Everything Trying to Kill You: Difference between revisions

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[[File:charliebrown and kite.jpg|link=Peanuts|frame|Tonight on "You're Gonna Get It, Charlie Brown"...]]
 
{{quote|"''Did I just die by walking into the fucking ''door!?'' Yeah! Everything kills you, literally ''everything''.''"|'''[[The Angry Video Game Nerd]]''' on ''[[Dragon's Lair]]'' ([[NES]])}}
|'''[[The Angry Video Game Nerd]]''' on ''[[Dragon's Lair]]'' ([[NES]])}}
 
Video games struggling for creativity will invent unlikely obstacles.
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* ''[[Time Gal]]'' on the Sega CD. That girl has no allies whatsoever. It seems that every era she gets transported to only serves the purpose of pitting her against something or another.
* In ''[[DmC: Devil May Cry|DmC]]'', the reboot of ''[[Devil May Cry]]'', Dante fights in a parallel dimension, Limbo, where the city itself literally tries to kill him.
* The ''[[Kunio-Kun]]'' series plays the Trope pretty straight, even lampshading it in ''[[River City Girls]]'', from the one of the two anti-heroines’ conversations ([[Hypocritical Humor|Of course, like ''they'' should talk...]]):
 
{{quote|'''Kyoku:''' You ever wonder why everyone in our town is so violent?
'''Misako:''' Nope.
'''Kyoku:''' I mean, everyone’s always punching and kicking each other, like everywhere we go, like all day long.
'''Misako:''' I guess so, what’s your point?
'''Kyoku:''' Nothing.}}
 
=== [[Adventure Game]] ===
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=== [[Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game|MMORPGs]] ===
* ''[[Kingdom of Loathing]]'' has its fair share of unlikely enemies, including hippies, [[McNinja|ninja snowmen]], animated nightstands, anime smileys, fire-breathing ducks, pastiches of characters from ''[[Final Fantasy VII]]'', and the Guy Made of Bees. Then there's the many twists on standard RPG enemies, like Orcish frat boys, apathetic lizardmen, misspelled undead (including zmobies, lihcs, and ghuols), and the 99 Bottles of Beer On A Golem. There's also an area (accessible only while high on [[Mushroom Samba|astral mushrooms]]) where you can fight things like [http://kol.coldfront.net/thekolwiki/index.php/Really_Interesting_Wallpaper some really interesting wallpaper] and [http://kol.coldfront.net/thekolwiki/index.php/Urge_to_Stare_at_Your_Hands the urge to stare at your hands]. Really.
** "Crimbo" 2010 introduced exciting new enemies, such as the Tedious Spreadsheet, the Hideous Slideshow and the Water Cooler. Oh yes, and there were elves climbing out of the toilets, too.
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* In ''[[EVE Online]]'', the safest way to play is to assume that everyone who isn't a close friend of yours will try to kill you if you have something valuable that will drop when you die. Many players don't even care about gain and do it simply [[For the Evulz]]. The central part of the galaxy you live in is usually safe to fly around in because the npc police are guaranteed to charge in and kill an attacker in 30 seconds or less (although that leaves the attacker a tiny window to successfully kill YOU). If you move out to the low security zone, it is literally full of roving pirate players looking for an easy target to dogpile and kill. If you make it out to zero security space, you'll run into the player alliances (who usually war with each other) who will shoot you on sight for tresspassing. Joining one of those alliances and working hard to support them and fight in their wars is often considered a way to become much safer from random hostility than staying in low security or high security space.
* ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' seems to have this in spades. You'll realise this as you count up the hours you spend running away from increasingly violent and aggressive deer, flowers, and moths - on top of the demons, dragons, and old gods (aka Faceless Ones), of course.
* Runescape has Ape Atoll. Pretty much everything is out to get you on this island, ranging from monkey archers (or even zombie monkeys) to poisonous snakes to birds to scorpions. The monkeys that aren't trying to kill you are not only trying to send you to jail, but make sure that you stay there. Unless you happen to be able to transform into a monkey. Into which case, the island is essentially harmless.
 
