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Introduced in the Baldimore comics
Baldi
- Abnormal Limb Rotation Range: He dislocates his elbow while waving at the player.
- Affably Evil: Implied in the Kickstarter demo. He says he's playing hide-and-seek with you, and as you just grab the notebooks instead of solving math problems, you can't make him angry. Also, his face appears in icons on the bottom right showing when he hears you, knows where you are, doesn't know where you are, etc. His expressions hardly look malicious, and more like he's genuinely having fun. This is certainly different from the original game, where he was more Faux Affably Evil. Likewise in Baldi's Basics Plus, which adds back solving math problems in the form of Baldi's Math Machine, but remains the hide and seek game from before.
- After beating the Brutal Bonus Level in Classic Remastered, Baldi replaces Null in every secret ending, and is happy to see the player every time for different reasons. In the Classic Style, he helps the player understand negative numbers in a subtraction problem, in the Party Style, he lets the player listen to a song he composed, and in the Demo Style, he gets the player to help him test out his Shrink Machine, not even getting mad at them when it malfunctions.
- Beating Plus will transport you into his office, where he sings a song congratulating you on your success. And then you get jumpscared by the whole thing glitching out like crazy, but it's obvious that's not deliberate on his part.
- Ax-Crazy: Baldi is this in every sense of the word. If you get just one of his math problems wrong, Baldi will chase you down throughout the school with a ruler in his hand and attempt to kill you. Or just spank you — it's never been made clear, and a kindergartner would find the latter to be terrifying enough.
- Bait the Dog: He initially seems like a nice guy; welcoming the player to his schoolhouse, congratulating them for getting questions right, and even rewarding the player with a quarter after they complete the first notebook. Then he gives you an unsolvable math problem and chases after you with a ruler.
- Bald of Evil: Except for a single hair on his head, meant to represent an ahoge.
- Berserk Button: Whatever you do, do not fail any of Baldi's math lessons, or he'll get angry and attack you.Baldi: I GET ANGRIER FOR EVERY PROBLEM YOU GET WRONG
- Big Bad: He is the one chasing after the player and the main threat to escaping the school.
- Big Eater: He is portrayed as such in the Baldimore comics.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: While he may look oddly charming, Baldi isn't above chasing you down with a ruler to kill or spank you if you get a problem wrong.
- Black Speech: Baldi is frequently accompanied by blaring static, which is also his jumpscare sound.
- Blatant Lies: "Now it's time for everybody's favorite subject: Math!"
- Charlie Brown Baldness: He only has one strand of hair on his head.
- Corporal Punishment: In this horror game, the monster is a school teacher who wants to kill (or spank) the player for just getting his math questions wrong.
- Creepy Long Fingers: Baldi has long, skinny fingers, most noticeable when he's standing still at the beginning of the game.
- Death Glare: If/when you get a math problem wrong in the original game, Baldi's smiling face on the screen slowly turns into a glare.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Tries to beat or kill you with a ruler for answering questions wrong or letting a campfire go out.
- Don't Make Me Take My Belt Off!: Whenever Baldi is nearby, you can recognize his approach by the sound of him hitting his ruler against his open hand. It's pretty clear what he intends to use it for.
- Dreadful Musician: "Baldi's Funtime Song" has terrible audio quality, is played off-key, gets its loop cut off, and has ten seconds of dead air before Baldi finally remembers to stop recording. The subtitles even describe it as "horrible, absolutely dreadful music".
- Evil Teacher: If you get even a single question wrong, Baldi WILL (or at least will try to) kill you.
- Extreme Omnivore: To the point of having eaten his wife's hairbrush at one point.
- Fair-Play Villain: In Plus, though it's arguable how villainous he really is - he starts in front of you, but as part of his hide and seek game he counts to ten before beginning his pursuit, allowing the player to gain a lot of ground.
- Faux Affably Evil: Baldi initially acts as a friendly Cool Teacher… but then gives you an unsolvable problem, and immediately goes completely batshit once you give a wrong answer.
- Green and Mean: Baldi wears a green shirt and he's an Ax-Crazy Evil Teacher.
- Guest Fighter: In another indie game called Strange Terror From The Deep, Baldi has a small chance of appearing, out to punish the player as usual.
- Hell Is That Noise: Baldi's presence is heralded by him menacingly smacking his ruler against his palm. The static sound when he catches you counts as well.
- Hidden Depths:
- The Field Trip minigame reveals that he loves camping.
- After defeating Null, the Demo Style secret ending reveals he's actually been developing a shrinking machine, although it's not working yet and blows up when he asks you to activate it.
