Poison Mushroom: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
[[File:rupoor 7777.jpg|link=The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword|frame|"Damn, now I can't make the payment on my horse."]]
An item which harms the player who picks it up or uses it instead of helping them. Differs from [[Power-Up Letdown]] in that the harm it causes is direct and intentional, rather than from a design flaw.
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{{examples}}
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
=== Card Games ===
* In ''[[Fluxx]]'', some expansions (the first being ''Zombie Fluxx'') have "Creeper" cards. These are like the negative version of "Keeper" cards - they have to be immediately played, and they prevent the holder from winning the game even if they otherwise meet the conditions for winning (unless the goal specifically allows it or calls for a Creeper).
=== Gamebooks ===
* In the ''[[Lone Wolf]]'' series of gamebooks the hero can gather quite a few items; some useful, others not so much. And then there are the items that will make Lone Wolf's adventure harder down the line (or outright ''kill'' him) if he was dumb enough to pick them up. These items ''usually'' have very ''evil'' sounding names to warn the player that they're better off leaving them alone. One of the earliest examples in the series is {{spoiler|the Glowing Crystal}} from Book 3 {{spoiler|which is actually one of the [[Artifact of Doom|Doomstones]]}}. Ironically enough, due to Dever's attempts to make the series more balanced, the ''[[Infinity+1 Sword|Sommerswerd]]'' can act like a Poison Mushroom; making Lone Wolf's life harder than it would be if he didn't bring it with him [[Nintendo Hard|(especially in Books 9 and 11)]].
=== Tabletop RPGs ===
* ''[[Dungeons & Dragons]]'': Several campaigns feature poison found in a treasure haul, in addition to your regular potions. Characters that drank it suffered anything from hit point damage to outright death if they failed their saving throw.
** Classic cursed items in D&D included weapons and armor that gave AC and to-hit-and-damage ''penalties'' instead of bonuses, such as a -1 sword or a suit of -2 armor. Naturally, once you equipped them, you couldn't take them off or otherwise be rid of them until a mage or cleric could cast a Remove Curse, Dispel Evil or other such spell on you. Not to speak of the various other major cursed items you could run across (see [[Baldur's Gate]] above for more examples).
** There was also the Potion of Delusion, which provided the ''illusion'' of the effect of another, beneficial potion type. The classic example is the illusion of a Healing potion -- the character ''believes'' he's been healed for an appropriate amount of hit points, and as far as sight and any other reasonable tests are concerned ''has'' been healed. but unless he gets full healing from some other source remains wounded and can be unexpectedly killed.
=== Trading Card Games ===
* The ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh (Tabletop Game)|Yu-Gi-Oh]]'' card game has "Parasite Paracide," which gets inserted into the opponent's deck, face-up. When they draw it, they take damage.
== [[Video Games]] ==
=== 4X ===
* The ''[[Civilization]]'' series (and many subsequent generations of turn-based strategy game) feature the so-called "Goody Huts" - old dwellings unaffiliated with any faction that, when explored, may turn out to contain scrolls of ancient knowledge, secret treasures, nomads or tribespeople who are sick of living in the ruins... or a barbarian hideout that is none too thrilled with your intrusion.
** ''[[Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri]]'' contains similar terrain features that are supposedly escape pods from the crashed starship. Could have personnel, could have recoverable tech data, could have a map of local metal deposits, could have [[Face Full of Alien Wingwong|helminthoid parasitic mindworms that attack your troops and psychically prey upon their minds before ripping apart their]] [[Nightmare Fuel|AAAAAAA GET IT OFF MEEEE...]]
* ''[[Colonization]]'' version of "goody huts" is "Lost City Rumours". These marked squares are unusable until explored. When an European unit enters, the result is random: [[Inexplicable Treasure Chests|Treasure Train]], modest gift from a small friendly tribe, lost Free Colonist happy to join you, Fountain of Youth (an instant crowd of eager immigrants), nothing ("it was just so: a rumour"), an [[Indian Burial Ground]] for disturbing which natives attack, or the scouting unit simply vanishes - with horses and all. Skilled scouts get better chances of good results, and one Founding Father bonus disables negative results. Of course, if you wait too long for improving chances, other European side may walk in and take the gamble.
=== Action Adventure ===
* Several games in the ''[[Castlevania]]'' series had, alongside the usual food items used to restore health, several rotten food items like "Rotten Meat" and "Spoiled Milk". In ''[[Dawn of Sorrow]]'', equipping a Ghoul soul allowed Soma to eat them safely. After which, against logic, they would heal full heath- apparently, to a ghoul, spoiled milk is more nutritious than an entire turkey is to a human.
** The Flesh Golem soul had the same effect in the previous game, ''Aria of Sorrow''. It's a kind of [[Inverted Trope|inversion]] of [[Revive Kills Zombie]].
