Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories



Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories is the second game in the Turn-Based Strategy series Disgaea, and was released in 2006 for the Play Station 2. It was later ported to the Play Station Portable as Disgaea 2: Dark Hero Days.

The game stars Adell, the only person unaffected by a devious curse that has transformed all of the human inhabitants of his home village into heartless demons. The source of the curse is Overlord Zenon, a enigmatic figure who became known as the God of All Overlords after he slew one thousand Overlords in a single battle. Adell's solution to the problem is simple: get his mother to magically summon Overlord Zenon to the village and then pound him into submission.

Unfortunately the summoning ritual ends up conjuring Rozalin, Zenon's Spoiled Sweet daughter. Having accidentally kidnapped the only daughter of the most powerful Overlord in existence, it's a race for Adell to return Rozalin to Zenon before he tears the world apart looking for her. It's a shame that Rozalin is so sheltered that she has no idea where her father actually lives. Meanwhile, Etna has decided to strike out on her own and is gunning for the title of God of All Overlords that Zenon possesses.

Joining Adell are his two younger siblings, Taro and Hanako; Tink, Rozalin's childhood friend who has been Baleful Polymorphed into a frog; and Yukimaru, a Ninja girl who seeks revenge against Overlord Zenon for wiping out her clan, zam.

""Goodbye Tink: Tink sacrifices himself, but nobody cares.""
 * Adorably Precocious Child: Taro. The Skulls have elements of this, but lack a clear-cut personality.
 * Action Girl: Yukimaru, Etna.
 * A-Cup Angst: Hanako wants to try hard to undo her un-bustiness. Yukimaru also qualifies.
 * An Ice Person: The snow clan.
 * Another Side Another Story: Much like Etna Mode in the handheld ports of the first Disgaea and the downloadable Raspberyl chapters in Disgaea 3 Absence of Justice, Axel gets his own story.
 * While Etna Mode was an Alternate Universe, Axel's Dark Hero Days actually tell of what he did just before the plot. (In the post-game, the people who joined him can join Adell)
 * Back From the Dead:
 * Badass Normal: Adell.
 * Baleful Polymorph:
 * An area-wide version of this forms the premise for the story. In the game, the Dark Sun in the Dark World sometimes has the ability to turn a character into a monster.
 * Tink is a victim of this, being turned into a demonic frog. In the good ending, he is eventually returned to normal as a bishonen butler.
 * Barehanded Blade Block: Laharl does this to protect himself from Flonne.
 * Batman Gambit: Zenon chose to sponsor a  competition to erase all competitors for the throne. Rozalin attending the competition in Adell's escort caused it all to backfire
 * Becoming the Mask:
 * BFG: Rozalin's "Rose Thorn" special ability uses a chaingun to deliver several successive hits to a group of enemies with a shower of bullets.
 * Big Damn Heroes:
 * Spoofed; Etna shows up just in time to save your ass, which pisses her off because she hates this trope so much.
 * Played straight in the manga where Etna deflects an incoming beam from a monster followed up by Laharl and Flonne bursting into the scene with their signature attacks.
 * Also played straight (though Lampshaded) by Axel. In fact, for a self-proclaimed rat bastard, he sure gets quite a few of these.
 * Bishonen:
 * Blood Knight:
 * Adell is the more chipper, fight-happy type.
 * was once one, until he tired of the endless bloodshed.
 * Bonus Level of Hell: The Land of Carnage, which gives the enemies a 2100+% boost in power. All of the enemy characters have a level boost of 2100% base plus two hundred, plus all their stats are doubled on top of that. Have fun.
 * Bonus Boss: Laharl, Etna, Flonne, and a bunch of other Nippon Ichi characters. The PSP remake adds more, for a total of twenty-six.
 * Bowdlerise: The English audio of was heavily censored in the US version, resulting in a severely butchered impression. Here's the real thing.
 * Bragging Theme Tune: Etna's Etna Rock and Axel's White Tiger.
 * Brick Joke: In Axel Mode, one of his baby brothers, Axeleration, is a Genre Savvy little know-it-all who loves sharing his insights on the entertainment business. Axel is horrified that he doesn't "act like a proper child". In the last act,.
 * Brilliant but Lazy: Adell is entirely capable of being intelligent, as he demonstrates with the Inevitable Tournament's ungodly complicated geopuzzle and his status as the group's Only Sane Man, but usually turns his brain off because solving everything by punching the crap out of it is generally easier -- and more fun.
