Genre Shift: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:NegimaBeforeAfter.jpg|link=Mahou Sensei Negima|frame|
{{quote|''(a montage of people driving in cars)''
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Genre Shifts are sometimes used in [[Sequel]] stories.
Genre Shifts sometimes occur at the ends of a series when the writers finally get around to [[Writer on Board|soapboxing their opinions]]. Many fluffy, over-the-top comedies will suddenly find their last episode making an attempt at drama. On the other hand, some cutesy or romance-based stories can experience
It ''is'' possible for this to work, as long as the creators know what they're doing, and it can pay off quite well at times. Usually, however, this requires planning it from the start, allowing the writers to [[Foreshadowing|set up the genre shift]] ahead of time so it doesn't feel like it comes [[Ass Pull|out of nowhere]]. Because of their sudden onset,
Even worse is if a genre shift is used as [[Deus Ex Machina|the solution to a plot point]], which just feels tacky.
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* Naturally, ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'' also surprised many fans ([[What Do You Mean It's Not for Kids?|and parents]]) at its increasingly dark tone as the show went on. To be specific, it starts as a [[Monster of the Week]] [[Real Robot Genre|giant robot series]] and ends up as an extended philosophical and psychological treatise. It's so much of a genre shift that even the plot itself essentially fades away at the end, to the point where after the last two episodes, you're asking yourself "What the hell did I just watch?" It doesn't help that after so many years, [[Gainax Ending|people still can't tell you what was up with the last two episodes.]]
* ''[[Mai-HiME]]'' starts out looking like a postmodern take on the [[Magical Girl]] genre, then turns into something disturbingly like ''[[Highlander]]''.
* ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'', as pictured. It ''looks'' like a [[Harem|harem comedy]] when it starts, but slowly starts throwing in more and more action sequences... until you hit the [[Tournament Arc]], and suddenly realize that you're reading a [[Shounen]] action series with an unusual amount of [[Fan Service]]. By now, the harem antics are only occasional joke fodder, the story's mainly about Negi's quest to find his long-missing father, and the [[Power Levels]] are over... well, [[Memetic Mutation|you know how it goes]]. Basically, it's become ''[[Dragonball Z]]'' meets ''[[Harry Potter]]'' meets ''[[Love Hina]]''. The anime adaptation was cut short ''long'' before reaching the aforementioned [[Tournament Arc]], but still managed to pull off a slightly different
* The Buu saga of [[Dragon Ball]] is an example, as it starts about a boy dealing with high school and a double identity as a super hero, and soon moves to a battle against a powerful monster that could destroy the Earth.
* ''[[Princess Tutu]]'', in its first season, was about a magical ballerina princess/therapist restoring emotions to her love interest. The second season revealed it just wasn't like a fairytale, and it turned into a dark, epic struggle against the sadistic author trying to wreck his character's lives. In other words, a slightly different type of fairytale.
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* ''[[Ouran High School Host Club]]'' went through most of the [[Anime]] as an over-the-top [[The Parody|parody]] of [[Shojo]] drama, but in the last few episodes became more of a shojo drama with jokes added.
* One may be excused for thinking that ''[[Guyver]]'' is a typical school-based shonen anime after the first few issues/episodes. But this changes pretty rapidly when {{spoiler|the school is blown up by either Zoanoids or Guyver 2, depending on what medium you prefer}} and Sho is almost never seen in school again.
* ''Rockman.EXE''/''[[Mega Man NT Warrior]]'' shifted from computer-based Mons to some kind of weird Sentai variant right around the third season, and completely gave up on its computer origins in the fourth, with the advent of Cross Fusion. Basically, it forced the human protagonists to merge with their partners and fight themselves, at which point the Mons were rarely seen again. This is one of the reasons the fourth season is disliked among the fanbase. Then, in the fifth season, it switched from computer [[Mon
* In the first few episodes (both in the Anime and Manga) of ''[[Bleach]]'', a reluctant teen fights ghosts (Hollows) [[Monster of the Week|in a series of unconnected locations.]] However, once Ichigo travels to the Shinigami world, the series completely abandons ghostbusting in favor of high-power duels between [[Sorting Algorithm of Evil|progressively more powerful rivals.]] Additionally, the series replaces its largely simplistic good spirit/bad spirit dichotomy with increasingly complicated plots, intrigue, and a much larger cast.
