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Knockback: Difference between revisions

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Knockback (view source)

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{{trope}}
{{quote|''Any outdoorsman will tell you the most frustrating part of hunting is when a deer simply '''FALLS DOWN''' when shot, and doesn't '''FLY BACKWARDS''' into the forest.''|[[Team Fortress 2 (Video Game)|Team Fortress 2]] [http://www.teamfortress.com/scoutupdate/force-a-nature.htm advertisement] of a weapon with high knockback}}
 
The first and foremost reason why players hate those [[Goddamned Bats]], and the means by which many [[Ledge Bats]] send players plummeting to their doom....
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== [[First-Person Shooter]] ==
* As mentioned, [[Rocket Jump|Rocket Jumping]] is a common technique exploiting the blasts from explosive weapons.
* ''[[GoldenGoldenEye Eye007 (1997 (Videovideo Gamegame)|Golden Eye 1997]]'' and ''[[Perfect Dark]]'' have a knock back for the player if they get shot. This also stops the player from shooting for a brief second. Combine this with several enemy soldiers and you're bound to lose more than half your health while unable to to fire back. Luckily, the enemy AI is programmed to stop firing for a moment and then resume.
** The ''[[Medal of Honor]]'' games also have hit-stun. If an enemy catches you off-guard at close range with an automatic weapon on Hard difficulty, you may be stunlocked. Conversely, due to the use of [[Hit Scan]], the knockback [[The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard|doesn't affect the enemy's aim]], so they can continue shooting at you while apparently flinching. The snipers in ''Allied Assault'' not only deal the most damage and knockback of all mooks, but they also fire at a higher rate than the rifle infantrymen.
* Shotgun Z-Secs and Pinky Demons in ''[[Doom (Video Gameseries)|Doom 3]]'' both deliverable sizable knockback, the former bordering on [[Blown Across the Room]], and can result in [[Stun Lock]].
* In ''[[Team Fortress 2 (Video Game)|Team Fortress 2]]'' regular attacks have an amount of knockback generally proportional to damage and only something like the Heavy's minigun does enough damage for this knockback to impede movement instead of just messing with aim. There are some special cases which do much more: explosives, the Scout's Force-A-Nature, sentry guns (which can be even harder to deal with than its damage, especially since the default [[Limit Break|Ubercharge]] does not protect against knockback), melee [[Critical Hit|Critical Hits]], and the Pyro's [[Attack Deflector|airblast]] (which does nothing ''but'' knockback). Probably the most bizarre thing is that damage over time (fire, bleeding) causes ''upward'' knockback for the sake of messing with the user's aim. The Soldier's Mantreads and the Quick-Fix's Ubercharge, respectively, reduce 3/4 and all knockback from sources that also inflict damage (i.e. everything but airblasts).
 
== [[Platform Game]] ==
* ''[[La -Mulana]]'' utilized significant knockback. Touch even the slightest enemy or brush up against a spike and Lemeza is sent sailing across the room at full velocity, with no ability to alter his trajectory until he lands.
* In the sidescrolling ''[[Mega Man (Videovideo Gamegame)|Mega Man]]'' titles, knockback always occured relative to the direction Mega Man was facing, regardless of the direction of attack. In the "classic" series, it also interrupted charged Mega Buster shots (starting in ''5'', ''4'''s Mega Buster was more stable), and in ''9'', Proto Man suffered double the knockback of Mega Man.
* The sidescrolling ''[[Super Mario Bros.]]'' games generally provided [[Mercy Invincibility]] without knockback, which allowed players to short-circuit the fights with Bowser simply by running through him and grabbing the axe at the far end of the arena. This was changed in ''[[New Super Mario Bros (Video Game)|New Super Mario Bros]]'', where coming in direct contact with Bowser knocks Mario back, away from the switch at the opposite end of the arena.
* In the ''[[Wonder Boy (Franchise)|Wonder Boy]]'' series (as well as its many ports), [[Mercy Invincibility]] only protected the player from further HP loss; it did not protect the player from being knocked back or juggled by repeated attacks.
** The rocks in the first game, which were the only non [[One-Hit Kill]] hazard, tripped Wonderboy when he ran into one, potentially bouncing him into an enemy or [[Bottomless Pit]].
* ''[[Castlevania]]''. :cough: [[Goddamned Bats|Medusa Heads]] :cough: [[Bottomless Pits]] :cough:.
** ''[[Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin]]'' has an equip that negates your character's stun animation (and by extension, knockback), [[Awesome but Impractical|but with it equipped, you may not notice that you're taking damage until it's too late.]]
** ''[[Castlevania: Symphony of the Night]]'' has two distinct types of knockback. Usually, taking damage just shoves Alucard back a couple of steps, but if he takes one hit that depletes half or more of his maximum HP, [[Blown Across the Room|he goes flying and won't stop until he hits a wall]], at which point he briefly sticks to it before falling down. In the special Luck Mode, this severe knockback is what lets you skip the screen where Death steals Alucard's equipment thanks to his greatly lowered stats: in normal gameplay, the only time you're likely to see it happen is if Galamoth hits you with one of his more damaging attacks.
* The first ''Flintstones'' NES game made the player fall back and be stunned for a second when hit, often down the pit. The second game removed the knockback, although the stun effect remained.
* The protagonist in [[Cave Story (Video Game)|Cave Story]] receives knockback only based on the direction he was hit from. This is an interesting case because while the character receives knockback, you're still in full control, enabling you to affect the distance of the knockback to a certain degree. In fact, the character rarely gets knocked ''back'', but often forward or forward and up. Furthermore, abusing vertical knockback from crashing into a flying enemy is the only way to get a certain item without backtracking (or grabbing the [[Recoil Boost|Machine Gun]]).
* The large knockback in the original MSX ''[[Valis (Video Game)|Valis]]'', combined with the lack of [[Mercy Invincibility]], frequently caused Yuko to be stunlocked and [[Cycle of Hurting|juggled to death]].
* The NES ''[[Ninja Gaiden]]'' trilogy. Like ''Mega Man'', it always occurs opposite the direction you're facing. This can be a problem if [[Cycle of Hurting|constantly assaulted]] by [[Goddamned Bats]] during a platforming sequence.
 
