Line #31 VideoGame/DLCQuest


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/DLC_Quest_7510.jpg]]
2
3	''DLC Quest'' is a 2011 satirical IndieGame developed and published by Going Loud Studios for [[Platform/IBMPersonalComputer PC]], Platform/AppleMacintosh, and Platform/XboxLiveArcade that takes DownloadableContent to its [[ExaggeratedTrope logical extreme]]. In this game, ''everything'' needs to be purchased. Including things like "Pause" and "[[YouHaveResearchedBreathing Walk left]]".
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5	Naturally, in keeping with the parody of shameless consumerism in modern video games, there is a MissionPackSequel: ''Live Freemium or Die'', which sends Player on an all-new quest to collect coins and spend them on even more DLC (oh, and save some villagers from a monster or something).
6
7	A sequel of sorts was released in 2017 that parodies shameless consumerism even further: ''VideoGame/LootBoxQuest''.
8	----
9	!!''DLC Quest'' contains examples of the following tropes:
10	* AchievementSystem: Or, as the game calls them, Awardments, for things like:
11	** Catch Them All: Find all of the hidden DLC Packs.
12	** Big Spender: Spend one hundred coins.
13	* ArsonMurderAndJaywalking: As Nickel the shopkeeper says: "That bad guy just stole Princess MacGuffin! [[SaveThePrincess You have to rescue her!]] Also, he murdered your uncle! [[ItsPersonal You must get revenge!]] I think he might have peed in the town's water supply too! ...That seems a bit less important now."
14	%%* TheBadGuyWins: The bad ending.
15	* BetterThanABareBulb: Yeah, pretty much everything in this game is {{Lampshaded}} in one way or another.
16	* BigDamnHeroes: [[spoiler:Your horse]] arrives just in time to save the day! Hopefully [[spoiler:you've bought that horse armor DLC pack]]!
17	* BladderOfSteel: Getting the sword without buying the [[PercentBasedValues 10x multiplier]] for each use means pressing X 1000 times without quitting the game, since grind progress isn't one of the saved values.
18	* BribingYourWayToVictory: Buy DLC to skip the [[{{Pun}} grinding]]! Buy DLC to trade your sword for a gun! Buy DLC to get [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion armor for your horse]]! Etc.
19	* ChekhovsGag: [[spoiler:The horse armor. Not just a shout-out! It turns out your horse comes to the rescue in the final battle, and if it's not wearing the armor, the bad guy will easily kill it and then kill you.]]
20	* {{Cliffhanger}}: When entering the boss room for first time, credits roll. Of course, you can buy the ending DLC pack.
21	* CosmeticAward: "Awardments" are basically in-game achievements, and amusingly earning them also earns genuine achievements for the game on Steam and Xbox.
22	* DeconstructionGame: The game is all about satirizing overreliance on DownloadableContent.
23	* DoubleJump: The first game has a double-jump, which has to be bought, of course.
24	* DudeWheresMyRespect: {{Defied}}. One NPC asks you to perform several mundane quests for him. You say "No."
25	* EarthShatteringKaboom: A planetary explosion occurs in [[spoiler:the ending of ''Live Freemium or Die'']] as a result of [[spoiler:the Shopkeep selling Player a {{BFS}} so enormous and powerful that swinging it causes the world to spontaneously shatter]].
26	* EverythingsDeaderWithZombies: One DLC is a zombie pack, described as "This really doesn't really fit, but our marketing department said every game needs zombies."
27	* ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: As the trailer puts it:
28	--> ''"DLC = Downloadable content. Quest = [[ShapedLikeItself Quest.]]"''
29	* ExaggeratedTrope: This game is all about taking DLC practices to the extreme, particularly how some games go so hard on the {{Microtransactions}} you can barely play the game without paying for at least a few extra things after already buying, which is parodied here through the fact you ''literally'' can't play much of the game without buying something right after getting into the game, specifically [[YouHaveResearchedBreathing the ability to jump and move left]].
30	* ExcusePlot:
31	** Parodied. The opening cutscene shows you and a princess--helpful arrows will point out which is which--as she is kidnapped by a bad guy, also identified with a helpful arrow. Finally, the bad guy grabs the princess and runs away, and another arrow helpfully provides a label saying "Motivation".
32	** Parodied further in that while this quest does exist, in practice the game is ultimately about you collecting coins so that you can get more DLC which enables you to collect more coins so you can get more DLC...
33	* {{Fanservice}}: Mocked with the five-coin swimsuit DLC that changes every single characters clothes for the rest of the game. (Everyone is an 8-bit sprite, including the player and the princess.)