 
=== [[Platform Game]] ===
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** Let's also take into account the 'shadows' (demons) of ''[[Persona 2]]''. In Persona 2, you could talk to them to get them not to rip your guts out. Now they just right out attack you.
* ''[[Dragon Quest VIII]]'' features enemies like living handbells, bags of money, and, in the game's penultimate boss fight, a homicidal, sentient ''castle''.
** ''[[Dragon Quest VII]]'' had it even worse, with the aforementioned bags of money (a staple monster for the series), a giant rose bush, books, pots, wells, eggplants, anteaters, columns, clowns, a moose, clouds, Aladdin-style lamps, Easter Island heads, starfish, snails, [[Everything Is's Better Withwith Penguins|penguins]], and ''wine bottles''.
** Solar systems. Every ''[[Dragon Quest]]'' game featured some bizarre enemies, it seems. ''[[Dragon Quest II]]'' had robots, in a medieval fantasy. ''[[Dragon Quest III]]'' had jewel bags, carnivorous treasure chests, and evil mushrooms. ''[[Dragon Quest VI]]'' had evil mirrors, castles, and waves.
* Similar to the ''[[Dragon Quest VIII]]'' example, one of the bosses in the second ''[[Xenosaga]]'' game is called Cathedral. It is [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin]].
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** The latest edition has made a decidedly strong return to this trope. While 4th edition removes nearly every outstanding environmental hazard from the previous editions (Hell no longer tries to kill you just from you being in the environment for example), now, quite literally, ''every single creature you meet may attempt to destroy you''. There's no such thing as a truly "Good-aligned" creature anymore, (or there is, but alignment in 4th doesn't actually mean much of anything): angels, devils, humanoids, dragons (all shapes, sizes and colors), living, unliving, [[Killer Rabbit|fluffy bunnies]], [[Happy Fun Ball|very small rocks]], literally anything that can have stats can, and most likely ''wants'' to, murder you.
** [[The Spoony One]] tells of a D&D adventure in a world based on [[Alice in Wonderland]] - where ''everything'' and everyone tries to kill you almost instantly, from the Cheshire Cat to the Caterpillar. Hell, even the ''[[Killer Rabbit|Dormouse]]'' is a [[Crazy Awesome|20th level ninja monk]]
** As far back in the original D&D Basic Set, TSR established this in the tutorial. The player - a novice Fighter - had the goal of hunting down a criminal named Bargle the Infamous, and along the way, met and befriended a beautiful female Cleric named Aleena. While it was possible to slay Bargle in this story (assuming the player overcame the ''charm person'' spell with a Saving Throw, which wasn't likely), the villain would murder Aleena, and no option the player could take could prevent it.
* In the RPG ''[[Paranoia]]'', there are countless ways to die. Whatever your mission is might kill you. Your teammates might peg you as a traitor and kill you. You might kill your teammates as traitors and have your death ordered by the Computer for murder. Malfunctioning equipment or the wrong paperwork might kill you. Ending up in a section of Alpha Complex with the wrong color-coding can kill you. There's a reason every player gets 6 backup clones.
** The second rule listed for the gamemaster: "Kill the bastards."
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* [[Warhammer 40,000]] is an example where ''everything in the setting'' is trying to kill each other.
* If you're a [[Promethean: The Created|Promethean]], your very existence ''pisses off reality''. No, seriously - the universe quite literally hates Prometheans, and makes it impossible for them to live peacefully. Spend more than a few minutes around humans? [[Hate Plague|Good chance they'll try to kill you.]] Try to pet a dog? [[Evil-Detecting Dog|It tries to take your hand off.]] That odd-shaped rock? Good chance it's actually the results of your kind's generative act gone wrong, forced into dormancy and waiting to be awakened by your presence, and the only way it can survive is by eating your viscera. Stay in one place more than a day? ''[[Walking Wasteland|The land itself wants you dead.]]'' Hang around your own species? Some of them are okay, but others have decided that this whole "Pilgrimage" business is a waste of time, and they ''like'' the powers being a horrid excuse for a living being can bring, and they can gain more power by doing unspeakable things to you. The entire world and everything in it is out for the fluid that passes for blood in your veins. [[To Become Human|There's a way out.]] [[Earn Your Happy Ending|Good luck.]]
 
 
=== [[Third-Person Shooter]] ===
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== Non-video game examples ==
=== Fan Works ===
* In ''[https://archiveofourown.org/works/975415 The Good Life]'', a fanfic for the 1980s ''[[Dungeons & Dragons (animation)|Dungeons & Dragons]]'' cartoon set after the main characters return to the "real" world, Eric the (former) Cavalier views the D&D world as this trope, but can't figure out why he felt safer ''there'' than he does now that he's home.
 
