The Demon Rush

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The Demon Rush is a PC RPG made in 2008 by Dragoon Entertainment, A.K.A The D. It is about a conflict between humans and demons called the Demon Rush, which has been going on for three years by the start of the game. However, a new breakthrough may put an end to the war. The city of Tiriad has built the S.S. Pursuit, the first spacecraft created in the Mittu System. This ship may be able to find the power needed to end the war. However, the mission goes awry, leaving two soldiers stranded on a distant planet.

The game gained some notoriety when the creator advertised it on the Something Awful forums, selling it for $20. Most Goons who saw the thread felt this was too high, and the price was eventually lowered to $10, and then made free in December of 2010.

The game has a cult following thanks to its simplistic graphics and character art, catchy music, and the plot's mixture of familiar JRPG conventions with strange and unexpected twists. Mikwuyma did a live broadcast of the experience, recorded in these two very long videos. You can download it for yourself here.

Tropes used in The Demon Rush include:

• Absurdly High Level Cap: A strange example. While levels cap at 8, it takes many fights to get there, due to the fact that most enemies (including several bosses) give out low amounts of EXP.
• Aerith and Bob: On one hand, you've got Cherry Venus, Sect Mawashun, and Brooks Cracktackle. On the other, you've got Jimmy, Joe, and Steve.
• Animesque
• Anti-Grinding: Higher leveled characters gain no experience from fighting weak enemies.
• Arbitrary Headcount Limit: You can only have 3 characters fighting at once. This is averted in the penultimate battle, though; all available party members will fight against the Possessor.
• Armor Is Useless: Despite being the only PC with visible armor, Knight is actually a Squishy Wizard.
• Awesome McCoolname: Pretty much everyone, but especially Brooks Cracktackle.
• Big Damn Heroes: Anna, Evif and some yellow guys save the heroes from DEST in the end cutscene.
• Bonus Dungeon: Once you get the airship, you can visit several of them.
• Chrome Champion: The Enforcer dons a metal sheen when you fight him.
• Cool Shades: Cook.
• Defend Command: Reduces damage taken by 90%. Quite useful. It's even better during extremes, as defending will restore 25% of the character's maximum health and MP.
• Duel Boss: Tara fights alone against the zombified Fleming, stating this is something she's got to do herself.
• Egopolis: Thormia's self-titled planet.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Knight.
• Evilutionary Biologist: E. N. Fleming.
• Face Heel Turn: Cook in the ending.
• Faceless Goons: Most non-boss enemies.
• Fun with Acronyms:
  • DEST stands for DEcide to Support Tomorrow.
  • Tratas stands for The Resistance Against The Absolute Siphon.
• Gameplay Story Segregation: Averted in a very strange instance early in the game where two characters ask a Guest Star Party Member why he didn't gain experience points at the end of a battle.
• Global Rocket: You eventually get the S.S. Pursuit, which can travel between Earth and Thormia, and land anywhere.
• Half Human Hybrids: The Legend Vipers are half human and half Viper, and each control a planet.
• Happily Adopted: While Cook very awkwardly introduces Claire as his adopted daughter, Claire makes no indication that she feels her family as being anything but. There is that matter of keeping her original last name, though...
• Heel Face Turn: Tara, who before the turn was better known as Argentia. This is fully cemented when the people she worked for kidnap her entire town and turn her daughter into a monster, whom she has to kill herself.
• Hello, Insert Name Here: Though, despite being a computer game, you can't just type it in. You have to select each letter like a console game.
• Identical Stranger: Alberto mentions early on how much Claire resembles his dead girlfriend Amy. Also, a likely unintentional example—Thormia's Half-Human Hybrid son Redfast looks exactly like Cherry Venus, down to the same outfit.
• In the Blood: At the end of the game, despite having heroic intentions up to that point, Cook could not resist the urge to fuse with the Absolute Siphon. From what little can be gathered from the story, Legend Vipers are Exclusively Evil.
• Killed Off for Real: Brooks Cracktackle.
  • Tara can also be permanently killed if you lose the Duel Boss fight against zombified Fleming.
• Lady Not-Appearing-In-This-Trailer: Tara is deliberately not mentioned in any capacity in the manual or promos for the game.
• Limit Break: Extreme mode, which increases a character's power and defense, and they recover HP and MP when defending.
• MacGuffin: The Absolute Siphon.
• No Budget: Doubly subverted. The game had a budget of around $1,500. Part of that was for a game engine (which ultimately went unused), while the rest was for professional grade music composition software (which was misused).
• Obligatory Swearing: Alberto. His sister Anna manages to outdo him.
• One-Winged Angel
• Only Six Faces: One for humans and one for dragons (seeing Pound's maternal family takes Identical Grandson to a whole 'nother level).
• Our Dragons Are Different: Legend Vipers, who can take human form.
• Our Souls Are Different: They're called siphons, and there is an Absolute Siphon.
• Post End Game Content: There are several challenges after beating the main game, available from the main menu.
• Preexisting Encounters: One of the game's main claims to fame is this. However, there are so many encounters littering the dungeons that Random Encounters would almost be preferable.
• Rouge Angles of Satin: Alberto is once described as wearing a "durag".
• Scaled Up: Thormia turns into a dragon for the later fights with him.
• Schizo-Tech: There are somehow spaceships and terraforming devices in 1918.
• She Is Not My Girlfriend: Alberto in the epilogue, referring to Tara.
• Sword of Plot Advancement: Archrip, the holy sword of Thormia. It has the power to split siphons.
• Terraforming: About half of Thormia's surface is taken up by the Devil's Playground, created by Thormia himself.
• The Dragon: The Enforcer, to Thormia.
• The Reveal: Knight is Sect Mawashun, the man who stole Earth's holy sword.
• The Unfought: You never fight the Absolute Siphon-infused Cook.
• The Vamp: The backstory for the Legend Vipers reveals that Diamo would often seduce the other Legend Vipers to create many babies, which she would absorb to gain power.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Alberto and Cherry.
• Unfortunate Names: Cherry Venus. Good name for a porn star, bad name for an RPG heroine.
• Weapon of Choice
  • An Axe to Grind: Tara.
  • Good Old Fisticuffs: Alberto.
  • Heroes Prefer Swords: Cherry.
  • Knife Nut: Claire.
  • Precision-Guided Boomerang: Cook.
  • Sinister Scythe: Knight.
  • The Gunslinger: Brooks.
• Video Game Characters:
  • Fragile Speedster: Claire, whose poor stat growth renders her a borderline Joke Character. However, her Poison Dart works on bosses, and, due to their high HP, deals a lot of damage over time. Also, her Extreme mode ability allows her to poison all enemies. Perhaps Lethal Joke Character?
  • Glass Cannon: Knight (despite wearing full body armor). Brooks Cracktackle by default has a high attack power, but his other stats start off low.
  • Jack of All Stats: Cherry Venus has balanced stat growth and has skills that can deal massive damage, heal, and block attacks.
  • Lightning Bruiser: Cook.
  • Master of None: Jimmy.
  • Mighty Glacier: Tara, although she does have a skill that increases her movement speed.
  • Stone Wall: Alberto, who is also a Combat Medic who can double the power of his healing spells and whose Extreme Mode ability heals all allies.