Darth Wiki / Max's Recollection

A game created by Wax using RPG Maker VX Ace.
The game is no longer available.
It's actually a 2-game "package" called Max's Recollection - The Compilation, but The Original is really just a mini-game and includes only one fight, which pretty much makes it a prelude Chapter to "The Sequel".
The plot is quite meta as it stars Max, an Author who has been deprived of the Author's Rights to his fiction and was trapped in his own fictional world and his memories stripped away and sealed. As he is trapped, "the Invincible" defeated the entire world of this fiction. However, Max's Author Avatar characters are aware of his being trapped, and they indeed save him from "Marieville".
The plot from The Sequel starts right afterwards when 4 villainous elementals each kidnap and trap one of Max and his author avatars. However, as Max wakes up from the Curb-Stomp Battle, he finds out another person appeared by his side by some sort of miracle. His name is Kelaud. Max goes to find the exit to this labyrinth and find the truth that he yearned for, and that seems to be Kelaud's objective too...
The game has an RPG Maker MV-made Spin-Off called The W-Team in Patina Castle. This game is a possible future of the plot prior to the Invincible's intervention. Wax, Loup, Athor and Michiru, as a group, are on the run from the Paladins' Order. They wander into Rusty City, where they are set to help free the citizens from the abusive Queen (yes, it's really her name). The game is just that short and ends with a Shout-Out to the Opening Narration to The A-Team.
A redone version of the game is in the works again.

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Max's Recollection provides examples of:

• A God Am I: Kevin. His Boss Banter in his second-to-last fight is "I am unbeatable! I am the God of this universe!".
• Action Girl: Every playable girl but Ella, who isn't meant to be a fighter. The ending proves she's one too as she grabs a gun.
• Adaptation Expansion: The English translation features a written tutorial and special thanks, along with specific cheat codes.
• All in a Row: Or at least the four that get to fight.
• And the Rest: If you don't bring Max to the first battle with the Invincible, she will call the party: "[name of party member n°1] and the others..."
• Apocalypse How: Fae gleefully announces that the Invincible will destroy the entire universe in their next battle.
• Arbitrary Headcount Limit: While you can have all 22 playable characters in the same party, no more than four can fight at a time.
• Armor and Magic Don't Mix: Some characters play it straight, others don't.
• Armor-Piercing Attack: There are a bunch of attacks that deal fixed damage, meaning they don't have any further damage calculation than its base damage. Since this ignores enemy defense, these are the more useful ones behind %-health attacks (sometimes even better if said %-health attacks aren't fixed damage) if your attack is inferior to the enemy's defense. Otherwise they're Useless Useful Spells since they scale way less with high attack stats.
• Arson, Murder, and Lifesaving: Backstory-only. To the Paladins' Order, Maw is guilty of high treason, attempted corruption, and saving the world. For this fact alone and his change of heart, the Order welcomes him back during the ending.
• Artificial Stupidity:
  • The Invincible's attack pattern is fixed. Also, nothing stops any enemy from attempting to inflict status effects on a party affected with Star Barrier, which blocks all statuses.
  • Xav, while critically wounded, will still protect the rest of the party and is likely to get himself killed during the Fae fight in Chapter 1.
• As Long as There Is Evil: The Invincible's "I will never truly be dead as long as [Kevin] exists." counts, as Kevin is acting the part of a God of Evil (despite his claims to the contrary).
• Asshole Victim: The elementals. When you beat Fira, Wata and Zephira, they're dismissed and attacked by a fairy. Terra is defeated by Maw. None of them do die though.
• Author Avatar: Wax, Xav and Maw. They're even referred to as "The Hero", "The Rival", and "The Villain" respectively. It's also the reason they share a similar character class (Author-class). They each cover different aspects of Max's personality. But Max is the straightest example, being an Author Avatar to the creator of the game.
  • Author Powers: Max is looking to reclaim his "Author's Rights" back, which would give him this.
  • This is also why moves like Super Nova and Apocalypse are exclusive to some Author-class characters, not to mention them knowing moves they shouldn't by their canon in the VX Ace version. At the end, he uses this for his characters to remember the plot of the game.
• Background Music Override: For a section of dialogue before battling the elementals, their theme gets to play before the battle starts, and smoothly transitions into the battle without interruption. Likewise, their theme continues to play after they're defeated, though it is often interrupted in short order by the "Betrayal" theme song.
