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== Film - Animated ==
* The limits of CGI regarding the [[Uncanny Valley|depiction of organic shapes and natural surfaces]] is the reason [[Pixar]]'s first feature film was about [[Toy Story|toys]]. As the technology improved, they worked their way up to [[A Bug's Life
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* This trope is touched on in the classic black and white movie, ''[[The Bad and The Beautiful]]''.
** A horror movie producer couldn't afford decent special effects for the monster. He teams up with the director to use camera tricks to make the monster into [[The Unseen]].
** From the trivia in the movies Imdb entry, "The scene showing the production of the fictional low budget horror film was based on how [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0507932/ Val Lewton] produced ''[[Cat People (
* [[Steven Spielberg]] couldn't get the mechanical shark in ''[[Jaws (
** Hooper was originally intended to die in the screenplay. However, some footage captured by Spielberg's secondary crew, of a ''real'' great white attacking a visibly-empty diving cage, was so awesome that the plot was changed to let Hooper slip out of it safely, allowing them to use the shot.
* Originally, [[Godzilla]] was going to be rendered via claymation for the original 1954 film ''[[Gojira (
* In the climax of the film version of ''[[From Russia
* In the ''[[
* The opening of ''[[Spy Kids]] 2'' was originally meant to take place at [[Disney Theme Parks|Disneyland]]. However, [[Robert Rodriguez]] discovered that Disney generally doesn't allow movies to shoot in their parks, not even Disney movies (note: The original ''Spy Kids'' films were distributed by [[Miramax Films]], which is owned by Disney, and released under the [[Dimension Films]] name). This led to the scene instead taking place at a fictional amusement park with humorously impossible CGI rides. Rodriguez thinks this is mostly an improvement, although he still would have preferred it if Carmen and Juni had appeared undercover at the park wearing Mickey Mouse hats, but they had to settle for propeller hats.
** Funnily enough, though, the finished film still has Carmen saying the line, "No more Mickey Mouse assignments" when she's annoyed at getting stuck with a mission at an amusement park.
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* The opening of ''[[Close Encounters of the Third Kind]]'' was originally scripted to take place in [[The Amazon]] with Lacombe's team finding the airplanes in the center of [[Crop Circles]]. This was too expensive and it got changed to a desert so that the sequence could be filmed near Los Angeles.
* In ''[[Clerks]]'', some local hooligans jammed gum into the locks of the convenience store's giant window shade, forcing Dante to make a huge sign that said "I ASSURE YOU WE'RE OPEN!" This gag is one of the film's most iconic images. But the truth is that the film was so low-budget that [[Kevin Smith]] could only shoot in the store at night, when the store was closed. Having the shades permanently down was a way to disguise the fact that it was dark outside during the daytime interior scenes.
* The sequence in ''[[The Fugitive (
* In the first ''[[Tomb Raider]]'' film, the amphibious duck vehicles in Siberia were included in the movie because the director thought they looked cool. Similarly, the procession of monks was not written in the script, but the procession happened to take place as they were filming and the monks consented to appearing in the movie. In the second film, most of Lara's outfits have long sleeves, because the concealing makeup used to hide [[Angelina Jolie]]'s tattoos in the first movie was not as effective as the filmmakers would have liked.
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*** Not quite. Although it's a fairly low-budget episode (mostly pre-existing sets, and only two additional actors), the blackout gimmick was part of an NYC blackout storyline running through one night of NBC programming. The characters in ''[[Mad About You]]'' knocked out the power, and characters in ''Friends'' and one other show (can't recall which one right now) suffered through it since those shows were all set in New York. The ''[[Seinfeld]]'' folks wouldn't play, though. A better example of this in ''Friends'' would be The One Where No-One's Ready, which, with the exception of the credit sequence, takes place entirely in Monica and Rachel's apartment and features only the main cast. Even the final scene is in a very uncomplicated set with only one additional actor.