** ''Vampire Killer'' had red books that would increase prices in the level's [[Dungeon Shop
* ''[[The Legend of Zelda]]''
** ''[[Phantom Hourglass|The Legend Of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass]]'' features "Rupoors", which would somehow ''reduce'' the number of Rupees Link is currently carrying when found. A minor key version of the series' trademark [[Item Get]] fanfare would play when a Rupoor was found, complete with Link holding the item above his head but looking none too pleased about it. One area in the game consists of a maze with Rupoors for walls, requiring Link to walk carefully to avoid them.
*** They also appear in ''[[
*** They also appear in ''[[Skyward Sword]]'' in the digging minigame. The look on Link's face (seen in the page image) when you pick one up is [[Funny Moments|priceless]].
** ''[[Twilight Princess|The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess]]'' has Purple Chus, which leave behind Purple Chu Jelly when killed. Other types of Chu Jelly are very useful, either restoring a good amount of health or as a Lantern Oil substitute, so Purple Jelly should have a good effect too, right? Wrong, they have a ''random'' effect: while they can heal a random amount of Hearts, they can also ''hurt you'', even taking you down to one Heart. The Nasty Soup, which can be gotten where you get the Lantern, has the same effect. The main purposes of Purple Chus are to make you fight a Chu without getting anything good out of it, or to have them in the same area as useful Chus, forcing you to kill the useful ones and grab their jelly before the purple ones absorb them and take away their useful qualities.
*** However, since the purple chu cannot outright kill you, it is best used while low on health so if you get the negative effects, nothing will happen.
** ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
* In ''[[
* The ''[[Superman]]'' game for the NES had this in the form of green and red Kryptonite, which sapped your energy instead of giving it like the blue power crystals.
* ''[[
=== Action Game ===
* The ''[[Bomberman]]'' series has the Skull item, which, when picked up, will temporarily give the player a randomly chosen negative effect, such as inability to drop bombs, slow motion, invisibility (worse than you might think), and a few others. There is a small silver lining, however; you can share the effects of the Skull item with another player by touching him or her.
** Though this is VERY dependent on the individual game's list of possible effects, getting the skull could be a GOOD thing. In ''Bomberman 64'', the effects were split 50/50 good to bad, for example, one possible outcome was you would instantly get full power bombs (with blue super sized explosions.) Another one set you on fire, making you able to kill anyone by touching them... but you'd have to move quick cause you would burn to death eventually. Another made you absolutely tiny, but super fast.
* ''[[
** They became useful in one specific section of ''The Second Attack!" which required the player cross the reactor core of a spaceship. Reducing the Blast Radius to zero was the only way to safely cross the otherwise lethal reactor fluid. At zero radius, ice bombs would not blowback on the player if they were careful.
* ''[[Zombies Ate My Neighbors]]'' has the Mystery Potion as a Type 3. Most of its effects are beneficial (mimicking those of Speed Shoes, Red and Blue Potions or First-Aid Kits), but they can also damage you when you drink them. The worst effect, however, is Mr. Hyde, which turns the player briefly into an uncontrollable monster who kills any victims he touches.
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* ''[[The Tower of Druaga]]'' has the Potion of Energy Drain and the Potion of Death, the latter of which makes the timer run out faster. Also, not picking up the Balance on any of the five floors that have one will turn the item on the next floor into an "Evil" item.
=== Adventure Game ===
* In ''[[Gobliiins]]'', many items Dwayne can pick up will harm him and make him lose some of the energy bar. Sometimes, he will ''deliberately strike himself with the object''.
* An old ''[[
* In ''Ravenskull'', you can't tell the effects of a scroll or potion without trying it out. Some that you can get are a Lightning Strike Scroll that kills you, a Thief Potion that, as its name suggests, empties your inventory of any items you currently hold (including the potion itself!) and an Energy Drain scroll that reduces your health every square you move instead of every ten. For [[
* ''[[Space Quest]] 4'' comes from a long series where nearly every item you found had a plot-important use. Yet in this game, early on, you can find a piece of Unstable Ordinance. If you keep it in your inventory while moving to the next zone, you explode and die. Your only option was to put it back where you got it from... for which you received praise and points for doing something smart.
* In the Super Nintendo version of ''[[
* The original ''[[Diablo]]'' had cursed armor, adding a bit of a gamble when you identified magical items. Cursed armor reduced attributes and didn't sell for much money.
=== Beat Em Up ===
* The old Capcom beat-em-up ''Tiger Road'' had you regain health from gourds. Some gourds cost you health instead of restoring it; these could be identified by one feature - they were upside-down.
=== Driving Game ===
* Fake Item Boxes in [[Mario Kart 64|Mario Kart 64 and beyond]] do about the same thing as Poison Mushrooms, whereas the normal item boxes are rainbow-colored or bluish and have a "?" while a fake one will be red and have a "¿". Both blocks look exactly the same from a distance (the fake one changing when you get closer), but most players can avoid them by memorizing where real items boxes should appear. The [[Trope Namer]] itself appears in the SNES original. The boxes can also be detected, at least in the DS version, by checking the game map. The fake ones appear different than the regular ones.
** The Wii game had a storm cloud item. It floated over your head, charging up lightning. If you didn't give it away by hitting somebody else in time, it would electrocute and shrink you.
