History Main / PreexistingEncounters

* Later games in the ''VideoGame/TalesSeries'':

** In ''VideoGame/PokemonLetsGoPikachuAndEevee'', all wild Pokémon encounters are preexisting encounters - wild Pokémon pop out of tall grass (and anywhere in caves) and roam around the map, prompting an encounter only if you run into them. This makes traversing caves [[AntiFrustrationFeatures much]], ''[[AntiFrustrationFeatures much]]'' [[AntiFrustrationFeatures less tedious]] than in previous games. This is combined with the usual RandomEncounters in ''VideoGame/PokemonSwordAndShield''.

** The Generation VI remakes of ''VideoGame/PokemonRubyAndSapphire'' take the version first found in ''Black and White'' UpToEleven with the [=DexNav=] Pokémon, which must be [[OptionalStealth snuck up on]] and often have moves they could normally only get from breeding, potentially also getting improved rates of top-tier stats.

* Taken UpToEleven in ''VideoGame/{{LISA}}''; ''every single enemy'' has a unique sprite and spot where they're fought. The only exception is the Figures that appear in a cave stretch in the first area.

* In ''VideoGame/EarthBound'', not only are enemies shown clearly on screen (though the sprites tend to hide their type), but the direction your character is facing when the encounter occurs makes a difference. If the enemy is facing away from you, you get an additional turn at the start; if you're facing away from it, the enemy gets the first turn. If an enemy is weak enough that you can kill it before it gets a chance to attack, it's defeated instantly. Getting an extra turn at the start of battle makes this much more likely.

* ''VideoGame/ZeldaIITheAdventureOfLink'' has certain squares on the overworld map that lead to a monster battle when stepped on, no matter what. There's a particularly annoying series of them near Death Mountain that you need to pass in order to reach the last part of the game.
** If your timing is just right, you can lure an enemy onto those squares and get off with a much easier encounter.

* Taken UpToEleven in ''VideoGame/{{LISA}}''; ''every single enemy'' has a uniques sprite and spot where they're fought. The only exception is the Figures that appear in a cave stretch in the first area.

* ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros3'' has Hammer Bros., Boomerang Bros., Fire Bros. and Sledge Bros. randomly wandering around the world maps. Mario is transported to a battle screen if they run into him, but can sometimes avoid them.

** ''VideoGame/PokemonOmegaRubyAndAlphaSapphire'' take the version first found in ''Black and White'' UpToEleven with the [=DexNav=] Pokémon, which must be [[OptionalStealth snuck up on]] and often have moves they could normally only get from breeding, potentially also getting improved rates of top-tier stats.

[[folder:Racing Game]]
* A significant number of street racing games such as ''VideoGame/TokyoXtremeRacer'' and ''VideoGame/RacingLagoon'' have rival cars that exist onscreen and engage you in a duel when you pass the headlights on them (or vice versa.)
[[/folder]]

** The same is true for ''VideoGame/{{Xenoblade}}'' and [[VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles2 it's sequel]]. All enemy encounters are present in the world proper, helping to lend to the game's grand sense of scale. The player can choose to fight any of them at will (Or not. The first time you go through any given area, there will be enemies a good four or five times your level scattered about). While most enemies will mind their own business otherwise, other enemies will initiate the battle on their own; some will do so if they see you, some if they ''hear'' you, and still others if you use an Ether-based move in their vicinity. Likewise, even enemies that wouldn't pick a fight with you ordinarily ''might'' do so if they stumble upon you in the middle of a fight with another one of their species. Also as an anti-frustration measure, even aggressive enemies will stop triggering if you're ten levels or more higher than them, allowing you to freely explore certain areas with impunity after a while.

* ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}''
** Numerous trainers are entirely avoidable, while legendary Pokémon (except for the free-roaming kinds) appear as sprites on the screen that the player has to walk up to to initiate the fight, and most can be ignored completely. However, starting with ''Ruby'' and ''Sapphire'', the cover legendary mascot ''must'' be encountered to continue the story. The only exception so far is ''Emerald'', wherein the mascot Rayquaza only needs to be approached instead of fought; a battle with it can optionally be done later. The remakes of ''VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver'' (''[=HeartGold=]'' and ''[=SoulSilver=]''), the first games to feature mascot legendaries, even changed it so the mascots had to be encountered before the player could continue for the Pokémon League.

* ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}''
** Numerous trainers are entirely avoidable, while legendary Pokémon (except for the free-roaming kinds) appear as sprites on the screen that the player has to walk up to to initiate the fight, and most can be ignored completely. However, starting with ''Ruby'' and ''Sapphire'', the cover legendary mascot ''must'' be encountered to continue the story. The only exception so far is ''Emerald'', wherein the mascot Rayquaza only needs to be approached instead of fought; a battle with it can optionally be done later. The remakes of ''VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver'' (''[=HeartGold=]'' and ''[=SoulSilver=]''), the first games to feature mascot legendaries, even changed it so the mascots had to be encountered before the player could continue for the Pokémon League.
** ''VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite'' add a new type of pre-existing encounter in the forms of shaking patches of grass on the overworld, clouds of dirt in caves, and shadows in the water. Moving onto either will start a battle with a wild Pokémon, but the Pokémon available in this fashion are often rarer than the norm or exclusive to this type of encounter, including even extremely powerful fully evolved Pokémon like Metagross, Tyranitar, and Dragonite.
** ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'' also have this, though in the form of shaking bushes that will trigger a Pokémon ambush if approached, along with shadows that appear in various caves and outside at Victory Road that will make a Pokémon dive down and attack you if you step under them.
** ''VideoGame/PokemonOmegaRubyAndAlphaSapphire'' take the version first found in ''Black and White'' UpToEleven with the [=DexNav=] Pokémon, which must be [[OptionalStealth snuck up on]] and often have moves they could normally only get from breeding, potentially also getting improved rates of top-tier stats.
** ''VideoGame/PokemonSunAndMoon'' add on to the version from ''X and Y'' with some unique behaviors for specific Pokémon. These include Pokémon that ''charge at you'' in the grass, Pokémon feeding on piles of berries, and one Pokémon that runs from you so quickly that it's necessary to ride on Tauros to actually fight it.
** In ''VideoGame/PokemonLetsGoPikachuAndEevee'', all wild Pokémon encounters are preexisting encounters - wild Pokémon pop out of tall grass (and anywhere in caves) and roam around the map, prompting an encounter only if you run into them. This makes traversing caves [[AntiFrustrationFeatures much]], ''[[AntiFrustrationFeatures much]]'' [[AntiFrustrationFeatures less tedious]] than in previous games. This is combined with the usual RandomEncounters in ''VideoGame/PokemonSwordAndShield''.

* Later games in the ''VideoGame/TalesSeries''.

*** An infamous area of Earth Cave, known as the "Giant's Arm", was a bending passageway where every single square was an automatic encounter against Giants and/or Green Ogres.

* A good number of the fights in ''VideoGame/CrisisCore: VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'' are like this. The first dungeon uses them almost exclusively. The one battle required to complete a side mission in ''VideoGame/CrisisCore'' is this as well. All other battles give the impression of being random encounters, although they only trigger at specific locations due to the realtime nature of the game's battles and can often be avoided by hugging the walls.

* You can't see them in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyI'', but there are squares where you are guaranteed to get into a battle if you step on them. These are almost always squares adjacent to treasure chests.
** An infamous area of Earth Cave, known as the "Giant's Arm", was a bending passageway where every single square was an automatic encounter against Giants and/or Green Ogres.

* In ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyMysticQuest'', unlike the rest of the ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'' series, the monsters in the dungeons are always visible and in fixed positions. There are two exceptions, but there are items to counteract their invisibility (which, conveniently, are found in that very same dungeon). Luckily for you, they don't respawn until after you leave.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXII'' has something like this as well, although you can't ''always'' avoid the enemies. Some of them come after you. On the other hand, some of them won't attack you until you attack them first.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII'' has visible encounters as well. Some enemies completely block your path and you are forced to fight them. Preemptive strikes occur when you approach the enemy from behind without alerting them.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII2'' has monsters spawn on top of you, but you can still run out of their agro radius to avoid fighting all but the fastest enemies, the game also has something called the Mog clock. The Mog clock has three sections, Green means you can do a pre-emptive strike, yellow means you can't, red means the enemy begins to chase you, and running out forces you into the battle without letting you retry from the beginning of the fight if you die (putting you back in the overworld with no guarantee the mob you were hunting will spawn again).
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXV'' has a combination of both random encounters and preexisting encounters: only a handful of enemies randomly spawn (usually from heavily-forested areas or the daemons at night) while most monsters and imperial soldiers can be seen beforehand and avoided should the player so choose.

* In ''VideoGame/MegaManBattleNetwork5'', there are image data of some Navis on some places on the Net. The player can freely fight the image data any time (s)he wants to.
** In all the games, [=V2=]/Alpha boss rematches are invisible encounters set at specific points on the overworld, usually on a random dead end. You can actually tell when you have it right - Mega Man will return to his standing position right before the FightWoosh rather than freeze in the middle of a step.

* The ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyLegendII' and ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyLegendIII'' DS remakes replace random encounters from the originals with [[ActuallyFourMooks monsters running on the world map representing battles]]. Most are possible to avoid.