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== [[Action Adventure]] ==
* ''[[The Legend of Zelda]]'' has various enemies whose main power is having more knockback than most, and the ''Oracle'' games featured a [[Ring of Power|ring]] that reduced knockback.
* The final segment of the [[Final Boss]] of ''[[Beyond Good and& Evil (Videovideo Gamegame)|Beyond Good and Evil]]'' suddenly ramps up the effects of the game's knockback--while present-but-negilible before, even a small attack will now result in the heroine getting totally decked. During one sequence of attacks, it is entirely possible to get "stunlocked" and make the fight [[Unwinnable]] until you inevitably die and get sent back to the checkpoint.
* ''[[Deadly Towers (Video Game)|Deadly Towers]]'' has Prince Myer get knocked in whatever direction is opposite the way he's facing quite a distance without a way to stop himself. Unfortunately, this game also features [[Bottomless Pits]]...
 
== [[Real Time Strategy]] ==
* While ''[[Warcraft (Video Game)|Warcraft]] III'' doesn't feature knockback, the trope's omnipresence is such that it's a very rare (custom) map that doesn't have this mechanism (such as ''[[Defense of the Ancients (Video Game)|Defense of the Ancients]]'' and its variants).
* [[Dawn of War]] has knockback for artillery and some units. Justified for some ([[Super Strength]], [[Psychic Powers]], etc), but it does get a bit ridiculous when the Kroot (lanky hollow-boned ''bird''-men) are upgraded to knockback units such as seven-foot-tall [[Power Armor|Power Armored]] [[Space Marines]] with the same ease as [[Made of Plasticine|ordinary Guardsmen]] and [[Our Goblins Are Different|Gretchin]]. Also a fallen unit ordered to move will do so while playing their "get up" animation, so they end up gliding majestically along the ground before getting up.
* ''Myth'' 1 and 2 have a flinch mechanic that is fairly central to gameplay as it allows certain rock-paper-scissors balancing. For example, the fast but unarmored Berserks can often kill heavily armored Warriors by whaling on them fast enough that the Warrior can't get a swing in from all the flinching. However, the same Berserks have a tough time against archers, as being hit causes the Berserk to stop running while he flinches--making him an easier target. Those heavily-armored Warriors are less likely to take damage from arrows, and still less likely to take enough to flinch.
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** Humorously, they can get so annoying in dungeons (they disrupt positioning and can knock enemies into reinforcements) that several classes have the ability to turn off the knockback aspect of the spell through the use of a glyph (Mages, Druids, and Shaman, for those who care.)
** The flinching ability is available from the start however, in the form of various stuns as well as interrupts.
* ''[[City of Heroes (Video Game)|City of Heroes]]'' has three versions: knock back, knock up, and knock down. Almost all melee classes have a power that resists these effects. There also exist enhancements that provide the player with resistance to it, which are in very high demand as most players hate being knocked around by enemies. There also exist enhancements for increasing the knockback in your own powers.
* As an action MMO, ''[[Dragon Nest]]'' practically requires players to exploit the various forms of this trope as even [[Mook|Mooks]] can easily do the same. Resistance to this trope can be a [[Game Breaker]] especially in PVP.
* [[Star WarstheWars: The Old Republic]] has it in various forms. From the simple 'interrupt' ability that interrupts abilities being cast or channeled (and preventing it from being cast again in a few seconds), then there are 'stun' and knock down abilities that is as good as it sounds (but also on very long cooldown), to knockback abilities that sends the enemies flying.
 
== [[Third-Person Shooter]] ==
* ''[[Gears of War]]'' 2 and 3 implement a "stopping power" system where being shot slows the player's movement toward the shooter. This was added to prevent players from charging through a hail of machine gun fire for a close-quarters execution with a shotgun. In addition, smoke grenades in 3 (and post-patch 2) cause a flinch effect, while in 1 and pre-patch 2 cause full-on knockback, though they deal no actual damage in either case.
 
== [[Turn -Based Strategy]] ==
* [[Hoshigami]] has an entire game mechanic centered around knocking enemies into a chain of allies to incur massive damage and have a chance at stealing an item, but unfortunately setting up such a chain leaves your party very vulnerable so it's only useful for eliminating the last enemy on a map.
 
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