You Shall Not Pass/Video Games

"The Guardian: Turn back, mortals. Death and darkness are all that await you in this forsaken vault. Arthas: I doubt there's anything more terrifying here than what we've faced already. The Guardian: Believe what you will, boy. You Shall Not Pass."
 * Happens in Warcraft III, outside the vault where Frostmourne is held:

""Galuf! You can't die! Curaga! Please... Raise! Open your eyes! Phoenix Down! Elixir! Anything!""
 * This appears to be nothing more than an invocation of the trope title, until you realize that the scourge may never have become such a serious threat if Arthas hadn't taken up Frostmourne.
 * Broxigar. He single handely kept the Burning Legion from coming through the portal, slaughtering demons until he stood atop a pile of their corpses, and managed to wound Sargeras. Yes, that Sargeras. All of this with an axe made of enchanted wood.
 * Skies of Arcadia had defense-minded Worthy Opponent Admiral Gregorio standing fast to allow the heroes time to escape from Big Bad Galcian as his Heel Face Turn.
 * Regal's More Expendable Than You moment near the end of Tales of Symphonia was of this type, by standing fast in the face of an army of angels to allow the others to advance without their interference. Unlike most examples, he enters the battle intent on getting out alive, having sworn to Lloyd not to die. He survives.
 * Bonus points for him actually saying the trope name word-for-word.
 * Then he pulls one again in Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World, against an army of one.
 * Asch in Tales of the Abyss pulls this in the final dungeon, as he holds off 4 guards while Luke goes on ahead. To make matters worse, he just gave his sword to Luke, so he has to fight without a weapon at first (he takes one from an enemy mid-fight). Why he didn't ask Luke for his old weapon in return for the Sword of Lorelei is a mystery. In the end, he seemingly kills them, only for 3 to get up suddenly and impale him all at once. He does still manage to kill all of them, but dies of his wounds afterwards.
 * In the animated adaptation, Luke actually hands him his own sword in return, for all the good that did him.
 * Literally done by Walter in Tales of Legendia. He shouts "You shall not pass..." and then runs off...
 * Seems to be a common trope in the Tales series as Judith says it to Nan and Tyson when the show up to try and kill Ba'ul in Tales of Vesperia.
 * Final Fantasy IV has Cid. After Yang has just made his own (unrelated) Heroic Sacrifice and it seems The Dragon is about to finally kill the rest of the party by demolishing the Tower of Babil's bridge with them on it, Cid catches them on the Enterprise. They are still being chased by other airships, however, and after flying into a tunnel leading to the group's next destination, Cid gives the wheel to Cecil and jumps off the ship carrying explosives. As soon as the ship is clear, Cid detonates his bomb to seal the passage with the enemy still inside (and presumably incinerate/crush himself). However, it was just a Disney Death.
 * There are two examples in Final Fantasy VI. The first comes when the party is nearly captured by the Big Bad after their raid at a Magitek Factory; even though Locke believes her a traitor, Celes throws herself at the enemy forces and casts a spell that warps them (and herself) to parts unknown, allowing Locke and the others to escape. Much later in the game, as the balance of magic is broken and the world begins to tear itself apart, the mercenary Shadow double-crosses the Big Bad and traps him while the party escapes back to the airship. Although the player is free to leave once the goal is reached (presumably, leading to Shadow's death,) there is also a chance to subvert this trope by waiting for him until the last possible second.
 * In Final Fantasy IX, Steiner, after finally realizing that Queen Brahne has been plotting against Dagger Garnet, offers to stay behind in Castle Alexandria, helping Freya and Beatrix fight the Queen's Black Mages, giving Zidane time to help Garnet escape. Steiner survives, and hooks up with Beatrix.
 * In Final Fantasy X, Kimahri does one of these, standing his ground against a major villain while telling the rest of the party to run. They do, but then decide to obey the No One Gets Left Behind creed instead and run back to help him.
