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The Very Definitely Final Dungeon: Difference between revisions
The Very Definitely Final Dungeon (view source)
Revision as of 08:10, 7 September 2014
, 9 years ago+Category:CRPG Tropes
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{{quote|''"This door just'' screams ''endgame."''|Shiki, [[The World Ends With You]]}}
A video game with any sort of combat (and a few without) can be expected to end with a dramatic [[Final Boss]] battle. Console [[Role Playing Game|Role Playing Games]] in particular tend to be downright obsessed with epic final showdowns. This clash needs an appropriate venue. Some get away with an ordinary castle, [[Elaborate Underground Base]] or the like, but that real twang takes a place that might as well bear the words "'''FINAL CONFRONTATION HERE'''" in spiky laser-shooting letters three hundred feet high.
It could be the [[Evil Tower of Ominousness|tallest of spires]] or the highest of mountains. It could be outside the world entirely, or in the distant past. In a [[Scavenger World]], it's a fully armed and operational [[Ominous Floating Castle|battlestation]] [[And Man Grew Proud|from legend]]. Often it's the very [[Weapon of Mass Destruction]] the [[Big Bad]] wants. In any case, it embodies the words "Serious business," and just entering it can merit an FMV or a [[Boss Battle]] (on the first try; from there on, it's easy as pie). Extra credit if it forms/arises/descends/erupts just when everything seemed all right, if it's [[Malevolent Architecture|more dangerous than would be allowed for any real place]], and if it has a [[I Don't Like the Sound of That Place|pretentious, overblown name.]]
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** The same goes for the Chaotic Realm in ''[[Aria of Sorrow]]'', except the Chaotic Realm map doesn't even display.
** The {{spoiler|Inverted Castle}} in ''[[Symphony of the Night]]''.
** In ''[[Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia|Order of Ecclesia]]'', {{spoiler|Dracula's Castle itself}} becomes this.
* In ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask]]'' the final dungeon, set within a terrifying grimacing moon, appears to be a beautiful field containing a single tree with children playing around it. [[Creepy Child|Children wearing the masks of all the bosses.]]
** While ''Majora's Mask'' definitely leads the series in this most of the other games aren't slackers though. ''[[Ocarina of Time]]'' is probably one of the best examples of this, with the transformation of Hyrule Castle into Ganon's Tower, a giant black monolith floating over a sea of lava. Twilight Princess also has the immense Hyrule Castle, which is this time sealed in a force field for most of the game and is visible almost anywhere in the overworld. Although in the end bits of the final battle take place outside the castle as well.
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* The last stage of ''[[Gungrave]]'' is reached through an incredibly tall elevator which dwarfs the city it extends from. In stark contrast to the urban crime drama of the rest of the game, is an ancient floating temple with crystals hovering around, populated with blue-skinned monsters which look remotely human at best. And no, the game doesn't explain where it came from. There is an explanation, but [[All There in the Manual|it isn't in the game, it's in the artbooks]].
** The last stage of the sequel takes place in the "basement" of a previous stage (The Laboratory). Said "basement" is really {{spoiler|The Methuselah Starship, an alien craft that crash-landed on the planet hundreds of years ago, and the very place where the technology necessary in engineering the Seed and Necrolyzation Projects originated from.}} Again, it makes more sense if you read the [[Concept Art Gallery|art]] [[All There in the Manual|book]].
* ''[[Ninja Gaiden]] II'' could be said to have invented this trope: during many of the game's cutscenes, you could see the final tower in the background, and after beating one stage, you see the tower in question in a final cutscene before actually entering it. However partially subverted in that the REAL final battle takes place in a hell dimension inside the tower.