 * Butt Monkey:
 * Tink, the lecherous frog. He even gets a subpoena from the Dark Court just for existing. Also note his ultimate attack-

"You old men are all the same. No stamina. And now us girls have to find our own way to amuse ourselves."
 * Axel gets it even worse.
 * Camp Gay: The Director, who calls Axel "Axel darling" and refers to him as "the man I fell in love with" in addition to an extremely gay-sounding voice.
 * Catch Phrase:
 * Adell does things, or refuses to do things, based on whether they are or aren't "his style". Also, in case you didn't know yet, Rozalin is "Overlord Zenon's one and only daughter".
 * For the very short time we knew him Overlord Zenon is a "being of solitude".
 * Celibate Hero: Adell is one, sort of.
 * Chekhov's Gun: The four leaf clover seal on Rozalin.
 * The Chew Toy:
 * Axel. The universe does eventually decide to throw him a bone for all the crap it's put him through (though he had to work for it. Hard.)
 * Etna when she looses her levels, also, a nice Laser-Guided Karma in favor of the prinnies.
 * Cloudcuckoolander: Taro.
 * Cooldown Hug
 * The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: When you magichange in the remake, you only have 2 turns to wield the monster-weapon (3 if you pass the once-per-resurrection bill for the monster). If the computer magichanges enemy monsters, they keep them forever.
 * Continuity Nod:
 * When the Prism Rangers appear in the 2nd game, they note that they can't let their guard down because of what happened last time (Etna shot 2/3 of them during their transformation sequence).
 * Etna also mentions at one point she knew of a demon lord that married a human
 * Flonne's final technique, Flonnezilla, is a reference to a gag in the first game.
 * Cross Dresser:
 * "Main Hero B", the Angel that joins Axel is a guy. Proof? Any Dark Sun (or Rozalin) effect that affects males affects him. They do NOT affect Player Mook angels with the same sprite.
 * Also, the flower monster in Adell's hometown.
 * Named Bridget
 * Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Rozalin, though this is powered by a Super-Powered Evil Side.
 * Cruel and Unusual Death: The gruesome death of in the worst ending.
 * Cursed with Awesome: Zenon's curse. While the negative effects (global amnesia, lack of conscience, Zenon can cast Life Drain on you) are pretty bad, Hanako points out that the deal of getting to be a demon is pretty sweet for anyone born and raised under it.
 * Cutscene Power to the Max: Laharl blows up the planet in a bad ending.
 * The Dandy: Tink.
 * Dark World:...the...um....Dark World; as well as the Land of Carnage.
 * Defeat Equals Friendship: In several ways. Most of the story characters have to beaten, or at least, foiled first. Downloadble characters (save one) have to be roughed up, and other extra characters that you can get in the Updated Rerelease are initially Bonus Bosses. Further, you can capture monsters by tossing them into the Base Panel and whupping the tar out of them.
 * Defrosting Ice Queen: Rozalin.
 * Determinator/Idiot Hero: Adell. He always fights face-to-face, and only uses Good Old Fisticuffs. Then again, this is Disgaea, where Good Old Fisticuffs involves punching people so hard they turn into a black hole, which then explodes.
 * The game takes time to point out that Adell really isn't an Idiot Hero when he easily unravels the geo puzzle in the colosseum. The explanation given is that just because he prefers to rush in with his fists doesn't mean he's incapable of thinking it out when he needs to.
 * Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Aside from the traditional punching of ridiculously overpowered demons, Adell takes a page from Kyon's book and defeats the apeshit Dimension Lord/borderline Eldritch Abomination Granted, he nearly got a face full of lead for his effort, but it did work.
 * Dirty Coward/Fake Ultimate Hero: Axel runs away numerous times whenever he's getting his butt kicked. He also claims to be a famous "Dark Hero", but nobody really thinks of him as famous, except for the Director who's always following him around and probably has a homosexual crush on him.
 * It eventually gets revealed that the whole point of a Dark Hero is to be underhanded, sneaky, and repulsive: in other words, all the qualities that evil just loves. Though, judging from some of the other games, not too repulsive.
 * Disc One Nuke: Pleinair. Being Level 100 and using her at Early game will solve till everyone catches up.
 * Disproportionate Retribution: The cause of the entire plot..
 * Also, if you win the first fight against Laharl, he destroys the entire world.
 * Downloadable Content: So far, Dark Hero Days will let you recruit...
