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A rather frustrating form of [[That One Level]] in which the player must make rapid progress to outrun a giant threat. The threat in question can be anything from rising water levels, to giant robots, or, as the name implies, a slowly advancing giant wall lined with all manner of painful things. Other times, there isn't even a visible threat, and the screen simply scrolls on its own. Sometimes going off the screen or contacting the [[Advancing Wall of Doom]] means instant death, at other times, it simply pushes the player forward,over a cliff,or just squishing them to death if necessary.
See also: [[Rise to
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== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* Towards the end of the Impel Down arc in ''[[
== [[Comic Books]] ==
* The anti-matter wave became this for ''[[Crisis
== [[Film]] ==
* The [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIxm3Z7s5ZI death machine] from ''[[Caligula]]''.
* ''[[
** Which turned out to be a couple of goblins on a bike with a giant drill attached to the front.
* ''[[
* The Conductor from ''[[
* ''TRON'' has the Derezzing Wall of Doom that Flynn and Yori must escape from while being trapped on board Sark's Carrier.
* Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia and Chewbacca found themselves trapped between TWO Advancing Walls of Doom in ''[[Star Wars]]'' when they ended up in the Death Star's trash compactor. Fortunately for our heroes, R2-D2 was able to save them.
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== [[Literature]] ==
* The final trap in [[Edgar Allan Poe]]'s ''The Pit and the Pendulum''.
* The wall of fire that Katniss must escape in the arena in Suzanne Collins' ''[[The Hunger Games (
* The Darke Domaine in ''[[
== [[Live Action TV]] ==
* The episode "Starship Mine" of ''[[Star Trek:
** Also near the end of "Remember Me", where Dr. Crusher has to escape the steadily collapsing bubble reality she is trapped in.
* Sometimes the dungeon in ''[[Knightmare]]'' featured this.
* The Japanese [[Game Show]] ''[[
== [[Web Original]] ==
* In the [[
== [[Western Animation]] ==
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** ''[[Castlevania III]]'' has several as well, including one 'rising water' stage, a few auto-scrolling stages towers (one up, one down), and one where the auto-scrolling occurs in noisy "jumps."
** ''Castlevania: The Adventure'' had a level that was ''MADE'' of this trope. Stage 3, Death Fair, featured a corridor where you had to destroy giant screws to keep the spiked ceiling from crushing you, a tower up which you had to slowly climb via ropes while being chased by a spiked floor, and finally another corridor where you had to outrun a spiked wall while killing enemies and balancing over bottomless pits. A [[Scrappy Level]] if there ever was one.
** ''[[Castlevania Rondo of Blood]]'' has the Behemoth chase you through part of Stage 2. The scenario gets repeated in ''[[Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin]]'' (which is not only the direct storyline sequel to ''[[Castlevania Bloodlines]]'' - quite a nice bit of irony there - but also a ''[[Metroidvania]]'' game.)
* ''[[Kid Chameleon]]'': The "Hills of the Warrior" level (pictured above). Especially bad because the giant wall of doom seems to have fairly strong [[Rubber Band AI]].
** Also a "feature" in two other levels. One is a series of timed block puzzles, and the other gives you a rather unwieldy tank to try (and fail) at navigating the level with.
** A [[Scrappy Level]] late in the game has an [[Advancing Wall of Doom]] that ends with a choice between top route and bottom route. If you pick the wrong one, "too bad!", there's a big wall, forcing you to die and start the level from the beginning.
** The difficulty spike represented by these levels (especially Hills of the Warrior, which was the first AWOD level, and Bloody Swamp, which was just plain goddamn sadistic), coupled with their music, can push them very close to the border of horror territory. Have a listen to [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVUsON3By08&feature=related this] and tell me you wouldn't be soiling yourself if you were fleeing a +9000 Wall of Meat Grinding to the tune of this little number.
* Viy in ''[[
* ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
** Then there's the room in the Shadow Temple with ''two'' spiked walls that want to crush you.
** ''[[Twilight Princess]]'' has a puzzle variation, where you have to move blocks to get the height to leap off a ledge before a wall of flame reaches you.
* There's also one or two death traps like this in ''Nightshade'', a game that spoofed 30s supernatural noir.
* In Taito's ''[[Rainbow Islands]]'' the player must keep above the rising water of Doom.
* ''[[
== [[Action Game]] ==
* ''[[God of War (
* ''[[Gunstar Super Heroes]]'' has the File Crasher. If you get caught by it, it, um... erases your file. {{spoiler|Actually, it only ''claims'' it will erase your save file, and even then only in the original Japanese version.}}
* ''[[Inspector Gadget]]: Operation Madkactus'' had quickly rising water in World 2-2, which invoked [[Super Drowning Skills]]. In the final mission, the wall of doom was the vehicle. There were also a [[Scrappy Mechanic]] that made jumps more annoying.