• Badass Boast:
  • Ralph, please...
    "I hear someone's calling herself Invincible. Let me just say she isn't gonna be bragging much longer."
  • Maw has a somewhat-meta one while during his entrance.
    "I should commend you for managing to injure me, however temporarily. But I didn't get called Wannabe-Sephiroth by dying this easily."
• Bag of Holding: You could hold an infinity of items, up to 99 of each.
• Bag of Sharing: Characters who are on nigh-opposite ends of the continent where "The Sequel" takes place share items.
• Bash Brothers: Ralph with Leeroy. Surprisingly, since they don't even come from the same universe due to a retcon in Leeroy's origins..
• Big Damn Heroes: In Chapter 5, Kelaud leads the 7-man party founded in Chapter 4. They join the party you have in Chapter 5, thus getting a 16-man strong party to fight the Elementals. Later on, Kelaud's brother Ferenan stalls Vanessa and fights her with the face-turned elementals.
• BFS: The Mastok Sword (unique to M), has this as its unique weapon class.
• Blasphemous Boast: Kevin's "I am the God of this universe!", which, while wrong, heals every damage done to him.
• Blocking Stops All Damage: Well, 50%. But even that is ignored by Super Nova and Fissure.
• Bond Villain Stupidity: "The Invincible" walks away in Chapter 2 after reducing the entire party's HP to One out of battle.
• Boss Banter: Bosses have scripted talk at certain portions of the fight, though it's often hinting at something they're about to do (Maw's "Accept defeat!" before defeating Terra, for example). Vanessa and Kevin get unimaginative and forceful with it, repeating the same thing each turn.
• Boss Bonanza: In contrast to all Chapters before, Chapter 5 has this. First are the optional bosses Fae and M, then you fight the four elementals, then Kevin and Vanessa together, then the Invincible, then Vanessa, then Kevin and the Invincible, and finally Kevin alone.
• Boss Game: All fights are boss fights, with a lot of plot going on in-between.
• Boss-Only Level: No Random Encounters means that every single level is this and exposition.
• Boss Rush: Averted. You do fight the four elementals in Chapter 5, but they're all dealt with in a single fight.
• Broken Bridge: Quite literally, two of them. They are repaired progressively during the game.
• Charm Person: Vanessa, representing the power to be loved. It fails as by the time she appears, Kevin already lost too many of his Author's rights for him to write everyone as having fallen in love with her. If you lose, he acquires them and it works.
• Cluster F-Bomb: Saylia is a walking one. Kevin, if he wins the final battle. "I don't give a shit about you asshats! I'mma find a real cool fic and start my awesome fanfic in a world that's Worth It. Bunch of little assholes, I fucked you all up! *Evil Laugh*"
• Combat, Diplomacy, Stealth: Completely averted. You can't sneak past enemies and they don't answer to diplomacy, except the elementals with Ferenan (which is done offscreen by the way).
• Comeback Mechanic: The damage formula for Fire Energy makes it drain more health for each 1% health Fira is missing. A rare example of a Comeback Mechanic used by an enemy.
• Cool and Unusual Punishment / Laser-Guided Karma: The Elementals were meant to trap their victims in labyrinths and wait for them to die inside. Their punishment is being locked inside a dungeon and be lectured every single day by Xav.
• Crippling Overspecialization: Maw has insane attack, but dies extremely easily. Bennett has great defense and can heal the entire team with the greatest of ease, but he barely can deal any damage.
• Critical Hit: Only physical attacks can do this. The exception being Screen Cut, that deals magic damage but still can deal a critical hit.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: In the beginning of "The Sequel", Max and the Author Avatar characters are trapped within caves and left there to die of hunger or thirst.
• Cutscene Power to the Max: At the end of Chapter 2, a single Judgement from the Invincible puts everybody at 1 HP. Note that she doesn't use it when fought as a boss and it's nowhere this powerful when used by Athor or enemies like Fae and Kevin.
• Damage-Sponge Boss: Vanessa. In her last battle, you have nothing that is able to deal consistent damage to her but her own instakill spell on the elementals that drains 5000 HP out of her. If she fails and attacks Ferenan, it takes out only around 500 HP.
• Damage Over Time: Only poison deals damage over time.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Maw. Sephiroth wannabe. Aligned with good and even becomes a Paladin.
• Deadpan Snarker: Max. Maw also embodies his dry sense of humor.
