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Ask the Tropers:
open Is there a trope for.... Videogame
Is there a trope for video games where developers seem to anticipate a player will try a certain strategy, and design the level to make that strategy more difficult to implement than it seems? Or if they design the level to punish a certain kind of play, even if it's just the player being careless and not anticipating the consequences of their actions? Kaizo Trap seems close, but it's specifically about victory or completion, I'm thinking more in the general course of gameplay. Batman Gambit works but is very broad as a trope, and it may or may not be Developer's Foresight depending on the exact example.
As two examples that would fit what I'm thinking of:
- In Hitman, the water tower on Colorado seems like the perfect spot to snipe targets from. But if you try it you'll find yourself trapped, as the AI will instantly surround the water tower and pin you down there with no hope for escape.
- In Dissidia Final Fantasy, the last level of an optional dungeon lets you challenge your Assist character to access two chests behind them. But if you do that, you'll have no Assist when fighting the boss Gabranth, and he has a very potent EX Mode build (Assists as a mechanic hard-counter EX Mode, but you just killed your Assist).
openDoes this fit as Even Evil Has Standards? Videogame
In Poppy Playtime, the corrupt, child experiment supporting evil CEO Leith Pierre, after a catastrophe happens in his factory's theater, does something to a large group of people that another executives questions they had to do. (It's heavily implied the theater burned down and he trapped the the theatergoers inside to protect company secrets, denying them a chance to evacuate and survive). However, it's Leith who people say Even Evil Has Standards applies to.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Leith is a vile man, but he was enraged at Harley Sawyer when Gerad Lockharte accused the latter of causing the Theater Incident [...]
openAre Fandom Rivalry and Friendly Fandoms mutually exclusive? Videogame
On YMMV.Mario Kart World, there's this entry:
- Fandom Rivalry: With Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds, due to the long-time Mario-Sonic rivalry and that both games are looking to expand upon vehicle transformation and otherwise take their respective series in bold new directions.
Seems kind of stubby, just making surface-level comparisons between the two games and the two franchises' history together, but I didn't really question it since Nintendo seems to still get compared to Sega even years after the latter exited the console business.
Then I scrolled down and saw this:
- Friendly Fandoms:
- Despite the historical rivalry and the duel with Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds, Mario Kart World in general has been positively received by fans of Sonic the Hedgehog, due to World's surprisingly robust movement mechanics that seemingly take close inspiration from Sonic itself, namely wall running, "spammable" aerial tricks, and rail grinding. For CrossWorlds specifically, many fans also see it and World as worthy competition which can take the Mascot Racer genre to new heights. It helps that both games are taking different approaches, with Mario focusing on open-world checkpoint racing while Sonic is sticking with circuit tracks.
So which is it? Can both happen at the same time? If not, which do we keep?
openUpdate Zelda Character Navigation Bar? Videogame
So most of the character pages for Legend of Zelda games have a character/game navigation bar at the top of the page, like so. I saw someone put it on the character page for the upcoming Age of Calamity spin-off game, but not add the game itself to the bar. Which got me wondering if it would be a good idea to update the navigation bar on all the Zelda character pages to include the bigger spin-off games that have such pages, like the Hyrule Warriors games, Cadence of Hyrule, and the CD-i games. (I'd say Ripened Tingle's Balloon Trip of Love as well, but its character page is so lacking, I'm wondering why it even exists.) So should I go ahead and do this?
Edited by RacattackForceopenSamus Aran from Metroid: Soldier or Warrior? Videogame
With regards to the trope Soldier vs. Warrior there is a list of distinguished soldiers and warriors and clashing ideologies listed as examples. If I may submit a question to the more well-read and better-researched Tropers for discussion and consideration:
Is the protagonist of the Metroid series, Samus Aran, as she is currently portrayed in the playable games of the franchise, considered better fitting the Soldier archetype, or the Warrior archetype? Or neither?
I understand that part of her backstory, as depicted in titles such as Other M, as well as in media outside of video games (such as the e-Manga) does place her as a soldier in the Galactic Federation army. However, Other M also depicts that she does get to be a bit headstrong and doubting of orders, with the example given regarding the tragedy of Ian Malkovich's sacrifice by a command decision from Samus's C.O. She may have questioned his order - and her internal monologue reflects this as well - but doesn't disobey his order at all. In this regard, she does - or did - lean towards Soldier.
However, after leaving the Federation, the English canon tells us that she became a "bounty hunter", which we can interpret as just becoming a freelancer and occasional contract mercenary. In Japan, the generally-accepted "closest" translation is "Space Warrior", as she is marked among an elite class of freelancer specializing in missions few can pull off, and in being an expert combatant. However, based on what's in the Soldier vs. Warrior trope page, it doesn't seem like she fits the Warrior archetype much at all. She doesn't really do it for the glory, or to aggrandize herself, or as some test of strength or out of a sense of competition.
But at the same time, she doesn't currently still fit the Soldier role either. She says on occasion that she works alone, by choice, and hasn't worked under direct authority from military C.O.s since leaving the service, with the two exceptions being in Other M and in Metroid Fusion.
So is Samus an example of a zigzagging of this trope? Or some strange deconstruction of it? Or not in this index at all? I'd like to get a well-researched answer, as I just lack the understanding and the nuances of Tropology to really get how to go about answering this.
Thank you ahead of time!
Edited by Miles07openTierInducedScrappy Edit War Videogame
A while ago, I added an entry to the YMMV page for Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn regarding Tier Induced Scrappy for a Crutch Character named Sothe.
