What are the best and worst plot devices for taking away your gear/abilities at the start of a game?

Metroid is full of this, most egregiously though is taking a slight bump in the opening of Prime that she would have easily shrugged off if it weren't a cutscene. To me, that's worse than "Adam won't let me" because at least that has the excuse of him not wanting her to use extremely dangerous weaponry in an enclosed spaceship he's in command of, even if it's still contrived.

Other M will forever be the fucking worst. Adam!!!!!!

A good one is Trails in the Sky SC, in which you're told that the new technology is so much better that you should drop your old quartz(which you use to learn spells).

Spider-Man PS4 has the classic excuse of "you need to upgrade your new suit". Whether that's good or bad, who even knows.

Castlevania Symphony of the Night?

Death realized the Alucard gears is too OP for Lv. 1.

The worst is Adam. It has to be Adam. Horrendous execution.

Metroid Echoes has a convincing approach - Samus enters a toxic parallel universe unprotected and the demons within strip her of essential suit modules, taking them for their own before discarding her. It feels like she barely gets out alive and the later victories against them feel all the more rewarding.

new vegas have several different ways to justify it in the DLC, be it "you get kidnapped and all your gear remains behind" for Dead Money, "its a long travel and you can't carry much but you can convince the loser of the group to carry a bit more for you with a skill check" for Honest Hearts and "fuck it take what you want" for OWB and Lonesome Road

Then Fallout 3 had the dumb "here's a bunch of raiders not unlike the other raiders you killed thousands by now but for some reason these ones are real scary and get a drop on you! so you lose all your gear whichever 'option' you decide" for The Pitt

"Adam, can I please activate my suit now so I don't have to continue burning to a crisp in this lava? Thank you, kind sir."

Best: God of war 2 with the Blade of Olympus.

Worst: God of War 3

Symphony of the Night is probably the coolest way I've seen it done.

99% of the narrative reasons for this trope are terrible, but /shrug.

Wolfenstein TNO is good and bad at the same time. It's good because it makes sense that BJ doesn't have any of his equipment and skills since he's been in a coma for years after the prologue. It's bad because as soon as he wakes up he stats killing nazis like nothing happened. Not that the game wants to be realistic, but still...

I know people hated the Lords of Shadow 2 plot device that lead to the mighty Dracula having to sneak and turn himself into a rat.

Alan Wake like every chapter. The worst. He falls down and loses everything or something I dunno I just remember it happening often.

Good is MGS2 or 1 and 3. But it two you run around naked and have to get your gear back off of Solid Snake who has an Infinite Ammo bandana and you don't.

In MGS1 it's just behind the torture apparatus and in 3 you have to find Eva to get it back.

I just thought Alan Wake had a terrible way of making the game scary again by removing your weapons after almost every chapter or however the game progresses

Wario Land 3 didn't even bother with an explanation so as a kid I was really confused at the beginning when I couldn't pull off the same moves from Wario Land 2 ha ha

Roll had to sell your special weapons between Mega Man Legends 1 and 2 to pay for repairs on your ship.

Try to remember the basics of CQC.

The one I quite like when it's done well is when the intro to the game is fundamentally as a different character. One example would be the prologue of Lufia, which begins at the climax of a previous adventure, telling the story of how four powerful warriors defeated the Sinistrals; you get a chance to play with a full-strength character for the duration of that prologue, and then segue into a new level 1 character when the game timeskips ninety years.

An even better example - and I think one of the best of all - is The Dragon's Trap, which opens with the end level from Wonder Boy In Monster Land with a full-power player and an easier version of the final boss - but then, on defeating the dragon, a curse infects him, turning him into a weak lizard - at which point the game proper starts up with you getting to grips with your lizard form and later other forms as you try to break the curse.

WestEgg said:

Metroid is full of this, most egregiously though is taking a slight bump in the opening of Prime that she would have easily shrugged off if it weren't a cutscene. To me, that's worse than "Adam won't let me" because at least that has the excuse of him not wanting her to use extremely dangerous weaponry in an enclosed spaceship he's in command of, even if it's still contrived.

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Yep, OTHER M the Thread.

Metrood the thread

other M being the worst of course

Yakuza Liwami handled it well, it gave a nice explanation in why Kiryu wasn't that powerful in Yakuza 1, while also making Zero fit in the narrative

Kingdom Hearts 1 to Kingdom Hearts 2.

They have 1 game in between to explain it !

Symphony of the Night is pretty good on this. You get your stuff taken away by an enemy due to being a threat.

No contrived plot about it.