• Defeat Means Friendship: Averted. Despite the Elementals' collective Heel–Face Turn, they still didn't do it out of friendship for Max. In the English version, just before the Final Boss, you can talk with Fira and she'll mention that she still hates Max's guts.
• De-power: The only stat you can actually reduce is defense. Fae loves reducing the party's stats, which would help a lot if she attacked less rarely.
• Defend Command: It's present in the game, but be warned that certain moves ignore it.
• Desperation Attack: Fira's Fire Energy drains more health the closer she is to death.
• Deus ex Machina: Max seeks to invoke one to get rid of "the Invincible". When he realizes the bad comes from Kevin "writing" bad fanfic into his universe, he goes with "get him banned". The Deus Ex Machina is done on the way.
• Disc-One Final Boss: The fairy is fought just at the end of Chapter 1. Counting "The Original" as Disc One instead, it's the Invincible.
• Disc-One Final Dungeon: Chapter 2: the Unknown Castle. Chapter 5 reveals this is actually the final dungeon, the Invincible's Castle.
• Dub Name Change: Ylva is still referred to by her French name Ilya.
• Easter Egg: A secret room accessed from the final stage allows you to get secret items.
• Easy Levels, Hard Bosses: Provided you know the controls, finding the bosses will be easy barring a few things.
• Embedded Precursor: The original game can be played, with a choice at the start.
• Equipment-Based Progression: Defied. Some equipment items are really powerful, but they tend to be locked on the character using them. There is little to no equipment to buy.
• Evil Wears Black: Inverted. Evil wears white. Black-wearing Maw is good.
• Exponential Potential: Averted: Most characters start with all their skills.
• Faux Affably Evil: Vanessa, at the start.
• Faux Symbolism: [[spoiler:"The Invincible"'s true name is Marie, evoking both Jesus's mother and Mary Sue.
• Fight Woosh
• First Town: Le Creux. Much bigger in-game than the Paladin Order's capital city Altiga, and you spend quite a while there.
• Foregone Conclusion: The fact that "The Sequel"'s plot occurs outside Marieville spoils that Max escapes in "The Original".
• Four Is Death: The number is recurring.
  • There are four chapters before the finale. The Elementals are four and you defeat one per chapter.
  • Chapters 1 to 3 end with 4-man parties formed.
  • There are four "real" villains. Fae, Vanessa, Marie and Kevin. There are also the four elementals.
  • There are four Author-class characters. Which means four M.S.P.. And four other unique accessories. (In the MV Version, Max, Wax, Xav and Maw would have had different classes.)
  • The 22 playable characters (Max and Ella are not counted as characters due to the fact that they are supposed to come from Real Life) can be rounded out as coming from 4 different origin worlds. This one, the original RPG Maker VX, Kelaud and the Sky Tower, and Kevin.
• Four-Temperament Ensemble:
  • The party formed in Chapter 1 has Kelaud as the Sanguine, Max as the Choleric (Fun fact: Fire is not his own element but that of his enemy Fira), Wilhelmina as the Melancholic, and Xav as the Phlegmatic. It doesn't quite work in Chapter 2 as Ralf and Leeroy are both Choleric.
  • Played with by the elementals, who represent elements associated with the temperaments. Fira plays it straight, being the Choleric. Wata plays her Phlegmatic role straight too. Terra even plays her Melancholic role straight... but Zephira is not sanguine at all, being flat-out inexpressive (though she is scatter-brained and egotistical, but then again, all the elementals are egotistical).
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: Xav is mortally wounded when you pick him up in Chapter 1. Even though in battle he is affected by a "Plot Injury" that divides his healing by 100 and blocks his healing magic, he still is able to walk just fine.
• Giant Space Flea from Nowhere: M the Mastok. He's inside the Invincible's Castle. For no reason. This is acknowledged in his character description.
• Glass Cannon: Maw exemplifies the trope. His Maw Blade EX maximizes attack power according to its own description. His armor is the Important Character's Cape, and it gives no defense, instead increasing his magic power. In numbers, his attack stat is 861, his defense is 113. He is one of the few who can deal significant non-%-health damage.
• Goddamned Boss: Fae. She acts 4 times per turn and does nothing but guard and spam debuffs on your team and buffs on herself. Debuffs that you reflect to her are likely to not even work because her defenses can't be debuffed and attack debuffs have 25% accuracy even when reflected. Despite her comparatively low 11400 HP, she is extremely annoying to defeat.
