NPC Amnesia: Difference between revisions

* Subverted, unsurprisingly, in ''[[Grim Fandango]]''. Part of the Rubacava section requires you to go through a security checkpoint, and the first time you go through the guard has you place all of your items on the nearby table. Later, after you've annoyed the guard so much that she throws away an item you need, you can return to the checkpoint and attempt to go through again. The guard appears to mindlessly repeat the earlier conversation about placing your items in the table...until she makes it clear she ''does'' remember you by following those instructions with a suggestion to "jump out the damn window!"

* Nearly any "okay, what's the password?" question will have several wrong answers, and it's not uncommon that you can't learn what the password really ''is'' until after you've given at least one wrong one (you didn't even know you had to find one until then). The guy asking never suspects you're just guessing, no matter how many bad passwords you give him.

* ''[[The Longest Journey]]'' had a few of these, the most blatant being a high-strung secretary who won't let you into the [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]]'s office. You can go through every option in the [[Dialogue Tree]] (all of which will fail), then leave, come back with a pizza and pretend to be a delivery girl (in the same set of clothes), and he'll let you through.

* In the second ''[[Tex Murphy]]'' game, Tex is on the phone trying to convince another man to meet with him. This requires a very specific set of (lying through your teeth) conversation steps, and if you say the wrong thing at any point he'll hang up on you. But don't worry, you can call him back two seconds later and repeat the process from step 1; he'll be none the wiser.

* Averted in at least one instance in ''[[Fallout]]'', where you can lie about having done a particular quest. If you chose to lie and get found out, you can go and do the quest, and come back only for him to tell you "I think you're just lying to me again. Go away." {{spoiler|Particularly annoying if you rely on this trope, since completing his quest is the only way to get the [[Power Armour]] and [[BFG|BFGs]]}}

** Also one instance in ''Fallout 2'', where if you fail to convince the guard first time and try again, the guard remarks that you didnt even walk behind the corner before coming back and giving another excuse.

* A required feature in [[Assassin's Creed]]. You can kill someone,turn and corner and hide in a haystack, wait for thirty seconds and then do it again. Nobody notices the man in white when he emerges from his hiding place.

 

=== Non-video game examples ===

* Mocked by ''[[The Simpsons]]'' - in one episode, Homer takes a free sample offered by someone in a store, but is refused a second. So he comes back with a fake moustache on, and is refused again. Until Homer comes back on the other side of the screen, and it's actually someone else who looks like Homer with a fake moustace. [[You Had To Be There]].

** Also done in [[Family Guy]].

 

== [[Real Life]] ==