*** One small benefit from the storm cloud is a constant speed boost. While the intention of this is to allow players to catch up to another player to pass it off, the boost also lets you drive off track without slowing down, allowing you to take some nice shortcuts especially in the final lap.
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** The second game lets you buy any car you wrecked in a race. This is a good thing unless you end up buying a bad car, wasting all of your money and being worse off. Hint: almost everything you could buy in the early game is worse than your starting car. This becomes a problem near the end, where you ''need'' something very heavy to kill your opponents (who at that point are driving enormous logging trucks and buses with rocket engines) but almost all of the heavy vehicles are either insanely slow, have terrible driveability, get stuck under or between scenery all the time or all of the above. Then there are the racing missions which have the opposite problem: you need to figure out which cars have high speed and good handling.
=== Fighting Game ===
* In ''[[Super Smash Bros.]] Melee'' and ''Brawl'', Super Mushrooms made your character grow, while Poison Mushrooms made you shrink. The latter could be identified from the former by a slightly darker color and a slightly meaner expression, with the outer corners of the Poison Mushroom's eyes turned [[Tsurime Eyes|upward]] rather than [[Tareme Eyes|downward]]. However, this difference may not be obvious when the camera is zoomed out enough.
** In ''Melee'' both mushrooms turn into question marks when you pause, meaning you can't "cheat" to identify them either.
* ''[[
** The Chocobo runs across the screen randomly jumbling each digit in both your own and your enemy's [[Break Meter|brave meter]], which often results in both players getting either a massive boost or a royal screw-over.
** The Moogle summon will randomly select an ability from any other summon in the game, which, coupled with poor timing, can result in the player getting hosed by a usually-beneficial effect (like Alexander's bravery-freeze when your brave is at or near 0).
** When [[Final Fantasy V
* Some ''[[Samurai Shodown]]'' games have itens landind into the battle, sometimes they drop food, and sometimes bombs. Even the food is not always a good item because of the random amount of life-recover and the risk of being hit with ridiculous high damage.
=== First Person Shooter ===
* ''[[Deus Ex]]'' lets you smoke and drink booze. Smoking whittles away at your health, while the booze blurs your screen and sways your view for a time. While nothing forces the player to try either booze or cigarettes, the assumption that these droppable items must have some actual ''use'' may draw naive souls in...
** If you're hurt, you can find a safe spot, down beer, wine and/or liquor, and recover some health (it works like any other food item), and just wait for the effects of blurred vision and swaying screen to go away (it's also explained that your nano-machines make you go through the effects of drunkenness much faster than a normal human as well).
** Similarly, ''[[System Shock]] 2'' features various alcoholic beverages and cigarettes aboard the ships. The booze would mildly heal you at the cost of some of your [[Mana Meter|psychic power points,]] and cigarettes would simply take a point off of your HP.
** And in ''[[
*** Note that in ''[[
* ''[[Rise of the Triad]]'' has the Shrooms Mode powerdown and the annoying (and depending on where it's located, potentially deadly) Elasto Mode powerup. Shrooms Mode makes shooting straight virtually impossible (and will probably make you feel a bit sick). Elasto Mode makes you bounce off solid objects and drastically reduces your friction with the ground. Given all the hazards in the game, you don't want to wind up picking up an Elasto Mode powerup in a large number of the areas in the game.
** One of the secret levels only reachable via warp cheats includes large rooms full of the Shrooms powerdown, floors filled with bounce pads and little else. It is aptly named the ''Vomitorium''.
* ''[[Pathways
* In ''[[Trouble in Terrorist Town]]'', Detectives can buy Health Stations that can heal other players when they use it. The traitors, on the other hand, can buy a Fake Health Station which looks exactly like a normal Health Station, except it explodes when an unsuspecting innocent tries to use it.
=== Hack And Slash ===
* The various ''[[Gauntlet (1985 video game)]]'' games have poison and Death hiding in treasure chests identical to food and potion chests. It's impossible to tell which is which without opening them. ''Gauntlet II'' had poisoned cider and poisoned blue potions. Shooting either of them would cause enemies to slow down. There was also "IT", which chased down a player and bonded to him or her, causing enemies to follow them. The IT effect persisted throughout the level and can only be mitigated by tagging another player ("Tag, you're IT!"), which simply passed the effect to that player.
** The upgraded ''Gauntlet: Legends'' and its sequel, ''Gauntlet: Dark Legacy'', avert this somewhat with the X-Ray Glasses power-up, which allow you to see what the chest contains; even without the Glasses, observant players will quickly notice that if a chest is shaking and jumping, it very likely contains Death. In any case, each chest location holds the same type of power-up every time, allowing the wise player to avoid opening harmful or useless chests on replay.
** ''Gauntlet: Dark Legacy'' had green apples (poison fruit that cost a player 50 health) and green drumsticks (poison meat costing 100 health). You could tell if food was poisoned if it was green, had two bones sticking out of it in an "X" and had a bite out of it. Good food (red apples and brown drumsticks) could become poisoned if it got hit with what came out of a green barrel (poison gas).