- Hollywood Tone-Deaf: Averted. The amateurish quality of "Baldi's Funtime Song" is quite realistic, with Baldi having less-than-studio grade recording equipment, accidentally looping the melody one too many times, and leaving in several seconds of dead air. If Baldi simply polished it up and played a little bit more on-key, it wouldn't be that bad.
- Idiot Hair: Despite his name, Baldi does have a single hair on his head that serves as an ahoge.
- Invisible Anatomy: He is stated to have very sensitive hearing, but doesn't have visible ears. Still doesn't stop him from detecting every noise the player makes and coming there.
- Jabba Table Manners: Baldi's idea of eating an apple apparently consists of smashing the thing into his face over and over again for ten seconds.
- Jump Scare: When you're caught by Baldi.
- Lazy Bum: Although he's not lazy when teaching a class, a chalkboard implies that Baldi was too lazy to add more subjects from the V1.3 and onwards.
- Lightning Bruiser: Baldi gradually becomes faster and faster with every incorrect answer. Six wrong answers is the point he's straight-up faster than the player. In older versions, twelve wrong answers
makes Baldi so fast that he's literally impossible to avoid as his usual ruler slap sound glitches. - Logical Weakness:
- As his profile describes, and his own angry statements hint, he is very good at hunting you by hearing and will know whenever you've opened a door thanks to the noise. This also means, fortunately for you, that he can't deal well with loud and constant noises and will put his search off momentarily if you set up an alarm clock or tape as a distraction; he'll usually head off to disable it before he can get back to you.
- Additionally, he knows when the player is in detention and will attempt to catch them while they’re there. If the player leaves detention before he gets there, he will have to check and confirm they're not there before continuing his search, either by escaping or serving the time (the former being risky as encountering the Principal again after escaping will result in him sending them back with a longer sentence).
- Baldi can potentially break his ruler as a random event in Plus. While this makes his movements silent, he also becomes incapable of catching you.
- Manipulative Bastard: Before your character's arrival to the schoolhouse, he seems to have vandalized the notebooks your character is out to collect, gives you the resulting garbled messes of math problems, and then goes in to kill you when you get them wrong. Or maybe something else happened to them and he just hasn't realized.
- Meaningful Name: Since he has but one hair on his head.
- Mighty Glacier: Baldi is extremely slow (though he gets faster and faster for every problem you get wrong), but only needs to touch you once to kill you.
- Murder Is the Best Solution: Instead of tutoring the player for getting his math problems wrong and help them understand the math they've been given, Baldi decides to just straight-up try to kill them! After surviving the Brutal Bonus Level and getting the secret ending of the Classic Style in Classic Remastered, however, this is subverted in which he actually does help the player understand, specifically by talking about how negative numbers work in a subtraction problem.
- Nerf: In the 0.3 update of Plus, Baldi can no longer end your game while his ruler is broken.
- Non-Giving-Up School Guy: A very dark example. If you get even a single math problem wrong, he will chase you relentlessly to beat (or even kill) you.
- The Perfectionist: Best displayed in Endless Mode. No matter how many questions you answer correctly, he will never stop chasing you for the one still unsolvable question in the second notebook.
- Pet the Dog: While it doesn't redeem him for his actions, he actually congratulates the player for getting all 3 questions correct in each notebook in Endless Mode. Does not stop him from continuing to chase them, though.
- Sanity Slippage: He goes from a kind, supportive teacher to a monster, who chases you down the halls with a ruler the attosecond you get a problem wrong.
- Silent Antagonist: Downplayed. Baldi is quite chatty at the beginning of the game when he's acting nice, but once he starts chasing you, he never speaks again… aside from one line when you collect the last notebook. In Plus, he also speaks again when the player reaches the next floor of the schoolhouse when they solve a problem on his Math Machine, or when he touches the player while An Apple for Baldi is in their inventory.
- Skewed Priorities: If you're holding an apple when he catches you in the full game demo, he suddenly decides that eating your apple is a better idea instead of finishing his hunt by killing the player.
- Suddenly Shouting: A terrifying, rather loud example. After NULL is beaten, however, this is subverted, with the shouting getting replaced by a proper instruction from Baldi.Baldi: Congratulations! You found all seven notebooks! Now all you need to do is… GET OUT WHILE YOU STILL CAN!!! Hahahaaaaaaaa!
- Super-Senses: Baldi was hired for "his incredible hearing abilities". Baldi can hear any door the player opens, no matter how far he is, and can even hear the sound of doing math wrong.Baldi: I HEAR EVERY DOOR YOU OPEN.
- Turns Red: After failing a question for the first time, he moves around the school roughly as frequently as the sound of his ruler hitting his hand plays. For each question you get wrong afterward, he speeds up substantially, and eventually, the ruler noise is no longer a useful way of predicting how far away he is. In later versions, just simply collecting the notebooks (since they don't contain the math problems) is all it takes for him to speed up.