=== Live Action TV ===
* ''[[Deadliest Catch]]'': This show is loaded with lethal things. [[Giant Wall of Watery Doom|Ship crushing waves]], [[Kill It with Ice|icebergs and ice in the rigging]], [[Kill It with Water|falling overboard in near-freezing water]], boats have been [[Kill It with Fire|destroyed by fire]], and finally, most ironically, 1000 pound crab pots [[In Soviet Russia, Trope Mocks You|swinging around like piñatas]].
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=== Web Comics ===
* In the faux-videogame [[Web Comic]] ''[[Kid Radd]]'', the eponymous hero sprite is damaged by apples and bazookas (and by touching [[The Goomba|Bogey]]). And he's damaged ''the same amount'' by each one. This is ''a major plot point''.
* Parodied (of course) in ''[[Adventurers!]]!''. The party encounters an [https://web.archive.org/web/20130615073739/http://adventurers.keenspot.com/d/0080.html Inanimate Chair] and somehow can't run away from it. An [https://web.archive.org/web/20140705081334/http://adventurers.keenspot.com/d/0343.html encounter] with [[Dancing Pants|evil pants]] is [https://web.archive.org/web/20130616061738/http://adventurers.keenspot.com/d/0344.html immediately followed] by one with a [[Rock Me, Asmodeus|demonic boombox]]. As Ardam says when [https://web.archive.org/web/20140705080434/http://adventurers.keenspot.com/d/20030113.html facing down a killer coffin], "It really says something about our lives that this doesn't seem at all weird."
* Castle Heterodyne in ''[[Girl Genius]]'', which also counts as [[Malevolent Architecture]]. {{spoiler|Since it recognizes Agatha as its master, the central AI won't hurt her. Or people she explicitly and unambiguously ordered not to. Everything ''not'' under its control will still try to kill her, and Everything Trying to Kill You still applies to everybody ''else'' in the castle}}.
* ''[[Gunnerkrigg Court]]'' has Annie [http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=875 joking] about various entities trying to end her story.
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{{quote|'''Fry:''' I was attacked in my bathroom, ''by'' my bathroom! }}
* In the first five seasons of ''[[South Park]]'', [[They Killed Kenny Again|everything is trying to kill Kenny]].
* Downplayed, Played for Laughs, in season three of ''[[Disenchantment]]'', where Bean complains that "everything is trying to kill me or kiss me!" Which is pretty much true, as a lot of unscrupulous characters ''are'' trying to get into her pants.
 