 * Gig (Japan only due glitches that occurred when he was downloaded)
 * Almaz and Princess Sapphire
 * Marona and Ash
 * Pleinair
 * Dark Eclair (Japan only)
 * Pram
 * Miabelle from Nippon Ichi's upcoming game Hymn Princess of Antiphona (Japan only)
 * Demon Lord Hanako
 * Unless you have the US version. In which case, say goodbye to Gig, Eclair, and Miabelle. Despite the fact that downloading Demon Lord Hanako unlocks Gig's Magichange data, and causes an impossibility.
 * Double Entendre: Etna:

"Because I loooove being hurt. <3"
 * Dropped a Bridget On Him: Tink attempts to hit on the Cute Monster Girl in Adell's hometown only to find out it's actually a Cute Monster Guy. For more fun, he's also named Bridget.
 * It should also be noted that the Angel who joins up in Axel Mode is affected by abilities and effects that only affect male characters.
 * Dumb Muscle: Subverted with Adell. Well, sometimes, anyway.
 * Duel Boss:, also serves as the Worf Effect as he is a base level of 1200.
 * Eldritch Abomination:
 * Empty Promise: Adell's parents promised to come back from fighting the Big Bad. The result? Their dejected son will never break a promise because of it. Ever.
 * Evil Debt Collector: The Big Bad of Axel's story is a repo man form of this trope.
 * Exact Words: Rozalin is bound to Adell by the strict terms of a summoning ritual.
 * Also, the terms of the ritual was
 * Expy: Adell's dad looks disturbingly like Kimura-sensei. Scary Shiny Glasses included.
 * Design-wise, Rozalin bears a lot of resemblance to Etoile Rosenqueen, both of them being the Lonely Rich Kid who hides More Dakka under a Pimped-Out Dress. Motivation and personality wise though, they're very different.
 * Fallen Princess: Rozalin. She goes from living in a huge mansion being attended to by hundreds of servants to essentially being stuck in the Netherworld version of a small Kansas town running around in the muck.
 * Fan Service: The Nekomatas and Succubus are back and the Magic Knight got a breast size boost. Then we have the new human classes Kunoichi and Beast Tamer. If you want to go there, Flora Beasts as well.
 * Fantastic Racism: Most "true" demons refer to Veldime inhabitants as "Altered Humans."
 * Fetish: When summoning Saphire as DLC in the PSP release, it's noted that since Adell summoned two princesses, he must have a thing for them.
 * The Dog Bites Back: For treating them like crap, killing them whenever she's bored or angry, and for being a bitch in general, the prinnies waste no time in betraying Etna once a botched summoning turned her into level 1. Everyone else is surprised at how hard the prinnies are working just so they don't have to work for Etna again.
 * The Fettered: Adell.
 * Five-Man Band:
 * The Hero: Adell
 * The Lancer: Rozalin (with elements of The Chick later)
 * The Big Guy: Taro (game play only as he's an uber tank)
 * The Smart Guy: Hanako
 * The Chick: Yukimaru (smarter about her lawful good alignment than Adell)
 * The Sixth Ranger: Etna
 * Foreshadowing: When you first meet the Prism Rangers, Prism Red says that Everyone says that it must be broken. It isn't.
 * A subtler one is the fact that
 * There's another one halfway through the game where Rozalin says
 * And, at one point, Hanako asks Rozalin if she could one day become as strong as Etna. Rozalin tells her she could become even stronger.
 * And of course, as mentioned under Exact Words:
 * Forgot I Could Fly: Subverted. Rozalin can fly, but not for long enough to help when she falls off a cliff.
 * Freak Magnet: Adell, who lampshades it. Several times.
 * Funny Background Event: While Rozalin discusses whether or not to let Adell die in Chapter 3, Adell is busy having a fight on-screen.
 * Gameplay and Story Integration:
 * Also,
 * Rozalin and Adell start out hating each other, and this is reflected by the fact that as the game begins they only have a 1% chance of engaging in a Team Attack together. As the story progresses and they grow closer, this slowly climbs to 99%. If you get DLC Almaz and Sapphire for Dark Hero Days, they too have a 99% chance of team attacking, due to them.
 * Get a Hold of Yourself, Man!: Adell does this to Rozalin after she totally wigs out in a battle against and starts to attack her teammates. This becomes retroactively awesome when you realize that, meaning that
 * Giant Waist Ribbon: Yukimaru, Fubuki, and Rozalin.
 * Goldfish Poop Gang: Axel is a one-man Goldfish Poop Gang.
