Apocalypse How/Class 2: Difference between revisions

 

{{examples}}

== Multiple Media ==

* Generally, the more extreme portrayals of [[World War Three]] are going to have this as a ''minimum'' outcome.

 

 

* ''[[Blue Gender]]'', in which giant bugs ravage the human population of Earth, forcing the humans into space. Admittedly, humans as a species are allowed to survive as small hunter gatherer tribes, but that still necessitates all modern civilization's knowledge and technology to be wiped out lest [[Gaia's Vengeance]] do an encore.

* ''[[Scrapped Princess]]'' has humanity defeated and imprisoned in a medieval tech level for 5000 years. The guardian AIs have a reset option of killing off 90% if the humans get troublesome.

* ''[[Stellvia of the Universe]]'' back-story falls half-way between this and Class 1: 99% of humans dead, global civilization mostly wiped out, yet they get right back on their feet in less then two centuries, advancing from the Stone Age to space-faring civilization. That the near-Class 2 event (the electromagnetic radiation blast from the explosion of a nearby star) is a harbinger of a Class 4 event (the arrival of the much slower physical shockwave from the same explosion) helped ensure that [[The Apocalypse Brings Out the Best In People]]. Stellvia is one of the enormous space stations built to prevent that event.

* ''[[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]'' begins centuries after a Class 2, with humanity confined to isolated and impoverished underground villages. The nature of the cataclysm, and the surprising reasons for it, are revealed as the show goes on.

* The world created by [[Tsutomu Nihei]]. Let's list it out:

** After that. In [[NOiSE]]. [[Cult Colony|Religious fanatics]] are trying to [[For the Evulz|bring out the chaos of the Netsphere]] and are doing so by doing [[Nightmare Fuel|less than humane things to people]]. Against them.....is a single police women who ends up not being able to stop them, and thus the [[Bizarrchitecture]] (built around the earth) begins to expand rapidly and increase the chaos. [[Downer Ending]].

** ''After that...'' The protagonist of [[Blame]]! is searching the the ginormous sphere for people with genes to turn off the chaos. He must deal with all the preceding crazy things mentioned (and more). Thankfully he succeeds in his mission (though the series ends right before it is directly shown).

** After that in "Net Sphere Engineer" the last remnants of humanity are unfortunately not as safe as they would have hoped. But they have another protagonist to deal with the problems this time.

* About 500 years prior to the beginning of ''[[Dragon Ball]]'', a violent storm raged across the planet Namek, leaving only one Namekian on the ground and another escaped to somewhere in space. Even centuries later with asexual Namekian reproduction, there are only a few hundred Namekians left. During the Frieza saga, Frieza, his henchmen and Vegeta almost completely eradicate the Namekian race, aside from the Nameless Namekian who fled all those centuries ago, separated into the light side of Kami and the dark side of Piccolo. Piccolo becomes the only living Namekian on the surface alive prior to most of the race being resurrected by the Namekian Dragon Balls and transported by the Earth Dragon Balls, followed shortly thereafter by Namek's explosion.

* In ''[[Uchuu Senkan Yamato]]'' humanity is reduced to survival in underground cites that are rapidly becoming uninhabitable due to radiation thanks to the Gamilas' continual bombing of Earth.

* ''[[Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind]]'' takes place a thousand years after the world has been devastated by what's implied to have been a nuclear war. The survivors have organized themselves into petty kingdoms, but are still at war with one another and technology has only progressed to the late medieval period for the most part (save for some remnants of pre-deluge technology like airplanes).

 

 

 

* In [[The Bible]], The Great Tribulation. Exact numbers are unknown, but the description "Mortals will be rarer than the gold of Ophir," combined with Revelation detailing the fact that over half of the population will die from the war, famine, plagues and various other disasters, and most of the Christians will be beheaded, burned or starved to death, while none of the unbelievers survive Armageddon means that you could expect maybe one out of a thousand people who enter the Tribulation to come out alive, perhaps a bit more.

** Then there's the reborn Kingdom of Britain that shows up in later volumes. It seems the U.K. military evacuated the Royals, a solid selection of reference materials, a few thousand lucky/skilled souls, etc. to the Isle of Wright and is steadily recolonizing a Britain occupied by "Brushwood Men" (and dealing with [[Royally Screwed-Up|Mad King Charles and his Icelandic Queen]], but that is beside the point).

** Stirling's ''Peshawar Lancers'' accomplishes much the same thing with a series of cometary impacts that destroy industrial Europe and the eastern United States in the late 19th century, setting the stage for a [[Steampunk]] 21st century where the British Raj in India, an ascendant Japanese Empire, and the Empire of Brazil are the dominant world powers. France is a shadow of its former self and Russia {{spoiler|is controlled by a [[Eldritch Abomination]]-worshipping death cult}}.

