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''[[Shining Force]]'' is a series of turn-based strategy games, and is part of a [[The Multiverse|larger franchise]] known simply as the ''[[Shining Series (Franchise)|Shining Series]]'', and was [[Tropes Are Not Bad|arguably]] [[Follow the Leader|Sega's answer]] to ''[[Fire Emblem]]''<ref>Not that many people in America will realize it unless pointed out, thanks to [[Marth Debuted in Smash Bros]]</ref>.
 
''[[Shining Force]]'' begins in the kingdom of Guardiana, where the main character, Max, is put in charge of the titular Shining Force and charged with stopping an invasion from the rival Runefaust army. The army is controlled by Darksol, a mysterious cloaked man with aspirations to revive the monstrous Dark Dragon and use it to [[Take Over the World]]. It's a prequel to the first-person Genesis RPG ''[[Shining in The Darkness (Video Game)|Shining in Thethe Darkness]]'', which featured Darksol's son Dark Sol (or, in Japan, Mephisto).
 
Its sequel, ''[[Shining Force]] II'', shifts the focus to the kingdom of Granseal, where an even ''greater'' demon lord named Zeon ([[Disgaea 2: Cursed Memories|No]] [[Mobile Suit Gundam|relation]]) is sealed off by two jewels. A thief named Slade steals one of them, and thus breaks the seal on the monster. Zeon possesses the king of the neighboring Galam nation, causing him to do all sorts of freaky [[Evil Overlord]]-type deeds. This time, schoolkid Bowie and his three friends (Sarah, Chester and Jaha) form the core of the new Shining Force, and are sent to track down the jewels before Zeon can wreak any further havoc on the world. Takes place in the same world as the first game, although at the time there was only a [[Continuity Nod]] to prove it. (This game also suffers from the naming problems of the previous ones, referring to Darksol as Dark Sol, and Lucifer as Dark Dragon, an unrelated enemy from Shining Force I).
 
The ''Shining Force Gaiden'' games were released on the [[Game Gear]] (the first one never made it out of Japan), but were later [[Compilation Rerelease|repackaged]] and enhanced for the [[Sega CD]]. Of those, the first one stars Prince Nick of Cypress, who has to help Anri (part of the original Guardiana Shining Force who ascended to become Queen) find a cure for her poisoning at the hands of a rogue wizard named Woldol. At first, the people of Guardiana are suspicious of him, but eventually he turns out to be a trustworthy and effective leader, thus gaining their respect.
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Shining Hearts also gets a Anime Adaptation that started airing in as a part of the Spring of the 2012s.
 
Recently, a letter writing/video-uploading/fan-art showing campaign has been started by the fan community to reunite developer Camelot with Sega in time for the series' 20th anniversary. More information and ways you can contribute can be found here https://web.archive.org/web/20131025001634/http://sos.shiningforcecentral.com/
 
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=== {{tropelist|The ''[[Shining Force]]'' games provide examples of: ===}}
* [[Action Girl]]: While the series is in no short supply, Sheela the Master-monk gains recognition even outside of the fan base; Her ditching of the [[White Magician Girl]] persona (with the exception of useful healing spells) to temper her body and eventual opening of her own dojo won her many a fan back in the day.
* [[Aerith and Bob]]: Every now and then a character will have a mundane name (Max, Sarah, Nick).
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* [[Arbitrary Headcount Limit]]: You can only have 12 characters in each battle. This can sometimes lead to having to make painful decisions over who gets bumped from the team when a strong new character comes along.
* [[Awesome but Impractical]]: [[Curse|Cursed weapons]]. Despite sporting a far higher attack than even [[Penultimate Weapon|mithril weapons]], they carry negative drawbacks that make them undesirable. These include ebbing away at the wielder's hit points, [[Nerf|nerfing]] the wielder's strongest stats (Defense for Warriors, Movement for Knights; etc.), and even paralyzing them during an attack. Worse yet, they cannot be removed without the aid of a costly purification from a priest or a high-level detox spell.
* [[Back Fromfrom the Dead]]: Woldol, the [[Big Bad]] of ''Shining Force Gaiden'', returns as an end-game boss in ''Sword of Hajya''. If you've only played the Game Gear port, his appearance [[Giant Space Flea From Nowhere|won't make much sense to you]].