* ''[[Star Trek]]'': Originally, going down to the planets involved the crew boarding a shuttle and flying down, but the cost of doing landings would have been too expensive, thus, the transporter was created.
** Inverted with the flat forehead Klingons. Because of low budget, Klingons only had a mostly ethnic makeup in the original series. In the movies and later series, which had better budgets and better makeup technology, they obviously had the ridged foreheads. In ''[[Star Trek: Enterprise|Enterprise]]'', a [[Prequel]] to the Original Series, they actually make a storyline to explain the change.
** Played straight with the model used to depict Romulan Warbirds in the original series. A technician apparently dropped the model before filming, and there wasn't time to fix it or come up with a new one, so they used the Klingon Warship's model instead. This led to the conclusion that Klingons and Romulans formed an alliance, with warship sent over to the Romulans and cloaking device sent to the Klingons. Consequences of this action influenced the storyline of the entire franchise forever.
* ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
* ''[[Doctor Who]]'': The TARDIS was originally going to be a big, magnificent vehicle. Except the show lacked the funding, so they said that it can disguise itself as anything it wants. Then ''that'' turned out to be too expensive, so it stayed as a police call box.
** In the original script of "[[Doctor Who/Recap/S13 E5 The Brain of Morbius|The Brain of Morbius]]", Morbius's new body was cobbled together by his devoted robot servant. But it was the cheap story of the season, so they couldn't afford a robot costume as well as Morbius's body. So it was heavily rewritten to make the robot a human mad scientist (brilliantly played by Philip Madoc, resulting in a classic story).
* While not a technical difficulty, during series 3 of ''[[
* Jane Leeves' second pregnancy on ''[[Frasier]]'' came at the perfect time, plot-wise, for Niles and Daphne to have a baby -- in the final season, just ahead of schedule enough for Daphne to give birth {{spoiler|in the finale.}}
* [[The Sarah Connor Chronicles]] originally was going to have a massive fight scene between the FBI and the central antagonist of the first season, a Terminator called Cromartie. When the budget turned out to be too low for it, the writing team got creative. This resulted in a [[Nightmare Fuel|chilling,]] [[Nothing Is Scarier|minimalistic]] sequence where Cromartie slaughters the FBI agents (mostly off-screen) and tosses their bodies into the hotel swimming pool. All while [[Johnny Cash|Johnny Cash's]] [[Crowning Music of Awesome|''When The Man Comes Around'']] plays...
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* In ''[[City of Heroes]]'', you could not initially wear a cape. In real life this is because the developers couldn't figure out how to implement [[No Flow in CGI|decent cape physics.]] In game, new heroes could not wear capes out of respect for Hero 1, who [[Heroic Sacrifice|went on a suicide mission]] to stop the [[Alien Invasion]] that [[Kill'Em All|wiped out the beta.]] The city representative gave a mission where you could read the history of Hero 1 and visit his memorial. Upon completion you get the option to wear a cape.
** By the time ''[[City of Villains]]'' arrived this was a bit of [[The Artifact]]. But Lord Recluse will not let you wear a cape until you prove you're bad enough to go to Paragon City, smash lots of property, take out a chunk of [[Redshirt Army|Longbow]], beat up a hero and take his cape for yourself.
* In ''[[Sonic 3 and Knuckles
* Fog in video games is usually done because it would be very difficult, or even impossible, to render an entire area all at once. In order to make-up for it, the developers will usually [[Hand Wave]] it in some way. Some examples:
** ''[[Superman 64]]'' infamously [[Handwaved]] its poor draw distance (a result of both the N64's limitation and terrible programming) by saying that there is "Kryptonite Fog" all over the city.
** A similar example (if better executed and received), ''[[Silent Hill]]'''s fog was originally there to cover up the graphical limitations of the PS. This helped the game's atmosphere so much that the fog (or sometimes snow) was retained long after technical improvements had obviated the need for it.