* George R. Stewart's novel ''[[Earth Abides]]'' depicts the near extinction of humanity from a pandemic disease. Although there are survivors, the population is too low to maintain technological advancements of modern civilization and within two or three generations humans are living as hunter-gatherers. Actually it's not as pessimistic as it sounds. Acknowledged as one of the inspirations for King's ''[[The Stand]].''

* Kurt Vonnegut's ''[[Galapagos]]''. Okay, technically the human race does survive in the end, but you can't really consider them human anymore by the time they do get back on their feet. {{spoiler|Their brains have atrophied and their limbs evolved into flippers. The ghostly narrator sees this as a good thing.}}

* ''[[Cell]]'', by [[Stephen King]]. We see only US residents, and the book doesn't really address other places, but there's really no reason to think any place with cell phones was spared.

** And of course, ''[[The Stand]]'' by the same author. King does regret not showing what the rest of the world faced, but it's clear that Captain Trips goes worldwide, especially since the US military released it into other countries so they wouldn't be able to attack us.

* ''[[The Day of the Triffids]]'' by John Wyndham. The light from a meteor shower renders most of the human race blind, leaving them vulnerable to carnivorous walking plants that sting you to death and eat your corpse, and reproduce rapidly. Don't bother watching the 1962 film which conveniently has a [[Happy Ending]] when they suddenly discover that the Triffids {{spoiler|can be killed with sea water}}.

* [[John Varley]]'s ''<s>Eight</s> Nine Worlds'' stories, where an invasion of aliens had come to Earth and literally plowed human civilization out of existence, supposedly to benefit Earth's true higher life forms: dolphins, sperm whales and other cetaceans. At that time, humanity had one single developed colony on the moon. They were warned - once - never to land on Earth again. Four hundred years later, humanity had settled all the other 'junk' planets in the solar system. What continues to happen on Earth is a sweet mystery.

* In [[Isaac Asimov]]'s classic short story, "Nightfall", a planet with six suns experiences night only once every 2048 years. Each time, the darkness drives almost everyone insane and they destroy civilization. At the end the scientists are unable to convince the people of the danger and it all happens again, but they're able to save their data about the event so that the next cycle might avoid the same fate. (Of course, given that this has happened nine or ten times before, it's very much implied that all this might be for naught, as by the time the next cycle's civilization is advanced enough to understand the data, it may well have degenerated into myth.) This is the exact situation in the novel version; one of the reasons the scientists aren't believed is because it's revealed that their prediction ''exactly'' matches the apocalyptic prophecy of an ancient cult.

* ''[[Z for Zachariah]]'', in which [[World War III]] seems to have wiped out everything but an isolated valley in America. From the sound of it it might actually border on a Class 3, since civilization and most of the population seem to have been wiped out entirely.

 

 

* In a [[Bad Future]] of ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]'', the immortal Adam Munroe unleashes the Shanti virus, wiping out most of the world's population so they can build anew.

* In the ''[[Babylon 5]]'' episode "Deconstruction of Falling Stars", its shown that humanity all but wiped itself out in a massive civil war. It takes quite a while and the aid of the Rangers to fix that mess.

* With 40 missile tubes each capable of delivering eight 20-megaton kinetic kill missiles a second, the [[Andromeda|Andromeda Ascendant]] can destroy every population center of a Tarn Vedra (read: Earth like) class planet in under six minutes.

* In the ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'' episode "A Taste of Armageddon", Kirk threatens to use "General Order 24" which is this caused by [[Death From Above|Orbital]] [[Nuke'Em|Bombardment]].

** In ''The End of Time'', {{spoiler|the Master does this in a very creative and, admittedly, totally awesome manner: by turning (almost) the entirety of humanity into ''carbon copies of himself,'' giving rise to, aptly named, "The Master Race". We all get better shortly afterwards, though.}}

** In "Day of the Moon", {{spoiler|we learn that the Silence have occupied the Earth since the age of fire and the wheel. Canton Delaware and the Doctor trick the Silence into post-hypnotically ordering their own destruction through a message in the 1969 moon landing. As there are probably remote corners of the Earth where people haven't seen the moon landing videos, it's unlikely to be a Class 3a.}}

 

 

 

 

* ''[[De Genesis]]'', a German roleplaying game set [[After the End]] sees presumably all of civilization completely destroyed. Humanity got back to their feet, making the initial apocalypse only a Class 1 case. However, since the asteroids left some alien material that constantly expands its turf, the survival of the human race is all but probable.