** The first movie, ''Memories of Nobody'' ended up being somewhat of a [[Wham! Episode|Wham Movie]] to those used to the dragging plot lines of the series, with a much different tone still.
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* Oh God, ''[[Narutaru]]''. It initially shows signs of being a lighthearted, female version of [[A Boy and His X]]... only to suddenly change into a dark, depressing series with lots of horrible things.
* ''[[D.Gray-man]]'' has evolved somewhat from being a [[Horror]] Gothic [[Shonen]] series to more of a... normal [[Shonen]] series. Oddly enough, if the [[D.Gray-man/Nightmare Fuel|Nightmare Fuel page]] is to be believed, the switch from horror-style [[Monster of the Week]] plots to a more complicated storyline has actually made it a lot ''more'' scary.
* ''[[Katekyo Hitman Reborn]]'' had a ''major''
* ''[[School Days]]''. It starts out as a typical romantic comedy, then slowly takes a turn for the worse, going into pretty much horror at the end.
* ''[[Chobits]]'' is a comedy series with a touch of sci-fi for the first two-thirds or so. Then it becomes serious sci-fi with a touch of comedy for the remainder of the series.
** As mentioned above [[CLAMP]] enjoys doing this with their series.
* ''[[Onani Master Kurosawa]]'' is perhaps another poster child of this. It starts off as ''[[Death Note]]'' [[X Meets Y|with]] [[A Date with Rosie Palms|fapping]] (yes, ''seriously'') but then after a certain [[Wham! Episode]] the main character decides he'd rather be [[The Catcher in The Rye|Holden Caulfield]] than Light Yagami.
* ''[[Medaka Box]]'' underwent a
** As the series nears it's end ([[Dangerously Genre Savvy|if the villain is to be believed]]), this would indeed appear to have been the point, as it's now come full circle back to the original plotline, except much changed from all the fighting and genre savviness that arose from the first shift.
* ''[[Full Metal Panic!]]'' - at least, the later novels. Directly [[Lampshaded]] by the author, who mentions that he's changing the series to have a darker, more depressing feel.
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== Fan Fiction ==
* ''[http://www.fanfiction.net/s/404359/1/Gaijin Gaijin]'' started as a darkly comic [[Self-Insert Fic]] in which the SI character was essentially Murphy's Law incarnate (''despite'' being more powerful than he had any right to be). Then he started disguising himself as [[Spider-Man (Comic Book)|Spider-Man]]. Then more analogues of Marvel characters started appearing, the most recent as of this writing being the Fantastic Four and "Tako-sama" (Doctor Octopus)...
* ''[[My Immortal]]'' starts off as a fairly generic, albeit a little over-the-top, ''[[Harry Potter]]'' badfic with a typical [[Mary Sue]] protagonist and the [[Most Fanfic Writers Are Girls|usual focus on relationships, clothing and teen popular culture]]. Then it gradually turns into a surrealistic mish-mash of fanfic clichés and confused plot points involving such things as [[Time Travel]]
* ''[[Undocumented Features]]'' started off as a joke, a corny self-insert fic in which college students launch part of their dormitory into space to fight anime villains. It quickly went [[Grimdark]] with the "Exile" plot, stabilized into an odd mash-up of science-fiction adventure, has intermittently gone [[Song Fic]], and has dipped into romantic fantasy with the "Symphony of the Sword" plot.