34	* FatalFlaw: The true BigBad of both games would be nearly unstoppable in his final plan if not for the crippling flaw of [[spoiler:greed, as the DLC shopkeep loves money so much he's willing to sell DLC packs of weapons that can hurt and eventually kill him just for a quick buck]].
35	* FightWoosh: Right before the random encounter. It's {{lampshaded}}, of course.
36	* FollowTheMoney: Coins. Which occasionally form the shape of a helpful arrow to point you in the right direction.
37	%% * InAWorld: The narrator in the trailer does his best.
38	* InexplicablyIdenticalIndividuals: The two shopkeepers are exactly alike. When you meet the second one, you question him on it, and he claims you've met his [[LongLostRelative long-lost brother]].
39	* IntentionalEngrishForFunny: Achievements are called "Awardments" in-game, though in the Steam version, the Steam achievement popups still say "achievement".
40	* JokerImmunity: {{Exaggerated}}, {{Parodied}}, and {{Exploited}}. The bad guy is well aware that you can't kill him (because if you did, [[MediumAwareness they wouldn't be able to make a sequel]]) and he rubs it in your face. In fact, you can [[spoiler:shoot him in the chest]] and he survives, seemingly without a scratch.
41	* LevelGrinding: Parodied with literal grinding--you have to grind a sword on a grindstone 10,000 times before you can use it. But you'll probably want to buy the DLC to skip that.
42	* LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading: ''Live Freemium or Die'' is less optimized and more prone to loading areas than the first part due to the developer not seeing it as important enough to delay for fixing. Naturally, there's a DLC for a day-one patch to fix that.
43	* LongLostRelative: The HandWave for the InexplicablyIdenticalIndividuals is them being long-lost twin brothers.
44	* MacGuffin: {{Lampshaded\|Trope}} with how the princess is named "Princess [=MacGuffin=]".
45	* MemeticMutation: Rather viciously parodied in-universe with Lamp, the town 'comedian' in ''Live Freemium or Die'', whose 'jokes' basically consist of witlessly regurgitating various pop culture and video game memes ("It gets a laugh, like, a third of the time."), much to Player's frustration whenever you interact with him. [[spoiler: Once you've interacted with him enough times, you can buy DLC which results in him dying from being repeatedly shot with arrows.]]
46	-->'''Player''': Looks like he took [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim an arrow ... to the knee]]. [[spoiler: And to the face. And several to the back. Yep, that'd do it.]]
47	* {{Metroidvania}}: It's a platformer with a lot of backtracking involved to find the necessary items for progression.
48	* {{Microtransactions}}: The premise of the game is satirizing having to pay for extra things to use in a game you already bought, specifically by making it where being able to do ''anything'' requires you to buy yet another DLC pack.
49	* MooseAndMapleSyrup: The sole point of the Canadian Dialog pack in ''Live Freemium or Die'' is tacking a questioning "eh?" on the end of most dialogue sentences, alongside making it where the DLC store ApologisesALot.
50	* MultipleEndings: There's a good ending if you [[spoiler:bought the horse armor]] and a bad ending if you didn't.
51	* OnlyOneSaveFile: The only big difference are the MultipleEndings, where there's only 2, and this is a short game so there doesn't need tons of saving to get both endings, so there's only one save file.
52	* OnlySaneMan: Player just wants to get on with his quest, but is continually exasperated by all the crippling DLC limitations, pointless {{Fetch Quest}}s and complete morons he has to deal with.
53	* ProductPlacement: Parodied. During the second game, ''BUY POP'' billboards appear everywhere (you can pay for making them go away, which just replaces them with advertising for the studio that made the game), and there is a ''POP ZONE - BROUGHT TO YOU BY POP'' area.
54	* RainbowSpeak: Like many other aspects of [=RPGs=] and other games, ''Live Freemium or Die'' parodies the tendency of text-heavy games to highlight important words with colored text through the [[purple:Incredibly Important]] Pack, as the Mayor is literally unable to tell you his quest until you buy the DLC to allow him to "speak" in color.
55	* RandomEncounters: Parodied. There's one random encounter after the "strange encounters" sign, and it happens in a fixed place at a fixed time. When they said it was "Random", what they really meant was that the character you encounter is ''named'' "Random".
56	* RealIsBrown: Parodied with the High Definition Next Gen Pack which does nothing but making everything brown and pale. It references the trope name in its flavor text.
