History Literature / DreamPark

Inevitably, the novel series gave rise to a tabletop [=RPG=] by Creator/RTalsorianGames.

!!Tropes featured in the Dream Park novels include:

* {{Zeerust}}: In the first book, Griffin has Millicent print out information for him on ''fanfold paper''.

* [[spoiler: NiceJobFixingItVillain: While the Frost brothers' kidnapping scheme does facilitate regime change in Kikaya, it also makes Ali an international hero who will very likely be elected President of their nation in a few years.]]

* UnderdogsNeverLose: [[spoiler: Al the Barbarian wins California Voodoo, brilliantly taking out two rival Loremasters in a row and keeping one of his followers (Mary-Em) alive to the very end. Prior to the Game's beginning, Vegas odds had ranked his Texas Instruments/Mitsubishi team dead last.]]

* BellyButtonless: In ''The Barsoom Project'', Martin Qaterliaraq is an Inuit shaman character in the Fimbulwinter Game. His lack of a navel is an early indication that his character was crafted from molded lava by the Raven, not born.

* BargainWithHeaven: In ''The Barsoom Project'', Yarnall is a game actor who becomes "stranded" in the Fimbulwinter Game due to sabotage. He makes a bet with the Game Master that he won't be killed out by the end of the day, and the Game Master seals the deal by sending a (holographic) heavenly arm to reach down from the clouds so they can shake on it.

* BigFatFuture: ''The Moon Maze Game'', in which standards of beauty in 2085 have swung this way, making plumpness desirable in women. Yhe ideal ''zaftig'' woman adheres to a "Fit/Fat" model, in which well-padded curves overlie toned muscles and a blood chemistry maintained at the peak of physiological health.

** Mary-Martha's brain-damaged brother Patrick dies off-page between ''Dream Park'' and California Voodoo.

* TheBusCameBack: Gwen and Ollie from the South Seas Treasure Game return as Game actors for Fimbulwinter. Acacia, Mary-Em, Holly and SJ all take part in the California Voodoo tournament Game, which Richard and Chi-Chi Lopez return to operate.

* ChekhovsGun: Griffin's ulcer in ''Barsoom'', which forces him to give up caffeine. Played as a RunningGag until ''Barsoom'''s climax, when [[spoiler: he's the only member of Security ''not'' to get incapacitated by drugged coffee at a critical moment.]]

* FightingSpirit: In ''The Barsoom Project'', the Gamers must fight an Inuit demon called a Paija. Because they themselves are not fit to do so (this Game is called a Fat Ripper Special for good reason), the party's shaman Snow Goose uses magic to summon their spirit-selves, which have their faces on healthy, strong, fit bodies. The spirit-selves then battle the Paija.

* FlippingTheBird: Performed by a ''cleaning robot'' in ''The California Voodoo Game'', in which a pair of such machines are disguised as cyborg octopi (long story) and sent to hinder S.J. Waters' crawl through a ventilation duct. The machines have no voice synthesizers, so after SJ overcomes the first in hand-to-pincer combat, the Game Master uses the second robot's hologram-illusion pseudopodia to express its defiance as it retreats.

* LostInCharacter: Eviane/Michelle

* OffTheRails: In the seond and third books:

*** Early in the Fimbulwinter Game, a monster goes off its programming (the first sign that something is very wrong in the Game Computer). It was supposed to kill out an actor because his role in the Game is done, but instead it chases and kills a Gamer. Wells bets the actor that he can kill him out without breaking the rules, with the stakes being the actor's pay: if Wells wins, the actor gets zip, but if the actor wins he gets ''triple'' his agreed-on pay.

* OurDwarvesAreAllTheSame: Mary-Martha "Mary-Em" Corbett reads like an homage to this trope. Though human, she's 4'1" tall, is built like a muscular fire hydrant, wields a halberd (~battleax), is TheBigGuy of her adventuring party, guzzles beer like a pro, calls a spade a spade, and sings repetitively while she's marching. Although her songs tend to be a hell of a lot raunchier than this trope usually allows.

