History Main / BlatantItemPlacement

* ''Videogame/DeepRockGalactic:'' There are no ammo drops in the caverns, since they're entirely unexplored and your enemies are all wildlife; the only way to restock is calling Supply Drops; ''those'', however, can be "purchased" with a mineral called Nitra, which has common deposits all over the planet. There are also small veins a mineral called Red Sugar around the planet, which thanks to the dwarves' biology is an effective painkiller and [[HyperactiveMetabolism delicious]], if [[ICantBelieveItsNotHeroin addictive]]; thus, it acts as a quick and dirty health kit.

* In ''Discworld/TheLastHero'' of the ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' series, Cohen the Barbarian makes a reference to the mysteriously-well-placed caches of supplies, spare weapons, keys, and such inside the dungeons he and his Silver Horde have visited over the years; it is heavily implied that The Lady and some of the other Gods playing games with the lives of mortals have placed some of these prizes around to support them when they served as their pawns.

* ''VideoGame/DeadSpace'' and ''VideoGame/DeadSpace2'' both plays this straight (see above) and averts it. While neither setting is a military heavy setting, the weapons are almost all mining equipment. Even the more blatantly offensive uses can be justified as a bit of jury-rigging on Isaac's part (the 'grenade' function of the Force Gun and Flamethrower can be justified as just launching the ammo container at the enemy). The only clear weapon is the Pulse Rifle, but that makes sense as simply being the standard issue security / police weapon. Item pickups waver back and forth on this. Items are generally found in lockers, storage crates, and on the bodies of the necromorphs (who used to be people probably trying to defend themselves the same way you are). However, what is in these locations doesn't always make sense.

* ''VideoGame/MaxPayne'': most weapons are dropped by enemies, and as health is in the form of painkillers, you generally find them in bathroom cabinets.

* The Minish race in ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheMinishCap'' is described in an encyclopedia that they have a habit of hiding goods in bushes and rocks.

* ''VideoGame/{{Borderlands}}'' may have explanations for why the wildlife has a diet rich in modern weaponry (see the aversions below), but that doesn't explain why every toilet and almost every mailbox in the game is an ammo box. Even if people were having ammo mailed to them, wouldn't they have picked it up? And there's every indication that some of those toilets are actually used by the locals for the things toilets are normally used for, but they're stuffed with supplies anyway. (A common mid-grade loot box in the second game is a porta-potty that gives off significant runoff and an unpleasant squishing noise when opened, and loot falls out.) The skags and stalkers certainly aren't using either of those things.

* ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'': You can find money and ammo in anything. Evidently Nords think burial urns are piggy banks.
** A minor case is that all coinage, even ones that would be more valuable as antiques than as actual coinage, is represented by Septims. That makes sense for many ruins (at the time of the games, Septims have been in use for half a millennium)... but not all. Especially blatant as the last game to feature Dwemeri ruins actually ''did'' have Dwemer coins (who worked as valuable clutter rather than coins, being antiques).

* ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion'': In the tutorial section you find some very rusted armour. Often treasure could be explained as being hoarded by monsters.
** The vast majority of things you find in Oblivion are things that are perfectly normal to find wherever you find them, meaning this trope only comes up when the leveling system messes up and you start finding bandits in armor that literally costs more than a house.
*** Or when well-locked treasure chests in ancient, pre-Imperial ruins contain inexplicable caches of Imperial coins.
** Morrowind is quite good at this too. Okay, the lockpick in the starting building might be a tad implasusible, but everything else, (the [[{{Plunder}} items you find on monsters and people (if you kill them)]], the stuff behind (and in) [[LockedDoor locked doors (and locked chests)]], the items you buy from shop keepers, etc.) has a perfectly justified reason why it's there. Hell, you can even steal the pillows from the beds and sell them!

* Dr. Robotnik seems to love keeping rings around, even though they're the only thing keeping [[Franchise/SonicTheHedgehog Sonic]] from being a OneHitPointWonder.

* ''Franchise/MassEffect''; one the worst examples being when you find perfectly functional modern (year 2183) equipment in a Soviet probe on the moon. The sequel averts this with weapons and the like, but the planet that Ronald Taylor crash-landed on has thermal clips for your weapons, a new development within the previous two years, lying around despite being out of touch with the galaxy for a decade.

[[folder:Action Adventure]]
* All of the ''Franchise/TombRaider'' games outside of Legend and Underworld use this; even in areas where Humans have apparently not been for thousands of years you find contemporary ammo, weapons and medikits.

[[folder:Adventure Game]]

--> '''Laredo:''' It means breaking into ancient buildings within which no man or woman has walked for thousand of years, apart from whoever it is who leaves all those medical kits, of course.

