Sand Worm: Difference between revisions
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''"Usul, we have wormsign [[Blasphemous Boast|the likes of which even God has never seen]]."''|Frank Herbert's ''[[Dune]]''}}
So you're travelling the desert. A dangerous place, isn't it? You've got dehydration to worry about, of course, then there's heatstroke, scorpions, snakes, pack animals of dubious trustworthiness, and native peoples who may be ruthlessly territorial or just poorly disposed toward your particular ethnicity. But if you think that's all you've got to worry about, check your setting: if you're somewhere other than Earth, be it a sci-fi or fantasy world, then tread softly; without rhythm and check the ground often, because you may just wind up with a case of
Scaled-up versions of real-life worms, these beasties tunnel through sand and dirt, being halted only by rocky terrain or artificial ground, though often enough they can force their way through that as well. They generally have no eyes or ears, rather detecting vibrations through their bodies. Beyond these basic traits, even the most incidental similarity to real creatures ceases. Sandworms are big, typically ranging between man-sized and resembling something like a moving mountain. They seem to be carnivorous, since they tend to go out of their way to attack and eat anything trudging upon the surface, either leaping without warning to swallow the prey whole or approaching with a [[Worm Sign|telltale furrow of disturbed earth]], depending on whether the writers want to give the target a chance to run away. Arguably, they could just be really, really territorial. Aside from the worm-like shape, these monsters are also recognizable by their mouths: they're always either completely round or trifurcated, lined with rows of teeth, and with long tentacular tongues, the better to grab you by the feet and reel you in.
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* Another [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]] example is [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Greater_Krayt_Dragon Greater Krayt Dragons], ridiculously huge ten-legged dragons that mostly ate banthas, but there's an illustration in ''The Wildlife of Star Wars'' of one digging up and eating a ''[http://msngroup.aimoo.com/IcewindDaleGamers/krayt_dragon_lg.jpg sarlaac]'' . Usually they stayed buried in the sand.
** They exist in canon. The skeleton of one can be seen when C3-PO is alone on Tatooine.
** Tatooine also has [http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Dune_worm dune worms], which... are basically exact [[Expy
* The Flayers in the [[Star Trek Deep Space Nine Relaunch]] are carnivorous worm-like creatures which lurk beneath the sand of a certain desert on the planet Harkoum. They're known to eat people; crossing the desert on foot is practically suicide.
* In the [[Retief]] story "Internal Affair", the ambassador sent to the planet Quahogg disappears after reporting being chased by forty-foot giant worms, and Retief and Magnan are sent to investigate. The worms turn out to be {{spoiler|the intelligent life forms the ambassador was sent to meet}} (somehow the CDT overlooked this little fact), and, while the ambassador ''was'' eaten, {{spoiler|this did no harm}}
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== Mythology ==
* The Allghoi Khorkhoi (Mongolian Death Worm), a legendary beast said to inhabit the Gobi Desert, is a
* Inuit folklore held that the dead mammoths they sometimes found embedded in the permafrost were burrowing creatures that died instantly upon contact with air.
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* ''[[Sands of Destruction]]'' has sand''whales''.
* So does [[Serious Sam|Serious Sam: BFE]].
* ''[[Gears of War]] 2'' features the Riftworm, a gigantic worm that the Locust use to sink cities, awakened by the detonation of the lightmass bomb in the first game. "Giant" doesn't even BEGIN to describe
** "[[Memetic Mutation|It's a GIANT WORM! They're sinking]] '''[[Memetic Mutation|cities]]''' [[Memetic Mutation|with a GIANT WORM]]!"
** It's also somewhat [[Handwaved]] as far as biology and physics go. It's supported by a skeleton, and doesn't seem to be carnivorous. Yes, some people get in its path, and are devoured with everything else, but it seems to eat minerals like a real worm.
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* Lanmola, Moldorm, Molgera, and Twinmold in ''[[The Legend of Zelda]]''.
** ''[[Twilight Princess]]'' sizes down the Sand Worms to a more reasonable size. ''[[The Wind Waker]]'' has both the aforementioned gargantuan Molgera, and its smaller offspring [[Mook Maker|that it likes to summon during the fight.]]
** On a more minor scale, ''[[Ocarina of Time]]'' has the Leevers, things like fat leeches that appear in some parts of the desert, and ''[[Spirit Tracks]]'' has the Malgyorgs, quintessential [[Land Shark
** ''Adventure of Link'' has sandworm-like creatures in desert-based [[Random Encounters]].
** You could be forgiven for thinking The Forsaken in ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword|The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword]]'' is a
* [[Shadow of the Colossus|Dirge the Tenth Colossus]] is a giant sand worm. Except it hits you. At high speeds. [[That One Boss|And it's hard]]. Oh, yeah, it '''[[Giant Flyer|flies]]'''.