- Ungrateful Bastard: Double subverted. If you give him an apple, he will thank you and stop chasing you to eat it, but after he finishes it, he will go back to chasing you.
- Unstoppable Rage: He'll chase after you with his ruler, and won't stop until you're dead.
- Would Hurt a Child: Since the player is, presumably, a child.
Susan
Baldi's wife who only appears in two Baldimore comic strips.
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: After the Baldimore series ended, she never appeared again.
- The Smurfette Principle: Susan is the only notable female character in Baldimore.
Andrew
Like with his mother Susan, Andrew only appears in Baldimore, although he was only in one comic strip.
- Captain Ersatz: He isn't one, but in the strip that he appears in, he is watching "Rag-Tom Floppy Shirt".
- Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Similar to his mother, he hasn't been seen in the franchise since the original comic series.
Doctor Reflex
- Anti-Villain: Once the player completes their reflex test successfully, he leaves them alone. He also leaves them alone after hammering them.
- Berserk Button: If the player runs from his test, he chases them with a hammer (though he has to rush to his office to get it first) and uses it to shrink them and other characters he runs into while hunting for them. And then he goes back to his usual pleasant mood immediately after hammering the player.
- Carry a Big Stick: When angry, he carries a percussive hammer to hit the player.
- Character Catchphrase: Doctor Reflex says "Thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiink... FAST!" whenever he spots the player.
- Creepy High-Pitched Voice: He speaks with a distorted, high-pitched voice when roaming the halls.
- The Determinator: If provoked, Dr. Reflex is so persistent in his plans to flatten the player with his hammer that he will not stop searching the floor for them until he manages to catch them.
- Early Installment Character-Design Difference: In the comic he premiered in, he looked practically the same as Baldi in the last two panels. However, in panel 2, due to a young mystman running out of space for his head, Dr. Reflex has an enlongated head with a ponytail, buck teeth, big eyes, and curly hair with a bald spot resembling a tonsure. While his Baldi's Basics design kept the ponytail and buck teeth, it was his nose rather than his entire face that become long, his eyes became beady, and he is no longer bald.
- Groin Attack: In the comic strip that featured him, Baldi kicks him in the groin after he tests the reflexes in his knee.
- Incredible Shrinking Man: Anyone hit by his hammer will shrink briefly, limiting what the player and other characters can do. The player mostly becomes incapable of picking up notebooks and other items, while other characters usually become unable to interact with the player in their usual ways, such as Baldi becoming unable to catch them.
- Morally Ambiguous Doctorate: While largely looking out for the well-being of his patients, he tends to hammer those who run away.
- Non-Standard Character Design: Unlike the rest of the cast, who are 3D-modeled, he's a Claymation-styled character similar to Wallace & Gromit.
- Super-Senses: When angered, he listens for the player by the sounds they make, similar to Baldi, to track them down.
- Turns Red: When angry, his voice becomes even more distorted than before and his model is lit as if he's under a sunset.
Introduced in Baldi's Basics Classic
Playtime
- Anti-Villain: Unlike Baldi, she's really just a Non-Malicious Monster wanting someone to play with. She doesn't get mad or anything if you fail, and politely releases you once you win her minigame.
- Creepy Child: She's a little girl in a horror game, who has a distorted, very un-little-girl-like voice, and a design that is Stylistic Suck-ish in a rather creepy-looking way. Despite all this, though, she's not outright evil, just unnerving.
- Easily Forgiven: No matter how many times you cut her jump rope, she will still want to play jump rope with you later on.
- Eye Scream: She's said to have poor eyesight, and her eyes (or whatever the hell's in her eye sockets) look terrible.
- Friendly Enemy: She just wants a friend to play jump rope with. The problem is that she forces you to play with her and won't let you go until you finish.
- Informed Flaw: She's said to have poor eyesight, but she can see you just fine. Granted, she does have to be a bit closer to you than the other characters.
- Karma Houdini: The principal does not punish her despite her running faster than you.
- Rhymes on a Dime: "Jump rope ten times in a row! Once you do, I'll let you go!"
- That Makes Me Feel Angry: When you cut her jump rope to get out of playing with her, she says "Oh! That makes me sad."
- Vocal Dissonance: Is described as a young schoolgirl, but has a janky, distorted voice.
- Voice of the Legion: Her warped and Sensory-Abusing voice.
- Weaksauce Weakness: The player can cut her jump rope with the Safety Scissors.
Principal of the Thing
- Adults Are Useless: He offers you no help despite Baldi trying to beat or kill you. This could be due to lack of knowledge though, or that the game might be set in a school where it's acceptable to do so. He does send It's a Bully to detention if he catches him harassing you though.