 * However, his heroism was later remembered by the villain, when most of his species stand against said villain later and are slaughtered. Only the ones who aren't home and the ones in the Blitzball team survive.
 * In Final Fantasy XI after defeating the Big Bad, the Shadow Lord, he has a Heel Face Turn when suddenly the even Bigger Bads Kam'lanaut and Eald'narche show up and summon the "Warriors of the Crystal" intent on destroying everyone in the room. The Shadow Lord stalls the Warriors of the Crystal giving Zeid, Lion, and you time to escape before he goes all explode-y all over the ["Big Bad|Big Bads"]. (You have to fight the Warriors of the Crystal later though).
 * Final Fantasy V beats out all of these with Galuf, though. The heroes are down, and everything looks poised for The Bad Guy Wins . Galuf's granddaughter pulls a Big Damn Heroes moment, but it turns into a Hope Spot that leaves her on the brink of death as well. And then Galuf gets up. He pushes through Exdeath's Agony Beam, saves his grandaughter from the spell trapping her, and then rushes the Big Bad alone. He goes head to head with the boss of the game, refusing to fall even in the face of Flare/Holy/Meteor combos, even as he hits 0 HP. And he finally manages to defeat Exdeath on his own, driving him away to lick his wounds. And then he collapses. What follows is one of the most heart-rending scenes in any FF game, and the sole subversion to one of the most famous Console Roleplaying Game Cliches, as the heroes try everything to resurrect him, and it all fails.

"Micaiah: We will not lose! We cannot lose! If we lose today, everything Pelleas has done will have been in vain! In the name of King Pelleas, fight for Daein!"
 * In the ending of Dissidia 012 Duodecim Final Fantasy, the Warrior of Light fights of a swarm of Manikins to keep Cosmos safe. The army appears nearly as massive as the one the other six heroes are fighting, and he lasts just as long as they did while completely on his own.
 * Breath of Fire 2 has a number of secondary characters sacrificing themselves for the party, the party sacrificing itself for the main character, and the main character sacrificing himself for everyone else.
 * In Super Robot Wars: Original Generation, Sanger holds back the UCC forces to give his teammates time to escape... but is actually defecting to the Divine Crusaders' side, because he feels that he can better prepare them for the coming battles as an enemy than as their commander.
 * Illusion of Gaia featured the protagonists captured by a village where the natives were so desperate for food as to preparing to resort to cannibalism. The princess' pet pig, a faithful companion who has gotten the party out of many tough scrapes by luck and its intelligence, leaps into the cooking fire, sacrificing himself to be food for villagers. Kind of sad...though also somewhat Narm worthy considering the reaction Will has if you examine the cooked remains. Oh, and the fact the pig's name is Hamlet.
 * In the first Suikoden game, Viktor and Flik pull this one off, earning themselves a No One Could Survive That! Of course, they did survive...they just didn't tell anyone that, for some reason.
 * Another case in the first Suikoden game was Pahn, a loyal retainer who tries to hold off the imperial army after the hero's army was defeated. You actually get to control him in the duel which determines whether he lives or dies.
 * In the second Suikoden there was Jowy during the Highland camp infiltration, where he uses holds off the enemy with his True Rune and forces you to run no matter what choice you make. He comes back, but he betrays you shortly after.
 * In the second NES Ninja Gaiden game, Robert, the CIA agent who is Ryu's ally for most of the game, holds off a horde of demons with a single pistol just long enough for Ryu to make it to the end.
 * Planescape: Torment does this with all your companions, except for three (one who just pretended to be dead, and depending on your alignment and if you have them with you, as many as two who decide they would rather kill you).
 * In one of the campaign missions in Age of Mythology, one of the secondary heroes, Chiron, holds off an army of Fire Giants to allow the rest of the characters to escape. He dies, to the great irritation of this editor, because he was a particularly useful unit.
 * Not only that, but he blocks the passage behind him with a cave in.
