History VideoGame / Underrail

** Heavy Guns have the most damage potential of any weapon, with high damage per shot and innately larger burst sizes. They also have the highest Strength requirements of any weapon, needing a massive 13 investment to use the heaviest minigun, which means a lot of investment in an attribute that does not directly increase your damage with them. They also [AwesomeYetImpractical cannot even fire in single shots], forcing you to use an entire burst if you want to finish off a rathound with 1HP left. The issues with cost and weight of carrying ammo with Guns is also magnified by Heavy Guns, since you need a whole lot more of it.

* ChainsawGripBfg.: The Heavy Guns skill exclusively features these, with both LMGs and Miniguns being depicted this way on the character models. This includes the [Aka47 N60] [SpellMyNamewithAThe The Warthog] whose real life counterpart actually was designed to be fired normally.

** Expedition adds a powered exoskeleton that increases Strength and [ThisIsADrill has a integrated mining drill] that more closely fits the trope, While Heavy Duty adds actual actual powered armor.

** Heavy Guns have the most damage potential of any weapon, with high damage per shot and innately larger burst sizes. They also have the highest Strength requirements of any weapon, needing a massive 13 investment to use the heaviest minigun, which means a lot of investment in an attribute that does not directly increase your damage with them. They also [AwesomeYetImpractical] cannot even fire in single shots], forcing you to use an entire burst if you want to finish off a rathound with 1HP left. The issues with cost and weight of carrying ammo with Guns is also magnified by Heavy Guns, since you need a whole lot more of it.

** Heavy Guns have the most damage potential of any weapon, with high damage per shot and innately larger burst sizes. They also have the highest Strength requirements of any weapon, needing a massive 13 investment to use the heaviest minigun, which means a lot of investment in an attribute that does not directly increase your damage with them. They also [SacrificedBasicSkillforAwesome cannot even fire in single shots], forcing you to use an entire burst if you want to finish off a rathound with 1HP left. The issues with cost and weight of carrying ammo with Guns is also magnified by Heavy Guns, since you need a whole lot more of it.

Another ExpansionPack, ''Underrail: Heavy Duty'', was announced on October 2, 2023. It revealed the addition of heavy weapons, companion characters, and a new area called the Dark Territories.

* MoreDakka: Characters who invest into Guns can quickly learn skills that let them add more dakka to the Underrail. Assault Rifles are better at it than [=SMG=]s and Shotguns, but all three classes of firearm are more than capable of pouring out lead. If you kill three enemies with one Burst Fire attack in the Arena, you'll even be nicknamed Dakka Dakka by the audience.

* RecursiveReality: PlayedForLaughs. One of the options on [[spoiler:Evelyn's laptop]] is "Play Underrail: Expedition." It just exits the dialogue. Whether this means the rest of the game is actually your character sitting there playing as their own self is anyone's guess.

* GlacialApocalypse: [[spoiler: The Utility Tower]] found in Upper Underrail HEAVILY implies that this was what forced humanity underground centuries ago. [[spoiler:It takes you up high enough to feel and see wind and snow, both of which are so deathly cold that they can kill you in seconds without protection]].

* GameGourmet: The game has an extensive array of food and drink; they provide varying buffs, but also serve as worldbuilding, showing how humanity has adapted to the underground.
** Grain-based bread is a thing of the past; instead, sandwiches are made with Rootbread, presumably made from ground-up roots. Mushrooms are ubiquitous in Underrail cuisine, and are used to brew [[GargleBlaster incredibly potent beer]]. Canned meat and mushrooms are still a thing, with the added bonus of ionizing radiation to ensure absurdly long shelf-life,. Just about the only Underrail critter humanity hasn't found a way to eat are Cave Crawlers; otherwise, enjoy Rathound Skewers, Psi-Beetle Brain Soup, Cave Hopper Steaks, Burrower Burgers, and more.
** At the Drag N' Drop, which is located in a different spot every playthrough, you can buy and drink several different mixed drinks. Examples include the Scrapperac, a play on the real-world Sazerac, the White Dude, a riff on the White Russian, and the Mindshroom Martini, which needs no introduction.