* [[Badass]]: ''Plenty'' of examples.
** If you didn't read the above [[Annoying Arrows]] example with Lyle (SFI), then let this statement be an example: Once you put [[Big Badass Wolf|Zylo]] onto your team, chances are you will ''[[Lightning Bruiser|never]]'' remove him.
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* [[Breaking the Fourth Wall]]: If your save file is corrupted in Shining Force II, ominous music plays while the witch informs you that it's corrupted. Yes, they designed the game to play appropriate music for ''losing your file''.
* [[Bring My Red Jacket]]: Sir Lemon [AKA the Red Baron before he finally exits the [[Heel Face Revolving Door]]] can revive himself from death after a battle, and wears armor that is ''precisely'' the color of blood -- because it's ''painted with the blood of his dead enemies''.
* [[But Thou Must!]]: Most egregious moment is in ''II'', where Thou Must go kiss the Princess Elis, the [[Distressed Damsel in Distress]] who you've known for maybe all of two minutes, and later get the implied [[Standard Hero Reward]]. Sarah, the [[Unlucky Childhood Friend]], is heartbroken and runs off, leading Kazan to go "[[Pair the Spares|comfort]]" her. Needless to say, [[Fan-Preferred Couple|many fans prefer the girl who's stuck by you the whole game and loves you dearly]] to the princess who barely gets one line in the game.
** This is also used to force the player to forgive bosses after they're defeated, no matter how much of a [[Dirty Coward]] or [[Complete Monster]] they are.
* [[Can't Drop the Hero]]: It never lets you. And when the hero dies, it's a game over. But because of this, it leads to the hero typically being many times stronger than the other characters. See [[One Man Party]] below.
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* [[Defrosting Ice Queen]]: The whole story of Blanc Neige in ''Shining Tears''. And, no, [[An Ice Person|Her ice powers didn't defrost]].
* [[Disc One Final Boss]]: {{spoiler|Kane, in the first game.}}
* [[Distressed Damsel in Distress]]: Princess Elis in SFII is pretty much the perfect cliched stereotyped example. All she needed was for Zeon to tie her to the railroad tracks.
* [[Doomed Hometown]]: The destruction of the first Granseal palace and town in SFII.
* [[Downer Ending]]: [[Subverted Trope]], the ending of the first Force game, where {{spoiler|Max is sunk under the water with the Chaos Breaker while a majority of the remaining of the force is [[Teleporters and Transporters|Egressed]] out scot-free,}} it is rather convincing until {{spoiler|you watch the cut scene after the credits, showing Max and Adam and alive and well}}.
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* [[Frickin' Laser Beams]]
* [[Furry Confusion]]: Shining Force II has an anthropomorphic rat character named Slade, and later in the game there is a boss that is a real rat.
* [[Game Mod]]: For starters there's [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGVf6Hdni7g Shining Force 2 CD-I], a fan-made [[YoutubeYouTube Poop]]-themed mod where the characters are replaced by characters from [[The Legend of Zelda CDiCDI Games]] and [[Hotel Mario (Video Game)|Hotel Mario]].
* [[Geo Effects]]: Terrain plays a role in giving a defense bonus, as well as a movement pentalty.
* [[Glass Cannon]]: Mages/Wizards, archers, and occasionally certain centaurs.
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* [[Kill Sat]]: In the remake of the first game, this powers a line of spells exclusive to Max.
* [[Kleptomaniac Hero, Found Underwear]] (Appears in II)
* [[LampshadedIf DoubleYou EntendreKnow What I Mean]]: In the third book of ''Shining Force CD'', after you get past the second battle Prince Nick and Gyan encounter a harem of sorts, who's members encourage them to rest by saying "Why don't you relax? You can even try '''THAT''' with us."
{{quote| Gyan: Th...THAT??!!<br />
Kisaragi: Yes, T...H...A...T!<br />
Mayfair: That's disgusting! }}
* [[Landmark of Lore]]: ''SF II'' contains a [[Lost Technology|hidden]] [[Cool Ship|airship]] that has the same outline as the Nazca lines.