** Only metaphorically, of course. Phalanx the 13th Colossus is the giant worm that '''literally''' flies.
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* A recurring enemy in the ''[[Final Fantasy]]'' series. Probably the most memorable ones are in ''[[Final Fantasy V|V]]'', where its corpse provides a stable path across the desert, and ''[[Final Fantasy VI|VI]]'', where being eaten by a specific one on a specific island leads to a hidden dungeon and party member.
** A particular area of the overworld in ''[[Final Fantasy V|V]]'' has a winding path of greenery passing through the desert. Simply traveling across the desert is faster, but you run the risk of encountering these things, which will almost certainly kill you at that point of the game.
** These monstrosities are living, breathing, adventurer-eating ''entrances'' to [[Bonus Boss|special boss fights]] in ''[[Final Fantasy XI]]''. There are also much smaller person-sized worms that cast
** The first time you face a Sand Worm in ''[[Final Fantasy X]]'', it has the most HP of any enemy you've faced thus far (and [[Boss in Mook Clothing|it's only a random encounter]]!). Fortunately, it's not ''too'' deadly, and it's vulnerable to attacks that remove fractions of the enemy's HP, so if you have some Shadow Gems lying around, you can make quick work of one.
** The [[Up to Eleven|Abyssal Worm]] in the [[Very Definitely Final Dungeon]] can be farmed for the very valuable items that allow you to exceed the 9999 damage cap. Unfortunately, they're located after the [[Point of No Return]].
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* ''[[Space Quest]]'' 1 used one of these to [[Border Patrol|prevent the player from venturing into the open desert]].
* [http://gmc.yoyogames.com/index.php?showtopic=279075 Death Worm,] in which you play a giant worm, leaping from the ground and eating people to grow larger.
* ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' has a few, the first being Ouro, a then-unique model boss in the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj. The Burning Crusade expansion introduced acid-spitting worms capable of tunneling through solid rock in Hellfire Peninsula and the Bone Wastes in the middle of Terrokar Forest. Jormungar of Northrend are quite a bit smaller, but adhere to the same principles (and spit acid too). With the release of the Cataclysm expansion, ''World Of Warcraft'' got sandworms that are made of stone [[Stargate
* ''[[Phantasy Star IV]]'' had these infesting the planet Motavia, with an enterprising farmer deciding to open a sandworm ranch. Unfortunately, it gets too big for its britches, and thus becomes one of the first ([[That One Boss|and hardest]]) [[Bonus Boss]] fights in the game at that point. You often fought baby Sandworms in [[Random Encounters]], and at least one variant, if you left a single one alive, would run off and summon [[Mama Bear|Mama]] (another full-sized one like the boss mentioned above). When you get the [[Tank Goodness|Land Rover]], one of the enemies you ran into was a [[Palette Swap]] of the Sandworm, while swaps of both the small and large kind could be found in the planet's oceans.
* The [[Bonus Boss]] of [[Gaia Online|zOMG]] shares its name with this trope's alternate title/humorous variation: Landshark. It is, quite literally, a shark that swims through (and appears to be made of) sand. Other than than its anatomy, it acts almost exactly like a sandworm, burrowing underground and eating unsuspecting Gaians.(It can kill a [[Power Levels|CL 10.0]] Player with multiple armor buffs and a health boost in 3 hits, and unbuffed players in [[One-Hit Kill|less than that]]. It took 3 6-Person Crews of CL 10 players to take it down. Plus the area it spawns in is usually filled with CL ''5'' players. No wonder tourism is hurting so much...)
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** A second type is called a "lungfish" (and looks vaguely like a real-life lungfish). Although the appearance is actually that of an eel-like fish, it acts like a straight sandworm, and is found in desert sand dunes.
* ''[[Gradius]] Gaiden'' has a snow worm as its first boss.
* ''[[Breath of Fire]] IV'' actually has a
* ''Armageddon 2'', a map-pack for Skulltag, has a pair of these as bosses in the "Sand Worm Trench" level. They don't swallow people, just breathe fire at them (and are lanky, looking somewhat like snakes).
* ''Runescape'' has the Strykewyrms, which come in Jungle, Desert and Ice varieties. They're normally unagressive and can only be fought as a Slayer task.
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* ''[[Bug!]]!'' had a [[That One Boss|really nasty]] swamp worm as the boss of [[Bubblegloop Swamp|Splot]].
* ''[[Heavy Weapon]]'' has the robotic Mechworm boss, fought in [[Shifting Sand Land|Antagonistan]]. It jumps out of the sand and spams missiles and bombs.
* One of ''[[Wario World|Wario World's]]'' bosses is a
* ''[[Panzer Dragoon]]'' has plenty of examples; they make an especially prevalent appearance in the second level of the first game.
* [[EVO Search for Eden]] featured these in one level. Notably, they are the only invincible enemy in the game, fortunately they wouldn't attack you actively, though one might pop out of the ground under or in front of you. A later level featured sand-dwelling dinosaur-like creatures called Mosuchop which would jump out and bite you before retreating under the sand. (Real Moschops, the mammal-like reptile on which it was based, were not known to do this.)
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