* The Great Rain of Fire, a planetary cataclysm that devastated the D&D setting of ''[[Mystara]]'' 3000-odd years ago, knocked human and elven civilization from scifi-grade technology back to savagery. The exact nature of the weapons Evergrun's elves and Blackmoor's humans threw at each other is unknown, but nukes were probably the ''least'' of them, as their conflict was so violent that it ''changed Mystara's axial tilt''. Note that this same event rates as a Class 3a for some of the other races that were around back then, and that still others only subverted a Class 3a [[Apocalypse How]] because the Immortals preserved some of them in the Hollow World.

* The "Crucible Of God" scenario in ''[[Vampire: The Masquerade]]'''s final supplement, ''Gehenna'', ends in this (if the PCs ''win''), with about 90% of the Earth's humans depopulated (and corresponding numbers of most other life).

** This is also what happens if the [[Werewolf: The Apocalypse|Garou]] ''win''. You don't want to know what it'd be like if they ''lose''.

* The Yozis in ''[[Exalted]]'' are trying to do this to creation, but it only falls into this category because they're not going to kill all humans. If the Yozis were to succeed it would be worse than a Class Z.

* In ''[[Rifts]]'', a small nuclear exchange during a major surge in the planet's magical field wiped out all human civilization, and nearly wiped out humanity itself. In the three hundred years since, small pockets of civilization have emerged here and there, but 90% of humanity lives as subsistence farmers or hunter-gatherers.

 

 

* [[Earthshattering Kaboom|The Shattering]] in ''[[Bionicle]]'' is implied to have reduced the population of Sphereus Magna, and significantly decreased the amount of resources available, resulting in a [[Scavenger World]] where villages have to fight for supplies.

 

 

* ''[[Chrono Trigger]]'', at least after the Day of Lavos. It's clear that a few isolated pockets of humanity have survived Lavos' wrath, but it's also clear that those isolated pockets are screwed, no matter how much "hope" is spread by the main characters. Luckily, the theme of the game is [[Time Travel]]...

* The freeware game ''[[Iji]]'' begins with a vast majority of all life on the planet blown to bits, your job is to try to save the remaining life from being blown into even tinier bits.

* ''[[Phantom Dust]]'' is a class 2 in many ways. The memory erasing dust on the surface makes long term exposure to environments that aren't pressure sealed a dangerous or even suicidal venture. The remains of humanity exist in underground shelters seemingly stitched together from collapsed subways. You only ever encounter one such lair, though it's suggested that more exist. Their government is comprised of a silent dictator and his interpreter, and their civilians/field agents are nearly all of suspect sanity. Parts of the vault seem to have technology superior to modern day tech, but the inhabitants are mostly ignorant; they have no idea how to grow crops and have to raid the surface for food and supplies. Of course, later on in the game you discover {{spoiler|That humanity has actually already gone extinct, and the protagonist and all the humans he has encountered are constructed figments created from the dust by the last surviving human, who has long since past away, making it a class 5.}}

* The Great War in the [[Fallout]] series caused one of these. Sure, it was worse in some places than in others, but humanity's pretty much been busted back to the Stone Age. Social organization is tribal in most cases and only the New California Republic even approaches [[Guns, Germs, and Steel|Jared Diamond's]] definition of a "state".

 

* In ''[[The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob]],'' the [[Dinosaurs Are Dragons|dragons]] [http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20100518.html did this to themselves] with an "iridium bomb," wiping out the [[Everything's Better with Dinosaurs|dinosaurs]] in the process. All because they panicked during a clumsy [[First Contact]].

* One of these appears in the backstory of ''[[Wapsi Square]]''. Thousands of years before the comic starts, an ancient civilization tried to create the ultimate weapon. [[Gone Horribly Right|Predictably]], they lost control and it destroyed most of the world. The three parts of the weapon are now main characters.

 

 

* The [[Set Right What Once Went Wrong|entire reason]] why the time traveler in the ''[[United States of Ameriwank]]'' visited George Washington in the first place.

 

 

* This was actually the ending to the last cartoon of the "future trilogy" [[Tom and Jerry]] cartoons from the Chuck Jones run.

 

 

* The [[wikipedia:Toba catastrophe theory|Toba Catastrophe]] is an event that may have happened about 75 thousand years ago, when a supervolcano reduced human population to 10,000 individuals total. There's a lot of tantalizing evidence that this may have happened, but no absolute proof.

* Mass Extinction-level events would certainly count as high-level class 2's; events such as the Cretaceous-Tertiary (K-T) event, which among others killed off the dinosaurs. Or the great extinction event ever, which was the Permian-Triassic event, which killed off approximately 90-95% of ''all life on earth''. It's not for nothing that archaeologists, who aren't a profession usually given to mass hyperbole, refer to it as '''''The Great Dying'''''.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Class 2]]