The Way



The Way is a freeware, indie role-playing game that follows Rhue of Landorin, a young wanderer on a quest to regain a piece of his past. He's been searching the Way for many years already as the game begins. With his hopes diminishing further and further each day, he is setting a frantic pace for himself, desperate for a simple clue that might help guide him to that which he lost so many years ago. Along the way, he discovers many new people, such as the arrogant and abusive Strata, the charming and world-weary Traziun, and the lawful and violent Slade. However, his situation and that of many others is about to become quite deadly as a shadow killer begins a murderous spree of destruction along the Way.

The game comes in an episodic format with a total of six chapters. Along the way, Rhue travels through caves, duels in tournaments, traverses infernal realms, gets caught up in a gang war, survives a, goes through a lawsuit and performs in a grand stage production.

All six episodes of the game can be downloaded here.

preferably by someone with a more intimate understanding of the history and development of this series.


 * Abusive Parents:
 * Action Girl: Every female who joins your party.
 * Dark Action Girl: Cetsa
 * Actual Pacifist: The Paradans will never kill anyone. Some of them refuse to kill even animals.
 * Actually Four Mooks: Most enemies.
 * After Combat Recovery
 * Alas, Poor Villain:
 * Amulet of Concentrated Awesome:
 * Annoying Arrows: Several minigames in Episode 6 employ these.
 * An Economy Is You: Averted. Rhue apparently is completely or nearly broke from the start of the game, never gets any more money, never does any shopping and only ever pays for (plot-mandated) things by getting other people to pay for him. Very, very rarely, you can barter goods in specific situations, but overall it's fair to say that Rhue has no impact on The Way's economy whatsoever.
 * An Interior Designer Is You: Borderline. In Episode 6, you can buy a house and fill it with furniture, but it's all placed ahead of time, and it's pretty important for
 * Anti-Villain: Slade. The man has a weird sense of justice, but that's simply because
 * Anyone Can Die: Averted... until Episode 5.
 * Asshole Victim: Cade in act 4 exists to be nothing but this.
 * Arbitrary Headcount Limit:
 * Art Shift: Some areas, particularly outdoors, have prerendered 3D backgrounds which are rather primitive by today's standards, while others, particularly indoors, use Super Nintendo style tilesets.
 * Artifact of Doom: Shadow Swords.
 * Anti-Hero: Rhue will often do some pretty shocking things. He's either a 4 or a 5 on the scale, depending on your interpretation.
 * Badass Abnormal: Traziun. Also Rhue, in his more "lucid" moments.
 * Badass Boast:


 * Bare Your Midriff: Cetsa.
 * Best Served Cold:
 * Big No:
 * Bittersweet Ending: One of them. See Pyrrhic Victory.
 * Black Comedy: Many of the funnier parts in the game are pretty much about Rhue being a grouch. Highlights include calling a woman a money-grubbing, lazy whore ( actually, he does that a lot) and insulting a young boy for no reason.
 * Block Puzzle: There is one in the battlegrounds in Episode 3.
 * Bonus Boss: The leptor. Many more, if you count optional plunges.
 * Break the Cutie: Take Lyrra, the most optimistic and innocent person in the world, then
 * Break the Haughty:
 * Bring It: See Pre-Ass Kicking One Liner.
 * Broken Bird: Many of the game's leading ladies might be this, or become this. Special notice goes to
 * Calling the Old Man Out:  in regards to his father.
 * Can't Drop the Hero:
 * Capital City: Estrana
 * Catch Phrase: Rhue: "How sweet it is." Every time he wins a plunge.
 * Also by Rhue: "Wonderful..."
 * "Sweet flaming lands..."
 * Cerebus Syndrome: It starts out as a fairly happy RPG with some dark themes. By the end...
 * Characters As Device: Many characters in Episode 1 are introduced merely to teach the basics. The most glaring examples are the characters Dana and Wes. They help Rhue fight a few battles, are knocked out cold, and... are never seen again. At least Therin got a cameo.
 * Character Level:
 * Rhue's companions in Episode 6 become stronger through this system.
 * Averted for the rest of the game though. Rhue gains points in individual stats one or two at a time by absorbing items, and other party members stay the same for the duration of their stay with you but usually have new skills and better stats if they show up again later.
 * Chekhov's Gunman: Slade shows up in Episode 1 long enough to save Rhue's life and scare Strata before disappearing until Episode 3.
 * The Chessmaster:  seems to be playing both sides of the conflict in Estrana.
 * Chick Magnet: Rhue. It's not clear why, but women just seem to flock to him. Even women who really don't have ANY reason to like him.
 * Chivalrous Pervert: Dirk.
 * Chronic Backstabbing Disorder:
 * Also, Rhue himself. The number of characters he works with but later injures or kills is staggering.
 * City with No Name: The last episode takes place in one.
 * Cliff Hanger: Most significantly,.
 * Combination Attack: Rhue can do this with  Its effectiveness depends on Relationship Values.
 * Contemplate Our Navels: Rhue, in . Also, H2O.
 * Control Room Puzzle: Several exist throughout the series.
 * Convection, Schmonvection: You are not harmed at all by the in Episode 3.
 * Corrupt Church: The Guided in Estrana are largely portrayed in this way.
 * Courtroom Antics: Rhue is on trial, and Alan is his lawyer. Hilarity Ensues.
 * Cradling Your Kill: Rhue desperately tries to convince  to hang on, after   Arguably, this is the moment when he begins to realize what he is becoming.
 * Crapsack World: The Purpose is implied to be there, one of the only large cities, Estrana, is full of poverty and crime, and the world is made up of crazy religious fanatics (The Guided) and tools (Blood Lyn).
 * Critical Hit
 * Cruel and Unusual Death: See Gorn below.
 * Cruel Mercy:
 * Cryptic Conversation: Several of them are shown throughout the series.
 * Cutscene Boss: The plunge battles, sort of. They do have a legitimate alternate combat system, but they mean that most of the one-on-one battles between humans in the entire game take place outside of the normal combat system (and early in the gane there's little you can do during the battles to really affect your odds of winning.
 * Darker and Edgier: Though the series started to step further and further away from light-hearted antics as it went on, Episode 5 was when the shit hit the fan. Anyone Can Die and the Dysfunction Junction is more clear than ever.
 * Dead Little Sister:
 * Deadpan Snarker: Rhue. Also, Slade has his moments.