*** There IS one way to turn poison food into good food again: use a magic potion on it IF your character was a magician (either Wizard/Jackal or Sorceress/Medusa). A magician at least Level 25 could turn poison fruit into good fruit with a potion, and could turn poison meat into good meat at Level 50 or more.
=== Maze Game ===
* ''[[Lady Bug]]'' had skulls scattered around the maze with the dots and other pickups. Running into a skull would lose a life for the player, but skulls were just as deadly to the enemies. There were more skulls on later levels than earlier ones.
=== [[Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game]]s ===
* ''[[Kingdom of Loathing]]'' has a series of potions that are a clear reference to these sorts of items. Their effects are mapped to specific potions differently for each person and each ascension, so they're risky until you've got them mapped out - especially if you hit the one that increases drunkenness while you're one point away from your limit (which makes you unable to continue adventuring) and have more than the rollover cap worth of adventures left.
** It also has "goofballs". It enhances your skills for a 10 turns, after which it penalizes your character by weakening him for the next 100 turns ("goofball withdrawal"). Only way to avert the penalty? Take more goofballs. And the price of the goofballs? First one's free. Subsequent ones ramp up in price exponentially. And subsequent consumption also causes lost of stat to boot. The moral? [[Drugs Are Bad]].
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* The laboratory maps in ''[[City of Heroes]]'' and ''[[City of Villains]]'' sometimes feature lab equipment, that when destroyed, will bestow a random temporary status change on you. It can be a good one (increased regeneration, recovery, recharge rate, damage) or a bad one (decreased regeneration, recovery, recharge rate, damage, or just damages you outright). As the duration is several minutes and the bad ones can be debilitating, many players don't take the risk and just leave them alone.
** The bad effects need to actually "hit" the player, while the good ones always hit, so increasing your Defense by any means before destroying a lab will allow you to get only positive effects, unless you are really unlucky. Also, the good effects last longer than the negative ones.
* In ''[[
* ''[[
* The Assassin Cross class in ''[[Ragnarok Online]]'' can, with a certain skill, mix bottles of Deadly Poison, drinking which will poison but also buff them, but a character of any other class will die on the spot when drinking this.
* ''[[Dragon Nest]]'' has rotten versions of food items that have a differently colored aura and a grey tint when compared to their originals. The penalty for each is ''at least'' a hefty 30% of a character's ''full'' HP or MP (sometimes ''both'') or a nasty debuff and it's hard to spot them in the inevitable carpet of loot unless the player turns item labels on.
=== Party Game ===
* Likewise, the ''[[Mario Party]]'' series used to have Black Stars (called Ztars in ''Mario Party 5'') which would reduce your number of stars. Bowser loves giving these out. Extra points if you actually paid for them.
===
* The [[Trope Namer]] here is the Poison Mushroom from the ''[[Super Mario Bros.]]'' series, a subtle [[Palette Swap]] of the iconic Super Mushroom. They first appeared in the Japanese ''Super Mario Bros. 2'' (known in the United States as ''[[Super Mario Bros the Lost Levels|The Lost Levels]]''), where picking one up was the same as touching an enemy.
** The SNES release of "The Lost Levels" made the poison mushrooms a completely and totally unmistakable solid purple with a skull on the cap of the mushroom and gave them angry eyes. If you still picked one of these up, [[Too Dumb to Live|you deserved it]].
** Subsequent remake on the Game Boy Color, Super Mario Bros Deluxe, retained the skull cap.
** ''The Lost Levels'' also has backwards [[Warp Zone|warp zones]].
** In many [[Super Mario World (
** In the Nintendo 3DS' [[
** In ''[[Super Mario XP]]'', the poison mushroom is a purple [[Palette Swap]] of the original Mushroom. As a reference to the two-hit system in the ''Lost Levels'' game, they take away half of his health.
* ''[[Sonic 3 and Knuckles]]'' had the "Robotnik" item, which acted like taking an attack from an enemy if its monitor was opened. These first appear in Act 2 of the Hydrocity Zone, but are easily missed. Later they appear in the [[Slippy-Slidey Ice World|Ice Cap]] zone, where they used the "obstacle" approach.
** They also appeared in the 2-Player mode in ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog 2]]''. Particularly evil given that the monitors in 2-Player mode display static until you hit them and find out what they contain.
*** In Casino Night Zone, if you get three Robotniks on a slot machine, you lose <s>all your</s> 100 rings.
** Hacking also reveals that Robotnik monitors existed in ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' (1). They aren't programmed to actually do any damage if you hack one in and break it, but one can assume that they would have if they were actually implemented.
* ''[[Toejam and Earl]]'' had these in two ways. First was the food that you could pick up to recover energy. Good food included bacon & eggs, cake, and fudge sundaes. Among this good food is bad food, like moldy cheese and fish bones (and a few which look innocuous at first, like the lettuce, which turns out to be old). These would cause you to LOSE energy. The game was also scattered with gift-wrapped
* The poison potions in ''[[Prince of Persia]]'' looked almost exactly like the regular potions (they had blue bubbles instead of
** Both of the original games also had a green potion that flipped the screen and reversed your controls. To reverse the effect, you had to find the other potion of the same kind.
