40:45 AM

[up] That would seem to be at odds with the "arbitrary" descriptor, which implies that there is no narrative reason for it. That is explicitly part of the definition in the related Arbitrary Headcount Limit, although in practice the example section includes entries where the limit is truly arbitrary with no explanation whatsoever, those in which it has a narrative justification, and those in which it's merely Hand Waved.

That aside, Arbitrary Augmentation Limit is explicitly about enhancement via "Cybernetics, Bio-Augmentation, Nano Machines, magic, or assorted other Phlebtonium." That would seem to exclude skills that you get through normal training or experience.

Edited by HighCrate on Jun 17th 2019 at 8:42:41 AM

Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#8920: Jun 17th 2019 at 8:45:29 AM

[up] Good point, so if "augmentation" is just a part of the normal character progression system, it wouldn't be an example. It only counts if it's an extra. For example, in Shadowrun (the TTRPG), you get skill points, but you can also spend money on cyber augmentation, without any limits other than how it affects your Essence. This would be broken if it were not for that cap.

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"
Crossover-Enthusiast from an abaondoned mall (Lucky 7) Relationship Status: Chocolate!
#8921: Jun 17th 2019 at 9:54:08 AM

This quote would be a discussed or lampshaded Glasses Pull, correct (I'm still not 100% sure on the difference between the two)?

"You don't understand the point of sunglasses. The thing about shades is to take them off at just the right moment."
Ryoko Ryuzaki, Worldend Syndrome

Edited by Crossover-Enthusiast on Jun 17th 2019 at 12:54:42 PM

Jawbreakers on sale for 99¢
crazysamaritan NaNo 4328 / 50,000 from Lupin III Since: Apr, 2010
NaNo 4328 / 50,000
#8922: Jun 17th 2019 at 10:07:56 AM

I could be wrong, but the way that I distinguish between them is that Lampshade Hanging is when characters talk about the effect of a trope that was present, and Conversed Trope is when characters talk about a trope that is not otherwise present in the work.

Link to TRS threads in project mode here.
Yinyang107 from the True North (Decatroper) Relationship Status: Tongue-tied
#8923: Jun 17th 2019 at 10:09:38 AM

Lampshading is anything that draws attention to the fact that a trope is present.

MasterJoseph Frolaytia X Qwenthur of Heavy Object from Not telling. Since: Mar, 2018 Relationship Status: All I Want for Christmas is a Girlfriend
Frolaytia X Qwenthur of Heavy Object
#8924: Jun 17th 2019 at 12:03:20 PM

This was on Aladdin (2019)

Unintentionally Sympathetic: While Jafar is just as bad as he was in the 1992 film (if less elegant and witty), this film still makes it clear that he crawled his way up from the humblest of backgrounds, a street thief, through sheer intellect, ruthlessness, and drive, and that some of his frustrations over his position are warranted, even if that doesn't excuse his villainy.

Should this be cut since he's been approved as a CM?

IPP Wick Check created.
Fighteer Lost in Space from The Time Vortex (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: TV Tropes ruined my love life
Lost in Space
#8925: Jun 17th 2019 at 12:05:13 PM

See, this is why I don't like the Unintentionally X tropes. First, they are purely an audience reaction, and those are always fraught with issues. Second, it must be conclusively demonstrated that the author did not intend the documented reaction. Unless it can be shown that Jafar was not intended to come across as even the slightest bit sympathetic, then it's not a valid example.

Heck, the simple fact that the film shows us his backstory and frustrations means that it does indeed anticipate that reaction, so it's not unintentional. Otherwise, why would they show us those scenes? Brains, folks. Use 'em.

Edited by Fighteer on Jun 17th 2019 at 3:13:47 PM

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

Total posts: 36,649
Top