 * All of Mario's companions have separate You Shall Not Pass moments in the final chapter of Super Paper Mario, leaving him to fight the Big Bad alone.
 * This could be seen as an inversion, since the point of the teams' |supposed sacrifice was to get Mario and Tippi past the Quirky Miniboss Squad so that Mario could defeat the Big Bad before The End of the World as We Know It. So it's more like "You Shall Pass!"
 * Seto in Final Fantasy VII singlehandedly defended Cosmo Canyon against a rival tribe. In the end, he was petrified, which means that he's still "defending" Cosmo Canyon forty or so years later.
 * And in all those forty years, nobody ever thought to use a Soft on the poor guy.
 * Leonard in Drakengard makes a stand against the Grotesqueries to let the others get through. In fact, here's the scene. A good scene to convey the Small Annoying Creature as well.
 * Captain Brenner/O'Brian from Advance Wars: Days of Ruin stands fast in the face of the New Rubinelle Army to allow the Independent Legion and the Lazurian Army to escape. He actually manages to eject from his command vehicle and escape, but is nuked to death shortly after.
 * The combined Lazurian/Brenner's Wolves have another such moment later facing against Tabitha/Larissa's forces in a mountain pass. They're saved by the timely arrival of Will/Ed and reinforcements.
 * In Grandia II, near the end and while on the moon, the group is surrounded by the young of Valmar, their transport is low on energy and the horde is closing in. Mareg throws the group into the transport and while fighting off massive number makes a prayer (to a) a god he doesn't believe in and b)a god believed to be dead) to send them safety. It works.
 * In Half-Life 2, Father Grigori diverts the attention of the zombies in Ravenholm, helping Gordon escape to the mines. It is debatable whether he survives or not.
 * You an clearly see him setting the entrance on fire, killing off the entire zombie horde then running into the catacomb if you wait long enough, which counts as 'surviving' as far as the game tells us. Assuming the explosion of City 17 at the end of Episode 1 didn't take out Ravenholm with it...
 * In Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn, Micaiah spends a good part of the game trying to keep the enemies out of her country, by any means necessary. The situation gets so desperate that toward the end the enemies think she's suicidal and/or crazy, and they propose their help. To no avail.


 * In Persona 3, this trope is used to justify the Arbitrary Headcount Limit during the Final Battle: while confronting Nyx Avatar, Fuuka detects a large number of Shadows approaching from the lower floors of Tartarus. Mitsuru then orders everyone not fighting Nyx to defend the combatants and hold off these hordes of enemies.
 * In Fate/stay night's Fate scenario, Archer does this towards Berserker to let the heroes escape -- the fact that a Command Spell was involved in making him do it is mitigated by the fact that he could probably have managed to save himself in the process if he had stuck strictly to the command wording, which was to 'delay', but chose instead to interpret it as an order to defeat Berserker.
 * After turning face, Lancer does this on Gilgamesh to let Saber get away with Shirou.
 * Parodied in Unlimited Blade Works, where Shirou and Rin are faced with Lancer and both attempt to nobly stand in the way so the other one can escape. The realization that both want to give up their life for the other quickly devolves into a lovers' quarrel about which one of them is best suited for the role, both completely ignoring the situation that brought it on in the first place. After a few minutes of standing around watching the two bicker, an extremely amused Lancer reveals that he wasn't there to fight them in the first place.
 * Exact quote from Aege, the Earth of Foundation, from Soul Calibur III, the Cute Bruiser Juggernaut Ditz with a unique trait that makes her unable to be thrown, knocked down, or stunned. She is the penultimate opponent of Chronicle 11, and cannot be avoided.
 * Axel pulls this one in Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories when he holds off every Overlord in the multiverse who came to kill Zenon so that the heroes could do it. He's doing this both to be helpful and to be a collossal dick of astronomical proportions Dark Hero.