** The Super Nintendo version of the original ''[[Prince of Persia]]'' had new traps, new enemies and [[Boss Battle
* The "Fat Head" power up from ''[[Dynamite Headdy]]''. It's occasionally mixed in with other powers in a power-up box, and if you accidentally pick it up, Headdy gets stuck with an over-sized head that forces him to move slowly and prevents him from jumping for several seconds. Fortunately, you seldom encounter it in a location swarming with enemies, but on the other hand, it occurs in multiple boss battles.
* ''[[Earthworm Jim (
* ''Rastan'' also had poisoned potions, which were red fluid in triangular bottles, as opposed to the safe blue potions in round bottles. While it reduced your vitality by as much as 15%, a red potion also was worth 10,000 points.
* ''[[
* Late in ''[[
* In the [[Platform Hell]] game ''Syobon Action'', you will die if you touch anything that looks like a ''[[Super Mario Bros.]]'' powerup (not only the Poison Mushroom). On the one hand, this means you should take care not to hit certain blocks from underneath, because you'll need to jump on them when they don't have a lethal item sitting on them. On the other hand, some of the game's puzzles are solved by feeding these items to enemies.
* ''[[
* The "Sleep" ability in ''[[Kirby]]'' is absolutely useless; it puts Kirby to sleep, without healing him, for approximately
** The True Arena in Kirby Super Star Ultra always has a pedestal with the Sleep powerup and a pedestal with an actually useful ability, which combined with the 5 tomatoes that barely heal you instead of your precious Maxim Tomatoes just goes to show how [[Nintendo Hard]] The True Arena is.
** ''Kirby Squeak Squad'' attempts to give Sleep a modicum of use: once you get the Copy Scroll for the ability, it will restore a small amount of health. Of course, you could just stock up food items in the touch-screen based inventory instead...
** There is also ''Kirby Air Ride'', where hitting someone would put him asleep too. But you still need a very good luck to hit someone when you can't turn...
*** ''Air Ride's'' City trial mode had gray power up items, which reduce the stat they were for instead of raise it. There's also an event that made some power up items turn fake. These had a subtly changed sprite and cause a small amount of damage if you grabbed one.
** In ''Kirby and the Forgotten Land'', however, Sleep actually ''does'' restore Kirby's health, just like its upgrade in ''Squeak Squad''. This doesn't stop it from being used as an obstacle in Moonlight Canyon, though...unless you have its upgrade, Deep Sleep, which not only allows Kirby to sleep whenever he wants but also gives him a random boost!
* ''[[Yoshi's Story]]'' has the peppers, which are similar in size to the fruit your Yoshis need to eat in order to complete the game, and sometimes found in the same bubbles that fruit is often found in. Eating it damages any but the hidden Black and White Yoshis, and even the Black and White Yoshis don't count it as actual fruit (they're just immune to the damage, and it heals them a little.)
* Eggplants from ''[[Adventure Island]]'' are a type 2. Like all power-ups, they're hidden inside eggs, so you won't know you're about to open one up until after the ominous-sounding music plays. When you do, your health meter drains three times as fast, leading to a very quick death if you don't [[Wizard Needs Food Badly|eat up quickly.]]
* In ''[[
* In ''[[Alex Kidd]] in Miracle World'', some blocks contain a [[Grim Reaper]] that homes in on and kills you.
* The NES platformer ''Low-G Man'' has red potion bottles that drain one block of health instead of restoring one block as the blue potions do. In fact, the main attack of one of the stage bosses is to throw these bottles at you.
* ''[[New Super Marisa Land]]'' has the blue mushroom, which turns Marisa into a Yukkuri. In this form, she can very easily spin out of control, and whatever form she was in before is lost. Similarly, there's the UFO Suit, which is slow and reverts back to small Marisa after a short time. While these powerups have their uses, they more often than not exist to make life difficult for the player.
** The World 7 boss, {{spoiler|Nue Houjuu}}, throws powerups at the player. The only problem is, you fight her in mid-air in UFO form, and all other forms will make Marisa plummet to her death. {{spoiler|It is entirely possible to catch a [[Invincibility Power-Up|Super Mushroom]] and fall into the boss, killing her in one hit. Good luck actually pulling it off, though...}}
* ''[[
* In ''[[Athena (
* ''Kick Master'' has a "poison" item that decreases your [[Life Meter]]. It's utterly obvious and avoidable unless you're not looking closely at what enemies drop.
* The videogame adaptation of ''[[The Blues Brothers]]'' movie has broken vinyl records that reset the number of records you have collected to zero.
=== Puzzle Game ===
* Pacman-like game ''Zoom!'' had a question mark powerup, which could randomly give you points, skip you to the next level, or kill you outright.
