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** In some JRPGs, particularly those where you can change the makeup of your party, characters often stop developing after you recruit them, particularly because they do not necessarily have to be present at any given scene.
** ''[[Fire Emblem]]'' has their own way of dealing with this. If a character is vital to the story, they'll get critically wounded and will never be able to take part in battles again, though they'll still be present for the story segments. It's still common for characters to get demoted out of the story once they're recruited, thus allowing them to die their [[Final Death]], though.
* In the ''[[Super Robot Wars]]'' pastiche game ''[[Battle Moon Wars]]'', this is transferred from Sacchin to [[Fate/stay night|Servant Assassin]] instead. All Servants made it to the game, even {{spoiler|True Assassin}}, who only appears in one route and is obviously less popular. Sacchin is at least playable and can be acquired. But Assassin wasn't even included in any of those series, {{spoiler|''not even as Caster's Servant''}}. Kotomine is also conspicuously absent, even though [[Justified Trope|the plot explains why he isn't there]]. Then there's the representation of ''[[
* ''[[The King of Fighters]]'' demotes the protagonist of the previous arc for the following arc. Kyo's importance to the plot during the Orochi saga was downgraded to make room for K' in the NESTS saga and then K' himself moved down to make way for Ash Crimson in the Tales of Ash arc. After being demoted the character continues to add to the story (Kyo was used as a base for a series of clones in the NESTS arc and K' got to fight Mukai in ''2003'') but it's the current main character who gets the spotlight and wraps up the saga.
* The American Sports Team from ''[[King of Fighters|The King of Fighters '94]]'', only returned as playable characters in one game and that was ''KOF '98''. Their other appearances in the series were mostly just background and ending cameos.
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* The [[Super Mario Bros.]] series and spinoffs has a few. Look at [[Mario & Luigi|Fawful,]] who went from [[The Dragon]] to minor NPC... right back to [[Big Bad]] by the next game. Or [[Super Mario Land|Tatanga,]] who went from [[Big Bad]], to boss, to vanishing off the face of the planet. King Boo went from [[Big Bad]] to standard boss after [[Luigi's Mansion|Luigis Mansion]], the Koopalings ended up in fairly mediocre roles after Yoshi's Safari up [[New Super Mario Bros Wii]] and Professor E Gadd went from important character, to minor NPC, to [[Put on a Bus]].
** And [[Super Mario Galaxy|Rosalina.]] Despite helping Mario save both Peach and the entire Mushroom Galaxy from Bowser in ''Super Mario Galaxy'', as well as being a playable character in the ''[[Mario Kart]]'' games, in ''[[Super Mario Galaxy 2]]'', she actually does not appear until ''after'' Bowser is defeated at the end of the game.
* Tawna, the title character's original girlfriend from the ''[[Crash Bandicoot]]'' series, only made a few returns appearances following her role as [[
* Examples from the ''[[Mass Effect]]'' series:
** In ''[[Mass Effect 3]]'', most party members from ''[[Mass Effect 2]]''. While [[Cowboy Cop|Garrus]] and [[Adorkable|Tali]] are the only ones to return as party members, Mordin, Thane, Legion and Miranda play important roles in the main game. The rest appear in side missions.
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* Pat Sprigs (AKA Gemini Spark), from [[Mega Man Star Force]], is a major character in the first game, to being an optional boss in the second, to only having a few references in battle cards in the third game.
* In the original arcade versions of the first two ''[[Double Dragon]]'', Machine Gun Willy was undoubtedly the main bad guy, as he was the final boss in the first game and the guy who shoots the Lee brothers' girlfriend Marian in the second game. In the NES version of the first game, he is simply the last guy Billy faces before the final battle with his brother Jimmy and is a complete no-show in the second NES game. The people who made ''Battletoads & Double Dragon'', aside for demoting him into a lackey to some made-up character, didn't even bother to get his name correctly. His [[Big Bad|main antagonist]] status was restored in the GBA version though.
* Heavily lampshaded in the ''[[Disgaea]]'' series, where former main character Laharl is quite annoyed with the fact that he's been delegated to an optional unlockable unit from ''[[Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories]]'' onward.
* ''[[Professor Layton]]'': Hi, Flora. How's it going after you left St. Mystere?
** In the third game she does have a major role, being a third party member, having her own puzzle solve screens, and her head shows up with layton and luke on the map, as for the second game, she is present for the first quarter before being kidnapped and replaced by Don Paulo in disguise. It may also be lampshaded by layton when he sees her again in the second game and states he forgot all about her.