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** To top that, the recently released REACH ends with a firefight taking place on a platform overlooking the {{spoiler|yet-to-depart Pillar of Autumn in the far distance.}} {{spoiler|After firing the MAC at a dozen or so Phantoms and destroying the [[BFG|glassing laser]] on the Covenant cruiser}}, Noble 6 is then {{spoiler|left behind in a foggy wasteland as endless and increasingly difficult waves of soldiers [[Last Stand|advance]] [[It Has Been an Honor|to take]] [[Dying Moment of Awesome|you down]].}}
** [[Halo: Combat Evolved]] has {{spoiler|the crashed Pillar of Autumn. [[Book Ends|Also where the game began]].}}
** ''Halo 2'' ended at the building that housed Delta Halo's control room. You fight a lot of Brutes, and then you get to the control room itself where the [[Final Boss]] takes place.
* The final part of ''[[The Darkness]]'' has you on a island with a lighthouse where the lighthouse is the where the final fight takes place. The area begins in full daylight, which as it's light you loose you powers, but soon after a solar eclipse happens, making the being inside you extremely powerful... for some reason, who then subverts this trope by destroying everything and body in a mile radius.
* ''[[STALKER|S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl]]'' ends inside the Chernobyl nuclear power plant itself, the location you've spent/struggled the entire game trying to reach.
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== [[Mecha Game]] ==
* ''[[Super Robot Wars Compact]]'''s final two levels takes in the [[Chars Counterattack|Asteroid Colony Axis]] about to [[Colony Drop|drop to the Earth]] because of [[Daitarn 3|Don Zauser and Koros]].
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** Classic [[WoW]] had final dungeon duties divided between two dungeons, which were on the opposite sides of the map to each other, aptly enough.
** At the northern end of the Eastern Kingdoms, located in the heart of the blighted plaguelands, we had Naxxramas, a vast floating necropolis. Home to Kel'thuzad, Dragon to the Lich King, Naxxramas featured never-before-seen monsters, bosses that tested raids like never before, buckets of horror, Nintendo Hard dificulty...oh, and K.T's pet cat, Mr Bigglesworth. It was such a good dungeon that Blizzard had it return as the entry-level raid for Wrath of the Lich King.
** And at the southern end of Kalimdor, deep in the deserts of Silithus, we have Ahn'Qiraj. Part blasphemous temple, part insect hive, and home to an [[Eldritch Abomination]] who whispered disturbing messages to the raid group. Sealed up by ancient protectors millenia ago, players have to undergo a massive quest chain that takes them all over the world to re-open it and bring death to the horrors inside.
*** Ahn'Qiraj was probably the hardest and most awe inspiring dungeon of Vanilla WOW. Populated by enough insectiod aberrations to wipe out several armies and reinforced by gargantuan colossi that were made in the image of one of the most terrifying [[Eldrich Abominations]] in the WOW universe, just opening the gates required a quest chain that took you to some of the longest and most challenging raids of the time and resulted in a world event that simulated a several day long war between the entire server and the denizens of the dungeon. The actual area was split into two regions each with about a dozen extremely hard bosses while the final boss of the forty man raid was completely UNKILLABLE until Blizzard scaled down the difficulty from impossible and fixed a few bugs. The actual mechanics of C'thun's fight could scale the damage to points that reached the tens of millions and massacre half a raid in a second.
* While there still is some way to go until the players reach Mordor, which most likely will be the very final dungeon, in ''[[The Lord of the Rings Online]]'' you will notice when you're at the conclusion for the storyline you're currently following. While Angmar itself felt like this from the start, that storyline didn't end until the final chapter, seven updates after the game launched. The Moria/Mirkwood storyline doesn't end until the players get to Dol Guldur, one of Sauron's fortresses. For raiders, the final challenge is climbing the fortress all the way to the highest tower, where they face one of the Nazgul and it's flying steed. Speculation is that the latest storyline will end at Isengard.
== [[Platform Game]] ==
* ''[[Mega Man Zero]] 4'': The Ragnarok orbital cannon, falling from space and burning its way into the atmosphere, with only two minutes provided to defeat the final boss of the entire series. [[Nintendo Hard]] indeed.
* ''[[Mega Man X]] 4'' is a partial exception--the [[Kill Sat]] on which the last battle takes place is a superweapon that X (or Zero) is trying to stop.