 
=== Real Life -- Australia ===
* Yes, [[Australia (country)|Australia]] has so much dangerous stuff we had to give it its own section. This quote is quite typical of most people's opinions on the place.
{{quote|"Every creature [in Australia] is bigger and angrier than anywhere else in the world. ...[[Insane Troll Logic|spiders and snakes and the like normally hide under rocks. The Earth is one big rock, Australia is at the bottom of the big rock, and so they're trying to hide under it.]]"
|'''[[The Ricky Gervais Show|Karl Pilkington]]''' - ''Happyslapped by a Jellyfish.'' }}
* Even the geological chemistry of Oz is trying to kill you. [[wikipedia:Wittenoom, Western Australia|Proof]]. [[Midnight Oil]] sang about the workers who had to suffer for it.
* About the only things that aren't dangerous or poisonous are some of the sheep (which aren't native to Australia). And maybe wallabies. The following things will kill you: common spiders, the most common snakes, ticks, crocodiles, sharks, jellyfish, stonefish, we have a seashell that will go for you and deliver a very painful, fast death. Even (male) platypus are poisonous.
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* If you think that's bad, Australia was even more of a [[Death World]] back in the Pleistocene, when humans first arrived. Carnivorous buzz-saw toothed kangaroos? Check. Monitor-lizards the size of a city bus? Check. Climbing warm-blooded saw-toothed crocodiles? Check. Gigantic killer pseudo-python? Check. Marsupial lion with sickle thumbs? Check. [[Morally-Ambiguous Ducktorate|The Demon Duck]] [[Doomy Dooms of Doom|of Doom!]] (I'm not joking, scientists actually call it that). Oh yeah, it's there. Ninjemys, a gigantic horned turtle built like a panzer tank (and yes, [[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles|the name means exactly what you think it means]] and it was named ''after'' that), check.
* [http://www.cracked.com/article_16868_6-deadliest-creatures-that-can-fit-in-your-shoe.html This Cracked article] feels appropriate. No, it isn't all in Australia, but half of it is.
** [https://web.archive.org/web/20131122060905/http://www.cracked.com/funny-163-australia/ Another Oz-related Cracked article.]
** Two thirds of the animals on [http://www.cracked.com/article_15853_6-cutest-animals-that-can-still-destroy-you.html this Cracked list] of [[Killer Rabbit]]s are found in Australia.
* Any child growing up in Australia learns (unless the parents are trying to kill the kid) a long list of things that can kill you, practically by heart. It's a long list, and just to make sure at least one state teaches it in primary schools.
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* Out of all these critters, the only ones that really cramp your style are the jellyfish. Sharks? Pfft, there's like three left. Spiders? Don't go picking up random bits of rusty iron. Snakes? Make a lot of noise whilst walking through undergrowth, wear tough shoes, etc. Stonefish/cone shells? Don't walk barefoot on reefs. Drop bears? Don't hang around underneath gum trees. But jellyfish? "Oh, I'm sorry if you wanted to go for a swim at that otherwise harmless sandy beach when it's 42 degrees. We'll just be floating around by our thousands, invisible and potentially fatal."
** Not to mention the Irukandji. The worst of the box jellyfish (an infamous class of jellyfish), they will actively seek out prey rather than drift along in the current, are the size of a fingernail, are transparent, can swim through anti-jellyfish safety nets on beaches and pack a horrifically painful sting which has 'a sense of impending doom' listed as a symptom on [[That Other Wiki]].
** Sure the little guys are scary, but on the other side of the scale, Australia is also home to a southern-hemisphere relative of the [[wikipedia:File:Jellyfish and shark - Sant Hall - Smithsonian.JPG|Lion's Mane jellyfish]]. Yes, that is a jellyfish that can grow up to 120 feet long, 8 feet across, and [https://web.archive.org/web/20140111053222/http://www.scubatravel.co.uk/lionsmane2.html whose stingers remain dangerous even after detached]. While there hasn't really been a ''recorded'' case of a person being eaten by one of these, isn't it nice to know that there are species of jellyfish actually capable of devouring you whole? Oh yea, and sometimes they swarm. Sleep well!
* They may not be dangerous to humans, but the only known variety of sea squirt that snares prey like a Venus fly-trap rather than passively filtering water lives just off Australia.
** Look at the rest of the list. Not dangerous to humans? Don't count on it.
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* One could argue that [[Real Life]] ''itself'' is ''loaded'' with this: wild animals, natural disasters, disasters from space, wars...And let's not get into the [[The Same but More|megadisasters]] on Earth: supervolcanoes, supertornadoes, megatsunamis, [[wikipedia:Hypercane|hypercanes]], ''giant asteroids''...[[The Long List|the list just goes on and on and on...]]
* Column writer Robert Brockway has written a book titled "[http://www.amazon.com/Everything-Going-Kill-Everybody-Terrifyingly/dp/0307464342/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1249601995&sr=8-1 Everything Is Going to Kill Everybody: The Terrifyingly Real Ways the World Wants You Dead]"
* How about the ocean? Obviously if you can't swim and don't have a lifejacket you're in trouble. But even if you manage to find some kind of floatation device much of the ocean is cold enough to get you via hypothermia as cold water conducts heat away from the body [http://www.ussartf.org/cold_water_survival.htm 32-times faster than cold air] - many of the victims of shipping disasters who escape the sinking ship die from the cold. Even heing adrift in warm waters in the relative security of a raft is no guarantee of safety as you are at serious risk of dying from thirst. Drinking large quantities of seawater is potentially lethal thanks to the [http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2131/what-would-happen-to-you-if-you-drank-seawater high salinity] that will lead to dehydration and kidney failure. Then there are the things that live in the oceans; large predatory animals [[Everything Is's Even Worse Withwith Sharks|including sharks]] and killer whales. Not to mention millions of lethally venomous jellyfish, sea urchins, lion fish, stone fish, octopodes, etc. Plus electric eels, catfish and rays, although the only of those you're going to find out in seawater are the electric rays, which like to swim in shallow coastal waters. Note that the electric ray genus "Torpedo" wasn't named after the naval weapon, [[wikipedia:Torpedo (genus)|the weapon was named after ''them'']].
** Octopuses are rarely dangerous, in spite of their infamous reputation for malevolence. First, while almost all octopuses venomous, very few will bite humans, with those few that will will do so only when provoked (i.e., being pulled out of their lair and or picked up). Second, the giant octopuses, the only ones capable of harming a human with sheer size, usually hide in caves deeper than human beings tend to dive, and are very shy. Third, in the very rare situation that an octopus ''is'' harming you, you can usually get it to let go by pinching the incredibly sensitive membrane between the arms. Fourthly, only one species, the Blue-Ringed, is the only octopus ever been documented as being able to kill humans.
** The [[wikipedia:Humboldt Squid|Humboldt Squid]], off the coast of South America. Know what it's Spanish name is? Diablo Rojo. This is a species of squid that actively attacks you and would be QUITE happy to kill you. And it can. One of them can do quite a bit of damage, even assuming it doesn't kill you and you have a buddy around to help you. You have to wear a suit of armour if you intend to go into waters anywhere people think there might POSSIBLY be one of these [[Demonic Spiders|evil, evil fuckers]].
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[[Category:Video Game Characters]]
[[Category:Truth in Television]]
[[Category:Everything Trying to Kill You]]
[[Category:Finagle's Law]]