Around March 4th troper Slimeshady adjusted the entry to be arguing with itself by making it talk about how he "used to be seen as one" and is now defending the character. I will put it under a note so it doesn't fill too much of this space out note Sothe used to be this. He's this game's equivalent to a Jagen, despite his decent growths, and has by far the worst third tier class (terrible stat caps including a measly 28 strength cap, and being restricted to knives, which are the weakest weapons in the game), and having a mastery skill that just leaves opponents at 1 HP with no additional effects while all other mastery skills do such egregiously high damage that they may as well outright kill. To make matters worse he has a forced promotion that doesn't occur until after you already completed the first Part 4 chapter, meaning he doesn't even get to be a third tier unit in one of his two pre-Endgame Part 4 maps, so you can't even raise him enough to be somewhat useful for some of Part 4 and he is going to be even farther behind when he does finally promote before you consider his awful caps. The biggest sticking point with players, though, is the fact Sothe is a forced unit throughout much of the game, and is mandatory to bring along into the endgame, where his class limitations make him nigh-useless; the last one is especially bothersome to fans of Volke, who is an objectively superior knife-wielder to Sothe (his base strength is greater than Sothe's maximum strength with comparable speed, while his mastery skill is a guaranteed death blow with the same activation rate), which means to bring Volke along into the endgame would mean having two knife-wielders among your limited units (while there's also only one SS knife in the game). In more recent times though as Jagens are looked at much more favorably by the community, the receptions to Sothe has changed, as Sothe is so indispensable in Part 1 and the DB's Part 3 missions (i.e. the hardest parts of the game), and that by the time he loses his usefulness, it doesn't really matter when you have so many other overpowered units to pick up the slack. Tier lists covering the game as a whole will generally put Sothe in the top tier as he is just so good in Part 1, and without him the early Part 1 maps would be insanely difficult on Hard/Maniac, while when the other Crutch Characters join in later Part 1 he still stands out for his great movement, strong 1-2 range with forged Knives, and all the thieving duties he can do. That said there are still certainly some people who don't care about Sothe's Part 1 contributions and remain resentful of how irredeemably bad Sothe gets in Part 4 while remaining a forced unit.
I adjusted the entry to be back to how it was before, but I did adjust it a bit to include his usefulness in part 1 so point out where the issues people had with him gameplay wise were. As it was before, it was arguing with itself since the entry said he was a bad unit but not anymore despite nothing changing about the game. Again I have put this entry under a note to save space. note Sothe, primarily after Part 1. He's this game's equivalent to a Jagen, despite his decent growths, and has by far the worst third tier class (terrible stat caps including a measly 28 strength cap, and being restricted to knives, which are the weakest weapons in the game), and having a mastery skill that just leaves opponents at 1 HP with no additional effects while all other mastery skills do such egregiously high damage that they may as well outright kill. To make matters worse he has a forced promotion that doesn't occur until after you already completed the first Part 4 chapter, meaning he doesn't even get to be a third tier unit in one of his two pre-Endgame Part 4 maps, so you can't even raise him enough to be somewhat useful for some of Part 4 and he is going to be even farther behind when he does finally promote before you consider his awful caps. The biggest sticking point with players, though, is the fact Sothe is a forced unit throughout much of the game, and is mandatory to bring along into the endgame, where his class limitations make him nigh-useless; the last one is especially bothersome to fans of Volke, who is an objectively superior knife-wielder to Sothe (his base strength is greater than Sothe's maximum strength with comparable speed, while his mastery skill is a guaranteed death blow with the same activation rate), which means to bring Volke along into the endgame would mean having two knife-wielders among your limited units (while there's also only one SS knife in the game). As to make this worse, Sothe is the only character who doesn't benefit from the bonus stats from the previous game because unlike others who instead gain a flat bonus for any capped stats, Sothe, if data is transferred, instead gains whatever his stats were from the previous game which means its possible he'll be even worse since his max stats in the previous game are only marginally higher than his bases here. His use in Part 1 is good but due to how awkward Part 1 is, using him to even the odds is more of a long term detriment to your units since he can soak up precious experience.
As of 6/14, they readded their entry, added a section under Vindicated by History note Sothe's perception as a unit. With how unsalvagebly terrible he ends up in Part 4 while remaining a forced unit for the entire game that can't even die without triggering a Game Over until the Part 4 endgame, for a long time Sothe got a lot of hatred from fans for being an "EXP THIEF!" that "stole" EXP from the rest of the Dawn Brigade in Part 1, only to become The Load in Part 4 no matter how much investment he got. In Japan he was even a Memetic Loser for his insistence on being Micaiah's "protector" up to the end of the game, while becoming so ineffectual in combat and was more someone who needed the protection himself. However more and more players started realizing that the endgame and max level stats are only a microcosm of an entire game, and that a unit's contribution in the entire game before that very much matters, with it being especially a big plus if that unit can provide that contribution without requiring significant resources. So Sothe, being such a vital unit for Part 1 (especially the first half) and still a useful offensive unit in the Dawn Brigade's Part 3 chapters with his Beastkiller, became much more highly regarded and shot up to the high or even top tier of unit tier lists, and he also got big props for providing that big contribution in what are generally considered RD's hardest maps (while most of Part 4 is generally considered pretty easy, as you have the Game-Breaker Laguz Royals, a third tier near-invincible Ike, and a bunch of other trained up third tier units, so Sothe being bad at that point doesn't really matter). Sothe additionally gets sympathy from fans for his boss conversations with the likes of Ike, Dhegnisea, and Sephiran, where he acknowledges that he is a normal man amongst gods that really doesn't belong, but he'll still try to fight for Micaiah and the little things even if he is hopelessly outclassed. Sothe nowadays is often regarded as one of the best executed "Jagens" in the series, as he fulfills his role of really helping the player during Early Game Hell and other difficult maps, while actually falling off hard later in the game like Jagens are supposed to unlike many other Jagens who remain strong late into the game or are flatout Game Breakers up to the very end., and added this message as the reason: "Not using Sothe in Part 1 becaus he "steals EXP' is a pitfall that makes Part 1 harder than it actually is, use him.".