* Justified in any ''[[
** The same goes for outrunning the water flooding the mineshaft in the second movie.
* ''Spider-Man''/''X-Men'' for the Super Nintendo had, in Gambit's first level, a gigantic spikey ball of doom, slowly crushing everything in his path.
** Wolverine's first level had [[The Juggernaut]] serving this same purpose.
* One of the later levels of ''[[Strider
* In ''[[Star Wars]]: The Clone Wars'' (a game that came out with the movie and featured mostly vehicle combat), there is a level where the player has to outrun the purple wave of death created by the Sith Harvester (ball shaped thing that absorbs the force from living things and stores it or some such thing).
* In the PC version of ''[[The Fairly Odd Parents]]: Breakin' Da Rules!'', one level has Timmy travel to the past and meet the younger-aged version of Vicky and Tootie's mom (named Nicky here), who romantically pursues him though the stage. The fact that she's the future mother of his nemesis and his [[Stalker
== [[Beat'Em Up]] ==
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* [[First Encounter Assault Recon|F3AR]] features a cooperative [[Advancing Wall of Doom]] mode, appropriately entitled ''[[Precision F-Strike|F**king Run!]]'', in which a massive black cloud rushes at you throughout the level. Naturally, getting caught in this cloud is [[One-Hit Kill|instantly fatal.]]
* A few custom ''[[Doom]]'' levels give the same effect as an AWOD by having the player chased through a maze of [[Insurmountable Waist-Height Fence|Insurmountable Waist Height Fences]] by either [[Exploding Barrels]] or revenants' homing missiles.
* ''[[
== [[MMORPG|MMORPGs]] ==
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== [[Party Game]] ==
* Some minigames in ''[[
== [[Platform Game]] ==
* ''[[
* Towards the end of the Sega Genesis version of ''[[
* In ''Blade Kitten'', Kit has to outrun an Advancing [[Kaiju]] of Doom called Acland at the halfway mark. Every so often, she has to stop and wait for it to smash through the floors so that she can proceed. If she is hit by the monster's large claws during the fixed-scrolling portions, it's usually instant death.
* ''[[
* The first ''[[Crash Bandicoot]]'' game had levels where you have to run from a giant boulder. The worst part being that you're running ''towards'' the camera, making obstacle dodging and box collecting very much a process of [[Trial And Error]].
** These levels even carried over to other games of the series, where you run away from such things as giant polarbears, dinosaurs and [[Outrun the Fireball|tsunamis]].
*** And a walrus.
* ''[[
* This is ''[[Dino Run]]'''s entire concept. It manages to still be fun because:
## You can get caught up in the doom wall and still escape with your life, and in fact can get bonuses for doing so, and
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** {{spoiler|It's actually the avatar of Yog-Sothoth.}}
* ''[[Donkey Kong Country]]'' has levels set in an ancient temple, where large spinning stone wheels will chase you.
** ''[[Donkey Kong Country Returns]]'' has one of the most horrifying examples of this trope: a level where you're being chased by [[Wave of Babies|a cascading "wall" made up of thousands of]] [[Big Creepy
*** Subverted in a later level. Near the end, a wave of lava chases you for a short time, but no matter what you do, it won't reach you and will be left behind. It's more of a psychological obstacle and [[Scenery Porn]] than anything else.
*** A rare cross-dimensional example in the beach, where you can see waves [[Depth Perplexion|come from the background and wash everything in the game area off the stage]].
* ''[[
* ''[[
* ''Jak II'' plays homage to its [[Crash Bandicoot]] roots in one scene where you flee a giant boulder through an underground tomb playing as Daxter. {{spoiler|The boulder is revealed to be a giant spider egg.}}
** A similarly hairy chase sequence occurs towards the end of the game where you must run from a giant centipede - this time away from the camera rather than towards it.
* ''[[Jurassic Park]] Rampage Edition'' has a flood variation of this trope in the cargo ship level.
* From the ''[[Kirby]]'' series:
** ''[[
** ''[[
** ''[[
** The alternate dimensions in ''[[Kirbys Return to Dream Land]]'', made worse by obstacles blocking your path that required a Super Inhale.
*** Not as bad in Return to Dreamland in that the wall of doom moves SO slowly, and that after using a super inhale, you can spit the resulting star at the wall of doom to beat it back.
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* ''[[Little Big Planet]]'' has the {{spoiler|Skulldozer, a giant skeletal machine designed to destroy everything in its path.}} Oh, and it emits an infinite supply of Horrible Gas that dissolves player characters. Not too long afterwards, you are sent running from a giant flaming boulder.
* ''[[Marble Madness]]'' implemented this wall in two player games, and only advances it when the players go through the track. If one player moved quickly enough and the second player lagged behind, the slow player is teleported forward and loses 5 seconds.