[[folder:First Person Shooter]]

* Franchise/SlyCooper, like a number of platformers, has its main minor collectible/currency [[FollowTheMoney just scattered everywhere]]. Lampshaded in a making-of video found in the third game:
--> If I ever become rich, I'm going to store all my money next to [[EternalEngine huge, moving machine parts]].
--> And [[NightmarishFactory open fire pits]].
--> Yes! Open fire pits [[ViolationOfCommonSense right near my holding paper cash]]!

* ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim'' does this to an extreme, you can find money and ammo in anything. Evidently Nords think burial urns are piggy banks.

* As a general rule, any game from Spiderweb Software (particularly ''VideoGame/{{Avernum}}'') will rationalise its loot, while still finding ways to reward you for major victories. If the boss you just killed is a human bandit, help yourself to his cash. If the boss is a giant spider, odds are that somebody two towns back wanted spider fangs to make a potion.

This trope mostly applies to games that otherwise take themselves seriously.

Supertrope of InexplicableTreasureChests, InexplicablyPreservedDungeonMeat, CrateExpectations, ExplodingBarrels, and SuspiciousVideogameGenerosity. Not to be confused with ProductPlacement (which can be very blatant).

[[folder:Played Straight]]

[[AC:Action Adventure]]

[[AC:Adventure Game]]

[[AC:First Person Shooter]]

** Probably the most {{JustForFun/egregious}} aspect of this has to be [[ComicBook/{{Doom}} The Great Communicator]], because it's really difficult to come up with any legitimate reason for why the hell there's a ''chainsaw on Mars''. The third game at least had the courtesy to [[LampshadeHanging lampshade this]] in one of the email logs, and {{handwave}}s it by explaining that an order for jackhammers got mixed up on Earth.
** A possibility being that others had been there before and had died and left the items (and were just not badass enough to continue), although that's probably just AllThereInTheManual, if anywhere at all.

** Much of the stuff could be interpreted to have been stashed by earlier generations of looters, who never managed to come back for them, or are still there and using the area as a base - many of the larger buildings are populated, as are the subways. For example, a supermarket near Megaton is populated by raiders, and while the shelves are stripped of anything useful, there are some supplies in the back room where raiders have their base. Post-war inventions like Jet (a drug invented on the other side of the continent [[VideoGame/{{Fallout2}} in Reno, 120 years after the war]]) appearing in undisturbed pre-War caches are playing it straight though.

** Often this was averted - Serious weapons and ammo are locked in cabinets or stored in (often heavily guarded) armories and guard stations, and in one notable instance, a research lab. In one notable aversion in [[VideoGame/DeusExHumanRevolution the prequel]], there is a [[RareCandy Praxis Kit]] next to a dead body. [[spoiler: It's booby-trapped, and the mine will alert any enemies in the area.]] Some [=NPCs=] will also provide you with weapons...for a price. Although it was odd the number of down and outs you met with nothing but the tattered clothes they stood in, a half bottle of booze, and a high-end sniper scope for a special forces issue assault rifle.

[[AC:Platform Games]]

** It makes sense in ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaLamentOfInnocence'', though. Walter Bernhard is stated to make a game out of hunters trying to kill him. Why not give them tools and make them think they have a chance? Of course, he never expected Rinaldo Gandolfi and Leon Belmont to [[spoiler: use the soul of Sara Trantoul, who Walter turned into a vampire and gave back to Leon, to turn the Whip of Alchemy into the Vampire Killer. Because of this, Walter's game ended, and he lost.]]

** Well, Proto Man does have that habit of being around all the time, and Wily is loony enough to create robots all weak against each other's weapons just for Mega Man to [[PowerCopying take advantage of]]. As for the sequel series ''VideoGame/MegaManX'', Sigma wants to "make X and Zero [his]", which might be hard if he kept scrapping them.

** Averted in Other M, where there are absolutely no refills unless you're on the ropes or at a savepoint.

[[AC:Role-Playing Games]]

** Apart from a few [[MoneySpider Money Spiders]] the game actually does a pretty good job at keeping stuff in their appropriate containers. For example, you are unlikely to find anything more valuable than clothes in cupboards and wardrobes. Leaving valuables for the dead is a pretty common custom in many cultures as well, either real or symbolic. Unfortunately, you also keep finding fresh vegetables in barrels and sacks that have sat in abandoned tombs for centuries.

** Dragons are the most notable example, as many contain random equipment that would have your head scratching, such as armor pieces, septims, and potions (all of which are worthless to the reptiles). However, if you paid attention during the fight with the first dragon, you'll notice that he devours a guard, and all of the guard's equipment is available for the taking after you kill the beast.

** You also have oddly convenient weapon-switch lockers strewn all through the second game, all of which have multiple copies of every single gun you have access to, including [[{{BFG}} heavy weapons]]. Why does a ''hotel'' need a ''nuke launcher'' lying around, anyway?

* Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinder tend to specifically encourage this. Especially true in 4th edition, since items resell for only one fifth of their market value, its important that DM's make sure the items the players need are in the treasure caches the players find and monsters are factored based on players having those items. Pathfinder went the other route and beefed up the player classes so that magic items were less important.

[[AC:Survival Horror]]

[[AC:Third Person Shooter]]

[[folder:Exceptions/aversions]]

[[AC: Action Adventure]]

[[AC:First Person Shooter]]

** It's seemingly played straight in some areas of ''VideoGame/HaloCombatEvolved'', where you would find Marine corpses (and handy ammo stashes) where they ''couldn't possibly'' have reached. However, [[Literature/HaloTheFlood the novelization]] justifies at least some of this, by having 343 Guilty Spark show the Master Chief the corpse of the previous human he had teleported to the Library, who had died in combat against the Flood (though this was never even mentioned in the original game).

** In ''VideoGame/HalfLife2'' and the Episodes, while a little bit of stuff is found lying around randomly, much of it is found in lockers, storage rooms and rooms that look like they've been converted into armories, on corpses, or in resistance supply caches marked by the lambda symbol. Most that isn't, or which falls into the last category, is also in distinctive supply crates.
** ''Half-Life 2'' actually goes so far as to ''justify'' this - at one point you actually meet a resistance member who's going around planting the supply crates in strategic locations along the route out of the city.

* In ''VideoGame/PAYDAY2'', this is mostly averted. The game treats random medical supplies and ammo bags as "Dead Drops" or, if the heist allows for it, "Pre-planning". Both of these allow for, er, dead drops of the ammo bag and medic supplies done by an inside man that Bain or a Contact for the Dentist has to place.

[[AC:Platform Games]]

[[AC:Role-Playing Games]]

*** Gold is gold. Payment in ancient coins instead of standardized coins is not even remotely far-fetched when you consider that medieval commerce (And by extension, a good portion of fantasy commerce) was based on the barter system.
*** The occasional placement of lockpicks or flatware in a wolf, rat, wild creature. Until you remember that bone can be carved easily.

*** The guards in the starting town are known to extort the townspeople, so the lockpick most likely belongs to one of them, probably the one in the bar since it was laying near a note left for him and he admits to recently breaking into a certain resident's house looking for his secret stash.
* ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'' and ''[[VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas New Vegas]]'' has Medkit Boxes (First Aid Boxes, really) that are strewed all through the ruins. Justified, in that most homes should have a First-Aid Kit, but yet, given 200 ''years'' after the apocalypse, why hasn't anyone found those supplies yet? Still, though, the boxes themselves seem to be placed with some type of logic.
** Also more or less true in earlier installments. While drugs, money, and ammo can be found nearly everywhere, large stashes only appear in abandoned military bases, gang hideouts, and the like.
** In ''New Vegas'', mostly justified, seeing as most good medical loot is in currently inhabited houses and must be stolen, or is in a very dangerous place, like REPCONN HQ + REPCONN Test site, and then it is usually locked. Also, in NV, there is some manufacturing of weapons and medical equipment, so some things the player finds may only have been there for months or even weeks, not 200 years.
** ''Fallout 3'' notably averts this trope with the Nuka-Cola Factory. Think it might be a good place to go looking for more bottles of Nuka-Cola? Two centuries' worth of looters had the exact same idea before you did.
* As a general rule, any game from Spiderweb Software (particularly ''VideoGame/{{Avernum}}'') will completely avert this and mostly avert MoneySpider, while still finding ways to reward you for major victories. If the boss you just killed is a human bandit, help yourself to his cash. If the boss is a giant spider, odds are that somebody two towns back wanted spider fangs to make a potion.

[[AC:Survival Horror]]

[[AC:Stealth Based Game]]

[[AC:Third Person Shooter]]
* ''VideoGame/MaxPayne'': most weapons are dropped by enemies, and as health is in the form of painkillers, you generally find them in bathroom cabinets.

[[folder:Non-Video Game Examples]]
[[AC:Literature]]
* In ''Discworld/TheLastHero'' of the ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' series, Cohen the Barbarian makes a reference to the mysteriously-well-placed caches of supplies, spare weapons, keys, and such inside the dungeons he and his Silver Horde have visited over the years; it is heavily implied that The Lady and some of the other Gods playing games with the lives of mortals have placed some of these prizes around to support them when they served as their pawns.

** ''ShadowTheHedgehog'' implies during the Egg Dealer boss fight that Dr. Eggman uses them as currency. When Shadow stops the slot reels on "Ring," the Doc cries out, "Noooo! My beautiful Rings!"

* ''Fred'' is an old Atari 8-bit game about a caveman travelling through the prehistoric wilderness. The British edition of the game notes in the manual that the protagonist may find tools "which have, [[LampshadeHanging by a strange fluke of nature]], been placed in vases on the landscape for his easy access."