** The Expedition adds [[MacheteMayhem Machetes]] and [[BladeOnAStick Spears]]. Machetes are middle-grounds between knives and sledgehammers. They're devastating against organic foes and effective against armored ones, but unless your character is exceptionally well-built, they have bad attack speed, limiting you to a few blows per turn. Spears are even better at piercing armor than sledgehammers, and have a range of two tiles instead of one, but are only slightly less slow than sledgehammers, and cannot stun. Both weapon types come with a new array of perks.

* DiabolousExMachina: Just when you have the cube in your reach it is [[spoiler: stolen by tchortists]]. This has very little foreshadowing and comes pretty much out of nowhere.

* HeartIsAnAwesomePower: [[DumpStat Persuasion and Merchantile]]. While little the skills can do at the beginning, pursuing them to go even higher will benefit each other mutually, reducing buying prices while raising yours significantly. Doing so will also make certain situations significantly easier, such as [[spoiler:allowing you get a second freebie from Quinton for your next Metathermics skill, persuading the Rathound King to make amends with Camp Hathor all awhile revealing you the shortcut that directly leads to his lair from the cave entrance to his maze and/or convinced a group of angry zoners to leave a damaged tunneler drill for you to repair it yourself]].

* ApocalypseHow: A catacylsmic event rendered life on the surface impossible, pushing the remainder of humanity to live in underground stations, mostly subway systems. The game is rather vague about the exact nature of this event, however.

* ArbitraryGunPower: Several pistols, especially those in the .44 and 9mm range, are just as powerful as full-sized rifles. Pistols are also much stronger than SMGs of the same caliber despite. Crossbows also deal just as much damage as sniper rifles despite being no more advanced than a modern-day composite crossbow.

* ArbitraryGunPower: Zig-zagged. Pistols are realistically much less effective than other classes of guns, although they are much more lightweight, even the HandCannon-type pistols. Played straight with crossbows, however; they are less effective at penetrating armor than other types of ranged weaponry.
** Played completely straight with the Wasteland Hawk, which is a handgun with a upper damage limit of 100 and a critical bonus of 150%, putting it in the same league as sniper rifles for damage.

* FutureImperfect: The people of the Undertail have forgotten a great many things about the Old World on the surface, which is particularly evident with regards to the subject of wood, which is extremely rare and only really exists in relics of the Old World. One of the ferrymen learned to TalkLikeAPirate from his father (with the style of speech presumably being passed down through the family), including the expression "shiver me timbers", but also admits he has no idea what "timbers" are, but also none of his passengers do either. In a twist, the word pirate means much the same in the Underrail as it does now, but the ferryman in question ''believes'' that in the Old World, a pirate was a type of trader or adventurer. As another example, Myles in Rail Crossing has a story of how he obtained what is clearly an M1 Garand and its manual, though he didn't seem to pick up its actual name. However, he did learn what wood was from the manual's mention of a "full wood stock" and does note that the wood furniture on another Old World firearm was noticably different, but seems to believe that wood is a synthetic material. Humorously, he and a buddy also got Garand thumb while experimenting with the rifle, but refer to the condition as "wood thumb".

* MundaneLuxury: During ''Expedition'', Seeger can offer you an insulated flask of real coffee brewed with actual beans. Your dialogue options make it clear that such coffee is a kingly luxury in South Underrail, to the extent that one possible response is - in the game's words - to "gaze at it in awe".

** The Wasteland Hawk [[DiscussedTrope is explicitly mentioned as being a monster of a weapon with no practical application]] by Myles if you show it to him. It costs 35AP to fire it, making it hard to fire more than 2 shots a turn but is loud enough to daze anyone near it when it's fired

** A character build focusing on pistols might find themselves outranged and outgunned by most human enemies using heftier firearms. It ''is doable'', [[NintendoHard but you will find it very hardgoing]]. Remember in real life, pistols are just sidearms and aren't intended to be main weapons. This is now downplayed, since Pistols have received several buffs and gotten some potent feats of their own.