 * Deal with the Devil:
 * Defend Command
 * Degraded Boss: The nasty boss of the Barucha cave shows up as a regular enemy a few acts later in the mines.
 * Demon Slaying:
 * Despair Event Horizon: A bunch of characters have this, but some notable ones:
 * The Determinator: You really have to admire Rhue for the lengths he will go to find one chick..
 * Devil but No God:
 * Dirty Old Man: Dirk.
 * Dissonant Serenity: Gaius. Well,
 * Downer Ending: The
 * Drama Bomb: Episode Five. Man, episode four took a turn for the dark, but... well, let's just put it this way. The episode is called Everyone Must Bleed.
 * Dramatic Wind: In place when Traziun makes his eye for an eye speech.
 * Driven to Suicide:
 * Duel Boss: Just about anything that would've been one of these is instead handled through the Plunge system.
 * Dysfunction Junction: Seriously, look at the characters after Episode 4. It's hard finding a character that doesn't have some kind of psychological issue.
 * Easter Egg: Lots and lots. Some can be found in the actual game (the twisted C.O.O.L Meeting, for example), or some that can be found only with RPG maker 2000 (The Short Sketch). Philisophical messages can be found in the code of Episode 6, including some kind of weird scavenger hunt and a code in PGP.
 * Fake Memories:
 * Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: The basic core of the plunge system works this way, though the more advanced mechanics are capable of bending the rules.
 * Empty Shell:
 * Famous Last Words:
 * "A life... for a life... how about that... ..." -
 * "Finally I'll do something I know is right...something for myself..." -
 * "I wanted to see you once more... just one... last... time..." -
 * Femme Fatale: Cetsa and Sorya.
 * The Fettered: Slade. He holds his screwed up perceptions of the world very high.
 * Foreshadowing: Tons. And tons.
 * Friendly Target:
 * Gainax Ending: All of them. Some might qualify for Esoteric Happy Ending, but don't expect sunshine and rainbows in any event.
 * Game Maker: All six episodes are made with the RPG Maker 2000 engine.
 * Game Mod: If you have RPG Maker 2000, you can change anything and everything in the game.
 * Gorn: Despite the 16-bit Super Nintendo RPG style graphics, there are very gruesome deaths, especially in episode 5. For starters: Heads being ripped off, the body collapsing into a bloody heap, characters being graphically impaled on stalagmites, having their faces ripped off, scalped, being ripped in half, having limbs amputated, getting ripped in half at the torso, having guts exploding out, and a bird graphically tearing strips of flesh from a corpse, all with blood splattering all over the ground and walls.
 * Generic Guy: Rhan.
 * Gang-Bangers: The drug gangs in Estrana.
 * The Ghost: Tetzel.
 * Glory Hound: Strata and Hill. Hill might also qualify as Miles Gloriosus.
 * Glory Seeker: Strata defines this trope.
 * Go Out with a Smile:  is a shining example: she not only dies smiling, but uses her last words to
 * Gray and Gray Morality: The conflict in Estrana.
 * Guest Star Party Member: Everyone to varying degrees, except for the people who join Rhue in Episode 6.
 * Guide Dang It: Achieving One Hundred Percent Completion. There's a Point of No Return for almost every area in the game, and many chests are hidden behind secret passages. Oh, and there are a few things that require inhuman clairvoyance or a complex string of Dialogue Tree decisions to get. Have fun.
 * Happily Married: Sacrifa and his wife Lilah. Of course, this being The Way, they both
 * Heads I Win, Tails You Lose: Several, most glaringly the headhunter near the beginning.
 * Health Damage Asymmetry
 * Heel Realization:
 * Heroes Prefer Swords: Rhue starts the game with a blade even though, by his own admission, he doesn't really know how to use it. That said, seemingly EVERYONE uses swords on The Way... blades for stabbing or slashing seem to be the weapon of choice for the whole world.
 * Heroic BSOD: In Episode 4, Rhue gets one when he.
 * Heroic Sacrifice:
 * Hidden Agenda Villain: As noted below in Well-Intentioned Extremist, does the  really have Rhue's best interests at mind?
 * Hidden Depths: Many characters, but an interesting interpratation is Strata. He seems genuinely broken up when  and actually keeps  for most of the game. Also, Lexus.
 * Hit Points: Of course.
 * Hopeless Boss Fight: Numerous, usually but not always Plunge battles. Most notably, the first three Plunge battles are unwinnable, and Rhue actually gives up after two strikes in the third.
 * Hot Chick with a Sword: Kloe.
 * Hurting Hero: Rhue is always this, but it really gets bad after.
 * I Have Many Names:
 * I Just Want to Be Badass: Parris tries to intimidate Rhue. It doesn't work. Also, Strata wants to become the Paraphalyn, the ultimate badass.
 * Inexplicable Treasure Chests: This is the case for all six episodes. Only treasure chests found in the settlements are ever truly justified.
 * Inevitable Tournament: Happens twice, with Rhue being forced into them by Traziun and Lexus.
 * Sort of subverted--the first and the plot doesn't really care if you win, and in the second.
 * Informed Attractiveness: Cetsa.
 * Inn Security
 * Ironic Echo:
 * Inn Security
 * Ironic Echo:


 * Jerkass: Strata, and possibly Rhue if you play him that way.
 * Jerkass Woobie: Rhue, Slade.
 * Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Rhue, before episode five. He is very bitter and doesn't have very many friends, but it's implied he cares very deeply for the friends he does have.
 * Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Many characters, but notably
 * Irrational Hatred: Inspecting the mirrors that can be found in most houses reveal that Rhue begins the game disliking them, and hates them more and more as you progress through the story. This, despite the fact that mirrors serve no role in the story whatsoever.
 * Kill'Em All:
 * Kill the Cutie:
 * Knight Templar:
 * Lampshade Hanging: Lots. For example, many of the more fashionable characters tend to insult Rhue's ugly clothing.
 * Lawful Stupid: Slade can come off as this. He works with people who manipulate him and take him for granted. He even admits he works for a messed-up court.
 * Lazy Backup: Rhue's party in Episode 6 if he recruits more than three teammates.
 * Left Hanging: So very many plot threads are never resolved.
 * Let's Play: Malefact is doing one and had just ended episode 5. It has been on hold for a long time, however. You can find it here.
 * Living Emotional Crutch: Lexus, for Rhue.
 * Long-Lost Relative: Maybe several.
 * Lost Forever: Except in Episode 6, previous areas cannot be revisited, so if you didn't get the items there, too bad. This goes for experience, too, since the game doesn't use random encounters, but also because the aforementioned items are your primary source of stat gains in the first place.
 * Love Makes You Evil:
 * Mad Love
 * Manipulative Bitch: Cetsa.
 * Mauve Shirt: So many.
 * Meaningful Echo: "Where are you?"
 * Meaningful Rename:
 * Mercy Kill:
 * Messy Hair: Dirk seems to have this. Fits the whole "eccentric old man" thing.
 * Miles Gloriosus: Alan, when you plunge with him.
 * Mind Screw:
 * While that is the worst offender, the rest of the series is pretty confusing as well. Not only is almost nothing resolved, what little the fanbase has to work with is extraordinarily cryptic and confusing. (The result is that Epileptic Trees start popping up absolutely everywhere.)
 * Mini Game: Several times. Holding off a siege with cannon fire, a vaguely side-scrolling shooter game, catching a rabbit...
 * Money Spider: Completely averted. No enemies, not even human ones, carry a single kipher of seru.
 * Mood Whiplash: In Episode 5, you wander around, listening to humorous conversations. Then, you witness Sacrifa's
 * Morality Pet: Sacrifa's wife.
 * Multiple Choice Past: Two of the flashback sequences Rhue has of Serena; they're dependent on what the player chooses for him. The first one decides her hair color, while the other defines how her personality matches with the various female characters Rhue has encountered so far in the series.
 * Multiple Endings
 * Names to Run Away From Really Fast: The Lord Below and the Phantom Slasher. The Blood Lyn also count.
 * No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: In an Episode 6 sidequest, you have to beat up a guy to make him squeal some valuable information.
 * Not Good with People: Being  and living alone hasn't done much for Scatha's social skills, but she's perfectly fine talking with monsters.
 * No Stat Atrophy
 * One-Man Army:
 * One of These Doors Is Not Like the Other: The end of the forest in Episode 5.
 * Optional Party Member:
 * Overly Long Name: Alanthreonus Phillipe Straphachar. Alan to his friends.
 * Parody Names: Alan worked in a play called Stann of Green Fables.
 * Party in My Pocket
 * Pass Through the Rings
 * Pimped-Out Dress: Hard to identify, but it seems Lexus' dress has wings attached to it. Might be there for the symbolism.
 * Planet Heck: The Reaches.
 * Plucky Comic Relief: Dirk may seem like this, at first. Just like everyone in The Way, though, he has Hidden Depths.
 * Point of No Return: Make sure you've gotten absolutely everything before going to a new area; you won't be coming back (except in Episode 6).
 * The Pollyanna: Lyyra.
 * Pre-Ass-Kicking One-Liner:


 * Preexisting Encounters
 * Protagonist Journey to Villain
 * Pyrrhic Victory:
 * Relationship Values: They're invisible, and most of them don't matter - some affect the dialogue, while others were created early on only to never be put to any real use.
 * Retraux: The game uses Super Nintendo style graphics and MIDI music.
 * Retcon: Kind of a subversion, in that instead of having later episodes contradict information from earlier ones, Lun went back and edited the episode in question. Examples include how the headhunter in Episode 1 used be looking for Gaius instead of Jeruh, and Slade reacting a lot differently at the mention of Serena's name in Episode 5.
 * Romance Sidequest:
 * Rule of Cool:
 * Sacrificial Lion:
 * Sanity Slippage:  starts losing it around Episode 5.
 * Scenery Porn: There are quite a few pre-rendered backgrounds that look nice despite being relatively simple.
 * Scratch Damage
 * Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: Every word out of Alan's mouth.
 * Shell-Shocked Veteran: While it wasn't a war, the Landorin Massacre screwed Rhue up pretty bad.
 * Shout-Out: On a bookshelf in Episode 6 you can find another RPG Maker game, ThreeTheHardWay.
 * There are lots in the bookshelves, including refrencing his old band, Phlounder, and Crestfallen.
 * Shout-Out Theme Naming: The Charlatans of Justice in Episode 6 are named after members of the Crestfallen forums.
 * Shoot the Shaggy Dog: One of the possible endings.
 * Slasher Smile: When
 * Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: Leaning far toward cynicism.
 * Smug Snake: Strata plays it straight.
 * Sociopathic Hero:
 * Socketed Equipment: Rhue can put notch items into the notches in his sword, and after enough battles they will be absorbed giving him stat increases, subverting the usual level up system.
 * Sssssnaketalk: Scatha.
 * Stepford Smiler:
 * Stock Video Game Puzzle
 * Sympathetic Inspector Antagonist: Slade  in Episode 5. Granted, Slade isn't exactly a "virtuous" cop, but by this point
 * Take Your Time
 * Talkative Loon: Dirk.
 * Teamwork Puzzle Game: One of the rooms in The Pits in Episode 3 require Scatha and Rhue to work together with the switches inside to get past it.
 * Theme Naming: Subverted. The episode names all rhyme with the previous one...except for the last, "Truth Hides Nothing".
 * Thriving Ghost Town: Justified. Most towns are pretty barren, since they are only supposed to be temporary.
 * Title Drop: The final bosses use attacks based on the episode titles. Not to mention the fact that the entire game is set in a place called "The Way"...
 * Tomato in the Mirror:
 * It says something when at least one of the endings has two such revelations in the same cutscene.
 * Tomboy: Kloe, Scatha, and, mainly.
 * Tranquil Fury: When Rhue is walking around in the rain after
 * Trigger Happy: Rhue. Amplified
 * The Unfettered: Rhue.
 * Unreliable Narrator:
 * Urban Segregation: Estrana.
 * Video Game Cruelty Potential: The aforementioned beating.
 * Villainous Breakdown:
 * Villain Protagonist: Rhue after Episode 4, depending on your interpretation.
 * Violation of Common Sense: Being a bad thief and acting like a complete Jerkass during the party in Episode 6, which leads to getting the worst courtroom result with no notch item rewards, is the only way to trigger an external event that gives the player a certain notch item that allows access to a hidden skill.
 * Volleying Insults:
 * The Voiceless: The Phantom Slasher.
 * Walking the Earth: Everyone, pretty much. It's considered blasphemous to settle down.
 * What Could Have Been: An episode retelling the past episodes from Lyrra's point of view, Episode 6 ending with Rhue entering the top cell of the Arm of Estrana, followed by an Episode 7, amongst other things.
 * What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic: Some attacks, like "Longinus" and "Outer Darkness," are pointless references to Christianity.
 * Hell, once the mind screw gets rolling in chapters five and six even the Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors starts getting symbolic, with elements classified into physical attacks, Elemental, "Oneness" and "Transcendental", each with four subelements like Spirit or Atoma. This can get rather confusing in chapter 6, which is ironically the point at which you start getting enough control over your elemental choices that you'd want to understand what's what.
 * What the Hell, Hero?: Characters often say this about Rhue, but a notable example is
 * Well-Intentioned Extremist:  wants Rhue to find Serena. His actions are... extreme.
 * Or does it?
 * Rhue just wants to find his girlfriend and make sure she's safe... but by the end, he's killed many, many people and is generally considered to have jumped off the deep end.
 * Wham! Line: The very last line of Episode 5, in which
 * Wide-Eyed Idealist: Lyrra.
 * Wide Open Sandbox: Episode 6, which is very open-ended and has lots of side-quest, unlike the rest of the episodes.
 * Wimp Fight: Rhue vs. Nomi at the beginning, complete with color commentary. The game doesn't even give you a reward for winning.
 * With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Rhue's moral boundaries are gradually torn down as he becomes more powerful.
 * What Happened to the Mouse?: The Citadels and Dippy.
 * What Have I Become?:
 * Woman Scorned: uses all her authority to degrade   and break him down, after he refuses her advances.
 * World's Strongest Man: This is what the title of Paraphalyn signifies. Oddly, no one seems to hold the title by the time the game rolls around.
 * Wraparound Background: This is used in the scenes where characters are running on  the Landorin Stretch.
 * Wrong Side of the Tracks: Outer Estrana.
 * Unstable Equilibrium: Very, very much. Winning challenges or finding secrets early in the game nets you awards that boost your power forever afterwards. If you do not find these secrets or beat these challenges, however, you're likely to do poorly in the future.
 * You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Sorya, Slade, and a few others.
 * You Just Told Me:
 * Younger Than They Look:
 * Your Cheating Heart: Patura
 * You Gotta Have Blue Hair: Sorya, Slade, and a few others.
 * You Just Told Me:
 * Younger Than They Look:
 * Your Cheating Heart: Patura