Illbleed

"You'll vomit with excitement! You'll puke with pleasure! You'll shit with fear!"

- Advertisement for Illbleed

Illbleed is an obscure, tongue-in-cheek Survival Horror game for the Sega Dreamcast that parodies American horror B-movies. It follows a group of horror movie aficionados (borderline Emotionless Girl Eriko Christy, wannabe psychic Michel Waters, average Joe Kevin Kertsman, and dim-witted Boisterous Bruiser and slasher-movie fan Randy Fairbanks) who receive guest passes to Illbleed, a horror amusement park built by reclusive movie director Michael Reynolds, who has filled his park with six terrifying attractions based on his movies, and promised to give one hundred million dollars to anyone who makes it through all six attractions without chickening out. Kevin, Michel, and Randy are gung-ho, but Eriko smells Hype Backlash in the making and opts out... until her friends fail to come back from their trip to Illbleed, and she's forced to investigate...

Players control Eriko as she travels through the six attractions trying to rescue her friends, facing foes ranging from the horrifying (like the vengeful, flamethrower-toting Gale Banballow in "Homerun of Death") to the ridiculous (the "Cake from Hell" in "Killer Department Store"). Each of the six stages is laden with traps that can harm Eriko, release monsters, or will just attempt to scare her to death. Fortunately, you have a special "horror monitor" that allows you to detect and tag traps (though use of the horror monitor is limited by your character's "adrenaline" level).

A let's play of Supergreatfriend can be found here.

"Eriko: How dare you! You're a maniac. Out of your mind!
 * Abusive Parents: Eriko's father put her through scare tests on an incredibly consistent basis when she was five..
 * All There in the Manual: Other than Eriko (who is actually given a bit more backstory in the manual), the backstories of the other characters aren't explored in the game at all.
 * The manual also explains the origin of Dummyman and some of the enemies in the game, along with adding a bit more backstory to the attractions in the game.
 * Amusement Park of Doom
 * Bittersweet Ending: In the second playthrough of the game,.
 * Breaking the Fourth Wall: The wall between the characters and the attractions themselves is broken in a few places. You beat one of the (animatronic) bosses by killing its operator (who may or may not be animatronic himself). In another level, you enter the boss arena only to meet a pair of maintenance workers who are repairing it. Also, there's an entire level based around the murders of several park employees, ostensibly by the villain of that level's attraction. The player is a potential suspect, and the game suggests that your "abnormality", as evidenced by purchasing Illbleed, is what drove you to commit the murder.
 * Brick Joke: Fall-Down Bear appears in the first level when you defuse the TV trap there. Another TV-related trap in "Killer Department Store" features him again, if you don't defuse the trap..
 * Call Forward: There's a cardboard cut-out of Cork in the toy section of Cashman's Department Store.
 * The Cameo: Dogs Bowser appears in the toy store being advertised and as a corpse in "Killerman".
 * Crapsack World: So we're talking about some crazy horror movie director who makes an entire theme park dedicated to basically killing people. How does he not get put in jail? Furthermore, events later in the game seem to point towards the fact no one is at all against the concept of the theme park, let alone the number of people who die there...
 * Not to mention that, according to Jorg, "more than a hundred visitors die in this park every day",.
 * You can bring people back to life by paying 75,000 for a SURGICAL OPERATION to restore them to life, good as new. Not paying to bring the people back to life shows just how much they care.
 * Creepy Doll: Cutey Mary.
 * The Ditz: Randy; it's made even worse if you fail to find his brain before turning him back from being a woodpuppet.
 * Could classify as Body Horror, but adds as a gameplay bonus. He got less points to deactivate traps, making him ideal for a Self-Imposed Challenge. His dialog is also just pure blubering.
 * The Dog Was the Mastermind: Played with in the "Killerman" event. Midway through, you're asked to finger a suspect for the role of Killerman (if you're right, you win more money). Besides the proper suspects you've encountered, the choices for who may be the murderous Killerman includes....
 * Engrish: From "The Revenge of the Queen Worm" stage, there are billboard advertisements for fake movies. Most of their taglines are in poorly-written English, including such gems as "GODDLA: Size is problem".
 * Everything Is Trying to Kill You: Everything. If it's in the level, it can probably come to life and menace you.
 * Everything's Better with Monkeys: One of the generic "mook" monsters is the Monkillers, creepy ape-like goblins.
 * Fan Disservice: Getting Eriko's friends killed so you can get her nude skin. Seriously..
 * Fanservice: If the player let's Eriko's friends die, her clothes get's ripped to the point of nudity. Also one scene in the second level may count depending on what character the player chose.
 * Final Boss: In the "bad" and "good" endings, you get to choose one final boss from a list of three. They are listed here in order of difficulty:
 * Dollarchura, the boss of "Killer Department Store" that you originally defeated by stealing his controls and making him jump into walls until he died.
 * OHNOMAN (yes, in all caps), a headless fellow with jaunty striped pants who attacks you with a pair of sickles.
 * Bullstinger, a mutated and more powerful version of an enemy from one of Crazy Games/Climax Graphics's earlier Dreamcast games, Blue Stinger.
 * Five-Man Band: The main characters.
 * Fright Deathtrap
 * Gainax Ending: The "true" ending. 'Nuff said.
 * Gameplay and Story Integration: Eriko's "fearlessness" translates into her being the only character to recover immediately upon knockdown, while all other characters need a Shock Bracer to do that.
 * Gimmick Level: Every level past the first seems to have a gimmick.
 * Insult Backfire:
 * Insult Backfire:
 * Aha, music to my ears!"