* The fairly unimportant '96 Breakout clone named ''Twinblok'' had a powerup that temporarily transformed all balls on the field into tennis balls. They turned completely harmless to blocks and the sudden change in their behavior was often lethal, since you were still obligated to keep at least one in play.
** Another Breakout clone called ''MacBrickOut'' has blocks randomly drop capsules. The majority of the capsules do useful things, such as increase the size of the paddle, allow the ball to stick to the paddle, or giving the player extra balls to juggle. A few, however, would have negative effects, such as shrinking the paddle. And getting too many "paddle expand" capsules would actually cause ''half of the paddle to break off'', so if you're close to the breaking point, even they prove to be Poison Mushrooms.
** This is common in Breakout-style games that use powerups. One variation, ''Alpha Bounce'', includes the "P" items that do something different depending on which paddle you're using.
* The objective of [[BBC Micro]] [[Puzzle Game]] ''Xor'' is to collect all the smiling masks. However, there are also frowning masks, which ''[[Blackout Basement|turn off the lights]]'', making the walls [[Invisible Block|invisible]] until a second frowning mask is collected.
=== Real Time Strategy ===
* The freeware [[Worms]]-esque ''[[Liero]]'' features a weapon called the Booby Trap, which creates land mines disguised as medikits. They could be distinguished from the real thing because they didn't bounce like the real powerups did.
* ''[[Command & Conquer]]: Red Alert'' has crates that explode and cause damage when picked up.
===
* In [[Roguelike]] games like ''[[Nethack]]'' and ''Crawl'', what the different magic items look like varies from one game to the next, so (for example) in one game a square amulet is an Amulet of Lifesaving, while in the next game a square amulet is a cursed Amulet of Strangulation. Part of mastering the game is developing tactics to discover which items are bad without killing yourself.
** ''Nethack'' also brings us the loadstone, an object which weighs an obscene amount (more than some characters' suits of armor) but if picked up cannot be dropped unless you cast an uncurse spell on it (and it automatically re-curses itself if you pick it up again). Of course, it looks just like two moderately useful other items when unidentified, and magical identification only works on items you're carrying. . .
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** Several potions, even after being identified, can also be harmful if they are cursed, regardless of if you are aware of it or not. For example, potions of enlightemnent usually give you insight and increase your wisdom, {{spoiler|whereas cursed versions just reduce your wisdom}}. Potions or gain level usually give you an extra experience level, {{spoiler|cursed versions warp you to the floor above you, that is, you gain a ''dungeon'' level.}}
** For type 3, ''[[Nethack]]'' uses actual dungeon elements: the Sink, Fountain, and Throne all have various effects when kicked/quaffed from, quaffed from, and sat upon respectively; most are beneficial, but negative effects are irritatingly common. In the upgrade SLASH'EM, there are also Gypsies, who may cause anything from a free wish to instant death when talked to.
** [[
** The original ''[[Rogue (
** In ''[[Angband]]'', the items which look different from game to game are rings, amulets, staffs, wands, rods, potions, [[Magic Mushroom|mushrooms]] (of course) and scrolls. All of these items exist in beneficial and harmful varieties. There are also cursed weapons and armor with negative bonuses; fortunately, ''Angband'' doesn't require the player to wield an item before identifying it. If you do wield a cursed item, it will instantly feel "deathly cold" and cannot be removed easily.
=== [[Role Playing Game]]s ===
* In the ''[[Star Ocean]]'' series, item creation often yields items like this, especially to begin with. One particularly annoying example is the Bounced Cheque in ''[[Star Ocean the Second Story]]'', which continually drains your party's money until you get rid of it, which costs money to do since you can't throw items away and its sale value is negative.
* ''[[Fable]]'' also lets the player character drink, with approximately the same effect. He'll even throw up if he gets smashed enough.
* ''Faxanadu'' had vials of poison that looked very similar to health potions.
* ''[[Paper Mario (
** It and its sequel also had some recipe items that sometimes had adverse effects (such as negative status or damage). Additionally, in ''[[Paper Mario:
* ''[[
** These have been around in previous ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' games. The ''Thorn Crown'' (found in 5 and 6) was a very strong headgear but caused a slow loss of [[Hit Point
* In ''[[
** Similarly, the game gives you Eggs, which are okay healing items. Hop into a hot spring with an egg and it becomes a Fried Egg, which is even better. But if you don't, Eggs will eventually hatch into useless Chicks, which grow up into useless Chickens (though at least Chickens can be sold for more than Eggs are worth.)