** Hostile human NPCs will nearly always have higher health than you will, even if you're a tank.

* TheRevolutionWillNotBeCivilized: The Free Drones may be opposing [[TheEmpire the United Stations]], but they are ''not'' good guys. Even joining them requires the player to sentence Rail Crossing to death by sabotaging relations between them and the United Stations, and their questline culminates in [[spoiler:bombing Epione Lab to take out the Protectorate's troop transport lines, killing an untold number of civilians in addition to the intended targets]]. Going by what some NPCs around Underrail will tell you when asked about them, what the cell in Southern Underrail does is ''tame'' by the group's standards.

* DifficultySpike: The early game up to Junkyard is fairly easy, but Depot A is very challenging on a first run. Numerous traps, Infected Dogs that stunlock you, Mutants that deal tons of Bio damage, and a mazelike design all make Depot A into the most difficult part of the game. This is an enforced example, since players who fail to beat Depot A will struggle to complete the rest of the game, which is similarly challenging but to a lesser extent.

''Underrail'' is a 2015 old school turn-based WesternRPG developed and published by the Belgrade-based indie developer studio Stygian Software that throws the player into a dystopian post-apocalyptic world deep underground. According to the developers, the game has lots of influence from ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'', ''VideoGame/SystemShock'', ''VideoGame/{{Arcanum}}'', ''VideoGame/JaggedAlliance'' (for the tactical aspect), and many other computer [=RPGs=] of the '90s, and it shows.

''Underrail'' is a 2015 old school turn-based WesternRPG developed and published by Stygian Software that throws the player into a dystopian post-apocalyptic world deep underground. According to the developers, the game has lots of influence from ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'', ''VideoGame/SystemShock'', ''VideoGame/{{Arcanum}}'', ''VideoGame/JaggedAlliance'' (for the tactical aspect), and many other computer [=RPGs=] of the '90s, and it shows.

* ShoutOut:
** In Core City you can participate in a DeadlyGame show called Gauntlet. The participants are called [[Film/TheRunningMan "runners" and your character has to wear a yellow jumpsuit during the game]].
** Camp Hathor has three merchants, named [[WesternAnimation/EdEddNEddy Fred, Fredd and Freddy]].
** At one point when asked for your name, you can respond with [[VideoGame/PlanescapeTorment "Adahn"]].
** The "oddities" include several:
*** A (broken) motion tracker from ''Film/AlienS''.
*** A cybernetic module from ''VideoGame/SystemShock2''.
*** The hollowed-out Bible from ''Film/TheShawshankRedemption''. You even find it in a prison escape tunnel that is hidden behind a poster.
*** A quad damage powerup from ''VideoGame/{{Quake}}''. It doesn't work, though.
*** Glowing red camera from [[Film/TwoThousandOneASpaceOdyssey HAL 9000]], here called "self-consciousness module".
*** Sports almanac from ''Film/BackToTheFuturePartII''.
*** A [[VideoGame/{{Fallout}} Pip-Boy]] wrist computer.
*** A [[VideoGame/{{DayOfTheTentacle}} purple-green tentacle]] plush toy.
** One side quest in Rail Crossing involves catching a medicine thief red-handed. Upon nabbing them in the act, the player character shouts for them to [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion "Hold it right there,]] [[Memes/TheElderScrolls criminal scum!"]]
** Most of the Foundry Guards' idle lines are references to classic metal music, specifically to ''Music/JudasPriest''.
** Dogs occasionally drop the Dog Collar oddity, which used to belong to [[WesternAnimation/WackyRaces a dog named Muttley]].
** The achievements have several:
*** [[{{Film/Highlander}} There Can Be Only One]] - for killing your doppelganger.
*** [[{{Franchise/Batman}} Mr. Freeze]] - for freezing 50 enemies.
*** [[Music/MCHammer It's Hammer Time!]] - for killing 50 enemies with Sledgehammers.
*** [[Film/DirtyHarry Do You Feel Lucky, Punk?]] - for killing an enemy with the last bullet in your magazine.
*** [[{{Franchise/Pokemon}} It's Super Effective!]] - for doing 500 damage with one attack.
*** {{Franchise/Hitman}} - for killing 10 humans with the Execute ability.
*** [[Creator/ChuckNorris Chuck Attack]] - for killing an enemy with Dirty Kick.
*** [[Film/TwoThousandOneASpaceOdyssey I'm Afraid I Can't Let You Do That]] - for dying to the same robotic enemy 3 times in one play session.
** If you destroy the cameras in the testing chamber at South Gate Station, Vencel will get upset and ask you what cameras ever did to you. One reply is [[VideoGame/DwarfFortress "It was inevitable"]].
** Another one to Dwarf Fortress - in ''Expedition'', female natives carry the Masterwork Bone Hairpin Oddity. The name itself is a reference to the highest level of crafted goods from DF, and the description notes that "[[Memes/DwarfFortress All craftmanship is of the highest quality]]," before describing the pin's artwork. It surprisingly does not menace with spikes of wrymbone.
** Taking Motion enough times after having met Ditch the Zoner will net you a scene of your character standing on a ledge, singing a Crawler-centric rendition of the classic Spiderman theme.
** The Deep Worm enemies found in the Deep Caves may as well be called "Definitely Not [[{{Franchise/Dune}} Sand Worms]]". They can drop a Weird Hook oddity, a nod to the Fremen method of riding the beasts.
** In the caverns, players [[https://www.stygiansoftware.com/wiki/images/6/63/Pumboar_and_Tipper.png may encounter]] a [[Franchise/TheLionKing unique Warthog, Pumboar, and his unique Cave Hopper companion Tipper]].
** After completing Big Bret's hopper roundup, he asks you to name the newly-captured critters. One possible response is [[WesternAnimation/DuckTales Huey, Dewey and Louie]].
** One possible inhabitant of the Water Treatment Plant dungeon is [[Film/DrStrangelove Dr. Oddloathe]].
** One of the generic lines of dialogue you may hear from the guards at Camp Hathor - "Visit our merchants. I'm sure you can find [[VideoGame/ResidentEvil4 somethin' interestin']].