** ''X2'' subverts this hard. After completing 4 levels in the North Pole, you see the [[The Dragon|X-Hunters']] base utterly destroyed. So where does X teleport into? Bizarrely enough, Magna Centipede's stage, or just the opening half, replacing [[That One Boss|the annoying sword]] with {{spoiler|possibly Zero and}} Sigma. In fact, going to Magna Centipede's stage at that point in time (rather than selecting Sigma) will still make it the closing level.
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** In the Sonic Game Gear game, you chase the boss from what appears to be the final area to {{spoiler|his flying base}}
* In ''[[Prince of Persia]]: The Two Thrones'', the final battle occurs at the top of the Tower of Babel, which provides a panoramic view of ancient Babylon on your way up.
** Additionally, the battle with the [[Big Bad]] at the top of the tower is followed by an epilogue of sorts where you chase the game's ''other'' [[Big Bad]] through a weird landscape of swirling mists, neon platforms, strange perspective tricks, and an occasional flash of a scene from the previous Prince of Persia games. Finally, you confront him in a room where the decor is dominated by... [[Title Drop|a pair of elegant thrones.]]
* The rest of the ''[[Metroid]]'' games are no slouches either:
** The original ''Metroid'' had Tourian, home of both the Mother Brain and the only place you'll find the titular Metroids.
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** In fairness, the expansion pack (and sequel) show that it wasn't the only Temple of Nod. It later becomes a standard building for Nod. Then the third game reveals that there is Temple '''Prime'''... [[Disc One Final Dungeon|Which gets besieged (three times, by different forces) and blown up by a]] [[Kill Sat]] [[Disc One Final Dungeon|in the middle of both campaigns.]] [[Xanatos Gambit|exactly what Kane wanted.]]
** Similarly the final missions of Tiberium Wars certainly feel like a final dungeon. You start off the campaign in the Blue zones either containing Nod insurgents or causing havoc as Nod, where the tiberium levels are low and contained. Then the action moves into the yellow zones as the fight is taken to Nod's front door, where tiberium proliferates and structures are all dilapidated. The final levels take place deep in red zones, where tiberium contamination is so high there are whole glaciers of the stuff and the blasted landscape looks more alien than anything, and that's besides the gigantic,glowing towers.
** Kane's Wrath features one where the [[Oh Crap]] meter boinks the roof. The enemy will spare no expense towards your destruction and you are awarded by Kane all three Nod Factions for use in the mission, allowing you to build three super weapons (normally restricted to one) and all of their units. There's also a count down timer to doom hanging over your head, with the Tacitus going ever more critical the longer you drag your feet.
== [[Roguelike]] ==
* In both ''[[Pokémon Mystery Dungeon]]'' games, the final dungeons both involve some sort of [[It's All Upstairs From Here|floating tower]]. You can tell that they are the final dungeons because 1) They're ''floating'' towers, 2) They have the epic "this is going to be our final journey" music, and 3) Both dungeons are located disturbingly far away from civilization and many NPCs are telling you that you must not fail or else the world is [[Doomy Dooms of Doom|doomed]] before you head out.
** The [[True Final Boss|real bad guy]] however isn't fought in tower. He is fought in crater. Which is by [[That One Level|itself hard]].
* The final level of ''[[Nethack]]'' is the Astral Plane (AKA Heaven) where you battle swarms of hostile angels and the {{spoiler|other three}} [[Horsemen of the Apocalypse]].
* Similarly, ADOM has the final battle ({{spoiler|with an [[Eldritch Abomination|Elder God]] no less}}) take place in the realm of primal Chaos.
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** [[Final Fantasy X|Some sort of crazy dimension]] {{spoiler|inside Sin, though the game does a fake out with Zanarkand looking like the end.}}.
*** [[Final Fantasy X 2|The Farplane]].
** ''[[Final Fantasy XI]]'' gets special mention because of having ''several'' of these dungeons, all [[The Very Definitely Final Dungeon]] of their storylines. Such examples are the Shadowlord's Castle for the original storyline, {{spoiler|the floating Zilart city of Tu'Lia}} in ''Rise of The Zilart'', and {{spoiler|the Zilart ''Capital'' of Al'Taieu... in ''another dimension''}} in ''Chains of Promathia'', which also has the very last boss fight take place {{spoiler|''Above Vana'Diel!''}} Yes, the FFXI teams love being over-the-top, why do you ask?