  • On the same note, Vanessa; like mother like daughter. She uses weak attacks most of the time, but the bulk of her arsenal is healing spells. All three of them, and she will liberally heal 4000 health in one go when she feels like it.
• Gun Fu: Before the final battle, Ella AssPulls out a gun to attack Kevin.
• Healer Signs On Early: Subverted. While Kelaud is a sub-healer, said healing abilities don't really show up until midway through Chapter 1, after the fight against Fira.
• Health/Damage Asymmetry: Played straight. All bosses have above 10000 HP, often much more, but they tend to deal mediocre damage.
• Heel–Face Turn: The Elementals rebel against Vanessa and fight alongside Ferenan. He carries equipment that lets him use their elemental energy arcanes on top of his own attacks.
• Hybrid Power: Fira and M have equally high attack and magic power stats. Fira's at 320, and M at 499.
• Inexplicable Treasure Chests: On the Fourth Wall, there are a few chests with a few important items. Not picking them is a Self-Imposed Challenge that makes the game a bunch harder.
• Infinity +1 Sword: Played with. Max has the Fusion Sword (which is by far the best weapon in the game) right at the start, but plot-wise, he had to fuse the four Master Swords after "The Original".
• Informed Equipment
• Injured Vulnerability: When taken to low-enough HP, Fira will cripple herself some more. Also, Apocalypse enforces the trope and deals more damage the less life the opponent has.
• Instant-Win Condition: Only present in the Terra Boss Battle. Survive 5 turns and you win. Also, in the Invincible's second-to-last fight, if you bring Kelaud, he verbally owns her about Super Nova never killing anyone so hard she spontaneously dies. And in her last battle, beating the Invincible alone is enough to win, as Kevin is immune to death and constantly heals himself to max at every turn.
• Insult Backfire: Terra calling Saylia a peasant.
  Saylia: "Peasant? Did you look at yourself?"
• In Their Own Image: Kevin's endgame.
• It's All About Me: Loup, mildly. He only follows Saylia in hopes Maw is dead and he can loot from him (though he accepts the possibility of saving Maw for no payment). At the end of the game, if you go talk to him before beating Kevin, he'll even say he had no interest in the journey, wondering why you even cared to go talk to him. This is only in the English version.
• Jerkass Dissonance: Fae is the local patron saint. Vanessa takes it after you kill her, saying you deserve death for that. Note that she's speaking to Ferenan who just entered the party, and the Four Elementals, who Fae tried to kill, not the other way around.
• Joined Your Party: Averted: There is no message to indicate people joining the party, much less fanfare. Michiru is perhaps the most disgraceful example, joining the party mid-battle after a quarrel with Saylia.
• Joke Character: Kelaud, Saylia and Ferenan. Kelaud and Saylia start at level 1, and only their inability to die saves them in their boss battles. Ferenan is saved by his equipment that gives him great stats, No-Sell abilities assorted to the elementals, and the elementals' arcanes, sure-hit Life Drain attacks, and MP regeneration so he can spam them. A secret code instead makes Kelaud a Game-Breaker.
• Karl Marx Hates Your Guts: It's nigh impossible to sell anything, except in Altiga's weapon store, which will have no problems buying your max potions.
• Kill Steal: Kevin is the one who ultimately takes out the Invincible, stealing the kill with Otherworld Energy when you've chipped away 99% of her health. It's easily done with two Super Novas or, if you bothered getting to 100 Fury, Fissure.
• Law of Cartographical Elegance
• Leaked Experience: The inactive party gets full experience from battles.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Quite literally. External characters (and Xav) have the ability to warp to the Fourth Wall (though Xav didn't exactly do it by will and he has problems surviving here due to his injuries at the time).
• Let's Split Up, Gang!: The party is formed from several 4-man groups, but never splits.
• Level Grinding: It's just as averted as Random Encounters.
• Light Is Not Good: Hand-in-hand with Dark Is Not Evil. The angelic looking "Invincible", as well as Fae, Vanessa and Kevin, is evil.
• Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards: Averted. The only character with noticeable stat growth is Max, who is a hybrid fighter (though with more physical attack). And skillsets barely change ever.
• Look on My Works, Ye Mighty, and Despair: The Invincible's Castle is times bigger than the royal castle of Le Creux.
• Mana Potion: These are in the game, and they can be very useful for characters who don't have MP regeneration and still want to spam spells (Max with Super Nova, for example).