** ''Brave Fencer Musashi'' also features food items that spoil over
** Played for [[Nightmare Fuel]] on Tanetane Island in Chapter 7. {{spoiler|Upon arrival, a Save Frog alerts you that your party is in critical condition, and they are--everyone is down to 1 HP. Also, all of your items are gone. Only way to heal? Go a little bit into the island and eat some suspicious-looking mushrooms. The result? Your party is fully healed...but now [[Mushroom Samba|you're hallucinating like nobody's business]].}}
*** {{spoiler|[[Nightmare Fuel]] additive in the form of the ''[[Matango]]'' reference.}}
* In ''[[
** Which is a continuation of the classical cursed items from ''[[Dungeons
*** Classic cursed items in ''[[Dungeons
** The Vampire's Revenge sword from the first game is an especially nasty example. Not only is it cursed, it also does the exact opposite of what a sword is supposed to do. It drains its wielder's health and heals its target. Just to add insult to injury, getting the sword is a case of [[Guide Dang It]] which involves fighting a Doomguard, one of the most powerful non-boss enemies in the game, going through one of the most annoying dungeons in the game which is chock-full of respawning Kobold Commandoes packing fire arrows, and forgoing a valuable reward of 1500 exp. Pouring salt into the wound, the sword's flavor text ''mocks'' you for going through all of that trouble to get a piece of cursed junk like this.
* ''[[
** It also has an unintentional amusing [[Good Bad Bug]] use: by equipping it and then getting swarmed by tadpole enemies that also slow you down, Neku's speed loops around to negative, causing him moonwalk backwards away from where you point the stylus.
* In ''[[
** In ''Ys VI'', the Galba Armor inflicts [[Universal Poison|poison]] [[Standard Status Effects|status]] unless you equip the Silver Armlet first.
* ''[[Persona 3]]'' has the Cursed Cards in the post-battle Shuffle minigame. Sure, you get to keep whatever the Card yields like any other time... but [[The Grim Reaper|Death]] is summoned to your side almost immediately.
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* The Black Potion in ''[[Light Crusader]]'' poisons your character, which in this game [[Interface Screw|flip-flops the controls]] rather than draining health.
* Similar to the ''Mother 3'' example, many item magnus spoil in ''[[Baten Kaitos]]: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean'', resulting in what are usually very poor attack magnus. One particularly devious example, which you might not even see if you go straight to the end of the game as quickly as possible, is Yesterday's Wine. Deluxe Red Wine is a fairly decent healing item (though it gets outclassed later in the game), but after 24 hours (yes, of playing), it becomes Yesterday's Wine, which just gives you a Headache.
** Oh, and just for bonus points, you ''need' to get each and every one of these for [[
* ''[[Pokémon Mystery Dungeon]]: Explorers of Sky'' has the Lookalike items. The first one you'll likely come across (Or''e''n Berries) does the opposite of what it's supposed to do, but there are a few like the Slip Seed which are beneficial.
* ''[[
* The chests left by defeated enemies in ''[[Secret of Mana]]'' may hold helpful supplies and other goodies. Then again they may only contain a booby trap, which can really mess you up. When you get a 'fake chest' which [[One-Hit Kill|splatters]] the Girl and the Sprite and sends the Hero screaming like a little girl all the way to the nearest inn, you may decide to stop opening those things.
** There is a way to avoid this - the Identify spell (on the Girl's list of Jinn spells) disarms all traps. Of course, [[Guide Dang It|it's only mentioned in one obscure spot]].
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* The Mac RPG ''[[Task Maker]]'' has the Skeleton Scroll and Depressions scroll, both of which temporarily deplete some of the player's stats. Devil's Scroll even goes so far as to decrease the overall value of each stat.
=== Shoot Em Up ===
* PSN/Steam shooter ''[[Soldner-X]]: Himmelssturmer'' has a bonus icon which instantly destroys your ship. In a game already [[Nintendo Hard]] and with sharply limited extra lives, [[Fake Difficulty|its presence is most unwelcome.]]
* An old N64 game called ''Chopper Attack'', featured different bonuses if you blew up a certain base. These bonuses were random, sometimes giving health or ammo. Or other times it was a black box that jumped up and exploded in front of you.
* ''[[Parodius]]'' features an ''!?/OH ('''MY GOD''')!'' "powerup" on the power meter, which nullifies every powerup you have. Well, ''[[All There in the Manual|''It's hardly worth being called a power up'']]''.
** Normally, it's simple to avoid; just don't power up when it's highlighted. But throw in the "powerup roulette" feature that activates by random (though actually specific) power pods, and you'll see its [[Scrappy Mechanic|true purpose]].
*** Thankfully in [[Updated Rerelease|Jikkyo Oshaberi Parodius: Forever With Me]] featured an option to change the ''!?'' into a slot machine roulette, which not only reduces greatly the chances of getting that dreadful powerup, but also rewards you with upgraded versions of the bell powerups in the game, and also extra lives.
*** On more positive side, the [[Gratuitous English|funny voiceover]] shouts the words '''[[Oh Crap|"OH MY GOD!!"]]''' loudly at Gokujyo Parodius, which truly shows the alarmed and frustrated feeling you get from that powerup. Sexy Parodius even gives every playable character their own shocked exclamations reacting to the selection of ''!?''-powerup.
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** Less detrimental here, but if you pick up a money doubler if you have more than around 450000 dollars, you get red text saying "money doubler malfunction"
* Some shmups, such as SNK's ''Alpha Mission'', have "power down" items, in this game, the item's letter was reversed.