** ''Spider-Man'' for the PS used the fog as a major plot point. The sequel got around it by having all the rooftop levels at night or dawn.
** ''[[
** The gas zombies in [[Dead Rising 2]] are accompanied by green fog because it makes it easier to render the increased amounts of zombies.
* As indicated above, multiple disc games often make certain areas inaccessable after certain points in the plot, to save on space on each disc. Each disc usually has some big event occur at the end of the disc that will remove access to certain side areas that are no longer useful to the plot in the next disc. It's annoying if you needed a certain item for a side quest, but allowing the developers to not have to try and fit the entire world and everything in it on the last disc, freeing them up some space for ending cutscenes, boss data, and the very definite final dungeon.
* ''[[
** A very eerie example was the lack of the World Trade Center in the New York Skyline. Due to memory limitations, the sections of the skybox including the World Trade Center had to be removed, and the creators justified it saying that they had been destroyed in a terrorist attack before the game started. Keep in the mind that the ''[[Harsher in Hindsight|game came out in 2000.]]'' <ref> It's not ''that'' prescient, mind-- people forget this because 9/11 eclipsed it, but Al Qaeda operatives had already attempted to bring the World Trade Center down in 1993, with a truck bomb.</ref>
** A [[Game Mod]] of the game, ''[[The Nameless Mod]]'', boxes its cities in as well and justifies it with a mention that Forum City is on lockdown due to one of the moderators being kidnapped. The maps are bigger than [[
* ''[[Deus Ex: Invisible War
* ''[[Donkey Kong]]'': The original arcade game had a chubby, mustachioed Mario (then known as Jumpman) wearing a hat and overalls due to technical limitations. The technology at the time would not have been able to show Mario's hair sticking up when he fell, a mustache would be easier to show than a mouth at that resolution, overalls were the only piece of clothing that could also been seen with 1981 graphics, and only square hit boxes were possible. These same traits would latter come to benefit Mario again in his Nintendo64 outings, which have aged considerably better than other early 3D games as a result.
* One of the key traits of ''[[Space Invaders]]'' is how the aliens get faster as you destroy more and more of them. This was originally an unfortunate consequence of the low processing power being choked by the large number of enemies, but the creators liked it and decided to keep it in.
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* Due to technical limitations, the early ''[[Resident Evil]]'' games had a loading screen for each area. The designers took advantage of this by making the loading screen the animation of a door opening. The door, in fact, that the player was entering through.
** In ''[[Resident Evil]] Code: Veronica X'' the developers tried to manufacture this tension, with deliberately delayed door openings accompanied by thudding heartbeat sounds and throbbing rumble controllers.
* The first ''[[Dizzy (
* In ''[[Kingdom of Loathing]]'', after a bug involving an item that took [[Global Currency|meat]] away from players (coupled with the ridiculously high [[Cap]] for meat) screwed up the game's economy, a number of "meat sinks" were introduced to deal with the "bug meat", including the Penguin Mafia and the various goods they offered. Much later in the game, a database error that wiped out several days' progress for many players lead to the introduction of a "Time Arc", in which portals through time started opening up throughout the kingdom.
* In the ''[[Monkey Island]]'' games, [[Honest John's Dealership|Stan]] has an [[Unmoving Plaid]] pattern due to technical reasons in the first game, but it has been kept, even after the series became full-3D (and it required extensive effort to replicate under the conditions) and becoming a plot point in ''Tales'', simply because it is so iconic of Stan.
* With ''[[Metroid]]'', the iconic Morph Ball came into being because the programmers had trouble making an animation of Samus crawling through small passageways. Thus, they made do with a much simpler animation of a rolling ball.
* ''[[Star Fox]]'''s iconic Arwing fighter design was concieved largely because it could be made out of relatively few polygons. In addition, the "fly into the screen" approach was used because of the SNES's strength at drawing 2D backgrounds, further conserving limited processing power. [http://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/#/3ds/starfox/0/1 Full details are provided in this Iwata Asks interview.]