57	* SaveThePrincess: The goal of the first game is to rescue Princess [=MacGuffin=].
58	* SchmuckBait: There's a sign in the snowy area that mentions how so many lives were lost installing spikes at the bottom of a pit, which sounds a lot like the game trying to trick you into avoiding a secret area. [[spoiler:Turns out that no, there is indeed a spike pit at the bottom. You are given an Awardment for ignoring the warning to sate you explorer's curiosity, though, so you at least get something by falling for the bait.]]
59	* SequelSnark: "That was pathetic! How do you expect them to make a sequel if you killed the badguy?"
60	* ShoutOut:
61	** The horse armor pack is a reference to ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion'''s infamous DLC of the same name, which cost a whopping $2.50 for a cosmetic upgrade and received a massive backlash from the fandom. In ''DLC Quest'', the horse armor costs 250 coins and is the most expensive piece of DLC in the game. [[spoiler:It's also necessary for the good ending.]]
62	** [[VideoGame/MassEffect1 "Player." "Shepherd."]]
63	** The "Finish the fight" pack is a little jab to ''VideoGame/Halo3'''s tagline.
64	** [[Series/PimpMyRide "We heard you like jumping, so we put a jump in your jump, so you can jump while you jump."]]
65	** The achievement for getting a gun is [[Series/TheITCrowd "I've Got a Ruddy Gun!"]]
66	** [[WebVideo/GameGrumps HERE LIES]] [[WebVideo/JonTron VILLAGER JON (???-2013)]] [[WebVideo/GameGrumps KILLED BY THE CREATURES. REAL TALK? HE WASN'T PAYING ATTENTION.]]
67	** Here Lies Ryan (??? - 2013) Tried to fight the creatures. [[LetsPlay/{{Northernlion}} Died from dumb damage.]]
68	** "Allan please add [name/details]" refers to an infamous EasterEgg in ''VideoGame/HitmanBloodMoney''.
69	** The final boss of "Live Freemium or Die" references Bane from ''Film/TheDarkKnightRises'' in one of his speeches.
70	** Some of the things asked for a one point may include [[Creator/MontyPython a shrubbery]], a RedHerring, and [[Franchise/AssassinsCreed 134 Masyaf flags]]. Hilariously and thoughtfully, [[spoiler:they're all in one package just above the NPC who asked for them. The PC will admit with relief that he expected a FetchQuest, and the NPC points out that's a lot to ask of a stranger, and they barely know each other. The PC will call the NPC thoughtful before proceeding on his quest]].
71	** Shepherd is shocked and finds it silly with a little thought about how [[VideoGame/PlantsVsZombies plants could defeat zombies]].
72	* SpikesOfDoom: ''Live Freemium or Die'' introduces the concept of platformer death, and naturally the most common source of dying will be spikes on floors, ceilings, and walls.
73	* SuspiciouslySpecificDenial: One underground path has a conspicuously placed sign that says "This is a dead end."
74	* TreacherousQuestGiver: The frequent quest parodies naturally means the "secretly evil quest provider" would be lampooned too, only the game goes an interesting route about it with [[spoiler:it turning out that the true villain of both games is the DLC shopkeep himself, who is determined to keep the adventure going because it lets him make more DLC to get more money from you]].
75	* TreasureIsBiggerInFiction: Coins in this game are large, about half the size of a person's head.
76	* {{Troll}}: There's a sign near the [[AllTrollsAreDifferent troll]] saying "No solicitors", and when the player realises he needs a better weapon, the troll responds, "Problem?"
77	* UnintentionallyUnwinnable: Getting the sword by actually grinding at the grindstone 1000 times manually without quitting partway without buying the DLC leaves you with some extra cash, which you can use to buy things other than the DoubleJump Pack when it's needed to get enough coins to actually finish the game. Soon you will have no money to even buy the pack and be unable to access the ending.
78	* VideoGameCrueltyPotential: You get an awardment for killing all sheep and humans in the game, including the shopkeepers[[note]]which you can still talk to for DLC-related business[[/note]]. [[spoiler:This becomes a plot point in ''Live Freemium or Die'']].
79	* VisualPun: One collected item in ''Live Freemium or Die'' is the "Humble Indie Bindle", which references the Creator/HumbleBundle discount site for indie games while also literally being a "humble" bindle.
80	* WallJump: Wall-jumping replaces double-jumping in the second part.
81	* YouHaveResearchedBreathing: Parodied. The first thing you have to do is buy the Movement Pack for the ability to move left and jump.

Context VideoGame / DLCQuest