• Moment Killer: Just before endgame, go see Michiru and she'll point out how she went to a remote place to confess to Maw in peace. Where she is? In Terra's Dungeon, underneath the Aalet Ruins.
• Money Spider: Averted: nobody carries money. Except Kevin, who carries 2$, which is obscenely low.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast:
  • "The Invincible". Kelaud is explicitly afraid of her at the beginning.
  • Maw also counts though his name is less fearsome.
• Narm: A lot. While it was aimed towards Narm Charm, it doesn't always make the cut.
• News Travels Fast: Only as fast as you do, and only one little girl actually changes dialogues at every chapter.
  • ... and then you realize that it's her in the Easter Egg Room and in The Original, so she already knew a lot of stuff and was only feigning ignorance.
• No Cure for Evil: Averted by Wata and Vanessa, who will constantly heal if low enough on health.
• No Hero Discount: Played with. The old man in Le Creux sells at skewed prices, selling weapons at reduced prices, but potions at 5 times the usual price.
• No Stat Atrophy
• Noob Cave: Fira's cave, which has no enemies (even though the rest of the game has no non-boss enemies). It does however have a unique gimmick.
• Not the Intended Use: Bennett, despite being intended as a level 99 Crutch Character, works best as a super-healing machine between two battles.
• Now, Where Was I Going Again?: It's gonna be hard to have this, since there's only one plot line. Though nobody is going to remind you of where you're going to go.
• Omnicidal Maniac: When the chips are down, "the Invincible".
• One-Winged Angel: Subverted: When Fira claims she's gonna go full power, she gets betrayed and attacked by Fae, and the fight is over.
• Only Mostly Dead: Wax's HP to One'd party is found in this state in Chapter 5, but Ella eventually heals everything off.
• Only Shop in Town: There's only two shops in the game, one in Le Creux, one in Altiga. Both play this trope straight.
• Opening the Sandbox: Before the very end of the game, when you drop all your party members and only Max and Ella are left. This also only occurs in the English version.
• Optional Party Member: Easter Egg-only Kitty, the most broken playable character (she has 100% dodge chance, crits everytime, and knows several of the aforementioned One-Hit Kill attacks). Actually, Kelaud also counts, considering there's an Easter Egg-only version of him acquired via Kelaud's Pass. It's also called Kelaud Streif in the files.
• Our Giants Are Bigger: M The Mastok. He is no bigger than the other characters on the map, but he's around 9 feet tall.
• Outside-the-Box Tactic: Fira can be beaten by using Super Nova and attacking her (or using Blue Thunder Cut if possible) before she uses Fire Energy... but Bisection will one-shot her anyway due to her weak (200) defense and Max's comparatively insane (465) attack stat.
• Outside-Context Problem: Every single villain. They come from Kevin's mind (which from the characters' eyes means "nowhere"), conquer the world, and cause the entire plot.
• Overly Long Fighting Animation: Super Nova, at least downplayed from the original, but it takes nearly 8 seconds to complete. Otherworld Energy also takes 8 second to complete. Both have a tendency to have their animation get laggy.
• Party in My Pocket: Just before the last Vanessa boss fight, the characters walking behind your first party member will simply walk into him. The fact that there's above 15 party members at this part of the game is playing the trope uber-straight.
• Percent Damage Attack: So strong they got their own element so they could be resisted. Bisection, Blue Thunder Cut and Super Nova are core abilities to use on everyone that has them. Because even the bosses' resistance to it is not enough.
• Plot Tunnel: The end to Chapter 2 used to be this (until you get the Fairy Hand, that is). In fact, there used to be a glitch where you could enter said Plot Tunnel in Chapter 5, making it Unintentionally Unwinnable, since the only way out was finishing Chapter 2.
• Power Crystal: Ralph shatters a pair during Chapter 2. They level up Wax and neutralize a flaming pillar that blocked the way.
• Pre-existing Encounters: Every single one.
• Pride: Kevin's main flaw, as well as everyone aligned with him, is their pride and self-benefiting morality. They're just unable to realize that they're wrong.
• Pyrrhic Victory: Very much possible against M. He heals you when you lose to him, but when you win, no such luck.
• Quirky Miniboss Squad: The elementals. Their quirkiness is also reflected given how they boost your characters.