*** Special mention to the final fight in the ''Treasures of Aht Urghan'' expansion where you fight {{spoiler|a newly summoned [[Light Is Not Good|Alexander]] inside the giant shell of his previous summon.}} Although you don't have to fight your way there and you could enter the area before that, it is still kind of freaky.
*** The VDFD for ''Wings of the Goddess'' has not been unveiled yet, though it seems it may be in the next story update. Players have been given glimpses of a fragmented town suspended in ethereal space with a massive maw in the "sky" over it. There is also the continuing hope that this expansion will finally grant players access to the Marquisette of Tavnazia, the city destroyed in the intro fmv.
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** And let us not forget that 2 takes you to the living heart of the planet through an inverted spiral tower that stretches on for deities know how long full of its own mini-bosses, and 4 takes you to a deranged, ARM-particle-infested Alcatraz overgrown with crystal and bizzare ARM mutants, with its own Load Bearing Final Boss... Hurr.
* Subverted in ''[[Phantasy Star]]''; King Lassic's tower of Baya Malay is at first glance the Very Definitely Final Dungeon, until you reach its peak and discover it's merely the gateway to King Lassic's ''invisible flying city''. The game then subverts the trope the second time when, after finishing the dungeon and killing Lassic, the ''real'' final dungeon turns out to be an unimpressive catacomb beneath Paseo, where the [[Giant Space Flea From Nowhere]] has taken up residence.
* The other games in the ''[[Phantasy Star]]'' series, however, usually play it straight: The control center for the entire solar system, an ancient city, the other side of a dimensional prison, etc...
* Soltis in ''[[Skies of Arcadia]]'' is a whole continent, but fits this trope perfectly. It appears ominously from [[Where It All Began|the happiest and lowest-level area in the game]], raising up dark clouds and the game's strongest monsters with it to change everything around. Everybody in the world automatically fears it, even when they can't see it. It was the original home of the [[Crystal Spires and Togas]] civilization that bore the [[Mysterious Waif]] and [[White-Haired Pretty Boy]], and {{spoiler|inside is the power to [[The End of the World as We Know It|destroy the world]].}}
* ''[[Baten Kaitos]]: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean'' had Cor Hydrae, the ancient castle of Malpercio currently floating in the middle of a dimensional rift.
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** But none of them can beat the spinoff game ''[[Shin Megami Tensei]]: Digital Devil Saga: Avatar Tuner 2''. The final dungeon of that game is {{spoiler|the afterlife, after all the main characters have died and Serph and Sera have fused into a superbeing on the way.}} Oh, and {{spoiler|the afterlife is inside the sun, and the reason they're going there is to speak to God and convince him to stop destroying the world.}}
*** Also, {{spoiler|the inside of the sun is apparently purple and kind of sparkly. Looks pretty, though.}}
** How about [[Strange Journey]]? While the entire game takes place in the Schwarzelt, the final sector, {{spoiler|Horologium}} just plain screams '''FINAL AREA'''. The influence of {{spoiler|Mem Aleph}}'s presence is so great that the area ''takes the form of primordial Earth'' -- ie, [[Fire and Brimstone Hell]]. The fact this sector is '''''absurdly large''''' and filled with powerful demons, as well as featuring a ''very'' confusing move-tile maze, contributes to making this sector one ''hell'' of a trek.
* The ''[[Suikoden]]'' series subverts this trope somewhat by relying on the series' emphasis on war: the last dungeon in most of the games is usually the other army's biggest fort or capital city. In the latter case, it almost feels anti-climactic, as the player had to fight ''to'' said city, ensuring most of the enemy army would be in tatters. However, in the third game in the series, {{spoiler|the final confrontation takes place in a suitably ancient series of ruins, which also happens to be the [[Lost Superweapon]] central to the (arguably) [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]] antagonist's plan}}, and in the second, {{spoiler|the last dungeon is not the last (optional) confrontation, which occurs near the scene of the game's ''beginning''}}.