* [[Let's Split Up, Gang!]]: The Shining Force gets separated for a while in ''The Sword of Haija'' and you must work through a few battles with only six characters.
* [[Light Is Good]]: In ''Shining Force II'' two of the main [[Amplifier Artifact|Amplifier Artifacts]] are the Jewel of Light and the Jewel of Evil, not Darkness.
* [[Lions and Tigers Andand Humans, Oh My!]]
* [[Loads and Loads of Characters]]: Usually about thirty per game, some of whom are [[Optional Party Member|Optional Party Members]], and can be [[Lost Forever]] if you're not prudent. You're also left with a choice of who to use since you can only have 12 characters at a time attending a battle.
* [[Lost Forever]]: A few characters, and often items you miss. The Game Gear version has an interesting subversion for items, where you can simply buy items you miss from the shop under deals. They cost a lot, which would be annoying, except the game soon ends up as [[Money for Nothing]].
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* [[The Man Behind the Man]]: {{spoiler|Almost every boss you will ever fight in the first game is actually innocent and under the control of Darksol. [[But Thou Must!|You aren't allowed to hold grudges against any of them]] no matter how angry you are after they've destroyed most of your force and you've had so much trouble defeating them.}}
* [[Meat Shield]]: Domingo's status as this bears repeating. He eventually gets one of the best HP and defense in the game. ''And'' the best evasion. So ''if'' a character can hit him, they generally only do [[Scratch Damage]], and he has enough HP to weather it all. He's also one of the highest priority targets to the computer, above most healers and other magicians, and below Max, [[The Hero]]. This means that if you put Domingo and almost any other character on either side of an opponent, they'll always go for him, allowing the other to hit them repeatedly from behind.
* [[Megumi Hayashibara]]: Neige, in the game. In ''Tears X Wind'', her lines were recorded by someone else (Ayako Kawasumi, AKA [[Fate/stay Stay Nightnight|Saber]])
* [[Mirror Match]]: In Book 3 of ''Shining Force CD''.
* [[Mithril]]: In the second game you'll find Mithril in different places, and if you hold onto them for the whole game near the end the Dwarf blacksmith will forge powerful Mithril weapons for your force.
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** In the second game, Gunther the werewolf starts out looking like just a hairy man, but after he gets a promotion he starts looking more like a wolf.
* [[Powered Armor]]: Guntz's suit of steam armor and Kokichi's flying machine, both from ''SFI''.
* [[Rare Candy]]: The food items, like Quick Chicken boosts dexterity, Power Potions or Power Wines boost attacks, Defense Potions or Protect Milk rarises defenses, Bright Honey increases mana (MP), and Life Bread boosts HP.
* [[Random Encounters]]: Shining Force I has [[Averted Trope|no random battles whatsoever.]] Every battle is well distinguished from the others.
* [[Redemption Demotion]]: Lemon in ''SFII'' is significantly stronger when you fight against him (in fact he's almost a [[That One Boss]]) than he is when he joins your team. [[Handwaved]] by the fact that he's no longer being controlled by a demon spirit, but still.
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* [[Save the Princess]]: In ''Shining Force II''. A rare [[Gender Flip]] occurs in ''The Sword of Hayja'' where you must save the prince.
* [[Schizo-Tech]]: Swords, axes and arrows coexisting in a world with lasers and robots.
* [[Sealed Evil in Aa Can]] (All ''over'' the place.)
* [[Sealed Room in Thethe Middle of Nowhere]]: In ''SFII'' when the Shining Force gets shrunk at Mr. Creed's residence and put onto a desk with an entire community of people who had the same thing happen to them. (The Shining Force gets away eventually of course, but for the other potential party members they must remain there until pre-departure on the Nazca ship, but it could still be like [[And I Must Scream]] as the others would be harder to level up at this point). The NPCs who have made a kingdom of their own are actually ''thankful'' to Creed for their Desktop Kingdom.
* [[She Cleans Up Nicely]]: A lot of the female characters get [[Fan Service Pack|surprisingly hotter]] when they get a promotion. This is most blatantly the case for Master Monks in ''SFII'', who go from priestly garb to [[Stripperiffic]] belly-dancer wear when they promote.