 * Good Bad Bugs: A possible Overlook bug, You can make the White Dragon party like you by going into a bill as Senator Adell where you're supposed to disapprove by spamming an item at them. They won't take the item, but their Likeness towards you goes up, which will carry on other bills.
 * Good Scars, Evil Scars: Adell has an x-shape scar on his cheek.
 * Got Me Doing It: "Why is everyone speaking like her now, zam?"
 * "Beauty Qu- er...Demon Lord Etna?!
 * Gratuitous English: In the Prism Rangers bonus battle, Prism Orange parodies this concept by speaking entirely in Engrish. In the original Japanese version, he spoke like a stereotypical foreign Japanophile.
 * As well as in White Tiger, Axel's theme.
 * Guys Smash Girls Shoot: Adell is proficient in hand-to-hand combat, while Rozalin is skilled with guns.
 * Heel Face Turn:
 * Hello, Nurse!: Rozalin. She even boosts the stats of adjacent male characters in an aversion of Gameplay and Story Segregation.
 * He-Man Woman Hater: Adell really doesn't like girls, though.
 * Heroes Prefer Swords: Mostly averted by Adell, who fights with his fists because to do otherwise is "just not his style". You can hand him a sword anyways. Barring slower weapon rank growth, he does fine with them.
 * Hey, It's That Voice!:
 * Asagi, Rozalin, and Taro just stole another gig or three from starving voice artists.
 * Huh. I never knew that DemiDevimon was into that. (Or at least implied.)
 * Honor Before Reason: Adell will protect anyone and everyone he makes a promise to, no matter what it takes. His shameless sense of honor also works as an in-game combat bonus: his attacks get stronger against enemies at a higher level than him.
 * Yukimaru frequently attempts seppuku whenever she thinks she failed her mission. She gets over it.
 * Hopeless Boss Fight: Etna and Laharl during the main storyline.
 * Partially subverted by the New Game+ system and ability to Level Grind -- you can win these fights, if you spend weeks preparing for them, and doing so in Disgaea 2 gets you a Nonstandard Game Over.
 * Hostile Show Takeover: After playing through the game a bit, various secondary characters will send proposals to the Dark Assembly to become the Main Character. If the proposal is passed -- and there's usually a very good chance of it happening -- a Nonstandard Game Over is triggered (You get a cool item if you defeat it).
 * Hot-Blooded: Quite a few characters, but Adell especially. He can even set enemies on fire through sheer hot-bloodedness.
 * Axel deserves specific mention, as well. Manages to roast his director with an explosion caused by his hotbloodedness, plus he's voiced by one of most hotblooded JP VAs around.
 * Hot Mom: Adell's mom. Just try to ignore that little third-eye thing.
 * If you include some sketches from Harada and the manga
 * I Am a Humanitarian: Adell in the worst ending.
 * Idiot Hair: Adell's character design notes go as far as explicitly labeling it as Idiot Hair.
 * Idol Singer: Axel has his own rock band -- and film crew!
 * Immortality Begins At Twenty: Unlike the rest of the worlds in the series, demons native to Veldime mature like humans.
 * The Immune: Adell is the only human in the world who isn't affected by Zenon's curse
 * Inevitable Tournament: Spread across two chapters.
 * Instant Plunder, Just Add Pirates
 * Insult Backfire: Any derogatory statement about Mom's lack of conscience will invariably be met with, "Damn straight, I don't -- Zenon took it. Now either go kick his ass or shut your trap."
 * Interface Screw: The map during battle against Zenon is oriented at a forty-five degree angle, compared to the rest of the game's maps (likely for the visual aesthetic), and your directional controls are altered to match.
 * Internet Backlash: The NA DLC release. Not only did it suffer from bugs, but NISA also decided to cut out Gig, Dark Eclair, and Miabelle due to technical issues. This did not sit well with most fans.
 * It Was with You All Along:.
 * Kangaroo Court: The Dark Court
 * Knight Templar Big Brother: Don't mess with Adell's little brother Taro or little sister Hanako or he will kick your ass.
 * Same for Axel and his little bro. He will willingly give up fame and fortune to tear your ass apart if you threaten him.
 * Large Ham: Overlord Zenon in the dub..
 * In the Japanese version as well, being voiced by Norio Wakamoto and all...