This is a matter of debate yes and I should have clarified why I adjusted it previously, that was my fault. However this is becoming an argument at this point. I will message this about this but the entries are written in such a way that they come across as very defensive about this unit and its becoming an edit war at this point.
openDoes Dummied Out apply here? Videogame
This example of Dummied Out is on the page for Animal Crossing: New Horizons:
- Dummied Out:
- Data for the Sanrio villagers exists in New Horizons, but the villagers aren't currently used, possibly being intended to be added to the game in future updates. The other Welcome amiibo-introduced villagers, however, have no data for them whatsoever.
- Museum room IDs exist
for a cafe (presumably the Roost) and a Gyroid exhibit. ID data also exists for a two-room art exhibit, but this was eventually implemented into the game itself via the Nature Day update, implying that the cafe and Gyroid exhibit will be made accessible to players somewhere down the road.
- Another dataminer
found even more info about dummied content. There's an unused shopping menu for the Museum (presumably the shop that was previously seen in New Leaf), as well as "Real Estate" and "Gallery" shops of unknown purpose. Data relating to diving and deep-sea creatures (from New Leaf) that may also tie into a third unused "Seafood" section of the Critterpedianote The manila clam is the only entity in this category which was implemented in the game at launch, vegetables that can be harvested, and recipes for cooked dishes and clothing were also found among the game's files. Finally, there's also data for a third Nook's Cranny upgrade.
- The same miner also found Leif's garden shop, the return of bushes and artwork, and Redd's Treasure Trawler before their proper release in the Nature Day update. The "private beach" where Redd docks is referred to as "Nつねきち" ("NTsunekichi") in the game's files, with Tsunekichi being Redd's Japanese name.
The problem is, New Horizons is a game that's being continuously updated with new content. As stated in the example, some of the items that were listed as Dummied Out have already been added to the game through content updates, and it's likely that more of them will be in the future. Since Dummied Out appears to deal specifically with content that was cut from a game, should examples be listed if there's still a reasonable chance that they could be added to the game?
openMinecraft YMMV Videogame
A big majority of the YMMV subpages for Minecraft such as Awesome, Funny, and Heartwarming, are mainly just stories about things other players did and put online and have nothing to actually do with the game itself. Is that allowed?
openSlightly suspicious troper Videogame
jamesalan
added a link to an unofficial web port of Five Nights at Freddy's 1 (hosted on y9freegames.com) on the Five Nights at Freddy's Franchise page. This edit strikes me as a bit odd because:
- It's an unofficial link, on a page about the official work.
- The link itself just reads "Online gameplay link" and is thrown in the middle of the spin-offs section of the page, on top of using the wrong formatting (a dash instead of asterisk for a bullet point), which has a bit of a spammy feel.
- Almost all of that troper's edits consist of adding links to web games.
I removed the link since it was out-of-place, but this incident makes the whole y9freegames site seem suspicious to me. The troper added another link to that site on Happy Wheels, which I'm not sure if it's OK or not.
openUndertale cleanup page Videogame
I want to discuss something that's about a general cleanup page for potentially every Undertale page. Specifically, I want to remove lines in articles where the tropers themselves refer the players who do the Genocide route a Complete Monster, or something similar to that, without it being an example of when the game itself is trying to make the player feel like a Complete Monster.
openVideo examples for Let's Player without a page? Videogame
I have a potential video example I want to upload, but it's from a Let's Play by HawkZombie
, who doesn't have a page here. His channel isn't very big yet (he has 359 subscribers right now), and I don't know enough about him to start a page for him.
What's the best way to handle this? Is it okay to only use the game itself as the video source? Can I link to the original video, or the player's channel, in the description?
It has to be from this Let's Play because the trope depends on the player's reaction.
Edited by DrNoPumaopenSonic's Dr. Eggmanā a misuse of "Affably Evil" Videogame
(Very thorough post below, apologies for length)
Dear Ask the Tropers,
I want to discuss how Sonic the Hedgehog Big Bad Dr. Eggman might be better off as an example of Faux Affably Evil as opposed to Affably Evil, the latter of which is what most descriptions of him I've seen on this site describe him as (including some trope subpage-only cases, hence why I've come over to Ask the Tropers). Spoilers unmarked for ease of reading.
Here are the main entries regarding him:
- Dr. Eggman from Sonic The Hedgehog has his moments of this.
- In Sonic Adventure 2 he acted very pleasant and, though he came close to killing Sonic, he was shown almost regretting it, showing profound respect for him after all the years that they were rivals. He had also been seen getting along with Tails at the end of the game. It also showed that he had the deepest respect for his grandfather, Gerald Robotnik.
- The best example was probably Sonic the Hedgehog (2006), where he's shown acting politely and gently most of the time, especially in front of Elise (except for the whole kidnapping part, of course).
- In the ending of Sonic Generations: The classic version, having learned that he never defeats Sonic, ponders upon pursuing a career as a teacher instead.
- Affably Evil: Despite really wanting to Take Over the World — and occasionally going to some extreme lengths to achieve this goal — Eggman's a fairly pleasant fellow who usually treats his enemies with Villain Respect.
- In Sonic Adventure 2, he lowers his head in melancholy after seemingly killing Sonic, and later gets along with the heroes after teaming up with them.
- In Sonic Colors, he takes Sonic's advice regarding threatening him directly rather than going through a bunch of terrible amusement-park-related puns on the way — for which Sonic then thanks him.
- In Sonic Lost World, he saves Tails' life from the rogue Cubot, even though it isn't necessary for his master plan, and seems to genuinely respect Tails. He's a complicated guy.
Here's my counterargument.
He loves being what he thinks is the most civilized and enlightened guy in the room, plain and simple, and the trope subpages of quite a few different adaptations have already described their Robotniks/Eggmen as "Faux", despite how two of them (AoStH and the movie) were heavily comedy-focused.
Now, I'm sure there might be a couple cases out there of game-universe!Eggman being genuinely affable (maybe just during Olympic season or something, the Twitter Takeovers are more of a different kind of portrayal altogether), but these are too few and far between to be a defining trait.