 * Two in succession at the end of Metal Gear Solid 4. First Meryl stays behind to hold off the FROGS while Snake goes on toward GW, then Raiden does the same. Snake is so awesome that he inspires two "You Shall Not Pass" choke points for the endless swarm of baddies.
 * Make that three. Lets not forget when Snake fends off the Scarabs in the server room to allow Otacon enough time to upload the virus.
 * In Lunar: Dragon Song, Rufus sacrifices himself to hold off the giant monster Gideon from being able to chase after the rest of the party. Is killed, with the only thing left to show is his sword, which is later handed over to the Big Bad who gloats about it at the heroes.
 * Somewhat parodied in Alpha Centauri. Richard Baxton held off four waves of mind worms on his own with a single recon rover, saving a colony. The parody is that his story rights are purchased, then altered and repackaged as "Recon Rover Rick" so that it can be sold as an entertainment franchise, downplaying the horror of his demise.
 * Subverted in Mass Effect's final battle. As the Citadel closes, the Turian Cruisers attempt this against Sovereign. Sovereign, being Sovereign, just smashes clean through them.
 * One of Shepard's backstories had him/her holding back an entire enemy platoon singlehandly.
 * In the sequel, most of your team for the Suicide Mission stays to hold off a horde of Collectors, allowing you and two others to destroy the Collector Base and The Human Reaper. Depending on who is left in that team and who is loyal, none, some, or all of them will get back to the ship and survive.
 * For extra drama/comedy try leaving a single heavy to hold the line.
 * Shepard invokes this to Harbinger during The Arrival DLC, reminding him that when the Reapers arrive, if they want to take the Galaxy, they will have to face them first.
 * In the final part Grunt stays behind holding off a horde of hushified Rachni as the party evacuates. It is definitely awesome both for him and for the game designers who set the mood with several important deaths, making it clear that Anyone Can Die, only to pull a Disney Death on the player, and a hilarious one at that. You have to have got Grunt loyal in the previous part to see it though.
 * Happens occasionally in Dwarf Fortress, especially against the HFS. Given that the Dwarves are one-tenth Badass and nine-tenths obsessive-compulsive alcoholic lemmings, these occasions tend to end hilariously.
 * In StarCraft: Brood War, Fenix and Raynor get one of these in the first chapter. They survive.
 * In the backstory of BlazBlue, a man called "Bloodedge" fought the Black Beast and held it in check for a year. Though he was eventually devoured by it, Bloodedge's act bought the Six Heroes the time they needed to develop the Ars Magus that would grant humanity victory against the Black Beast.
 * In Halo:Reach, Noble Six does this to let the Pillar of Autumn get away. S/he eventually falls to seven elites.
 * While not explicitly said, the Six Sages of Team Plasma attempt this under Ghetsis' orders to bar you from your "destined" battle with N. This fails before it gets very far, as Bianca requested backup in advance. The Gym Leaders pretty much do the same to stop them from stopping you, with much more success.
 * Saga Frontier 2 has this in the one chapter where you control Johan the Assassin. Do note the enemies in that section are actually infinite, and Johan is poisoned to death, meaning you'll eventually lose - but Johan is so strong that you can easily rack up a huge kill count, and in fact, canonically, when people come looking for Gustave and Johan in the wreckage of the area they fought in, they find neither of their bodies among the hundreds of corpses that litter the area. Now you know why you don't mess with Johan.
 * In Snatcher, Random does this for Gillian when Snatchers have them cornered.
 * Seen in the final mission of Hello Kitty: Roller Rescue, with Kitty stalling an invincible robot until the others can finish it off.
 * In Ar tonelico II: Melody of Metafalica, Alfman does this immediately after his Heel Face Turn. He blocks the entrance to an elevator against the Divine Army so the main cast can continue their climb.
 * At the end of the first chapter of Monster Girl Quest Paradox, La Croix and her three remaining zombie minions stay behind to delay Adramelech. Adramelech kills them and continues pursuing the party but is reduced to 10% of her usual power, allowing her to be defeated.

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