* There are also two auto-scrolling segments in Dr. Cossack Stage 3 in ''[[
** ''[[
** [[ROM Hack]] ''[[Rock Man 4 Minus Infinity]]'' has a ''very'' fast wall in Dust Man's stage.
* ''[[Metal Storm]]'' for the NES has one of these in level 5, but it's so slow that it'll only catch you if you're deliberately waiting.
* ''[[
* ''[[Rocket Knight Adventures]]'' has a few of them:
** A sort of a maze/descending ceiling hybrid in the middle of Stage 5. This gets extra tough when you consider that rocketing around, your primary means of moving fast, has ricochet. Very easy to bounce yourself right back under the crusher...
** The fifth boss has [[Evil Counterpart|Axle Gear]] coming after you in a giant robot. However, this level redeems itself from being a total [[Scrappy Level]] because you get your OWN giant robot at the end of it, making it one of the few [[Advancing Wall of Doom]] levels where you get to fight back, in rock'em-sock'em style even!
* In ''[[Rosenkreuzstilette]]'', you have the Cross Wall, which will move menacingly towards you. Like the example above and the Mecha Dragon from ''[[
* The Genesis ''[[
** In [[Sonic the Hedgehog (
** In Angel Island Zone, Act 2 of ''[[Sonic 3 and Knuckles
** On the other hand, the advancing brick wall in the very next level -- the beginning of Act 2 of [[Underwater Ruins|Hydrocity]] Zone -- was pretty darn nerve-wracking.
** Then there's the section in Marble Garden Zone where an earthquake starts bringing the land and the ceiling together and you have run like hell before your escape window is closed and you're crushed between the two.
** In ''[[Sonic 3 and Knuckles
** Then in the ''next'' level, Act 2 of Sandopolis Zone had several areas where throwing a switch would cause sand to pour from the ceiling, and the sand would form a floor rising from below. With the winding passageways of the level, you could easily get crushed between the sand and the ceiling if you dawdled.
** Yet again, the Death Egg Zone [[Final Boss]] isn't really an Advancing Wall of Doom, but sorta becomes one if you die on your first try (there's no place to get rings on subsequent attempts). He pretty easy though, it's the run afterward thats tough as you have to stay ahead of a collapsing platform and hit the fleeing Robotnik at the same time.
** And then there's the pachinko-themed bonus levels, in which you collect powerups while outrunning a glowing double helix that crawls steadily upward.
** ''[[Sonic
** ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 (
** ''[[
*** In the Ocean Palace level (the first level), there's a section where you run from one...then two...then ''three'' gigantic, ornately carved stone wheels. Apparently created and placed there for no reason other than to harass anyone who should happen upon that particular hill.
** The Master System ''Sonic The Hedgehog'' had a version during Jungle Zone Act 2. Most of the level is a vertical climb. The camera followed you up the level, but not downwards. If you fell and hit the bottom of the screen during that section it was instant death time. The near identical Game Gear version didn't have this, I'd guess because it would've made the level stupidly hard with the Game Gear's lower resolution.
** ''[[
*** Lost Labyrinth Act 3 also has a wall of doom, but it's much shorter.
** The last level of [[
** This is the entire premise of the ''SegaSonic the Hedgehog'' arcade game. One of these is always after you, be it lava, ice stalactites, tornadoes, or gears.
* ''Stargirl and the Thief from the Exploded Moon'' has two. The second makes is much more annoying, since it randomly stops the scrolling for one of its attacks, either causing you to either miss a planned jump or throw the bomb just short of its hitbox.
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** ... a later boss filled the whole space between the floor and the ceiling, advancing inexorably. You had to throw eggs to pound its jello body until its heart was exposed, then shooting its heart. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBH2fw9jO1o&feature=channel_page Quite stressful].
** ...the [[Genre Shift]] [[Final Boss|final]] [[Make My Monster Grow|boss]], [[Turns Red|on its last hit]]: it just [[Self-Destructive Charge|runs toward the screen]] and must be [[For Massive Damage|hit in the mouth]] before it [[Collision Damage|touches you]]... [[Failure Is the Only Option|not that it would matter]], because it simultaneously destroys [[Above the Ruins|what's left of the final castle]], leaving only a [[Bottomless Pit]]. [[We Only Have One Chance|You only get one chance]]. Video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjwLnUSoaig&hl=fr here].
** ''[[
* ''[[
* ''[[
** The Wii game has such a wall of doom in the first level of world 8, with a giant wall of smoke/fire coming from behind Mario. Oddly enough, it's actually too slow for a whole lot of people to notice its existence.
*** It's actually a Pyroclastic Flow, which are known in real life to ''vaporize'' anything not-burned that gets engulfed in them. It's a bit of realism that touching it is an instant death. Major props to Nintendo for making a creative and somewhat realistic [[Advancing Wall of Doom]].