Let's look at the alleged examples being most frequently cited:
- Sonic Adventure 2:
- The Misaimed Fandom entry I put on the game's YMMV page explains the "Gerald" bit in detail. Long story short, he looked up to his grandpa as a brilliant scientist rather than because of anything benevolent, and he's disappointed that Gerald went crazy trying to destroy the world since he takes pride in his own Pragmatic Villainy.
- The "admirable adversary" scene has him send Sonic to his death via explosive escape pod and then lowering his head out of respect⦠before immediately getting over it and pointing his gun back at Tails. His Dark Story recap also has him gleefully proclaim, "I finally did it! I've defeated Sonic! That annoying hedgehog is gone forever! He's nothing but floating chunks in space now!"
- He did get along with the heroes during the Last Story, but, y'know, no world means no empire so necessity and all that.
- The somber "you're right" response he gives to Tails' "we all did it together" was meant to fit with the equally somber tone of Shadow's death and Gerald's tainted legacy. As sincere as it sounds, it's just Eggman acknowledging the facts after being briefly lost in a moment of thought.
- Here's a Dummied Out exchange that was meant to happen after that, anyways:
Tails: "Where are you going?"
- Sonic the Hedgehog (2006): He's only gentlemanly to Elise because she has something he wants and he still tries to get rid of Sonic and friends in multiple ways. And he doesn't even give Elise a nice room or a meal.
- Sonic Unleashed: He keeps Professor Pickle fed with cucumber sandwiches on request. Yeah, a corpse is less useful than someone to interrogate, food makes a good bribe in case you don't have a lot of other time and options, and he got the recipe wrong anyways.
- Sonic Colors: The "Eggman changes his evil speech at Sonic's request" scene was most likely meant to be played for laughs given how the doctor does it begrudgingly. There's also this line he gives afterwards to Sonic: "I would say it's been nice knowing you, but it hasn't." Not even this game has a genuinely nice Eggman.
- Sonic Generations: The whole "teaching degree" joke was probably meant to be sarcasm from Classic Eggman, with Modern Eggman missing the point and only considering it because "I've always enjoyed telling people what to do!", causing his Classic self to Face Palm. Also Lost World and Mania happened because each Eggman went back to world conquest, so no.
- Sonic Lost World:
- It's stated in a Magnificent Bastard entry and supported by the game's ending that he only saved Tails to make sure his Enemy Mine with Sonic stayed on schedule. At best, I guess you can argue that he'd want to beat Sonic and Tails personally.
- A scene earlier into the game (the one where Sonic sets the Zeti loose) has him tell the Deadly Six that he's a "compassionate" man⦠with the rest of what he says being covered up by Sonic and Tails talking over him. Listening closely, this is what he says to the Zeti:
Eggman: "I'm a compassionate man, or else I would've dropped you into a bottomless pit by now!"
- The game in general seems to subtly emphasize how is Eggman a Jerk with a Heart of Jerk— he's back to stuffing animals in robots, he only sees the Zeti as useful lackeys for him, he doesn't care that the Cacophonic Conch's noises are "very painful" to the Zeti and only that the shell itself is "very rare", and he only saves Sonic's life so the hedgehog can get rid of the Zeti for him while he sneaks back to his Extractor device. And to top it all off, this line just oozes with Faux Affably Evil:
Eggman: "Finally, with the energy drained from the Extractor, I can rule the world! Pity about the damage done down there, but there's still enough left for me to conquer."
And considering how he's a very Opportunistic Bastard willing to pervert anything to get what he wants (e.g. Little Planet, Angel Island, an ancient pyramid, a planet, five planets, time and space, a guy's very reason to live, etc.), I think it's safe to say he'd even exploit a Draco in Leather Pants situation like this one if he existed in the real world.
Hence, why I think we should change this. My proposed plan here is to edit the main pages that matter and then edit those linked to it in some way. I'll deal with the latter once I've gotten the go-ahead for the former.
Thank you all for listening.
Many regards, Blurry
openPreventing an edit war on MythologyGag.NickelodeonAllStarBrawl Videogame
I've edited MythologyGag.Nickelodeon All Star Brawl on various occasions in the past few months to add examples, some of which include external links to help back them up. (Here
are
some instances of this.) On the 12th of this month, Pgj1997 removed several of these links
, explaining in an edit reason after the fact
that Weblinks Are Not Examples.
While I understand the policy, I made an effort to write all of my examples such that the connection between something in the game and the original series it's based on was evident from the text alone, which means that their edits seem like they're overreaching. Put another way, I tried to abide by what the page itself says:
- It is always preferable to use outside links as additional tools to clarify, enhance, or provide reference to a detailed example's content, rather than using them in place of the detailed example itself. In short, weblinks are to supplement context, but never substitute for context.
I don't want to risk edit warring, so I wanted to bring up the matter here to get others' opinions on this before taking any action.
openExtremely small "Referenced By" page Videogame
So I recently discovered this 'Referenced By' subpage for the Halo franchise that appears on every single game's subpage bar as a redirect. It was created in February of this year by darkemyst and has only been edited three times since, with the last edit being in May of this year.
It also only has six examples and not all of them even seem to be valid, which has me thinking it should be cut. To list all the examples and my thoughts on them:
- Aldnoah.Zero: The Hypergate looks very similar to the African portal that leads to the Ark from Halo 3.
- This entry provides two image links on the page itself, one of which is broken and just redirects to the main page of Bungie's website (and they don't even own the Halo franchise anymore). I found a working image and frankly the similarities seem fairly superficial, though I suppose the argument could be made that it's a reference: Hypergate (Aldnoah)
◊, Gate at Voi (Halo)
◊
- This entry provides two image links on the page itself, one of which is broken and just redirects to the main page of Bungie's website (and they don't even own the Halo franchise anymore). I found a working image and frankly the similarities seem fairly superficial, though I suppose the argument could be made that it's a reference: Hypergate (Aldnoah)
- Guardians of the Galaxy: Peter's laser pistols bear more than a passing resemblance to the Covenant Plasma Rifle from Halo: Combat Evolved, or also the laser pistols from The Black Hole (1979).