- Averted more in Plus. He will drop whatever he is doing and immediately rush to your need if you use the Principal's whistle.Principal of the Thing: Don't worry, I'm coming!
- Averted more in Plus. He will drop whatever he is doing and immediately rush to your need if you use the Principal's whistle.
- Anti-Villain: Unlike Baldi, he's just a Punch-Clock Villain enforcing the school rules. And the worst he does is put you in ridiculously-short detention (99 seconds at maximum). He can also put It's a Bully in detention for bullying the player as of Update 1.3 of Baldi's Basics Classic.
- Benevolent Boss: He could be seen as one to Baldi, Gotta Sweep and Mrs. Pomp, as his description of Baldi in his office refers to him as a great teacher, and he never fires Gotta Sweep despite him sometimes crashing into him while cleaning.
- Buffy Speak: His own name, The Principal of the Thing.
- Beans calls him "The Guy of the Thing".
- Creepy Monotone: Always delivers his speeches in a monotone voice.
- Dean Bitterman: He seems to have shades of this, as he will send you to detention if he sees you breaking a rule for 0.5 seconds. However, he's not as mean as Baldi.
- Disapproving Look: His sprite features this.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Detention just for running or drinking in the halls or entering school faculty rooms?! (Granted, the detention only lasts a maximum of about a minute and a half, so it may not be that disproportionate.)
- Eyes Always Shut: While it's hard to see on his in-game sprite, he does have closed eyes. This is much more easily seen in merchindise.
- Eyeless Face: He seems to lack eyes due to the dithering applied to them.
- Eye Scream: He seems to lacks eyes; however, he does have what appears to be creepy, smudged-out eye sockets.
- Ghostly Gape: To add to his terrifying appearance.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Could serve as this since he is the principal of the schoolhouse, while Baldi is merely a teacher.
- Hypocrite: Despite him telling the player not to run in the halls, he still moves faster than the player's running speed.
- Idiot Ball: He still says "No [x] in the halls" even if you are not in the halls, but instead the cafeteria or classrooms, which should not be punishable in that case. He also lets Playtime get away with running. Adverted in the Public Demo and Plus, however, where he doesn't punish the player if they're breaking rules in the playground.
- Mad Libs Catch Phrase: "No [x] in the halls!"
- Nerf:
- In the full game, he'll increase the time he sends you to detention by 5 seconds for each subsequent time he sees you breaking rules instead of 15 seconds, making it easier to serve your time before Baldi catches you. However, Hard Mode in Classic Remastered reverts him to his earlier behavior.
- Version 1.2 now makes it possible to outrun and escape the Principal and cause him to stop chasing you. In previous versions, if he saw you breaking a rule, he'd be much faster than you while chasing you down.
- Not Cheating Unless You Get Caught: You can break the rules as much as you want as long as the Principal doesn't see it. If he does, though, it's off to detention!
- Punch-Clock Villain: While he's an obstacle to the player, he's just doing his job and bears no malice towards them.
- Punny Name: Named for "the principle of the thing", an expression generally used to justify Honor Before Reason behavior.
- Vocal Evolution: Principal of the Thing's voice started off monotonous, but still pretty sharp, but newer voicelines in the Field Trip Demo and Baldi's Basics Plus relaxed his voice to sound even calmer, which enhanced the monotonous tone. mystman12 later re-recorded all of his older voicelines to match the newer ones more perfectly.
- Voice of the Legion: His voice has a slight reverb to it.
Arts and Crafters
- Animate Inanimate Object: He's a giant sockpuppet.
- Awaken the Sleeping Giant: He spends most of the game as a background character, not having any effect on gameplay and running away when you get close. In Classic, once you collect more notebooks than him, however, he becomes one of the game's biggest threats, chasing you down and teleporting both you and Baldi to the entrance if he reaches you. He still does this in Plus, only now teleporting you to a random part of the facility instead.
- Beware the Quiet Ones: Never speaks, but is nevertheless quite dangerous.
- Border Patrol: In the Field Trip minigame, if you go past the "NO," sign, he will immediately begin to chase the player at extremely high speeds before teleporting them (and Baldi if he has spawned) to the campfire.
- The Collector: He is implied to have 6 notebooksnote , and gets jealous of anybody who has more than that amount.
- Difficult, but Awesome: It provides an easy way to the real exit once you have all 7 notebooks, but you have to have a way to avoid Baldi as well, as he's teleported to right behind you at the same time. This is most easily done by having a BSODA on hand to immediately push him away, though Fandroid demonstrated that it isn't impossible to win without one.note This was once more reliable in Plus, where he will only teleport the player, and not Baldi, though it's worth mentioning he only does this once per run, disappearing until the player tries the floor again or reaches the next floor, but eventually Baldi being teleported was reinstated, reverting this to how it was in Classic.