* The Spanish-language [[Suzumiya Haruhi]] fic called, unoriginally [http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5125713/1/El_de_Haruhi_Suzumiya El ... de Haruhi Suzumiya] starts out as your ordinary OC-with-[[Sailor Earth|new-powers]]-joins-the-SOS-Brigade fare, albeit with the twist that the OC's powers are rarely used. Then, the characters all graduate and join the [[Author Appeal|military]] {{spoiler|[[Recycled in Space|IN SPACE!]] At that point, the genre shifts to war story and then to [[Space Opera]], with the characters fighting [[Horde of Alien Locusts|insectoid aliens]] who destroy one of Earth's cities. Might I add that the OC from earlier reappears with a [[Hollywood Cyborg|bionic arm]], and that their [[Casual Interstellar Travel|faster-than-light]] spacecraft is so luxurious it has a ''[[Serial Escalation|miniature shopping mall]]'' inside?}} The author expects his reviewers to understand what's going on, but he still has not provided a convincing explanation for the sudden shift in tone.
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* ''[[Hot Fuzz]]'' spends the first half humorously [[Deconstruction|deconstructing]] Nineties action film clichés, and spends the second half [[Reconstruction|playing every single one of those clichés straight]].
* ''[[The Lost Boys]]'' begins as a bleak, played-straight vampire horror film and then takes on a humorous tone in the third act, with the teenage heroes spouting such lines as "Whoa, death by stereo!"
* A pronounced
* ''[[Hollow Man]]''. Another ''sci-fi''-into-''thriller'' shift.
* ''Click'' started as a [[Fantastic Comedy]], then very suddenly and very early turned into drama. [[Trailers Always Lie|Guess what part the ads were sampled from]].
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* For much of its long life, ''[[The Bill]]'' was a [[Police Procedural]], but when a new executive producer took over in 2002 it rapidly shifted into a [[Crime-Time Soap]], alienating many long-term fans.
* ''[[Baywatch Nights]].'' Goes from action to sci-fi in season two.
* ''[[Look Around You]]'' is one of the biggest users of this
* As lampshaded by the announcer, following the move from TechTV to G4, the video game review show ''[[X-Play]]'' became less about reviewing games and more about employing successive [[Gag Series|"lame vaudeville gags]]." At one point, the show was able to provide thorough reviews of at least five games in one single airing, but thanks to the space the gags took up, they were barely able to get through three. They have become less frequent recently, and ''[[X-Play]]'' now only has one or two sketches a week.
** Really it can be argued that the ''opposite'' then happened. It used to be a sketch comedy/video game review show, but now it's ''just'' about the reviews (and even then, there's only about two an episode) and video game news (that are significantly less comical) as it's [[Network Decay|the only thing on G4 still about video games]], and ''[[X-Play]]'' has simply become a 22-minute distillation what G4 was 24 hours a day not even a few years before.
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== Tabletop RPG ==
* ''[[Dungeons and Dragons]]''
** Adventure S3 ''Expedition to the Barrier Peaks'' starts off as a standard "clean out the monster filled dungeon" scenario. After the [[PC
** The 1st Edition Dungeon Master's Guide had advice for sending a party of [[PC
* Lesser Shades Of Evil -- the book quite literally ''begins'' with a disclaimer telling would-be PCs not to read any further, which is setting them up to make blessed champions of the gods in a high fantasy setting, then face all of the following in ''the very first session'': that was all centuries ago, their powers are all genetic engineering and nanomachines, the intervening time has moved the setting [[After the End]]... and even the idyllic fintasy setting was after a separate, ''earlier'', end. Also, their main superpower is creating multiple bodies for themselves. After this exposition-heavy first session (which fast-forwards the PCs through their actions over these hundreds of years), one assumes the players are meant to go home and contemplate why any of that was kept secret if it were just going to be revealed as soon as they made their characters, anyway.