- The Expanse: While at first glance the Ring's design is reminiscent of a lifeless Halo, ManƩo Jung-Espinoza's attempt at flying through it reveals that it actually operates more like the Supergates built by the Ori.
- Both of these entries openly admit that the similarities are vague and limited enough that it could be a reference to something else entirely, which makes them invalid IMO.
- Marathon: The Eternal Level name "These Caves Can't Be a Natural Formation" is a line from Halo: Combat Evolved
- The Marathon series pre-dates the Halo franchise which made me seriously scratch my head at this. I had to dig through our page on the former to find out that this is apparently a reference to a fan-made total conversion mod called Marathon: Eternal that was released after Halo. Not sure if that's valid.
- Quake: The Blaster in Quake IV can fire either single, extremely weak shots or more powerful charged shots in a manner similar to the Plasma Pistol.
- This is an extremely basic and generic gameplay mechanic that many, many shooters have adopted for many, many weapons throughout gaming history. Edit history shows that it was also in the above category of "the entry outright admits it could be referencing something else" until the last edit on May 10th 2021 - specifically, pointing out that it's equally similar to the "Dispersion Pistol" from Unreal I.
- Minilife TV: In "Spirit in the Sky", Master Chief's helmet is one of the items in Chris's swag pile.
- This is possibly the only inarguably valid entry on the page and it's for a LEGO stop-motion web series sitcom I've never heard of.
openThe Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild headscratchers page Videogame
I found this absolute wall of text on Headscratchers.The Legend Of Zelda Breath Of The Wild. Placed in a folder because it's long:
- I haven't found what's supposed to claim this but I see talk of how Zelda's father, who is explicitly mentioned to have the title of "King", isn't of Hylia's bloodline. As Hylia's incarnation is always Princess Zelda that would indicate that her kin should be the side of the family with the literal divine right of kings. So unless there's something important here I'm missing how in the world did Zelda's mother, who was of Hylia's blood which was why losing her was so crippling to this incarnation of Zelda and assumedly the naturally born crown princess/Queen of Hyrule, get outranked by some schmuck she married and who does this glorified Prince Consort think he is to declare himself King while acting as Zelda's regent until she comes of age to rule on her own? "King" as a title can't belong to anyone not of the direct ruling bloodline after all, as in a Kingdom it outranks its sister title of "Queen", since consorts/spouses aren't permitted to have titles higher than the actual ruler's. On a similar note if being protected by a religiously powered matriarch is so fundamental to Hyrule in the first place (And as the local deities of worship that can be confirmed to exist are almost all female) why is it a Kingdom instead of a Queendom in the first place?
- You're looking way too far into this. The simplified way that the royalty in this game works is the same one that has been portrayed not just in other Zelda games, but across most realms of media and fiction in general - the idea of Prince-consorts as opposed to true kingship seems almost strictly limited to the real world. And that's even if the thing about Rhoam being from outside the line is true.
- Original poster here: This is the headscratchers page, no need to be so rudely dismissive about answering since this is where fridge logic is meant to be put and nothing is considered "too far" as long as you can see how the question came up. Why comment if you aren't actually addressing the question being posed in the first place for that matter and instead just attacking someone for asking it? Most other Zelda games just plain don't talk about the royal family beyond Zelda herself so there's no need to question if her father has the right to be called king, as their competence isn't in question and neither is her own (Unlike here where her father outright tells her that her people think she's the "Heir to Nothing" like an abusive asshole and encourages the only heir to the throne to act more like a priestess than a studious princess) so the fact this game did want to go into royal politics for a change doesn't make me out of line. And just because mainstream media doesn't like to do it's research most works that do want to make royal politics a major plot point, like Zelda tried here, do go into this sort of thing plenty often. Only part I'd grant would be "too deep" is the notion of a patriarchy existing in a world where the major religious and cultural foundations are primarily presented as female-focused with confirmable magical existences, and that contradiction has always been a part of the game's setting. And as I said in the first line I don't know if it's true so the least you could have done was find what could confirm or deny it, as obviously that's my main concern here.
- First of all, let me apologize for coming off as rude, since that wasn't my intention. It just seemed like you were getting a bit too...upset, if I may, about something that's been a common part of royalty's portrayal throughout most of popular culture. Having nearly completed the main story and collected all of the memories, I've yet to come across anything indicating that King Rhoam was from outside the line, but even if he was, what I meant with my earlier response was that, in the game's universe, he would probably still be considered a genuine "king", as opposed to prince-consort, because that's how it typically works in fiction. So his line to Zelda about her inheritance probably wouldn't be seen as that level of disrespectful, in-universe - I didn't want you to get that worked up about it, and I'm sorry if it came out wrong.
- OP again: Alright, it just rubbed me wrong that it didn't seem like any other questions got that sort of treatment without any meaningful expansion/explanation on anything added to it even though this one isn't the only one with parts that can be difficult to check by the nature of the game, like the timeline debates, or one based on honest confusion. But with monarchies hardly being a fictional concept as Great Britian's royal family is easily one of the most well known existing monarchies to date (regardless of how vital it is for their current system of government) and seeing it used as an excuse for sexism's a Pet Peeve trope of mine as well... you'd figure people should know or at least infer by now as despite easily being the world's best known monarchy it openly has no King at present and hasn't in ages (with the Queen's husband indeed only ever having the title of "Prince") that not all Kingdoms need a King to function you know? Though his telling his daughter to her face that the people she knows should be looking to her for future guidance have no faith in her like that in such brutal phrasing was still an awful parenting move on his part considering it couldn't help her with anything and just further hurt her self esteem all because she tried to act like princess in her situation should.