* ''VideoGame/SuperMarioRPG: Legend of the Seven Stars'' has enemies walking around, but like the PC [[ActuallyFourMooks a single enemy represents the whole party]].
** ''VideoGame/PaperMario'' games has the monsters walk around in plain sight, with contact leading to combat. They can be avoided entirely, or the player can opt for a First Strike (leading to a bit of extra damage) by jumping on the enemy or hitting them with the hammer or certain partner skills. Some badges also provided other options. One of them would instantly defeat weak enemies if you hit them on the field, while another would stun the first enemy instead of damaging it.
** ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigi'' games have this as well. If an enemy hits the second character, they get the First Strike.
** ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros3'' has the Hammer Bros., Boomerang Bros., Fire Bros. and Sledge Bros. randomly wandering around the world maps. Mario is transported to a battle screen if they run into him, but can sometimes avoid them.
* In ''VideoGame/Persona3'' and ''VideoGame/Persona4'', Shadows walk the map as blobs - black blobs are normal, red blobs are EliteMooks, and gold blobs are MetalSlime. Hitting them with your weapon starts the fight. Hit it in the back and you get a surprise round; get hit first and ''they'' get the first move. If you level up enough, they ''run from you'' - and if you happen to fight them anyway, the enemies will suffer from the Distress status effect.

* Numerous trainers in the ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' games are entirely avoidable, while legendary Pokémon (except for the free roaming kinds) appear as sprites on the screen that the player has to walk up to to initiate the fight, and most can be ignored completely. However, starting with ''Ruby'' and ''Sapphire'', if the Pokémon on the box is legendary, the one pictured ''must'' be encountered to continue the story. The only exception so far is ''Emerald'', wherein the mascot Rayquaza only needs to be approached instead of fought; a battle with it can optionally be done later. The remakes of ''VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver'' (''[=HeartGold=]'' and ''[=SoulSilver=]''), the first games to feature mascot legendaries, even changed it so the mascots had to be encountered before the player could continue for the Pokémon League.

*** ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'' also have this, though in the form of shaking bushes that will trigger a Pokémon ambush if approached, along with shadows that appear in various caves and outside at Victory Road that will make a Pokémon dive down and attack you if you step under them.
*** ''VideoGame/PokemonOmegaRubyAndAlphaSapphire'' take the version first found in ''Black and White'' UpToEleven with the [=DexNav=] Pokémon, which must be [[OptionalStealth snuck up on]] and often have moves they could normally only get from breeding, potentially also getting improved rates of top-tier stats.
*** ''VideoGame/PokemonSunAndMoon'' add on to the version from ''X and Y'' with some unique behaviors for specific Pokémon. These include Pokémon that ''charge at you'' in the grass, Pokémon feeding on piles of berries, and one Pokémon that runs from you so quickly that it's necessary to ride on Tauros to actually encounter it.
*** In ''VideoGame/PokemonLetsGoPikachuAndEevee'', all wild Pokémon encounters are preexisting encounters - wild Pokémon pop out of tall grass (and anywhere in caves) and roam around the map, prompting an encounter only if you run into them. This makes traversing caves [[AntiFrustrationFeatures much]], ''[[AntiFrustrationFeatures much]]'' [[AntiFrustrationFeatures less tedious]] than in previous games. This is combined with the usual RandomEncounters in ''VideoGame/PokemonSwordAndShield''.

* The ''VideoGame/SaGa2'' and ''VideoGame/SaGa3'' DS remakes replace random encounters from the originals with [[ActuallyFourMooks monsters running on the world map representing battles]]. Most are possible to avoid.

* In the ''VideoGame/KisekiSeries'' games, which were remade for PSP, have their "random" encounters wandering around the overworld. They'll home in on you at close range, but if you're careful, you can pretty much avoid them completely.

** ''VideoGame/{{Mother 3}}'' has a similar system, although back attacks never lead to automatic victory; instead, if you are on a high enough level, you can just dash through the enemies, gaining no rewards but also avoiding the encounters entirely.

* In ''VideoGame/MegaManBattleNetwork 5'', there are image data of some Navis on some places on the Net. The player can freely fight the image data any time (s)he wants to.

* In ''VideoGame/SepterraCore: Legacy of the Ancients'', every battle is a set encounter. Worse, if you leave the map and have to backtrack later, every encounter is respawned in the exact same location. Some battles are skippable only if there's multiple ways to get to the destination, and even then, there's almost always at least one encounter on each route.

[[folder:Table Top Games]]

** ''VideoGame/PokemonBlackAndWhite'' add a new type of pre-existing encounter in the forms of shaking patches of grass and shadows in the water. Moving onto either will start a battle with a wild Pokémon, but the Pokémon available in this fashion are often rarer than the norm or exclusive to this type of encounter, including even extremely powerful fully evolved Pokémon like Metagross, Tyranitar, and Dragonite.