* UnderwaterRuins: One of the attractions of the titular park is a walk through the (simulated) underwater ruins of Los Angeles.

* BlueMeansCold: One pit has normal fire on one side and "anti-fire", which is like fire but cold and blue, on the other. The anti-fire turns the ashes into fuel for the normal fire.

* OffTheRails: Bishop talks the UC/Apple alliance into leaving the intended play-zones of [=MIMIC=], taking a short cut through its residents' apartments. The Tex-Mits/Army alliance opt to quickly rappel down the front of the building rather than traverse its interior passages, thus getting ahead of the opposition and avoiding whatever hazards the [=GM=]s have set up inside.

* SeldomSeenSpecies: Giant ''hornbills'' attack the Daribi village early in South Seas Treasure.

* BigBeautifulWoman: Trianna, Gwen and Eviane from ''Barsoom'' are all good-looking, with Trianna in particular radiating ''serious'' sex appeal. By the time of ''Moon Maze'', this trope has become the ideal (Fit/Fat).

* BigFatFuture: Zigzagged in ''The Moon Maze Game'', in which standards of beauty in 2085 have swung the other way, making plumpness desirable in women. Instead of being unhealthy, however, the ideal ''zaftig'' woman adheres to a "Fit/Fat" model, in which well-padded curves overlie toned muscles and a blood chemistry maintained at the peak of physiological health.

: The Quake of 1985, which had to be re-scheduled for 1995 by the third novel. When it didn't happen then either, the series became AlternateHistory.

* FailedFutureForecast: In ''The Chalet School in Exile'', one of the wartime books, the school relocates to Guernsey. As [[http://lampandbook.blogspot.co.uk/2010/04/chalet-school-in-exile-2.html this article]] points out, Brent-Dyer had no way of knowing that, just after the book was published, the Nazis would invade Guernsey.

* DeweyDefeatsTruman: The Quake of 1985, which had to be re-scheduled for 1995 by the third novel. When it didn't happen then either, the series became AlternateHistory.

* GoodGirlsAvoidAbortion: Trianna, in ''The Barsoom Project'', [[TarnishingTheirOwnBeauty gained weight to keep men away]] after she had attracted too much male attention at a young age, and ended up getting an abortion. The procedure left her sterile. Her character arc involves forgiving herself for this.

* GoodGirlsAvoidAbortion: Trianna, in ''The Barsoom Project'', [[TarnishingTheirOwnBeauty gained weight to keep men away]] after a botched abortion led to her being sterile.

* BiTheWay: Alan Leigh.

** Possibly a mild case for Charlene Dula, as it's ''very'' complimentary to her uncle that materials from Falling Angel happen to be a source of great power in the Fimbulwinter Game's mythos.

* ManInWhite: Wannis's initial appearance.

* BawdySong: A favorite activity of many Gamers, particularly Mary-em in ''Dream Park''and Kevin (to Orson's horror) in ''The Barsoom Project''.

* NeverMessWithGranny: Margie from ''Dream Park'', a senior-citizen Gaming veteran who chops through zombies like a tornado despite being of a non-combat character guild.

* OurZombiesAreDifferent: Reanimated corpses that appear in the first two novels differ from ''each other'', as befits their respective scenarios' radically-different mythos. South Seas Treasure zombies are rotting and decrepit, often laugh eerily (due to having died of kuru), and keep fighting until dismembered. Fimbulwinter zombies ''look'' like living humans in a trance, can open their mouths unnaturally wide, and only need dismemberment to prevent them from arising in the first place. MIMIC zombies are loa-possessed, with animalistic (baboon, crocodile) features, and their wounds leak nasty black ooze. Zombies from the horror attraction in book one are classic Romero-style flesh-eaters with a taste for shark, and vice versa.

* UnusualEuphemism: "Drown it!"