  • Fira gives your characters Fire enchantment, giving them more attack and a Fire element that she will completely No-Sell. This can be circumvented by using other skills and spells scaling on attack. She also chunks her own health down with Rage, but this is to drain more with Fire Energy, and Rage also massively increases her attack.
  • Wata increases your characters' attack, by 50% rather than 10%, but this also confuses your character. Confused characters can still hit her, so you can easily benefit from it even though you don't control your character. Also, Water Energy scales on the target's attack stats. Worse yet, she now has a move called Ripper Tide, which deals massive %-health damage and boosts your characters' attack stats.
  • Terra replenishes your character's MP and Fury. This is to hit you harder with Pangaea.
  • Zephira speeds up everybody. Because the Breather scales on her speed, but also the opponent's.
• Rage Against The Original Author: "The Invincible" rages on Max. She is just another reflection of Kevin's self-aggrandizing delusions.
• Randomly Drops: Completely averted. No enemy ever drops anything.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: Fira, Wax and Maw. Averted with Malirak who has red eyes, but is just an NPC.
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: Wilhelmina decides to move out and save her city when you come to her.
• RPGs Equal Combat: Most of the gameplay is fighting. There are a pair of labyrinths but they aren't difficult once you figure out the gist of it. Though the equipment and skills come naturally.
• "Save the World" Climax: In Chapter 5, the heroes attack the Invincible's Castle to save the world. Later on, it's not only to save the world, but catch Kevin and prevent him from harming other worlds.
• Scratch Damage: Due to the damage formula, there will always be some, except in the case of elemental immunities.
• Secret Level: By end-game only can you go back to all the dungeons you've ever visited (the exception being the early-Chapter 5 distorted Fourth Wall). This is the only way to enter Terra's Dungeon, which makes it this. A programming oversight made entering the dungeon possible during Chapter 3, and Maw wasn't there despite being supposed to be.
• Shout-Out:
  • Many, to Final Fantasy. VII and IX mainly.
    • Sephiroth Expy Maw. Driving the expying further, he dual-wields, and guess what, he wields his sword left-handed.
    • Max's Fusion Sword is also named after Cloud's, despite being nothing like it.
    • The ability Super Nova is ripped straight, minus the status effects.
    • Wilhelmina is an Expy of Beatrix, complete with the exact same techniques, not in name, but in effect. She has Blue Thunder Cut (really Thunder Slash), Stock Break, Screen Cut (really Climhazzard) and Seiken Clash (really Shock, it's even renamed to go with Beatrix's Seiken skillset which contains the four aforementioned techniques). She also has a functional copy-paste of her White Magic skillset.
    • "The Invincible"'s nickname is taken from Kuja and Garland's Cool Ship.
  • M.S.P. also means Master Sword Phantom.
  • Xav wields a key that doubles as a sword. He is also based on Crusade-era Ky Kiske.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: A very short one starts the final battle.
• Situational Damage Attack: A few of them. Loup has Reactive Attack, that deals extra max-HP-based damage to poisoned enemies, and Modulus, which is a random damage attack that can deal up to 9999 damage if your HP can be divided by 7. Apocalypse's execute factor counts, giving it more damage on low-health foes.
• The Smurfette Principle: The playable cast has it somewhat. All parties formed during the three first chapters have only one girl, and it's also the case in Chapter 4 before they group with the Chapter 1 party. Chapter 5 also only brings one new female... but she's the only character new to this chapter.
• Sorting Algorithm of Evil: Averted if you count The Original, given that you meet the Invincible there. Otherwise played straight excluding Optional Bosses. Averted in terms of in-game menace, as the Invincible is stronger in gameplay than Kevin, mostly due to her spamming Super Nova in her last boss fight.
• Status Effects: More often used by enemies Kevin and Vanessa, but also Loup.
• Story to Gameplay Ratio: "The Original" only has one battle. "The Sequel" has one battle per chapter barring Chapter 1 (which has two) and Chapter 5, and even then it's 90% story.
  • Insult Backfire: Maw ends up turning his part into a Badass Boast.
• Terrifying Rescuer: Maw. His arrival changes the tone of the screen to night for a second, changes the music to a 50%-slowed One-Winged Angel, and he Octaslashes Terra to oblivion. And if that doesn't work, he backstabs her for a One-Hit Kill.
• That One Attack:
  • Super Nova. You may spam it, but when an enemy (like M or the Invincible) pops it up once, better have Xav in your team - and even that won't save you from taking at least one loss.