- For all we know, both of Zelda's parents might be descended from Hylia's line. An awful lot of time has passed since the Skyward Sword era, and unless the line of Hyrule enforces a strictly one-child-per-generation rule, it's bound to have branched out countless times. Rhoam may be the de-facto king, and married to a member of a cadet branch. Apparently being a woman is a requirement for the powers of the blood of Hylia to fully manifest, so only his wife was taught the procedures.
- I can find no mention that he isn't a descendant. I think we can assume, as with European nobility, a lot of inbreeding was happening. The King probably married a distant cousin who happened to be a priestess. This sort of thing happened all the time to keep blood-lines "pure", and that's before we add in descended from Gods into the mix to have some sort of actual reason to do it. Of course this then raises further questions; if there is a large body of nobility all tangentially related to each other then losing Zelda's mother shouldn't have been the death blow to her teachings the King and Zelda believe it to be.
- Because she's smart enough to know that ruling the kingdom is nothing like sitting on the throne and ordering minions around while gloating in their ego on their high title; The Good King or Queen takes care of their people and make their place safe. After all, she holds the Triforce of Wisdom. So she brushed all her responsibilities as a ruler to her husband even though it means he'll get the glory and status in the process.
- Issue with that would be that the title of "King" couldn't be given to him under any circumstances barring him overthrowing his wife if she was the by blood rights ruling party because that's not how royal titles work period and it is factually wrong to depict them as such and was the core point of my initial complaint/confusion. In order to be King, Rhoam would have to have more royal blood than the Queen does in the first place, so you missed the point about how having the title "King" over "Prince" or "Regent" isn't possible if she was the primary and acknowledged descendant of Hylia instead of him, which is why the focus of most attempts to make sense of this are instead focusing on looking into where his blood right is called into question. Also with the implications that holding the Triforce of Wisdom wouldn't obviously make her best qualified for and the one who would be actually preforming the duties you are at the same time suggesting she delegates away to the man who would still be required to have a lower title than her own by basic law and common sense sounds incredibly confusing at best and overtly sexist at worst as why wouldn't she want her subjects to know who exactly in HER country deserved their respect exactly and by whos authority they lived under?
- One thing I'd like to note is that Rhoam very closely resembles Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule from The Wind Waker (who, by the way, also seemed to possess mystical, divine powers - did anything every say that Hylia's powers only went to the females?), as well as various other Hyrulean kings across the series, just with a longer beard and hair and a pointier nose. The resemblance suggests that they're related through more than just marriage.
- As a common thread seems to be that whatever helped make the idea that Rhoam wasn't Hylia's descendant seems to have been a rumor more than an actual in game claim or a particularly hard to find diary entry so thanks everybody for helping clear that up! Being a Daphnes Expy does make him being at least one of Wind Waker Zelda's descendants does seem very likely (or something similar if this can't connect with that timeline at all) instead of Nintendo just dropping the ball where their research or world building was concerned and falling into harmful/sexist traps regarding royal politics just when they decided to try and go that extra mile for this series. At the very least Zelda's lack of spiritual connection could easily be attributed to just taking after him too much as, even though him being a guy made it a less important issue, he certainly seems less attuned with his bloodline's magic or their piece of the Triforce than Daphnes was and provide a reason for how if her mother was less "pure"/directly connected to Hylia she was supposed to have been in charge of this area of Zelda's teachings.
- As I understand your remarks, you've basically made three distinct arguments: (1) A man cannot become a king by marrying a queen; (2) A king always outranks a queen; and (3) All monarchies operate according to uniform rules of heredity. All three are historically false. Argument (1) is false because there exist two different ways of becoming king by marrying a queen: the king jure uxoris ("by right of [his] wife"), who becomes king in fact as well as name by marrying an heiress or a queen regnant; although these men did not wholly displace their wives, they did acquire the right to rule on their wives' behalves by what English law would later call coverture, the woman's property being automatically administered by her husband. There are a number of examples of kings jure uxoris in the Medieval period: Fulk, Count of Anjou, as king of Jerusalem via Melisende, daughter and heiress of King Baldwin II; Conrad, Marquis of Montferrat, and Aimery, King of Cyprus, as kings of Jerusalem via Queen Isabella I; John of Brienne (later emperor of Constantinople) as king of Jerusalem via Queen Mary (Isabella I's daughter by Conrad); Emperor Frederick II as king of Jerusalem via Queen Isabella II (Mary I's daughter by John); Philip IV, King of France, as King Philip I of Navarre via Queen Joan I; Emperor Sigismund as king of Hungary via Queen Mary; and Albert V, Duke of Austria, as king of Hungary via Elizabeth of Luxemburg, daughter and heiress of Emperor Sigismund. Kingship jure uxoris more or less died out by the time of the Renaissance and the Early Modern Period. Around this time we see the rise of the king consort, as women were accepted as queens regnant suo jure; their husbands might be granted the title of king. The existence of the king consort simultaneously demonstrates that both arguments (1) and (2) are false. Examples of kings consort include Philip IV of Burgundy as King Philip I of Castile via Queen Juana I; Philip of Spain, King of Naples (later Philip II of Spain), as king of England via Queen Mary I (Philip's father, Emperor Charles V, had donated his kingship of Naples to Philip in 1554 as a wedding gift, so that the Spanish prince would be equal in rank to his fiancée, Queen Mary, at the time of their wedding); Francis II of France as king of Scots via Queen Mary; Henry Stuart, Lord Dudley, as king of Scots via the same Queen Mary; Infante Pedro of Portugal as King Peter III of Portugal via Queen Mary I; Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha-Koháry as King Ferdinand II of Portugal via Queen Mary II; and Francisco, Duque de Cádiz, as king of Spain via Queen Isabella II. There are also a handful of cases in which a queen regnant shared her authority with her husband as co-ruler without being legally displaced by him, such as Prince Louis of Taranto as king of Naples via Queen Joanna I; Philip, Count of Évreaux, as King Philip III of Navarre via Queen Joan II; Jogaila, Grand Duke