- Eldritch Abomination: Even by this game's standards, he's quite left-field, with an odd design, no dialogue, just Black Speech (even more than Baldi's), Insane Troll Logic-fueld motivation, and a Reality Warper-type ability.
- Fish Eyes: His googly eyes go in opposite directions, giving him a comical look.
- Green-Eyed Monster: He attacks you because he's jealous that you have more notebooks than it does… if you take the description on his poster at face value, at least.
- Not-So-Harmless Villain: Initially starts as a mere background character, peering around corners occasionally. Once you collect the 7th notebooknote , however, he'll actively chase the player down, teleporting the player and Baldi to the entrance if caught.
- The Quiet One: He does not speak, aside from making a loud static noise when he attacks you, and his poster describes it as "shy".
- The Scream: When he attacks you, his sprite changes to a picture of the sockpuppet with its mouth wide open. Combined with the loud static noise that occurs, this gives the impression that Arts and Crafters is screaming at you.
Gotta Sweep
- Almighty Janitor: Literally. He's not the main villain or even one of the bigger threats, he's just the school janitor. He's also by far the fastest and strongest character in the game, able to sweep the entire school in just half a minute, and push all the other characters in the game (aside from It's a Bully) around like rag dolls.
- Animate Inanimate Object: It's a broom.
- Anti-Villain: Unlike Baldi, he's just a Punch-Clock Villain cleaning the Hallways. And the worst he does is push you if you're in his way, which he's just as likely to do to Baldi or anyone else in his way.
- Character Catchphrase: "Gotta sweep, sweep, sweep!"
- Early Installment Character-Design Difference: Downplayed. His “design” is a picture of an old Libman broom, but later versions of Classic and everything else since then (with the exception of a figure and a t-shirt) have altered the image to change the colors of the bristles from grey and green to plain black, so as to not have it be 1:1.
- Foe-Tossing Charge: Sweeps away anyone — and everyone — in front of him.
- Lightning Bruiser: The fastest and strongest character in the game, able to sweep the entire school in half a minute and push all of the other characters (aside from It's A Bully) around at once.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: He speaks in a voice that brings Louis Armstrong or Fat Albert to mind.
- No Indoor Voice: Gotta Sweep sure loves his job.Gotta Sweep: LOOKS LIKE IT'S SWEEPING TIME!
-
Reality Subtext: The decision to have him be a living broom was made very shortly before the original game’s release due to time constraints for the Meta Game Jam, which his description in the Principal’s office cheekily reflects. - Wild Card: Gotta Sweep can either help you or doom you based on where he moves. He's just as capable of sweeping everyone else away from you as he is sweeping you directly into Baldi.
It's a Bully
- Adults Are Useless: Just the very fact that the school seems to openly welcome bullying is concerning on every level. Downplayed as of update 1.3, where if he's caught bullying the player by the Principal of the Thing, he'll get sent to detention.
- Big Eater: He just loves eating chocolate bars and drinking sodas, despite that the Principal has a policy of no eating in the halls, at least until the rule was patched out (and Principal of the Thing therefore allows food).
- The Bully: Naturally.
- Creepy Monotone: Similarly to the Principal, his lines are given in a deadpan tone.
- Designated Villain: In-universe, "bully" is apparently the role designated for him, according to his poster.
- Facial Horror: His face seems somewhat warped.
- Fat Bastard: Implied. His torso is just a big elliptical sphere, which is probably meant to be a Stylistic Suck way of rendering this trope.
- Give Me Your Inventory Item: His schtick is taking your useful items—items you may have needed to evade being captured by Baldi. Worse, if you have no items, he blocks your path and won't budge, potentially allowing Baldi to corner you.
- Humanoid Abomination: Putting aside his deformed face, he seems to teleport away entirely if you give him whatever he wishes, and also has a fading echo applied to the last word he says.It's a Bully: I'll take that! It's mine nowwwwww...
- Jerkass: He stands in your way and won't let you pass unless you have an item for him to take. If you have more than one item, he won't let you choose which one to give up and will just take whichever one he wants.
- In the Field Trip minigame, he will also hide under trees and take your sticks while running away with them for no reason other than that he wants them.
- Necessarily Evil: If we take his profile's word for it.
- Nerf: His spawn points were changed in the 1.3 update so he's more likely to force you to take an alternate path and less likely to completely trap you if you don't have any items. Also, the Principal of the Thing can put him in detention for "bullying in the halls". Sometimes he will also despawn out of boredom.