** Guns are solid all-rounders with answers for most situations, but they're limited by several factors. They can be rendered nearly-harmless by well-made armor, energy shields, and enemies who have high dodge stats.

* ElaborateUndergroundBase: [[UpToEleven Basically the whole game]].

** [[KnifeNut Knives]] are as fast as fists are, but slightly more damaging; they come in three flavors. Serrated knives do less damage but inflict bleeding wounds, Daggers are weaker against mechanical resistance but do more damage to vulnerable enemies, and Combat Knives are all-rounders with no real strengths or weaknesses. While knives have more perks than fists do, they are completely useless against armor in contrast to 'mostly' useless.

* KnifeNut: One popular build is a sneaky melee assassin. You'll be able to carve up humans and most animals without even raising the alarm, but you're going to have a tough time of it if you ever need to handle robotic opponents. On the NPC side of things, most Bandit clans in the game have KnifeNut[=s=] of their own running around, especially [[CannibalClan the Lurkers]].
** Ol' Chopper is a boss variant, wielding a deadly Kukri and ambushing unwary travelers so he can [[AnArmAndALeg do exactly what his name implies]]. The Butcher in the Lurker Base wields a meat-cleaver, and Zaman wields a blood-soaked knife called "The Dehumanizer"; all of them are complete lunatics.

''Underrail'' is a 2015 old school turn-based WesternRPG developed and published by Stygian Software that throws the player into a dystopian post-apocalyptic world on the underground. According to the developers, the game has lots of influence from ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'', ''VideoGame/SystemShock'', ''VideoGame/{{Arcanum}}'', ''VideoGame/JaggedAlliance'' (for the tactical aspect), and many other computer [=RPGs=] of the '90s, and it shows.

** Aegis Incorporated: "You go any direction, provided it is forward"
** Coretech: "State-of-the Art equipment amounts to a State-of-the-Art agent"
** Praetorian Security: "Order through Strength"

*** The Wasteland Hawk [[DiscussedTrope is explicitly mentioned as being a monster of a weapon with no practical application]] by Myles if you show it to him. It costs 35AP to fire it, making it hard to fire more than 2 shots a turn but deals very consistent damage.