of Lithuania, as King Władysław II of Poland via Queen Jadwiga; Ferdinand II of Aragon as King Ferdinand V of Castile via Queen Isabella I; and William III, Prince of Orange, as King William III of England via Queen Mary II. Władysław and William continued to reign after their wives died. Argument (3) is false because each monarchy operates on its own individual rules. In England (and by extension, the modern UK), male-preference primogeniture meant that a female could inherit the crown if there was no male with a superior claim (e.g., Mary I, Anne, Victoria, Elizabeth II), and also that the line of succession can pass through a female dynast (e.g., the current Prince of Wales and his sons). In France, however, the legal fiction of Salic law forbade a woman from inheriting the crown and also forbade the line of succession from passing through female dynasts (i.e., if a king's daughter had a son, he would have no rights of succession through his mother). In the Holy Roman Empire, Poland, Bohemia, and Hungary, the crown became elective (although in many cases, election was merely a formality). In Wallachia, any male with royal blood was eligible to succeed, even if he were illegitimate. In the Ottoman Empire, any male of the dynasty could become sultan through a rather vague process of dynastic consensus, resulting in uncles succeeding their nephews on occasion. Furthermore, all of these rules operated only so long as it was advantageous to the most influential and most powerful that they operate. When these rules were inconvenient, people could and did flout them. The Norman Invasion (1066), the Anarchy (1135-1154), the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453), the Wars of the Roses (1455-1487), the War of the Castilian Succession (1475-1479), the War of the Burgundian Succession (1477-1482), the War of the Portuguese Succession (1580-1583), the War of the Spanish Succession (1702-1715), the War of the Austrian Succession (1740-1748), the '45 Rebellion (1745), the War of the Bavarian Succession (1778-1779), and the Carlist Wars (1833-1840, 1846-1849, 1872-1876) — to name only a few prominent examples — were all results of disputes over succession.This is to say nothing of civil wars or usurpations of monarchs already ruling. Of course, all of this is moot because (A) there is no evidence whatsoever that King Rhoam Bosphoramus Hyrule is not king suo jure, and (B) we know very little about how the House of Hyrule determines succession. As far as point (A) is concerned, Rhoam bears a physical resemblance to the King of Hyrule (AL), the King of Hyrule (LP), King Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule (WW), King Daltus and King Gustaf (MC), and the deuterocanonical King Harkinian (LZ animated series and comic series, but less so his appearances in FE and WG), and, like Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule, appears to use Hyrule as a cognomen or surname. All of this circumstantially suggests that he should be interpreted as exactly what he appears to be. With respect to point (B), we know only that the royal family apparently practices male-preference primogeniture during the Golden Age in the Downfall timeline (the Prince of Hyrule and the Princess Zelda in AL), and that it is possible for a princess to be "queen-in-waiting" (TP trading cards and Prima guides). Presumably this means she is the legal ruler in reginam promovenda, pending some the completion of some ceremony or other condition before coronation as queen, and we further assume that this is the case of other princesses whom we might otherwise expect to have acceded as queens (the Princess Zelda in the Adult era of OT, Tetra in WW and PH, the Princess Zelda in ST, and the Princess Zelda in BW, although it is also possible that some of these princesses could be regents pending the arrival of another dynast with a superior claim to succession). We simply don't know how the crown is passed, and there's certainly no reason to assume that the English rules of succession apply.
- The short version of the above is: "Yes, a man can become a king by marrying a queen. No, this does not automatically mean he rules instead of her. No, there's no reason to assume that King Rhoam shouldn't be king."
- The issues with the above come from saying we have no reason to assume Rhoam isn't the by-blood king when we really do, which is what lead to the king debate. If he married into the royal family taking his wife's surname in a case like this would most likely be the expected practice, so his name doesn't seem to prove much of anything here. Looking like kings of the past could also be just as indicative of him coming from one of the supposed side families as he is lacking in the royal family's ability to use Hylia's magic which seems a lot more important for this than appearances. Hylia's bloodline being central to why "Princess Zelda" is always a princess (As opposed to just having the prophecy say a descendant of Hylia is needed to seal Ganon) seems to indicate their connection to this Goddess is why they are the ruling family, a lot like the legends about the Japanese ruling family being descendant of the Goddess Amaterasu in a variation of the divine right of kings, so it seems like decent reasoning to assume he's more likely to have married into the family than his wife did. Had Hylia's power come from a "side family" it seems odd he wouldn't have had any other alternatives for Zelda's teacher after the Queen died, as mentioned above, when if the power was kept within the direct royal family this element of the story makes more sense. Also it's unclear if Hylia's power really is gender locked since no other goddesses power in this series seems to be restricted in this way, as two of the three holders of the Golden Goddesses' triforce are male, and since Wind Waker's king was adept at least at general magic, given how he animated the King of Red Lions and created the Pirate's Charm, Rhoam completely lacking in this area sticks out more as an oddity.
- In point of fact, no, we really don't have any reason to assume that Rhoam is not king suo jure. There is no evidence saying this. There is no reason to assume this. Your suggestion that he might have adopted his wife's name — which has no precedent in history that I am aware of (the closest being the examples of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine and the surname Mountbatten-Windsor, neither of which support your argument) — is both begging the question and a violation of Ockham's razor. There is no reason to assume that his surname "Hyrule" means anything other than his dynastic kingship of Hyrule, so you are positing complexity without need in order to explain why he has it. Your talk about his apparent lack of magic powers is irrelevant; of the eight kings of Hyrule we know of (Harkinian, AL, LP, OT, Daphnes, Daltus, Gustaf, and Rhoam), precisely one of them (Daphnes) has displayed magical abilities without use of the Triforce — and there is absolutely no indication that his magic has anything to do with Hylia, given that it is possible for Hyrulians to learn magic via study (AL) or to use it via talismans (LP, OT) — , so there is no reason to believe that magic has any strong correlation to Hylian kingship. If anything, the ability to use magic makes Daphnes the odd man out.