 * Loads and Loads of Characters: The PSP version of Disgaea 2 is looking to beat Disgaea 3 in this aspect. Alongside the returning playable characters, the optional bosses that were originally not playable in the original in the Play Station 2 version are now playable, many of whom became DLC in Disgaea 3. Additional bosses have been added including Mao, Raspberyl, and Mr. Champloo from Disgaea 3 as well as the Disgaea 3 version of Asagi, all of them playable. And if that wasn't enough, Disgaea 2 is also getting Downloadable Content.
 * Lost in Translation: The bill to fight Zetta is "Meet The Strongest Overlord." Zetta's self-declared title in Japanese pretty much means that, so it ended up summoning him.
 * Mana Drain: Fubuki.
 * Medium Awareness: at one point in Disgaea 2, Etna checks her status screen to see what her title is.
 * When asked about why her title is "Beauty Queen" and not "Demon Lord", she claims to have hacked it ages ago.
 * Awesomely enough, they actually store your title as a string instead of a reference to a list somewhere. You want a custom title, go for it.
 * When Adell insists that he is going to beat Zenon, Rozalin asks why he's so overconfident; does he have an extremely high level or something?
 * Mega Twintails: The archers get a new hairstyle in this game, which consists of this.
 * My Friends and Zoidberg: "You aren't alone. You have friends that care about you...and Etna."
 * Mythology Gag: The entire "Makai Wars" chapter of Axel's story; about a movie that has never been finished the past 100 years.
 * Names to Run Away From Really Fast: When the game generates a random name for a character, one possibile outcome is Deathsatan.
 * No Fourth Wall: Rozalin asks Adell where his confidence comes from; is he descended from heroes? is he level 100,000,000?
 * Noble Demon: Axel might arguably be considered one, as a major motivation behind his actions is
 * Rozalin is just a snob at times; she honestly cares about Adell's family. As for Adell, well, as Etna puts it; they have one of those kinds of relationships.
 * For all her display, Etna does let Adell go when she beats him and it's a Nonstandard Game Over if he beats her only because it drives the plot Off the Rails. If you're paying attention, you'll also notice that she takes the hit from Zenon's super blast in the ending in order to protect Hanako.
 * Now Buy the Merchandise: In Dark Hero Days, Aramis, Badman, and Mao all shill the Dark Council for Prinny Can I Really Be the Hero, Holy Invasion of Privacy Badman (And its sequel), and Disgaea 3 Absence of Justice respectively. Amusingly, their petitions that you watch their commercials always have 100% approval and will pass even if you cheat to make the Council vote no. It's a great way to get items, though.
 * Obvious Beta: Dark Hero Days's DLC was released with so many crippling bugs and glitches that they had to take it down from PSN so they could fix them.
 * Offscreen Moment of Awesome: The story-relevant fight of Level 1000 Etna vs. Overlord Zenon happens completely offscreen.
 * Ojou: Played straight with the Tsundere Rozalin.
 * One-Winged Angel: Played straight with Zenon is a bit of an Anticlimax Boss, though.
 * Only Sane Man: Adell.
 * The Other Darrin: Various characters have a different voice actor in Axel Mode.
 * Peninsula of Power Leveling: Map 4-3, where nearly half of the map has enemies level up every turn.
 * Pimped-Out Dress: Rozalin.
 * Pillars of Moral Character: Adell's requirement to live up to all his promises binds him like a ball and chain.
 * Playing with Fire: Adell.
 * Power Fist: Lots of classes use unarmed strikes with weaponry -- and Adell, of course.
 * Power Nullifier: Yukimaru.
 * The Power of Love:
 * Precocious Crush: Taro on Rozalin. Both voiced by the same person.
 * Princess Classic: Rozalin partly fits this, at least at first.
 * Real Princesses Eat Meat: In contrast to Etna's Sweet Tooth, Rozalin is a meat and potatoes girl.
 * Referenced a couple of times in the manga adaptation.
 * Promoted to Unlockable
 * Rainbow Motif: The Prism Rangers.
 * Redemption Demotion: When Etna first shows up, she is an extremely powerful boss-type character that's impossible to defeat on most first playthroughs. She reappears later on in the game, but is reduced to level 1 and given crappy equipment, and she forces herself into Adell's party to gain her levels back. Their initial exchange upon her return is rife with Lampshade Hanging. This can also be subverted using the New Game+ feature which allows for your previous party members to rejoin at the level they were during your last playthrough, how does this affect your series well, if your Etna was at level 9999 and had all the best weapons and armor then she'll rejoin your group in that chapter at this level.
 * Redheaded Hero: Adell.