* In ''[[Dragon Age Origins]]'', none of the Qunari had horns although their race is supposed to have them. This was because [[
* The miasma in ''[[Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles]]'' is the driving force of the ''entire game'', but it was originally just designed to keep the whole team on screen at all times. Your party has to carry around a chalice that wards the miasma in its radius, and leaving the ward causes you to take damage, so nobody can wander off, so split-screen isn't necessary, so everyone gets to enjoy [[Scenery Porn]].
* ''[[
* In the ''[[Legacy of Kain]]'' series, the second game ''Soul Reaver'' was much larger during development, which lead to it being an [[Obvious Beta]]. Among other cut content, Raziel's final brother Turel would have been fought, the Human Citadel would have been non-optional and contained a hidden area where the vampire worshipping humans lurked, and the ending was entirely unambiguous, Raziel successfully killing Kain and then activating the Silenced Cathedral to destroy every Vampire in Nosgoth. But the team was running out of time and there was only so much room on the disk, so a lot of content was cut and left out to be included in future games. A definite case of [[Tropes Are Not Bad]] though, because the series would go on to have an amazingly complex [[Kudzu Plot]] centering on Kain and Raziel's trips through time, and likely would have been nowhere near as successful and certainly not as deep or memorable if it had ended with ''Soul Reaver''.
* In the original ''[[Prince of Persia]]'', the game developers wanted to add another character; however, space on the game floppy was limited, and a new character could only be created if it was a [[Palette Swap]] of an existing one. After tinkering a bit, the development team came up with a dark copy of the Prince: the Shadow Prince. This later became central to the game's plot, as {{spoiler|the Shadow Prince is generated when the Prince passes through a magical mirror, and the Prince must rejoin his split self near the finale of the game.}}
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== [[Web Original]] ==
* ''[[Zero Punctuation]]'''s Yahtzee declared that older horror games are more frightening than the newer ones, because the older games had to have "fog" due to technical limitations, and the monsters weren't as well fleshed out, leaving the details up to the viewer's imagination. And when it's up to your subconscious, [[Nothing Is Scarier|it's always scarier]].
{{quote| ''"This was part of ''[[Silent Hill]]'' from the beginning. Konami wanted to make a full-3D survival horror game, but since they were making it on the [[PS 1]] they had to wind back the draw distance to about six inches and make up a story about supernatural fog. Result: instantly iconic horror, and by following the same principle, ''Silent Hill 2'' still looks fantastic despite the [[
** This was part of a column he wrote about several "rules" game developers should follow, one of which was something like "Thou Shalt Always Embrace One's Limitations", which is this trope in a nutshell.
** He also thought that ''[[Driver San Francisco]]'' was all the better for explaining the body-jumping mechanic and all [[Acceptable Breaks From Reality]] as part of Tanner's [[Adventures in Coma Land]]. When a chase ends with the target escaping out of the gameworld's limit, the game [[Lampshade Hanging|hangs a lampshade]] on with Tanner having to make excuses for losing him without saying "He went past the edge of my dreamworld".
* From ''The Furious D Show'', a blog about pop culture and the business behind it, [http://dknowsall.blogspot.com/2010/06/hollywood-babble-on-on-528-curse-of.html Hollywood Babble On & On #528: The Curse of the Dark Castle]
{{quote| ''"I think it was Stephen King who said that horror has to be cheap, because big budgets require big explanations. If a company is spending tens of millions of dollars on special effects, a filmmaker is compelled to show the entire monster in loving detail. That kills the mystery, and with it, the horror. It's actually better to cheap out, because then the filmmakers have to use darkness, and mystery to hide the fact that they're made of rubber and string, hence escalating the potential for horror."''}}
* A music editor decided to make the turrets from ''[[Portal (
* The author of the ''[[
== [[Western Animation]] ==
* Similar to the Pixar example above, ''[[
* ''[[
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