I guess Zelda, since Link is reincarnated or in Majora's Mask, Zelda had rewinded time at the end of Ocarina so Link is a kid again and won't miss 5 or so years of his life.

Trails using technological advances to start you from basic quartz was a pretty good one

Other M thread? Why, of course.

♡♪!? said:

I guess Zelda, since Link is reincarnated or in Majora's Mask, Zelda had rewinded time at the end of Ocarina so Link is a kid again and won't miss 5 or so years of his life.

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That also served the function of preventing Ganon's rise to power in the first place. Or it would have, had Link and Zelda understood split, branching timelines.

God of War 2 /thread (for one of the best*)

Admodieus said:

My favorite one is probably the first Darksiders, where you start off as a horseman of the apocalypse should (just a one man wrecking ball) and then are stripped of your powers by the Charred Council as punishment.

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forgot this one. (which was clearly GoW2 inspired) but yes that one was good as well

Everyone is going to say Other M, but I'd argue that Prime 1 has an even stupider reason.

You hit a wall. That's it.

While metroid does it a lot, and rarely well, Metroid Fusion does it brilliantly. Losing your suit and recreating those powers biologically until you fight your previous self. It's a tired trope executed perfectly.

God of War 3 was really bad. He falls into the river of Styx and somehow being touched by the ghosts depowers him and destroys his weapons even though even after this Kratos was still strong enough to fairly easily kill Hades. I guess generic ghosts>Hades.

God of War 3. Kratos fucking fell into a river and now his weapon and magic and HP are all fucked.

There's a game called Knights of Xentar. It's a hentai game that was given a gag translation, but I played the censored version as a kid so I didn't know it was a hentai game for the longest time. At any rate, it has a device like this that stuck with me. Might have been the first time I've seen this.

The hero, Desmond, drunkenly stumbles into town equipped with his legendary armour and sword from the Japan-only previous game and is surrounded with a bunch of muggers. He accidentally lets slip to them that he's only allowed to draw his sword in face of ultimate evil. So they strip him of all his possessions. This includes his underwear. He's now only protected by the pixelation around his junk. He's still at an extremely high level, so after recuperating, he goes to the bar and beats the crap out of the thugs effortlessly. But their leader escapes.

The hero visits the richest man in town, a cheap asshole named Don Frump, who has put out a reward for stopping the bandits. The bandits come from a hideout in the west where they make pacts with demons. After negotiating a deal with the rich man to buy back his legendary sword and armour, the hero goes to the mountains and meets the bandit leader, who turns out to simply be a demon disguising his form. The demon hints that there's more to the treasure that the hero lost than he knows about, and casts a spell that teleports him out of the mountain.

The rich man has gone to the next town over, so the hero goes to visit him. Along the way, he starts feeling weak, and his level reduces to one. When he meets the the rich man, the hero is promised that he will get his sword back, and is led into a cave. Don Frump then reveals himself to be the same demon from before; he had tricked the hero in order to weaken him. Before he can attack, he's defeated by a bright flash of light, and a disembodied voice tells the hero that if he seeks out his treasure it will lead him back to his legendary sword. That's where the game properly starts.

Kingdom Hearts 2 is pretty good about this. After all the memory fuckery in Chain of Memories, Sora forgets most of his abilities.

Other M took the bullshit trope of past games and made it infinitely worse. Oh I have the ability to do this but Adam says no. Lmao fuck that game.

I love that Metal Gear Solid 4 went out of its way to retroactively give an excuse for why Solid Snake never used CQC in MGS1 and 2

SuperiorTrashTalk said:

Kingdom Hearts 2 is pretty good about this. After all the memory fuckery in Chain of Memories, Sora forgets most of his abilities.

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Pretty much every game with Sora has a surprisingly decent excuse

They even play it for laughs at the end of 0.2 with Sora going "happens all the time!"

Probably the best is YS where Adol consistently gets into shipwrecks and loses all his gear before washing up on shore. It wouldn't work so well if the first game didn't start like that and then lampshading it by making it a running gag in the series acknowledged by the story.

SOTN was my favorite, with Death jacking Alucard's gear like "yeah no" can't let you have that.

What's even cooler in SOTN is that you can avoid it with glitches and just march through the castle killing everything with your super good gear if you want, also.

Real Renaissance Man said:

God of War 3 was really bad. He falls into the river of Styx and somehow being touched by the ghosts depowers him and destroys his weapons even though even after this Kratos was still strong enough to fairly easily kill Hades. I guess generic ghosts>Hades.

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Blade Wolf said:

God of War 3. Kratos fucking fell into a river and now his weapon and magic and HP are all fucked.

