Fission Mailed: Difference between revisions

Fission Mailure is whenever it appears you have lost the game, sometimes so far as to present an apparent [[Game Over]] screen, but in fact you ''had'' to fail in order to advance the plot. The title comes from ''[[Metal Gear Solid 2]]'', where there was a rare clue: what popped up was not the authentic "Mission Failed" screen, but rather a [[Spoonerism|spoonerized]] version.

 

 

[[I Thought It Meant|Not to be confused with]] any conjunction between [[Atomic Hate|nuclear weapons]] and [[Our Lawyers Advised This Trope|the postal service]]. Or between nukes and chainmail.

** In ''[[Assassin's Creed I (Video Game)|Assassin's Creed]]'', Al Mualim stabs Altaïr with a dagger in the second Memory Sequence for his failure at the Temple of Solomon (where he broke all three parts of the titular Creed). The game returns to the White Room of the [[Framing Device|Animus]], just as if Altaïr [[Insistent Terminology|gets desynchronised]]. However, Altaïr awakens in front of Al Mualim's desk, in shock that he has survived. It turns out that Al Mualim intended for the stabbing to be a "spiritual" death, effectively giving him a blank slate and allowing him to continue serving as an Assassin... [[A Taste of Power|except now he has the lowest rank and has lost almost all of his skills and items.]]

** In ''[[Assassin's Creed II (Video Game)|Assassin's Creed II]]'', {{spoiler|Rodrigo Borgia defeats Ezio using the Staff and takes the Apple from him, depriving him of the only way to fight against his power. Borgia then stabs Ezio and leaves him for dead. Ezio struggles but ultimately collapses in a pool of blood. The screen fades to black. However, a few seconds later it fades back, with Ezio standing and recovering slightly.}} The next game reveals that {{spoiler|Ezio's armour blunted the attack, causing only a shallow wound.}}

* ''[[Super Metroid]]'''s giant Metroid pops up, is unavoidable and quickly drains your life. When you're at 1 energy, it [[Androcles' Lion|remembers you're its mother]] and backs off. Health Refill station is in the next room, enjoy!

** Super Metroid does this ''again'' in the incredibly creepy final boss fight, just a few minutes after the Giant Metroid event. The boss is almost dead, and it uses its most powerful, unavoidable attack. You're left with hardly any energy left -- and Samus just sits on the ground, panting. While said unavoidable attack is being charged again...

** Similarly in ''[[The Elder Scrolls Four|Oblivion]]'', there's a quest where you have to let a NPC kill you. This time though the game explicitly tells you what you must do.

* In ''[[Chrono Trigger (Video Game)|Chrono Trigger]]'', when you face Lavos, your party will get your asses handed to you and {{spoiler|Crono will actually ''die''}}, but this will only start you on the next part of your quest.

** You can also {{spoiler|get an item, the titular "Chrono Trigger", and go back, freeze the instant of time Crono was supposed to die, and replace him with a clone. Surprising, this part is actually '''optional'''. You can choose not to do it, leaving Crono to his fate}}.

*** {{spoiler|Well, you as the player can. Beating the game with Crono dead shows the party reviving him.}}

* ''[[Fallout New Vegas]]'' has a mission in which after finding 50 Sunset Sasparilla Star Caps, upon telling Festus that you've won the contest, he proceeds to give you the prize: {{spoiler|Telling you the story of the origins of Sunset Sasparilla}}. After which, you immediately fail the mission. If you complain about your crappy "prize" however, Festus will direct you to a better prize: {{spoiler|A bunch of stickers, amongst which is the asphyxiated corpse of a raider who was also suckered into all of this who happens to be holding a powerful laser pistol, as well as a whole lot of bottlecaps which went from being trash in pre-war times to being the most versatile currency in the land.}}

* In ''[[Arc Rise Fantasia]]'', the first boss fights against Ignacy, and much later {{spoiler|Luze}}, play out like this. It's impossible to win both fights, so you have to let them kill you to advance the plot. The two fights against {{spoiler|Alf, Adele, and Leslie/Clyde}} ''would'' count; except in the first fight, you CAN defeat them, but it is very difficult to do so, and the plot continues on whether you win or lose (though you lose out on getting a [[Mons|Rogress]] if you lose). In the second fight, while it's impossible to win, if you lose you get the standard Game Over; the key is to stall out the fight until it ends on its own after enough turns have passed.

** Also played with earlier on with Shadow Rise. When she uses Supreme Insight, none of your attacks will hit her. The battle will still continue for a few more turns until you're treated to a cutscene of you and your team about to die {{spoiler|until Teddie/Kuma goes [[A Worldwide Punomenon|bearserk]] and kicks Shadow Rise's multicoloured ass.}}

 

** As well as the infamous "Controller unplugged" fake error message.

* ''[[Ghost Hunter]]'', on [[PS 2]]: When Lord Hawksmoor has you realise that there is absolutely no way out of your predicament, and possesses your partner to shoot you dead, the game returns silently and sadly to the main screen. {{spoiler|Then the computer AI that's been guiding you on the game, and is present on the main screen, speaks up. And possesses a robot with a giant chaingun. And sets about fixing the problem and reviving the main character.}}

** ''[[Silent Hill 2]]'': Maria's {{spoiler|many deaths}} serve as a sort of Fission Mailed as well, as triggering them outside of scripted events causes a [[Nonstandard Game Over]].

** The Nightmare Amusement Park in the beginning of ''[[Silent Hill 3]]'', where Heather gets run over by the roller coaster at the end. Heather can also "mail the fission" at any time during the nightmare by being killed by the enemies or jumping into a [[Bottomless Pit]].

** And the beginning of ''[[Silent Hill Homecoming]]''.

** And once more, with Harry ''again'' in ''[[Silent Hill Shattered Memories]]''.

 

== [[Turn Based Tactics]] ==

* The original ''[[Jagged Alliance]]'' has an assortment of randomly picked exit messages, one of which is an error message explaining the game failed writing the player's quick save (to avoid [[Save Scumming]], the only way to save the game during battle is to exit the game) followed by "just kidding".

 

[[Category:Video Game Tropes]]

[[Category:Fission Mailed]]