** Played mostly straight in ''[[Suikoden Tierkreis]]'', {{spoiler|the tower of the Order of the One True Way functions as this well enough the first time through, but after that, The One King arrives and turns the whole thing into a giant, but hollow, statue of himself, which you have to go through again.}}
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* ''[[Jade Empire]]'' - the Imperial Palace is [[Ominous Floating Castle|a gigantic, floating palace]] inhabited by the [[Big Bad]], the [[Bigger Bad]], and the [[Powered by a Forsaken Child|source of their power]]. The entire purpose of the fourth chapter, the Lotus Assassin Fortress, is to gain access to the palace. Then you [[Storming the Castle|storm the palace]] and defeat the [[Big Bad]], only to {{spoiler|be killed in turn by [[Magnificent Bastard|your teacher]], who set the whole thing up. You get better and promptly come ''back'' to the Imperial Palace to kick even ''more'' ass.}}
* The final dungeon in ''[[Drakengard]]'' is {{spoiler|the skies above Tokyo}}.
* The Hanging Gardens/Eden in ''[[Tactics Ogre]]''. A surprisingly tranquil looking place full of palm trees and waterfalls...until you get to the final stages, which are crawling with undead and a ''gate to hell''.
** ''[[Tactics Ogre]]: The Knight of Lodis'' features the prison of a fallen angel. It's surprisingly beautiful.
* ''[[The Elder Scrolls]] 3: Morrowind'' drops you in a volcano for its final dungeon. ''[[The Elder Scrolls]]: Arena'' puts you in the imperial palace. ''[[The Elder Scrolls]] 5: Skyrim'' puts you ''in an afterlife''. For extra bonus points, the background music actually chants your title in this final dungeon. Daggerfall's final dungeon is a number of islands and structures ''floating in space''.
* In ''[[Cthulhu Saves the World]]'' it's, surprise surprise, R'lyeh.
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** ''[[Resident Evil 4|4]]'''s is a military base on a island (Dead Aim also does this, but with a different island).
** ''[[Resident Evil 5|5]]'''s is {{spoiler|Wesker's personal battleship, which is bursting into flames by the final segment}}.
*** And the ''final'' final showdown takes place {{spoiler|inside an [[Convection, Schmonvection|active volcano]].}}
* You always know when you're at the end of a ''[[Silent Hill]]'' Game - if the [[Bizarrchitecture]] and increasing grossness of the environs don't tip you off, the increase of monsters surely does.
** ''[[Silent Hill 1]]'': About 90% of the way into Otherworld. Order? Logic? Sanity? Causality? You wish.
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* The final showdown of ''[[Max Payne (series)|Max Payne]]'' takes place atop the Aesir Tower, headquarters of Aesir Corporation and [[Big Bad]] Nicole Horne. ''Max Payne 2'''s final battle happens inside the Woden Manor, and is initially a two-person [[Storming the Castle|castle storm]] until {{spoiler|Mona is gunned down by Vlad}} at the end of the second to last level, at which point Max chases the [[Big Bad]] straight to the top for the final level and faces off with him for the last time.
* The final showdown of the [[John Woo]] game ''Stranglehold'' has Tequila storming the gates of Wong's Manor in order to save his daughter, with the showdown with Wong and Dapang proper taking place in the big chamber with the huge jade dragon statue.
* Dead Space at least has quite a big change of scenery, while Dead Space 2 has you see the [[Artifact of Doom]] and the {{spoiler|Convergence they have been talking about for all of the two games}} all through the final section. And all culminates in {{spoiler|your own mind, fighting off [[The Plague]]}}.
* Uncharted 2: Among Thieves' final boss fight takes place within the mythical {{spoiler|neon-blue, glowing Life Tree}} that was mentioned very early on and then repeatedly discussed the entire game.
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Role Playing Game]]▼
[[Category:Video Game Settings]]
[[Category:The Very Definitely Final Dungeon]]
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