* The [[MSX]] version of ''[[
* ''[[
* ''The 3-D Battles of WorldRunner'' had literal poison mushrooms. Items could be made to drop by bumping into columns, and mushrooms were the one bad kind of item.
=== Simulation Game ===
* In ''[[Lost in Blue]]'', there are eight different kinds of mushrooms that you can find. Their effects differ from game to game; some will burn your throat and thus make your thirst meter go down faster, some will keep your energy meter from going down, some will induce stomachaches, and some will do nothing.
===
* In the original ''[[Metal Gear]]'', [[Drugs Are Bad|the cigarettes kill you]].
** Unless you use them at the end of the game, which somehow increases the [[Timed Mission]] timer.
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* ''[[Rise of the Kasai]]'' features an inversion of this trope. [[Dark Action Girl|Tati]] can find literal poison mushroom pick ups and use them as weapons by planting them on the ground as mine traps for her enemies to step on, causing them to explode into a cloud of poison gas. It is played a bit straight though, as these mushrooms can prove lethal to the player and their AI partner, being the only player controlled weapon that can do so.
=== Survival Horror ===
* The Whiskey in ''[[Alone in the Dark]] 2'' will mess you up big time (and make the game [[Unwinnable]]) if you drink it. Instead, you have to give it to a certain guy to obtain a Santa Suit, which is critical for entering the house without arousing suspicion ([[Guide Dang It]]).
** "Fragments from the Book of Abdul" and "De Vermis Mysteriis" in the first game. The first book drains your health, the second kills you immediately {{spoiler|unless you read them while standing on a very specific spot in a secret room.}}
* The Rotten Egg in ''[[Resident Evil 5]]'' takes off a large amount of health, but [[Lethal Joke Item|throwing it]] deals a [[One-Hit Kill]] to Majini.
* Don't take the Shabby Doll from Walter in ''[[Silent Hill 4]]'', or it will cause inexorcisable hauntings in the apartment.
=== Third Person Shooter ===
* In the third-person shooter ''Wild Guns'' there's the Mystery Power-Up (a bullet with a "?" next to it). While you can still get every gun in the game (Shot Gun, Grenade Gun and Machine Gun), woe onto you if you get the dreadful ''Pea Shooter'', which doesn't do ''any'' harm to your enemies and which you must discharge completely before you can switch back to your standard infinite-ammoed gun.
=== Turn Based Strategy ===
* ''[[Heroes of Might and Magic]] 2'' had the Tax Lien (Makes you lose gold every day), the Hideous Mask (Monsters will never join you), and the Fizbin of Misfortune (Ruins your morale). You can see them on the map and avoid them, but sometimes you'd find them in treasure chests with no warning.
** The Fizbin is at least as old as ''[[Might and Magic]] 3'' (not the "Heroes of" strategy series, but the apparently-lesser-known RPGs), where it doubled shop prices. It also eradicated you in the Slithercult Saloon if you had it in your inventory and tried one of the slot machines. However, with it you can take a treasure hoard you couldn't otherwise.
** Getting rid of a bad artifact in HOMM2 was easy though. Just recruit a new hero, give him the artifacts and then dismiss him. (Removing him from the game). Did not work in HOMM I, though, giving you a message saying "this item can not be traded".
* Some of the relics your dwarf miners can find in ''[[Delve Deeper]]'' are "bogus" relics that are either either worthless or actually take points ''away''.
=== Wide Open Sandbox ===
* In the game ''[[Way of the Samurai]] 2'', the rice ball restores 200 HP, the ''rotten'' rice ball costs you 200 (it can't kill you, but it does come very unpleasant in the middle of a heated battle). The difference? Color and description, but who would read it in a battle? Furthermore, most thugs drop this and the real variety. The safer alternative is to just go for better health item, such as the (so-described non-perishable) dried fish, yum.
* ''[[Bully (
* ''[[Grand Theft Auto Vice City|Grand Theft Auto: Vice City]]'' allows you to take drugs (large floating discs similar to health pickups and bribes, except bearing an image of a pill), which temporarily slow you down until you get into a vehicle or go to a different area. In some cases, you might take corrosive damage and most likely die.
** These are in fact adrenaline pills. The "slowing down" is actually [[Bullet Time]], and during this you get super strength (just try punching someone and see what happens...)
** Likewise, ''GTA IV'' allows you to get drunk, impairing your driving ability just like in real life.
* The 2005 remake of ''Narc'' also has a few somewhat useless drugs, Ludes reveals which persons are enemies and which ones aren't, another drug just zooms in and shows you close-ups of enemies for a few seconds, and Weed just slows you down, and your character will get addictions from all of them, though they're less severe than the addictions you get form the more useful drugs like Crack and Ecstasy.
* The racing game ''[[Re-Volt]]'' has a "bomb" powerup; if you're unlucky enough to pick this up, your RC car turns black, its antenna becomes a fuse and it explodes after a few seconds (not destroying it, but sending it flying). Touching another car "gives" the bomb to them, though, so it's a lot like a game of "hot potato".
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[[Category:Video Game Items and Inventory]]
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