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== Video Games ==
* ''[[Battletoads]]'' starts out as a 2.5D beat 'em up, and then changes so dramatically that it's almost like a collection of minigames rather than a cohesive whole. It changes nearly every stage, with only hints of the first few beat 'em up levels surfacing every so often
* ''[[Max Payne (series)|Max Payne]]'' likes to tease the player with hints and suggestions of genre shift. For example, the first portion of the game seems to be a shooter set in a "normal" world with normal enemies, specifically a mafia group that the titular Payne had infiltrated, but then was exposed after being framed for murdering his partner. Following the connections up the hierarchy leads to a Hellfire Club-like nightclub called Ragnarok, where multiple references to The End of the World are brought up, and it seems the mafia heavy who uses it as a front is worshiping demons and practicing dark magic. However, it turns out that he's just a little insane and full of crap, even if he was killing people in his demented
** And then there's the elements of espionage/technothriller stuff that starts early on in Part 3, with Max battling heavily-armed mercenaries and infiltrating a military bunker in order to get to the bottom of Valkyr, along with a brief detour back to the usual crime-noir in Chapter 4, where {{spoiler|Max confronts B.B., the backstabbing bastard who actually murdered his partner and set him up to take the fall for it}}. Then after that, we go into espionage mode again, this time with what seems like some kind of [[Ancient Conspiracy]] {{spoiler|but which is actually, according to Max Payne 2, a very old criminal syndicate}} culminating in a final confrontation at the top of Aesir Plaza.
* ''[[Drakengard]]'' starts off as [[Heroic Fantasy]], but slowly and surely turns into a [[Hack and Slash]] version of [[Survival Horror]], the [[Horror Tropes|horror]] aspect being the emphasis here. When things start to really get weird, they [[Lampshade Hanging|hang a lampshade]] on it when one of the mission descriptions is "Time and space fall apart, and the fantasy begins."
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*** Seems to be toyed with in ''Uncharted 2'' when {{spoiler|you bump into what seems like a yeti-type monster while in the mountains. However, later on it turns out to be a bunch of apparently bullet resistant natives in suits. Which you then discover are actually mythical ape-like Guardians of Shangri-la, so everything is okay again.}}
* [[Half Life]] started as a deconstruction of [[I Just Want to Be Badass]], and is currently one of its most shining examples.
* In ''[[Medal of Honor]]: Airborne'', after 5 missions of largely realistic gameplay based on actual historic [[World War II]] campaigns, the final mission throws bulletproof, heavy-machinegun-wielding Nazi [[Super Soldier
** Those "doom fortresses" are actually real. 8 were built, they were ridiculously sized, and they had more refuge in intimidation than use. I mean, come on, they're towers built to repel air attacks that are also made of concrete. Still true to this trope, however, the Allies never actually attempted an attack on one of them.
* ''[[Oddworld]]: Stranger's Wrath'' starts out as the Oddworld equivalent of a western. Mysterious [[Bounty Hunter]]? Check. Gun toting outlaws? Check. Hick Towns populated by chicken men? ...Um, Check. But then in the final third of the game, {{spoiler|after stumbling into an ambush set up by the [[Big Bad]], and getting hit with a [[Tomato Surprise]],}} the game shifts to a more traditional Oddworld setting as you help the native Grubbs overcome the [[Big Bad]]. This change completely overhauls the game. Stranger's costume changes, the concept of Moolah (and therefore the concept of enemy bounties) is removed (enemies are turned into ammo instead. Don't ask), the soundtrack changes from spaghetti western music to epic orchestrated pieces, the enemies change from gruff outlaws to military Mooks, new gameplay mechanics are added, and the scenery colors shift from browns and reds to blues and greys.
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* ''Iji'' has a decidedly Survival/Horror twinge to it, especially in the very first level, but that is very quickly dispelled, and it very rapidly progresses into an epic Sci-Fi battle to secure the safety of the planet, with increasing levels of epic warfare depending on how you progress.
* ''[[Boiling Point: Road to Hell]]'' most of the game is set in a Troperiffic [[Wide Open Sandbox]] [[Banana Republic]]. You deal with the drug lords, the rebels, the army and the CIA. The final act: Stop the [[Big Bad]] in his volcano lair from using his giant mind control device.