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** Larry the Lobster got some decent roles early on, but seems to have been forgotten as a character in later seasons.
** A lot of recurring characters from the show seem to have been abandoned most of the time due to the unhealthy amount of focus with [[Spotlight-Stealing Squad|Mr. Krabs and Plankton]]. Such as Sandy, Gary, Mrs. Puff, Pearl, Larry, The Flying Dutchman, Karen, and Patchy the Pirate.
* In ''[[Hey Arnold!]]''s [[The Movie|movie]], Phoebe Hyerdahl only gets one line, and the only memorable thing she does in it is run into some newsguy's camera. (For that matter, none of the minor recurring characters, except [[Stalker with a Crush|Brainy]], get any credit.) The movie that Craig ''didn't'' get to make supposedly would have re-dressed the balance. According to [http://heyarnold.wikia.com/wiki/The_Jungle_Movie this Wikia article], the [[Out of Focus|much-ignored]] Nadine would have finally gotten some screentime in it.
* Pongo and Perdita, the main characters of the ''[[One Hundred and One Dalmatians]]'' movie, are secondary characters in the TV series. The episode "The Making Of..." [[Lampshades]] this by having them remark that they but were told that Disney "decided to go for a younger look". "But we're not bitter," Perdita remarks, [[Hypocritical Humor|immediately before tearing a rip on a promotional poster]].
* Lots of ''[[The Simpsons]]'' characters, especially those from the show's first two seasons. For instance, in Season 1, Lewis was regularly seen with Bart and Milhouse, and was explicitly said to be Bart's 2nd best friend. He was quickly demoted to background character, and even those appearances are getting rarer.
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** For similar reasons, Lunchlady Doris stopped appearing after the death of her VA, Doris Grau. This lasted about a decade, until someone noticed [[Tress MacNeille]] does a rather good impression.
** Marge's mother has also largely vanished. This is a matter of the stress on Julie Kavner's voice; whenever Mrs. Bouvier appears, so do Selma and Patty, and Kavner's voice takes a beating.
** Bill and Marty (Springfield's resident
** Guest characters voiced by celebrities sometimes stick around as mute extras. This especially common for classmates of Bart and Lisa like Alex (voiced by Lisa Kudrow), Allison (voiced by Winona Ryder) and Jessica Lovejoy (voiced by Meryl Streep.)
* The Riddler rarely appeared much in ''[[Batman: The Animated Series]]'', but what episodes he did get were quite excellent and put a refreshing spin on the character. When the sequel series ''The New Batman Adventures'' rolled over, however, ol' Eddie got the shaft, despite getting an entirely new character design more faithful to Frank Gorshin's take on the character. You know that things are bad when the new Riddler's biggest role was in a ''Superman'' episode.
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* When the ''[[Winx Club]]'' [[Spin-Off]] ''PopPixie'' was announced, one of the major concerns about the series was the apparent disappearance of Digit (Tecna's pixie). She didn't appear in any official art at all, and the first that anyone saw of her... was when she appeared in the opening titles. It remains to be seen how significant Digit will be. (The other bonded pixies? All present and accounted for.)
** While we're dealing with ''[[Winx Club]]'', and related to the Avatar figures example above: Under Mattel, Tecna and Musa were never represented as much as their fellow Winx in the doll lines. Some lines even omitted Tecna altogether, but their biggest sin was when they released the Singsational line... and released Musa (the ''musical'' fairy) behind the others. (Also, the only doll they ever released outside of the main fairies was one of Sky.) Italian licensee Giochi Preziosi, and later Rainbow Toys, appear to have been a bit better with equal representation in the doll lines, at least with the fairies (they even made dolls of the Trix).
* Dana Tan in the second and third seasons of ''[[Batman Beyond]]'', with the introduction of [[Spotlight-Stealing Squad|Max]]. Went from being Terry's main "normal person" confidante and having a scene in almost every episode to mostly being a background presence who got tossed a few lines every now and then, except for the one episode where she got to be a [[
** And oddly, Max too. Despite knowing Terry's identity and being the closest thing he had to a sidekick, she's ''completely'' absent in both ''Return of the Joker'' and the post-series finale ''Epilogue''.
** Terry's family, Matt and Mary McGinnis, while not as prominent as Dana, also had less and less screentime as the series continued.
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