Shantae/YMMV

""My Mom dressed up as the Pirate Lady for Dad. But I'm not allowed to talk of such things.""
 * Base-Breaking Character: Is Holly Lingerbean an interesting idea for a rival character that deserved a bigger role, or a forgettable, inconsequential waste of space that has little relevance to Half-Genie Hero's plot?
 * Breather Boss:
 * Risky's Oceanic Tinker Tub is fought twice in Risky's Revenge, and while it is a bit tougher in the second bout, it has nothing on how much stronger Shantae is.
 * Steel Maggot in Pirate's Curse. Its only attacks are to either walk into you, or to shoot a spread of projectiles if you shoot the wrong button on its back, both of which are easily dodged. It's a "guess the sequence" type of fight, but there are only three buttons to shoot and the sequence never uses repeat buttons, so you really have nothing to fear.
 * The Wheel Beast in the first game. It's damaged by hitting switches on the wall in spider form to drop it into pits. Not only is it very easy to bait the Beast into falling into a pit, wall-crawling keeps you free from damage with no consequence.
 * Wilbur is a relatively simple puzzle boss at the end of Tassel Town, coming hot off the heels of a rough chase up the Tassel Tower and the player's first real experience with platforming over bottomless pits.
 * Crowning Music of Awesome: which you can listen to right here for free, courtesy of Shantae's composer Jake "virt" Kaufman.
 * Generally, any game with a Virt soundtrack is guaranteed about nine separate instances of this trope.
 * Special mention should go to "Burning Town". Like others, it came back in Risky's Revenge, but the remix (available at the composer's site) takes it Up to Eleven, dipping into the GBC version at times just for extra impact.
 * Through the Trees combines this with one of the lushest, most visually stunning levels in the game.
 * Cult Classic: The first game bombed on release and the sequel spent years in Development Hell because publishers didn't want anything from WayForward that wasn't a licensed game or a casual downloadable title, but still manages to have a sizable fanbase most other smaller games could only dream of, to the point that it was successfully crowd-funded to become one of the sleeper hits of 2016.
 * Ensemble Darkhorse: Everyone seems to love Rottytops.
 * Evil Is Sexy: Risky Boots. In-Universe an NPC boy comments.

"Risky Boots: "Now hoist my booty into the air, and put your back into it.""
 * Foe Yay: Many fans have ideas of this. Risky capturing Shantae in the third game by booby-trapping her bathtub only encouraged it.
 * Game Breaker: Fighting the final boss as plain ol' Shantae? A nightmare.
 * Germans Love David Hasselhoff: The game has a not-insignificant Japanese fanbase despite never officially being released there. The combination of Animesque-Kawaii-Fan Service-Metroidvania likely has something to do with it.
 * And then there's this piece of fanart, released in hopes of encouraging WayForward to get hopping on the worldwide release of Risky's Revenge.
 * Getting Crap Past the Radar: This risque comment from Risky, after swiping the lamp:

""When I was a little boy with a full beard...""
 * Moe: Cited by Destructoid in their review of Risky's Revenge: Your first instinct on seeing the female main cast is probably not so much "Whoa, that's hot" as "Aww, that's cute".
 * That doesn't stop the fanbase's artistic views, however.
 * Needs More Love
 * One-Scene Wonder: Tuki, the "sneaky, snakey seller of magical secrets" is a naga merchant that Shantae can find at certain areas of the game, designed by a fan backer. Despite appearing only briefly in the fourth game, depictions in fan art and fanfiction expand her role greatly. (Snakes Are Sexy, after all.)
 * Squick: Rottytops, a (cute) female zombie, manages to break into a ruin -- in order to allow Shantae access -- by temporarily removing her left shin and jimmying the lock with her tibia. Still cute, but rather disturbing.
 * In a conversation with Bolo (Had while you are searching for the Zombie Caravan), he asks you to tell him if you meet any cute zombie girls. That's right, Bolo is a not-so-closeted necrophile.
 * Considering Rottytops, being that sort of 'necrophile' in the Shantae 'verse is entirely understandable
 * How Uncle Mimic explains how he prevented triggering a pressure trap: by switching the treasure with the contents of his bowels.
 * One of the fishermen:


 * That One Level: The entire overworld is harder than most dungeons!
 * What Do You Mean It's for Kids?: Part of the game's commercial failure is sometimes attributed to this. The art and story are cute and comical, and there's a definite hint of Girls Need Role Models behind the mostly-female, all ass-kicking cast. But the crap gone past the radar, the difficulty during the later stages, and the sheer sexiness of the cast seems a bit odd.