* The ''[[Don Pachi|(Do)DonPachi]]'' features this not exactly in its gameplay,<ref>the later games play differently from earlier games, but in ways [[Public Medium Ignorance|nobody cares about]]</ref>
* The [[Ultima I|very first ''Ultima'' game]] begins as a more-or-less typical fantasy RPG and then gets to the point where you have to use a time machine and go into outer space to defeat twenty spaceships to gain the title of "Space Ace." All this in 1980, mind you.
* ''[[Rainbow Six]]'' switched from a plan-based multi-team [[Tactical Shooter]] to a more straightforward single-team semi-tactical shooter starting with the console versions of ''3''.
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** ''Final Fight: Revenge'' for the arcade and Saturn, which is ironic since the original ''[[Final Fight]]'' began development as a beat-'em-up spin-off of ''[[Street Fighter (video game)|Street Fighter]]'' titled ''Street Fighter '89''.
* The original ''[[Saturday Night Slam Masters]]'', along with its upgraded edition ''Muscle Bomber Duo'', played pretty much as one would expect from an arcade-style [[Wrestling Game]]. The sequel, ''Ring of Destruction: Slam Masters II'', plays like a wrestling-themed version of ''[[Street Fighter II]]'' (i.e. multiple punch and kick buttons, command-based special moves, 2D playing field, victory by KO, round-based matches).
* ''[[Mortal Kombat]]'' started out as a tribute to martial arts cinema. Apart from the [[Multi-Armed and Dangerous]] monster dude Goro, pretty much nothing out of the game was too out of the ordinary for those who've seen martial arts movies, and its main claim to fame was being the first major "bloody" fighting game. Then Mortal Kombat II came around, and the main plot of the
* The original ''Mario vs. Donkey Kong'' for the [[Game Boy Advance]] was a puzzle platformer modeled after ''[[Donkey Kong 94]]'', but the sequels from ''Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2'' and onward were ''[[Lemmings]]''-style puzzle game that utilize the touch screen and stylus.
* [[Fahrenheit (2005 video game)]]'s story is an extreme example of this; the story starts out as an occult murder mystery, but, somehow, it suddenly turns into a philosophical sci-fi action flick a la [[The Matrix]] near the end.
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* ''FOG Club'' began life as a romcom about four college anime fans, before - with little to no explanation - having the cast sucked through a portal into an alternate dimension based on Trigun, where they fought an evil scientist called Falco Amadeus and an android duplicate of the main character.
* ''[[Achewood]]'' shifts back and forth between domestic, observational strips that find humor in the mundane, and surreal fantasy arcs involving Mexican [[Magical Realism]], three-hundred-man outdoor brawls, and Heaven burning down.
* Numerous webcomics have experienced [[Cerebus Syndrome]], which is somewhat similar to, but not the same as,
** ''[[Megatokyo]]'' is a good example of this. It began as a simple, four panel webcomic about two friends trapped in Japan, the focus being more on the two men playing off each other verbally and [[Two Gamers on a Couch|talking about video games]]. As time went on, [[Continuity Drift|the comic drifted away from this]], and began to focus more on the relationships Piro and Largo were creating in Japan, and [[Deconstruction|picking apart aspects of popular Japanese culture]].
* ''[[Questionable Content]]'' started out about a post-college Indie rocker, his friends, and his weird little [[Robot Buddy]]. Then Faye got her tragic backstory, Pintsize got increasingly destructive and psychotic, Raven got kinda skanky, etc, until you can barely recognize the characters from the early strips.
* ''[[YU+ME: dream]]'' starts out as a romantic story between two girls at a Catholic school, dealing with the various issues that comes with, with some family
* Within [http://xkcd.com/734/ this xkcd strip].
* [[Bob and George]] was originally intended to be a superhero comedy webcomic about the titular brothers. It changed into a sprite comic after the author realized he couldn't draw.
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