Is this tropeworthy/Chairs?

Can someone explain how characterization tropes like Abusive Parents go beyond "Abusive Parents exist"? I understand it intuitively, but I can't actually put it to words.

A character is horible because they are an abusive parent, or a character is angsty because their parents are abusive.

"is exists" can be said about any trope, because they wouldn't have a page otherwise.

Fair enough, thanks

Double-Sided Book strikes me more as a trivia item because I can't see how it might affect the story itself. It's just a way in which printed media sometimes gets formatted. A few of the examples have the two stories intertwine in the middle, which is trope-worthy IMO but the description doesn't mention that. The occassional In-Universe examples are formatted in a way that is "a double-sided book exists", which is no better. So I'm a bit lost here.

Might be worth a wick check. Not sure if it'd even work as a Trivia item, given the lack of context on entries, but I could be wrong.

Is there much to Smashing Watermelons besides the activity/tradition itself? It's a Japanese cultural trope but there's non-Japanese examples of people smashing watermelons. In any case, this just seems to be something people do.

Edited by MacronNotes on Apr 3rd 2023 at 10:18:55 AM

I think it's troping the shenanigans and incidents that happen when the characters play this game. I don't see the point in limiting this to Japanese examples if there are examples from non-Japanese media. If there are examples that are just "this happens in X" then these need to be cleaned up as ZCEs.

Well, the game is Japanese in origin and seems to only be present in Japanese examples so it makes sense to be limited to that as the things associated with the game don't seem to appear in non-Japanese works. If that isn't the case, the definition needs to be tweaked. In any case, the western examples used appear to be misuse as the characters playing the game.

Edited by MacronNotes on Apr 3rd 2023 at 12:03:06 PM

I mean, blame the title for that one. I hear "smashing watermelons" and think all manner of doing it, not the specific Japanese cultural game version.

Yeah, that's what I thought the trope was about but it's apparently about a specific game. I guess I'll look into it later.

Is Robo Ship a trope? Its stated basis doesn't seem tropeworthy to me. If it isn't, the Image Picking for it should stop, then?

So... Robots are special because they're unable to have sex? ... That's not really common at all, in this age of Ridiculously Human Robots and such?

The first example is involving one of said Ridiculously Human Robots?

• The possible relationship between Negi and Chachamaru

Edit: I didn't realize Robo Ship was literally a shipping trope (I confused it with Robo Romance) and now I actually am unsure whether it's worth splitting off as a separate trope. We don't, for instance, having a "shipping counterpart" to Interspecies Romance.

Edited by nrjxll on Apr 6th 2023 at 11:23:22 AM

Is there any narrative relevance to Long Pants? I found it while clicking on "Random Trope" a lot.

Not all tropes have or need narrative relevance but Long Pants is a Lazy Artist trope where creators draw pants or some other garment and shoes as one unit out of convenience.

Edited by MacronNotes on Apr 6th 2023 at 2:37:17 PM

Got it. Thanks for the feedback—I'll keep that in mind.

It doean't have narrative relevance but it's still significant enough to not be chairs. All tropes should have some significance/purpose no matter what type it is.

it's essentially the same as most appearance tropes, yeah; it says more about the characters or artstyle than the narrative. it's also subject to lampshading or conversational troping (with the name coming from a very thorough lampshading in homestar runner).

I've already queued it up for being Not Thriving, but is Protective Pressure tropeworthy?

It seems like the Sci-fi equivalent of Dramatic Wind. If I had to guess what the meaning of Protective Pressure, maybe it's a way to establish that the lab is very high tech and restricted. I could also see a situation where there's some malfunction and there's a risk that the lab gets contaminated or some microorganism escapes, causing drama.

Is there any significance to Game Gourmet that isn't already covered by Hyperactive Metabolism, Cooking Mechanics, Power-Up Food, etc.?

I know Cooking Mechanics came later but I can get where that's significant because it's often a component in a game that gets its own tutorial segment or has a role in the gameplay loop.

Most of the examples on page are just "game has food that may restore HP" and the criteria of at least 12 foods in 3-4 groups doesn't help either since a game that gives you a cookie, burger, and pizza to restore 5, 10, and 20 HP isn't really that different from a game that gives you Small Potion, Medium Potion, and Large Potion that heal the same amount.

It should be, as the Laconic says, "When a video game provides a wide variety of food that its player characters can eat."

It's not about their in-game effect, but the worldbuilding that their world has food variety.

That's... not really worldbuilding unless there's some reason to think the world wouldn't have a lot of food.

IMO, the tropeworthy thing is more about the idea of food as healing items and random drops and the like, which is abnormal.

i think it does count as worldbuilding because it isn't especially common for lots of games to have wide varieties of food. while Cooking Mechanics have become more common, Game Gourmet doesn't necessarily have to co-exist with them or the other food-related video game tropes; the mother games for example are known for having an extensive variety of food, and mother 3 adds a worldbuilding bit to it by having certain food items heal more depending on the characters' tastes (specifically, whether they like cheese or not). sonic unleashed also has regional cuisine that doesn't heal or give power-ups, but gives sonic extra EXP depending on how much he likes it compared to chip (sonic likes savory foods more while chip likes sweets more).

Edited by NoUsername on Apr 10th 2023 at 9:01:46 AM

Worldbuilding is about how a setting is constructed and fleshed out. Food can act as worldbuilding (I launched a whole trope about it), but "food exists in a video game" isn't necessarily there to flesh out the setting. It's just a gaming mechanic quirk.

It's also not worldbuilding for characters to have preferences — that's characterization.

Edited by WarJay77 on Apr 10th 2023 at 12:20:16 PM

How is "game has lots of food you can eat" any more world building than "game has lots of plants you can consume/use in medicine/plant" or "game has a lot of gems you use in crafting/put on display in a museum"? I could understand if the focus was more along the lines of food helping to enrich the various cultures in a game world or food facilitating good conversation between characters but nearly all of the examples look like grocery lists or restaurant menus without a lot of context, like this one.

Legionnaire: Apples, oranges, cheese, candy, donuts, soft serve cones, tea, soda, bread, cornucopias, and power drinks.