- No-Sell: Spraying soda at him does not affect himnote . He probably enjoys it, being a Fat Bastard and all. He is also unaffected by Gotta Sweep, who just passes right through him. That said, he CAN be flattened by Dr. Reflex's hammer, making his threat non-existent for a little bit and letting the player pass right by him as if he was never there.
- NPC Roadblock: Pretty much his whole shtick. Unlike other examples of this trope, however, he is meant to be moved instead of just being there to block you.
- Pet the Dog: For some reason, he does not bully Playtime in any way, possibly because she's a girl, or because she's much younger than either him or the player.
- Punch-Clock Villain: "Here at here school, we believe every good school needs a good bully! That's why we have this kid!"
- Sarcasm Mode: "Thanks for the generous donationonononononon!"
- Voice of the Legion: His voice echoes at the end of his lines.
1st Prize
- Anti-Villain: Like Playtime, Principal, and Gotta Sweep, he's not all bad and he only wants you to hug him. That being said, his slow movements can be a hindrance to the player.
- Cuddle Bug: According to his profile, he's only seeking the player to offer hugs.
- Fish Eyes: His model features these, althought they are also incredibly long.
- Foe-Tossing Charge: He pushes you around, similarly to Gotta Sweep. However, unlike Gotta Sweep, 1st Prize actively targets you, although he's a lot slower.
- Helpful Mook: Due to his really high top speed and the fact he always goes for you, if you position yourself right, he can be very useful in getting around the school faster; long stretches of hallways can be traversed in seconds this way.
- Noisy Robots: Makes an incredible amount of noise just moving.
- Phlebotinum Breakdown: In the Full Game Demo, he's conspicuously placed out of the way in a corner of a facility room, and appears to be out of order.
- Robo Speak: His voice is very monotone and definitely not human.
- Token Good Teammate: Possibly of Here School. He's the least evil of the characters and is compassionate, wanting to hug the player and even helps the player get away from Baldi.
Null (SPOILERS)
Filename2 / Null
- Anti-Villain: Wanting nothing more than to destroy the game he's trapped in, presumably with the help of the player, he heavily suggests, begs, screams, shouts, and even outright tries to hunt you down in a separate game-mode, complete with a surprise boss fight in order to attempt doing so. For his efforts, he ends up getting Ret-Gonned out of the game after completing NULL Style for the first time.
- Ascended Extra: In Classic Remastered, he gets more screen time than before, even serving as the main antagonist of the game's Brutal Bonus Level.
- Author Avatar: It's jokingly implied in his hidden cameo appearance during the ending sequence of the 1 Year Birthday Bash update that Filename2 is game creator Micah McGonigal himself after trapping himself in Baldi-Land. That being said, at the end of NULL Style, he addresses Micah as “the developer”, revealing that he isn’t him all along.
- The appearance of the 'Me' NPC, which is an image of Micah McGonigal, with minimal to no distortion at all, serves as a more proper avatar, only showing up to say his singular line: "Thanks for playing my game".
- Character Filibuster: He rambles very awkwardly and incoherently about how the game is evil and needs to be destroyed in an Overly Long Gag probably intended to poke fun at the "haunted game" trope often found in creepypasta stories and other indie horror titles.
- Deadpan Snarker: Find Baldi's Basement before you've finished NULL Style, and he'll appear and comment that you shouldn't be down there before jokingly assuming you're trying to find lore in a game that has none.
- Dull Surprise: His tone is comedically casual and conversational for apparently warning you about how the game is evil and must be destroyed. Greatly subverted for his appearances in Classic Remastered, especially in the Brutal Bonus Level."Oh jeepers, you found me…"
- Final Boss: Of Classic Remastered, as he is your sole opponent for the final unlockable mode in the game: NULL Style. This mode can only be accessed by finding the secret endings in all three main game modes and beat each mode with all Fun Settings active at once. He's also this in the more traditional sense, as NULL Style ends with a proper boss battle against him.
- Humanoid Abomination: He resembles a vague outline of a T-posing human with only his hair, eyes, eyebrows, and clothes remaining.
- Incurable Cough of Death: FileName2/NULL suffers from coughing during his last moment in Classic Remastered. Downplayed in that it's not the cough itself that finishes him off.
- Medium Awareness: In the creepy sense, as he keeps telling you to "destroy the game".
- No Fair Cheating: Trying to use Debug Mode in the Brutal Bonus Level will have NULL call you out for it through the You Can Think Pad and prevent you from collecting the notebooks.
- No Name Given: We're never told who he is. The only hint in the game we have towards his name is his name in the game files. Averted in Classic Remastered where he gives a vague name, that being Null, since he has no name to call his own.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: While he remains calm and collected most of the way through Classic, Birthday Bash and Classic Remastered, there are times in the latter-most game when he loses this cool demeanor.