- I would also like to point out that Hyrule was both founded by a woman and named after a goddess. It's very likely that despite being called a 'kingdom', it is very likely that queens were the higher ranking royalty, especially considering that only women could inherit Hylia's power.
- You mean they used the wrong word and use of "kingdom" has become a case of The Artifact as the series has gone on? Since there is already a word for this concept in English, as pointed out in the question that led to this. A queendom would be a realm controlled by a queen first and foremost, much the same way kingdoms are for kings which is why ruling queens in a kingdom are technically considered "queen regent" when "regent" is a title for someone serving in the place of the "proper" ruling party.
- You're mistaken. A ruling queen in a kingdom is called a "queen regnant," to make clear that she is reigning in her own right and is not a queen consort, a woman who has the title of queen because she is married to a king; it is possible for one woman to be both a queen regnant and a queen consort (e.g., Isabella the Catholic, Mary of England, Maria Theresia). "Queen regent" refers either to a queen consort who exercises royal authority in a kingdom on behalf of her husband the king (who is absent or incapacitated) or to a queen dowager (wife of a previous king who is now dead) who exercises royal authority in a kingdom on behalf of her son the king or her daughter the queen regnant (who is absent, incapacitated, or has not reached his or her majority).
- Is it really that hard to believe that a fictional kingdom just has a different hierarchy/titles/rules for succession? There's never been much but practically everything we've ever heard about the Hylian royal court across all games doesn't jive with historical monarchies. At this point it's more ridiculous to try and shoehorn the Hyrule family into our understanding of real-world royalty than it is to just start theorizing how their monarchy works from scratch.
- That's what I was going to say, but I'm gonna rehash anyway. First of all it's not like this is the first time we've had a Hylian King; Daphnes from WW and OoT's King, for instance, and there's no evidence for or against them being of Hylia's blood. Secondly, as the above says, it's a fictional world and applying real world conventions to it without any proof of it is kind of silly. Hyrule could easily be a "a Prince/Princess has to get married and they become King and Queen" sort of Kingdom. TBH I didn't even read all of the real world examples and arguments because bottom line... this is not the real world. There are flying tree people, giant bird people, giant fish people, ROCK people, flying dragons, and that's not even getting into monsters and Gods and such. It's not the real world, bottom line.
- Hyrule is a fictional kingdom so it likely follows different rules. Since the power of the bloodline only appears to manifest in the women of the royal family it's possible that succession is matriarchal (and the powers might even been seen as the right to rule, remember Rhoam's line about "heir to nothing"). Also remember that Hyrule fell on the day Zelda went to the Spring of Wisdom, which was her 17th birthday and the day she was seen as an adult in Hyrule (No one under the age of 17 is allowed there) so Rhoam could have been Zelda's regent. Now Rhoam could easily also be a descendant of Hylia, see above about the Royal family branching out and intermarrying with other noble families (this might even be a requirement of the royal spouse to keep the bloodline and powers as strong as possible), but since he's not a female of the line he doesn't know how to access the special powers.
- Technically speaking, we also have no reason to assume that Hylia's power doesn't manifest in male members of the royal line; as previously noted, Daphnes displayed magical talent that was never implied to be not his own (when recounting how Ganondorf overtook Hyrule, he does say "My power alone could not stop the fiend"), and the king from Adventure of Link also knew enough to hide the Triforce of Courage so well. Neither of those contradict anything we're told in this game, either, because even if Rhoam can access the divine magic of his line, he's established as being such a stickler for tradition that he would still see the duty to harness it as falling to Zelda, if he even knows that he could do it just as well himself.
- Age of Calamity contains some details that shed a bit more light on things. Rhoam's main weapon in that game is a Royal Claymore, which is explicitly stated to be the type of weapon issued to the royal family's personal guards. This strongly implies that Rhoam served in the Royal Guard, and may have even been one of Zelda's mother's bodyguards prior to their marriage (in real-world history, it wasn't unusual for younger sons in noble families to enter the military, where their rank would put them on the fast track to promotion—Hyrule's nobility might do something similar). While not an outright confirmation, this suggests that Zelda's mother was the direct heir and Rhoam married into the throne. If the sealing power is a sign of the right to rule, as mentioned above, Rhoam may fall victim to the opposite side of the coin: he can't use it because he's King by marriage, not a direct member of the royal line. If it's accepted in-universe that Zelda is the only one who can wield it as long as she's alive and has no children, this would also explain why no one else with Hylian blood is trying to unlock the sealing power in her stead.
- There's still his resemblance to previous Hylian kings, though, particularly Daphnes in The Wind Waker, who seemed to be a direct heir since he possessed the requisite powers. And Rhoam is already a king by the time of Age of Calamity when he's using the Royal Claymour. Being so adept with it doesn't mean he must have had a past as a royal guard; he could've been born a royal who chose to use it as a weapon.
Is there anything we should do about this? I've briefly touched upon this in the Headscratchers cleanup thread
but even with a possible conclusion I still have no idea what to do.
openMedieval II: Total War Videogame
So, I have checked the Characters page for Medieval II: Total War, and much of the descriptions are copied from the game itself. Feels like plagiarism, though it needs thorough investigation.

So, for those who don't know, The BumbleKast is a podcast run by semi-famed Sonic the Hedgehog writer Ian Flynn and a close friend of his. From its humble beginnings as a rather standard podcast, it's more recent incarnations have become more frequently about for fun questions from various Sonic fans (myself included). The sticky thing is that it also does occasionally get serious questions pertaining to Sonic lore and due to his increasingly prominent role in the franchise, his answers are frequently treated as Word of God and regularly gets cited on various Sonic trivia pages, even when he makes clear his word only goes so far. And they've had incidents with hostile tropers in the past.
For these reasons, the page would obviously get a huge disclaimer relating to how seriously it is to be taken. I'm wondering if a stricter citation rule would be warranted too. Any other advice before I go forward with it (or if I shouldn't) would be welcome.
Edited by DDRMASTERM