 * Relationship Voice Actor: Probably the real reason why Zetta is a Bonus Boss. (Adell = Hikaru Midorikawa, Zetta = Takehito Koyasu)
 * Restart At Level One: Etna, due to a summoning ritual gone bad.
 * In a more meta-example,
 * Rule of Symbolism: Rozalin's childhood is extremely similar to that of (I kid you not) the Buddha.
 * Samus Is a Girl
 * Fridge Brilliance:
 * Save the Princess: Subverted. Axel makes the assumption that Princess = Must Be Saved, even if said princess is with her "captor" willingly (Rozalin). The situation ended in comical pain.
 * Seppuku: Yukimaru is a little too eager to commit suicide after 1) your group defeats her and 2) the odds against surviving an encounter with the Overlord Zenon don't look good. Adell has to talk her out of it both times.
 * Serial Escalation: The original Disgaea 2 has a way of constantly making each challenge worse than the last. Starting from the first fight with Axel culminating in the Bonus Boss Baal, but every time each battle not only gets consistently harder, geo effects are played with, enemy equipment is pushed to its limits, and eventually stats are just ridiculously allocated on the enemies. It finally gets Up to Eleven when Pringer X is introduced on the port "Disgaea 2 Dark Hero Days" as a boss who is just overall ridiculously difficult, but even after winning the player is forced to refight 8 of him with maxed out stats in every category or the battle doesn't count in the dark record.
 * She's a Man In Japan: The angel in Axel Mode.
 * She Is Not My Girlfriend: Oh yeah?! Well you're not my boyfriend either Adell!
 * Shout-Out: Has its own page.
 * Stay with the Aliens: It's stated in the Good End that
 * Sound-Only Death:
 * Stealth Insult: Axel Mode's Evil Pink specializes in this.
 * This Cannot Be!: Rozalin's response upon finding out that the "most powerful Overlord" in The Multiverse is
 * Throw the Dog a Bone: Axel.
 * Token Evil Teammate: Etna, since you're playing as heroes this time.
 * Too Kinky to Torture: The angel who joins Axel in Axel Mode, who's only purpose for showing in the first place is to get hurt.
 * Too Kinky to Torture: The angel who joins Axel in Axel Mode, who's only purpose for showing in the first place is to get hurt.


 * It seems he named himself "Main Hero B" just so that the demons would have an excuse to hurt him.
 * Tsundere: Adell's mom. One minute, she speaks cheerfully to her little children, and the next minute she's chewing out her husband for things said by the giant monstrous mole on his chest.
 * Rozalin might also count, although she skirts the line between major Tsundere and mild Yandere and just plain being Spoiled Brat. The later games seem to make her the poster child for Tsundere in the Disgaea series (Or in Nippon Ichi games in general) with Hanako and Raspberyl both calling her out on it and even a database entry on the term in Disgaea Infinite that uses her as an example.
 * Axel Mode adds in, who's even worse about hiding her feelings with all the Suspiciously Specific Denials.
 * True Companions: The reason that Rozalin try to stop
 * Twice Shy:
 * Unknown Rival: Axel.
 * Verbal Tic: Yukimaru, zam. All the freaking time, zam. Even gets other characters doing it, zam.
 * It makes more sense in Japanese. What she does is add "de gozaru" at the end of every sentence, which is an archaic way of speaking and often crops up with jidaigeki involving ninjas.
 * Vile Villain Saccharine Show: Real Overlord Zenon. Also Adell in the infamous worst ending.
 * Violence Really Is the Answer: Adell's justification for why he solves most of his problems by punching their source to dust even though he's actually pretty smart: beating the crap out of things IS the most efficient solution. A short look at the entire series makes it hard to disagree.
 * Axel paraphrases the trope when Taro and Hanako are arguing over a candy bar.
 * Vocal Dissonance: With the Japanese voices, Axel Mode's  falls into this. Averted by her English voice.
 * Well, Excuse Me, Princess!: Rozalin.
 * What Could Have Been: Disgaea 2 was originally going to star Laharl, Etna, and Flonne again, but according to Word of God, they had felt that they had done everything that wanted to do with them and decided to create a whole new world with new characters and everything in order to bring in new people to the series.
 * Who Dares?: Should you decide to fight Zetta, his first words upon appearing are "Who dares summon me?"
 * Worth It: Axel says this in not so many words after . One of the last images the game gives us is
 * Wrong Genre Savvy: Adell assumes that he'll be able to beat Zenon despite his low level because he's the only human in Veldime who hasn't been affected by Zenon's curse, and thus he must be the main hero character who triumphs against all odds..