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Powers of the Styx
The gods used the River Styx to swear oaths upon. Zeus swore an oath to Semele and, since he had to adhere to it, the unfortunate outcome was her death. Similarly, Helios was responsible for the death of his own son when he swore upon the river. If a god did not stick to his oath, he would be forced to drink from the foul river and thus loose his voice for nine years. The myth originated during the Titan war when the goddess Styx allied with Zeus. Once the war was over, Zeus declared that every oath sworn would be sworn to her.

The River Styx was believed to have magical properties and could make a person invulnerable. Achilles was allegedly dipped into the river by his mother, making him invulnerable, but his ankle remained a weak point as he was suspended by it when dipped into the river. Achilles became a great warrior, but he eventually died when an arrow struck him in the ankle. The weak point became known as an Achilles heel.

Ancient historians believed the death of Alexander the Great, the king of Macedonia, may have been the result of the poisoned water of the Styx. Modern scientific sources reveal the water may have contained a deadly bacterium.

Yea.... let's not doubt the River Styx anymore, since it can kill gods. Kratos isn't even a god at that time, yet survives.

Other M Adam clearance is probably the worst.

I liked God of War 2's with you draining everything you have into a sword to kill a boss

And God of War 3 tossing you into the river styx so the souls can drain your life

Best is definitely the explanation for Megaman Legends 2. Roll selling all of Megaman's weapons behind his back to pay for airship repairs and upgrades was a great joke.

The worst was the entire death and resurrection plotline from Mass Effect 2. Everything about that was awful.

danmaku said:

Wolfenstein TNO is good and bad at the same time. It's good because it makes sense that BJ doesn't have any of his equipment and skills since he's been in a coma for years after the prologue. It's bad because as soon as he wakes up he stats killing nazis like nothing happened. Not that the game wants to be realistic, but still...

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Then they redeemed themselves with the sequel, The New Colossus, since BJ was fucked up after the first game.

The Battle Network games all have the "Uhh, it's been awhile, give me a refresher" tutorial at the beginning of them, but I don't think they ever actually give you a reason why you don't have your chips. I think they get away with the new navicust for Mega Man's programs, but they never explain what happens to his styles or souls from game to game.

I liked the way Shadow Complex did this. You played the intro as a different character who is using the suit that you will eventually find. He doesn't make it into the actual story, but your new character finds the armor piecemeal.

Force Unleased did something similar and had you start the game as a full powered Darth Vader before taking control of your real character.

Siege.exe said:

The Battle Network games all have the "Uhh, it's been awhile, give me a refresher" tutorial at the beginning of them, but I don't think they ever actually give you a reason why you don't have your chips. I think they get away with the new navicust for Mega Man's programs, but they never explain what happens to his styles or souls from game to game.

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I know standard mega man's reason is that he will go crazy if he doesn't drain his gained powers each time

The worst is the Kingdom Hearts series

Kingdom Hearts CoM - Lol I forgot
Kingdom Hearts 2 - Lol I forgot
Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance - Yensid said I was doing everything wrong so I'll start from scratch
Kingdom Hearts 3 - Xehanort took my powers

Siege.exe said:

The Battle Network games all have the "Uhh, it's been awhile, give me a refresher" tutorial at the beginning of them, but I don't think they ever actually give you a reason why you don't have your chips. I think they get away with the new navicust for Mega Man's programs, but they never explain what happens to his styles or souls from game to game.

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He gets a new PET every game I just assume that old chips for old PETs aren't compatible.

WrenchNinja said:

The worst is the Kingdom Hearts series

Kingdom Hearts CoM - Lol I forgot
Kingdom Hearts 2 - Lol I forgot
Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance - Yensid said I was doing everything wrong so I'll start from scratch
Kingdom Hearts 3 - Xehanort took my powers


He gets a new PET every game I just assume that old chips for old PETs aren't compatible.

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I guess that would make sense.

WrenchNinja said:

The worst is the Kingdom Hearts series

Kingdom Hearts CoM - Lol I forgot
Kingdom Hearts 2 - Lol I forgot
Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance - Yensid said I was doing everything wrong so I'll start from scratch
Kingdom Hearts 3 - Xehanort took my powers

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CoM is that your memories were removed and rewritten by namine.

KH2's is you've been out for a year and in that time was split into 3 people so your abilities are a little spotty

DDD is you got got in the dream and the villain stole your shit so you gotta go train with Hercules in kh3.

Z-Beat said:

CoM is that your memories were removed and rewritten by namine.

KH2's is you've been out for a year and in that time was split into 3 people so your abilities are a little spotty

DDD is you got got in the dream and the villain stole your shit so you gotta go train with Hercules in kh3.

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