""Here's your favorite Sexydoll. She'll comfort you!""
 * Invincible Minor Minion: The zombies in "Killerman", who are, it's suggested, not part of the attraction, but the real deal.
 * Jump Scare
 * Kill It with Fire: Gale Banballow in "Home Run of Death". He's horribly burned, and lugs around a flamethrower with an attached tank of fuel.
 * This is also the proscribed method of killing, The Queen Worm.
 * Also Video Game Cruelty Potential.
 * Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: The sixth level is filled with these, from main hero Cork Inda being a cross between Woody from Toy Story and Indiana Jones from the boss, Zodick the Hellhog, being an obvious Shout-Out to Sonic the Hedgehog.
 * Let's Play: One by Supergreatfriend, where he shows the various characters and scares in the game whilst questioning the game's internal logic.
 * Luke, I Am Your Father: Eriko's dad is.
 * Mad Artist: Michael Reynolds.
 * Mascot Mook: The Crash Test Dummies and their leader, Dummyman
 * Money Spider:.
 * Monster Town: The hub world has atleast three characters who consistently try to kill you in the attractions tending to shops.
 * One-Winged Angel: The True Ending's final boss.
 * Recurring Boss: Dummyman takes a swing at you every now and again.
 * Rewatch Bonus: In the intro, Eriko is being chased by a monster. If you play through the game again after getting the true ending, you realize what the monster is: !
 * Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Gale Banballow again.
 * Scare Chord: One accompanies every "scare" effect.
 * As well as an unintentional Scare Chord from the controller; each "scare effect" will be preceded by a "whirr" from the VMU. Kind of takes the bite out of it.
 * Sequel Hook: ...
 * Shout-Out: Cork from "Toy Hunter" looks like a cross between Woody from Toy Story and Indiana Jones, with William Riker's beard thrown in for good measure. His robotic companion, Potedon, also has the same markings and color scheme as Buzz Lightyear's chest, buttons and all.
 * Also, the boss of the next-to-last level is a demonic Sonic the Hedgehog, complete with rings. Sometimes he'll even do Sonic's old "uh-uh-uh" finger waggle.
 * "The Revenge of Queen Worm" seems to be a big shout out to Tremors, due to worms being able to detect you if you're on dirt.
 * Stripperiffic: On a second playthrough, do not save any of Eriko's friends. As Eriko advances through each stage, she loses progressively more clothing with each one. By the time she hits the "true" final stage, she's dressed in bandages and extremely tattered undergarments.
 * Related to the plot, disturbingly enough - the game's announcer is so turned on by her that he jumps down and starts the final battle. Which is made a lot worse when it's revealed that . Oh, Illbleed.
 * Lose every friend, and Eriko will be clad in a few mud splatters and blood stains.
 * Stupidity Is the Only Option: In "Woodpuppets", you encounter the area where people are turned into the eponymous creatures. You have to jump in and become a Woodpuppet to progress in the level.
 * Surreal Horror/Surreal Humor: What the game basically runs on, though it relies on the latter more than it does the former.
 * Together in Death: Non-romantically, but Old David and Rachel can be seen as this. A strange mixture of creepy, darkly amusing and sad.
 * Too Awesome to Use: Averted - your inventory is emptied at the end of every level, so you have no reason to sit on your items.
 * Troubling Unchildlike Behavior:


 * True Final Boss: With an accompanying Gainax Ending.
 * When Trees Attack: Well, it would have if . You still end up fighting the tree.
 * You Gotta Have Blue Hair: While all the male characters have normal colored hair, Eriko and Michel have purple and green hair respectively.