** Also Tao and Anri in the first game who, if you look hard enough for them, can be equipped with bikinis. Narsha also gets a bathing suit in the remake.
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** Also, the rat boss in ''SFII'' is named [[Willard]].
* [[The Something Force]]
* [[Spell My Name Withwith an "S"]]: Happened in ''Shining Wisdom'', because Sega (who had most Shining games) had the license to use the names but the game was licensed by [[Working Designs]], who had to rename everything that appeared in another game; for instance, Parmecia became Palacia.
** Also Luke/Lug, Kyantol/Cantaur...
* [[Spiritual Successor]]: [[Golden Sun (Video Game)|Golden Sun]].
* [[Spiteful AI]]: Even when death seems imminent, the enemies seem to at least die happy when they know they used their last move to kill one of your weaker characters rather than focusing on the main character (who might have survived the hit) like they had been.
* [[Squishy Wizard]]: It can depend on the character and how leveled up they are, but it's generally not a good idea to put your wizards or healers on the frontlines. If they run out of MP they might as well be a [[Meat Shield]] since their physical attacks rarely do much (again, depending on the character).
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* [[Team Pet]]: Kiwi in the second game. In the first game, there's an extremely large number. Save for one (Bleu, who is plot-mandatory), all of these characters are [[Lost Forever|easy to miss]].
* [[Too Awesome to Use]]: Shower of Cure can become this, as well as level 4 magic attacks (you want to save your MP so you can keep attacking of course).
* [[Took a Level Inin Badass]]: Most characters will once promoted.
* [[Unexpected Gameplay Change]]: After ''SFIII'', every last game in the series save for the [[Updated Rerelease]] of the original ''Shining Force'' has been an action-adventure RPG in the vein of the ''[[Seiken Densetsu]]'' games. Mostly critically panned, the games range from playably mediocre (''Neo'' and ''EXA'', the first ''Shining Soul'') to actually ''fun'' (''Shining Soul II'').
** Though technically, ''Shining Force I'' was an [[Unexpected Gameplay Change]], as the first game in the series was a dungeon crawling RPG called ''Shining In The Darkness''. This genre was revisited with ''Shining the Holy Ark''.
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** Desoul is perhaps the most traditional example. Essentially, the equivalent of ''[[Final Fantasy]]'''s Death spell, it almost never works. That is unless [[The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard|an enemy uses it on you]]. Generally speaking, unless you're using Blaze, Freeze, Bolt, Heal, Detox or Boost, most other magic falls into this category.
* [[The Vicar]]: The promoted class of healers in most games.
* [[We Cannot Go Onon Without You]]: losing Max at any point forces you to restart from the last save point. This is quite odd, in that it's the case in every battle, even when he has ''no apparent importance whatsoever''. [[Because Destiny Says So]] indeed.
* [[White-Haired Pretty Boy]] (and [[White-Haired Pretty Girl|girl]]): Keiner in ''Tears'', who is an [[Aloof Big Brother]] of the already aloof Neige. Also princess gone ice mage Anri from the original, as well as Ernest, a knight.
* [[White Magician Girl]]: Most of the games have at least one of these, a female healer who usually (unless promoted to master monk) has no real offensive power besides maybe a Blast spell.
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** The Jewels of Light and Evil in SFII, though they have no effect on gameplay. The Shining Force swords in ''EXA'' also have a similar effect.
* [[You Dirty Rat]]: Slade the Rat is the cause of everything that goes wrong in SFII. Though it is mentioned that he was more of a Robin Hood-type [[Loveable Rogue]] who [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|simply had no idea what he was unleashing]] when he stole the jewels of Light and Evil. He does later join the Shining Force and redeem himself.
** Redeem himself? He becomes one of the best members of the force, barring [[The Hero|Bowie]] and [[Game Breaker|Peter]]. He's also the only member, when promoted, to be able to [[One Hit KO|slice things in two]] without damage rolls (except a boss) if he lands a critical. {{spoiler|Guess that's what [[Took a Level Inin Badass|being promoted from a thief to a ninja]] does for you!}}
* [[Your Mom]]: In ''Shining Wisdom'': "Your mama's so ugly she looks out the window and gets arrested for moonin'!"
 
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