- Finding him in Party Style while the Red Baldi "balloons" are tearing the schoolhouse apart causes him to Freak Out and practically BEG for the player to close the game and get out of there before it's too late.
- He hits his Rage Breaking Point in the Brutal Bonus Level, however, when he pleads with the player one last time to close the game and never come back. When they make it clear it's not happening, however, he flies into a rage and attacks the player for their troubles, only stopping to calm down in the Developer's Room when it's clear it's taking a toll on him.
- Pre-Asskicking One-Liner: He gives one out after suffering his first hit at the start of the final Boss Battle, right before losing his temper and pursuing the player relentlessly."AAAGHH! Hehehe-! Okay, okay! You know what? You are *really* going to regret that one. AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!"
- Public Domain Character: It has been revealed as part of an ARG that Null is now in the public domain, free for anyone to use.
- Ret-Gone: He suffers this fate at the very end of the Brutal Bonus Level of Classic Remastered, getting himself wiped clean from the code for his troubles. He gets replaced by a red Baldi "balloon" on subsequent runs of that level, and Baldi replaces him in all the secret endings as a result of his absence, in addition to Baldi's speech after collecting seven notebooks getting modified to remove the "GET OUT WHILE YOU STILL CAN!".
- Riddle for the Ages: With his removal and death, questions still remain unanswered about Null. Why did he want the player to destroy the game? How did he wind up trapped in it? Was anything he was saying even true?
- Sdrawkcab Speech: One of the dialogues he can say in NULL Style is him chanting "Destroy the game" backwards, and then asking if that was supposed to be scary.
- Sensory Abuse: His dialogue is interspersed with loud, blaring electronic sounds.
- Stupidly Long Filler Sound: He clumsily "umm"s and "uhh"s through every single one of his sentences at hilarious length.
- Take That!: He’s meant to be one towards horror games that focus heavily on lore over gameplay. Although he would probably fit right at home there, Baldi's Basic’s has no lore of any variety, so his presence feels totally off-putting.
- The Unintelligible: The audio for his dialog is heavily distorted and compressed to a ridiculously low bit-depth, making his words nearly impossible to understand. It doesn’t help that garbled electronic sounds often censor out some of his dialog, making it impossible for NULL to fully explain the situation.
- What the Hell, Player?: He can be found via different means in Birthday Bash. His speech is changed as well, being shocked and calling the player out for not destroying the game. He still implores the player to destroy it before the game crashes yet again. Come Classic Remastered, however, and his temper is pushed to its limit, angrily scolding the player on it and trying to make them quit the game by force. By the end, he decides to take matters in his own hands.
- You Are Already Dead: In Classic Remastered, during NULL Style, he will gleefully rub this trope in the player's face if he's in pursuit while the player has no items and is out of stamina, as NULL is faster than the player.
Introduced in the Field Trip demo
Cloudy Copter
A new character introduced in the 1.1 version of the Field Trip demo. If the campfire is bright enough, Cloudy Copter will come down from the sky and start blowing on it, causing it to go out faster. In the full game, it will blow the player down the halls.
- Cartoon Creature: It vaguely resembles a cloud or aircraft as its name implies, but it also has what looks like a snout with whiskers.
- Fish Eyes: Its eyes resemble these slightly.
- Sentient Vehicle: It seems to be in the shape of some sort of aircraft.
- Sphere Eyes: It has big, round eyes.
Joe
The (former) owner of the school bus Baldi uses in the demo.
- Butt-Monkey: Baldi apparently stole his bus.
- The Ghost: Although the character is confirmed to exist, he has yet to appear in the game.
- Mythology Gag: His name is a reference to a virtual pinball game called Joe's Ultimate Bus Ride that mystman12 made before Baldi's Basics.
- The Voice: mystman12 was briefly role-playing as him in his Livestream. His voice sounds like a mix of It's A Bully and Gotta Sweep.
Introduced in the Kickstarter-exclusive demo
Chalkles
A sentient chalk face that appears on empty chalkboards in the classrooms. If the player does not quickly leave a classroom that it appears in, it will surround the player and emit a laughing noise that attracts Baldi's attention while also preventing the player from leaving the classroom for several seconds before leaving.
- Art Initiates Life: According to its description in the Principal's office, it's a drawing a kid made that spontaneously came to life and now causes trouble in the school.
- Evil Laugh: Emits a distorted laugh while trapping the player.
- Flying Face: Appears to be a poorly drawn face and appears like this if allowed to fully spawn.
- Living Drawing: It is a chalk drawing of a grotesque face. If the player sees him on a chalkboard in a room, the player must leave that room quickly, or else Chalkles will float off of the chalkboard and lure Baldi towards the room and trap the player in it, all while laughing. His description on the character posters sums him up well:Some kid drew this face and next thing you know it's floating around, laughing and making mischief.