* ''Far Cry''
** First ''VideoGame/FarCry'' is pretty good about this, as all the weapons you find are either in armories, mercenary camps or other logical places, or directly from their late owners.

** Probably the most {{egregious}} aspect of this has to be [[ComicBook/{{Doom}} The Great Communicator]], because it's really difficult to come up with any legitimate reason for why the hell there's a ''chainsaw on Mars''. The third game at least had the courtesy to [[LampshadeHanging lampshade this]] in one of the email logs, and {{handwave}}s it by explaining that an order for jackhammers got mixed up on Earth.

** This is sometimes used along with FridgeBrilliance to further the narrative. Dragons are the most notable example, as many contain random equipment that would have your head scratching, such as armor pieces, septims, and potions (all of which are worthless to the reptiles). However, if you paid attention during the fight with the first dragon, you'll notice that he devours a guard, and all of the guard's equipment is available for the taking after you kill the beast.

*** Maybe it's because the lockers work differently from how we here in 2010 expect them to. After all, [[FanWank why not have them break down and re-manufacture the weapons as needed?]] In that way, [[FridgeBrilliance EDI can direct the lockers to manufacture the guns you already have, because she has the schematics for them.]]

** Possible bit of ''FridgeBrilliance'' there: the Town, in its infinite, mind-raping evil, wants you to stay alive as long as you possibly can, in order to prolong your suffering. It's giving you a sporting chance, because nobody falls as hard as the man elevated by hope.
** Further fridge when you consider the fact that the monsters in several games are hinted or explicitly stated to be manifestations of the protagonist's sins / fear / etc. If that stuff is manifesting uncontrollably, it isn't that much of a stretch to suppose that his will to survive manifests itself as items and equipment, is it?

* In ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros1'', powerups be they mushrooms, flowers, or even the horsetails are Toads transformed by Bowser. [[FridgeHorror So that mushroom that you just ate to become large....]]

* Having treasure chests in ''DigimonWorld3'' made sense seeing as the entire game took place inside an MMORPG.

** ''Fallout 3'' notably averts this trope with the Nuka-Cola Factory. Think it might be a good place to go looking for more bottles of Nuka-Cola? ''Two centuries'' of looters had the exact same idea before you did.

** ''Fallout 3'' notably averts this trope with the Nuka-Cola Factory. Think it might be a good place to go looking for more bottles of Nuka-Cola? Two centuries of looters had the exact same idea before you did.

** In ''New Vegas'', mostly justified, seeing as most good medical loot is in currently inhabited houses and must be stolen, or is in a very dangerous place, like REPCONN HQ + REPCONN Test site, and then it is usually locked. Also, in NV, there is some manufacturing of weapons+medical equipment, so some things the player finds may only have been there for months or even weeks, not 200 years.

** Much of the stuff could be interpreted to have been stashed by earlier generations of looters, who never managed to come back for them, or are still there and using the area as a base - many of the larger buildings are populated, as are the subways. For example, a supermarket near Megaton is populated by raiders, and while the shelves are stripped of anything useful, there are some supplies in the back room where raiders have their base.

* For a place that's trying to torment you constantly, ''VideoGame/SilentHill'' is awfully generous with ammo and health boosters lying strewn randomly through the empty streets. This is not to mention what sort of mental hospital or prison would leave guns or ammo lying around. A player can sometimes finish a playthrough of the game with ammo for all weapons clocking in at over 100, and enough health drinks, medkits and tourniquets to [[TakeThat keep the series alive]] after the canceling of ''VideoGame/SilentHills''.

** Because they've probably been horribly killed somewhere out in the Wasteland by any of the myriad things that can kill a curious looter. Things that the equipment they've stashed would probably save them from.
*** Or they did equip the items, the stash is just their backup in case their current is damaged or worn out.
*** So they looted all the medicine then stashed it in the first aid boxes in the hospital? Sure, nobody'll ever look for it there...
*** Think the medicine cabinets are bad? There are barbeques in gardens and picnick spots with food still on it. No matter how desolate or dangerous the place is..
*** There's also no reasonable excuse for why Jet (a drug [[VideoGame/{{Fallout 2}} developed after the war]]) can be found in various locations that have been sealed since pre-war times.
** Then again, most of the stuff found freely around isn't stuff you tend to keep (aside from the ammo, of course). The real goodies are stashed in locked containers, and the PC just happens to be unrealistically good at lockpicking.
** There's actually a far greater fridge logic aspect at work here which explains why the stuff is able to sit around in perfect condition. Think about the 50's Science! setting of the game- these were the days BEFORE expiration dates were introduced, and when as far as America felt, anything built by American hands would last forever (aka would survive the end of world?). So it's actually perfectly fitting that decades-old weapons would still work, and armour would still be usable. Bethesda, you've done it again....