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* ''Taz: Escape From Mars'' has the Moleworld drilling machine.
* The ''[[Tomb Raider]]'' series is chock full of spiked walls/ceilings that are too eager to impale and crush Lara. A secret room in the first level of ''3'' is guarded by such a spiked wall of doom.
* ''[[
* An extremely annoying version can be seen in [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3fPfDgm1SE&feature=channel_page this] ''VIP Mario 4'' video by [[Raocow]] in the Temple of Homing level, where the entire second half the level is trying desperately to outrun a homing missile at top speed, including flight.
* The indie game ''[[
* The first ''[[
* ''X-Men: Mutant Apocalypse'' opted for the pursuing wall of lava approach, first horizontally, then vertically. Made even nastier by random walls dropping into your path that had to be destroyed. This, in turn, made the section nearly impossible for some characters (while others, such as Wolverine, could plow through with relative ease)
* Taken to its logical conclusion with a giant 30 foot high [[Super Mario Bros.|Mario]] that destroys everything in its path in this video of the aptly named [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvKAE6E8To8&feature=channel_page The Mario] by raocow.
* ''[[The Legendary Starfy]]'' (the localized one) featured a series of stages in which fire chased our five-armed hero upwards. Touching it meant losing a heart and restarting that bit of the stage.
* ''[[
** The first game has an interesting variation, which can't really be explained very well verbally. See [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3anfBkIcn0&fmt=18 here], about 2:25 in.
** ''[[Rayman Origins]]'' requires the protagonist/s to outrun an advancing wall of evil red fish in one of the swimming levels.
* In the Titus game ''Prehistorik 2'', one level has you platforming your way down a giant hollow tree. The screen steadily goes down and if you go completely off the top, ''or'' fall to the bottom before another platform appears, you die.
** The SNES version ''[[Prehistorik Man]]'' has no slow-descending level, but it has [[Rise to
* The Flash game [http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/582472 Discount Mayonnaise] ([[Word Salad Title|yes, really]]) uses a [[Sand Worm]].
== [[Puzzle Game]] ==
* In ''[[
** Even weirder, (bigger spoiler) {{spoiler|since the whole level is actually playing in reverse of what "really" happened, the wall is actually ''The Future receding into the past.'' Cross the barrier between present and future and you enter the oblivion of what hasn't happened yet.}}
* ''[[Henry Hatsworth in
== [[Real Time Strategy]] ==
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** ''One'' square? Try ''three'' to your ''one''. That's why you can't merely pace the stuff. Unless I'm recalling it wrongly?
*** In the Test of Speed, the solution is to enter combat mode, where you get about six steps to its three. Made a little harder by the goblins you have to fight in the tunnels.
* ''[[
** ''[[
** ''[[
*** Or you can avoid the wall altogether by equipping the Fairy Shoes, which lets you teleport instead of walk, thus you can attack the wall from behind and it can't move backwards.
**** It has a spell called Telega which teleports the target in front of the wall (and inflict Immobilize).
** ''[[
** One word: Tonberries.
* The mining equipment in Armored Armadillo's stage in ''[[
** The same cannot be said of the advancing wall of ''magma'' in Area K of ''[[
* In ''[[Secret of Mana]]'', there's a particular boss that you have to fight, whilst trapped in a room, that's a wall that slowly pushes you towards a pit of spikes on the other side of the room. Not defeating it in time means game over.
* ''[[Valkyria Chronicles]]'' features a mission where Squad 7 must divert the Marmota, the Imperials' ''battleship-sized tank'' into a detour. At the end of each turn, the Marmota would advance downwards on the map, decimating anything it ran over. If any of Squad 7 is unfortunate enough to be caught underneath the Marmota, they were not only instantly incapacitated, but instantly killed with no chance of a medic rescue.
* In ''[[
** The Cryomancer has an attack that is nearly identical, though it also freezes the squares it affects.
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* ''[[Gears of War]] 2'' is full of these in the level "Intestinal Fortitude," which is set {{spoiler|inside the Riftworm.}} The Gears are trying to find a way out and to kill [[The Dragon]]'s giant pet. At one point they have to avoid a "Debris Wall" or get crushed. Later in the level, while chainsawing {{spoiler|the Riftworm's cardiovascular arteries (or whatever they are)}}, you have to do it quickly and then escape the room before the rising water {{spoiler|actually blood}} drowns you.
== [[Turn
* ''[[Advance Wars]]: Days of Ruin'' had a map where you had to get at least one allied (uncontrollable) unit to an allied city which was on the other side of two Laser Walls. Behind you follows a whole army, who can deploy new units (you can't) and outnumbers you from the start. Your strongest unit is uncontrollable and works as a temporary wall (until it's destroyed).
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