- Punny Name: His name is a portmanteau of the words "chalk" and "chuckles".
- The Stool Pigeon: Its MO seems to be snitching on the player to Baldi.
Beans
- Canon Immigrant: Beans' concept originated in an idea for an unmade Baldi's Basics parody game from two fellows known as Padre Snowmizzle and Malitzchek before being added to the official game. Beans himself is voiced by the former.
- Gonk: Definitely not a looker.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Though this can't happen normally, you can ensure he ends up like this by firing a BSODA at the gum wad he spits out, therefore ensuring he ends up stuck in it.
- Non-Standard Character Design: Beans' appearance is noticeably distinct from the rest of the cast (including the character he debuted with: Mrs. Pomp), having the appearance of a Thin-Line Animation toon (with an extremely gonky design) and using actual walking animations rather than moving in a static position like most of the other characters.
- Older Than They Look: Despite his voice and obsession with gum, he's apparently 25-30 of some unknown age unit. If in years, then he rivals Baldi in age, who is 29.
- Rhymes on a Dime: A few of his lines are like this.
- Sticky Situation: He can spit out gum which slows you down and likewise gets you in trouble with the principal if it hits. However, he can also hinder Baldi and other annoying characters if you manage to get Beans to hit them.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: His dialogue makes it apparent that he doesn't intend to spit his gum at you, but rather just wants to show off a cool trick and messing it up.
Mrs. Pomp
- Adapted Out: Is completely absent in Classic Remastered, not even appearing in the Demo Style, though all her assets remain hidden in the files.
- Berserk Button: Whatever you do, DON'T be late for her math classes!
- Freak Out: Don't follow her instructions and she'll throw an utterly massive fit, screaming at the top of her lungs. You'll be unable to move or get out until she calms down, which could leave you at Baldi's mercy if he's nearby. Should you somehow escape her grasp using items, she'll just turn right back around to bring you to her class.
- Hell Is That Noise: A loud thumping noise when she's moving around.
- Jump Scare: She will come rapidly stomping at you out of the blue just to politely tell you to report to her class. Likewise, if you make it to her classroom after the deadline and try to open the door on the way out, you'll instead find yourself briefly face-to-face with an angry Mrs. Pomp. Go to any classroom other than hers if late, and she just drags you into hers to do this.
- Meaningful Name: Mrs. Pomp has a big, bright yellow pompadour. She's also rather pompous, treating her math classes like Serious Business and freaking the hell out whenever you don't attend.
- Nightmare Face: When sufficiently pissed off, her already-creepy face will turn even more distorted, suddenly gaining a dark shade over it.
- No Sense of Personal Space: Gets right in your face when telling you to come to a classroom.
- Psychopathic Woman Child: Actually no, she's somehow worse; when angered, she screams at the top of her lungs and stomps around the room, like a child throwing a gargantuan hissyfit.
- Sadist Teacher: She's not that bad when compared to Baldi, since at least she won't kill/beat you for being late to her classroom, but she compensates for it by throwing a horrifying tantrum and screaming with the player just for not attending her class or entering it a few seconds late.
- Suddenly Shouting: Normally talks in a pleasant and friendly tone, but yells extremely loudly when during her freak out.
- Timed Mission: If she appears and tells you to report to a classroom, you're given a set amount of time to reach it. Manage and she'll be pleased and leave without incident, fail and… well see Freak Out and Jump Scare above.
- Waddling Head: Well, more like a hopping head anyway. Her design consists of nothing more than a head on a single high heel shoe.
Introduced in Plus
The Test
- Character Resemblance Tropes: He resembles Baldi, more so than any other character. This has led some fans to believe that he is Baldi's son, though this has not officially been confirmed.
- Losing Your Head: His head just floats there menacingly after he turns the lights out. It gets reattached after some time.
- Unknown Character: Just what is this guy? Why does he shut the lights off? How come his head was found in a creepy area in Birthday Bash? Only the Test knows, and he isn’t saying anything.
Johnny
- Black Comedy: Some of his quotes veer into this."Thank you! Now I might not starve!"
"I didn't really want food today anyways."
"Thank you! My parents would have been so proud that I made a sale!" - Does This Remind You of Anything?: Essentially a drug-dealing teen running a black-market shop.
- Parental Abandonment: Implied. That he says his parents would have been proud of him suggests they aren't around. Worth noting is that his expression will change to a frown after saying this line, unlike the other post-purchase quotes. mystman12 even responded to a emailer asking if Johnny's parents are alive with "Johnny has a pretty sad history..."
- Scolded for Not Buying: Johnny will sometimes make condescending remarks at the player if they don't buy anything in his store.