  • The Invincible's Secret Art Power Energy. Despite the redundant name, it's a dreaded move for the reason that it debuffs all the target's stats, for 1000 turns. Including Max HP and Max MP.
  • The Final Boss Kevin is not really that threatening, most often, and usually spams Judgement. However, in his last two fights, he may use Super Nova followed by Screen Cut (which often leads to a Total Party Kill), or even worse, Otherworld Energy. It removes immortal state and then deals a 100%-accurate instant kill. Saylia's immortal state may be permanent, but if he hits her with this move, she's afflicted by a plethora of statuses including Toxic, which renders her unable to take moves and lose 20% of her HP and MP every turn. And he can bust this move up as his first move, even in his first appearance which is just after the Elementals.
• Theme Music Power-Up: Used for Ferenan's Big Damn Heroes moment. The fact that his theme is shared with the elementals means he also brings them with him, heel-face-turned and everything.
• Time-Limit Boss: Inverted. You have to survive Terra for 5 turns, and then you win.
• Token Evil Teammate: Maw thoroughly averts this. In The Original however, he is still playing it straight.
• Turns Red: Fira's case is literally called as such. She halves her remaining health, but also gains massive attack power.
  • Artificial Stupidity: Fira would use it even when raged. This was patched with it simply being an attack buff when she was already in the Rage state.
• Underground Level: The two dungeons and the Aalet ruins.
• Unintentionally Unwinnable:
  • There was one in old releases of the game: jumping in the hole at the second floor in the Invincible's Castle during Chapter 5. There was no way to get out of there, resulting in you being locked, and you had access to a switch that would only lock you further.
  • Ella actually subverts it if you bought a gun in Altiga during Chapter 4, as using it gives her a chance to deal instant death on enemies.
• Universal Poison: Justified by the rarity of the spell.
• Unstoppable Rage: Saylia cannot die. Methods of defeat in battles including her have her flat-out removed from the party, but the fact that only Terra and the Invincible can do it means that simply using her makes most boss fights unlosable.
• The Very Definitely Final Dungeon: The Unknown Castle, really the Invincible's Castle, counts as this especially when you get to the higher floors, whereupon you just start exiting reality.
• Video Game Geography: Played straight, not that you ever can verify it.
• Villainous Breakdown: Kevin progressively gets there, with all his characters losing sanity before dying, and he is left ranting and raving more and more. Before his ultimate battle, he is spinning around at the speed of sound, further emphasizing his craziness.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: From the very start, Fira, if you're unaccustomed to this type of bosses. If it's not her, it's Zephira (she used to be That One Boss, and the Breather alone required four nerfs [first one removed the 800 extra base damage, second one indirectly nerfed it by gutting her speed boosts, third one removed its Life Drain status, and the fourth one halved its damage]).
• Wallet of Holding: You can find 9300$ in a chest, but it never goes out of your wallet.
• Walking the Earth: Wax, after the ending. Having never been a main part of the heroics, he wanders looking for the true meaning of being a hero.
• Would Hit a Girl: Mandatory, given there are 7 girl enemies and 2 male ones, one of which isn't even mandatory and the other one being the Final Boss.
• You Have Failed Me: The elementals get this, one per chapter. Until Chapter 5. Fae gets carelessly abandoned so Vanessa could have her death as tragic backstory into the next world, Vanessa herself isn't spared a thought by Kevin, and he himself completely destroys the Invincible when she's out of health.
• Zip Mode: Hold C to run. It only works in certain maps. The MV version "zip button" can be configured.

Tropes exclusive to the VX Ace version:

• All Swords Are the Same: While a few of them get different visuals, they play the exact same. Heck, even some things that shouldn't count as swords (the Key of Hearts) are treated as swords by the game!
• Anti-Magic: The Silence state is extremely rare, with only Loup's Fog doing just that. Kelaud or Wilhelmina's Aura has a chance of achieving this effect. Also, the Invincible has a chance to block magic attacks.
• Attack Reflector: The Golden Star allows its holder to passively reflect all magic attacks. Including Super Nova.
• Can't Catch Up: A lot of characters. Max starts with stats close to some characters like Wilhelmina (even though he's level 60 by the time you get her at level 80), but as he levels up to level 99, he leaves almost everyone else behind. Even Wax, Xav and Maw and M who themselves leave everyone else behind.
• Can't Drop the Hero: Aversion. Whether Max or Wax is treated as The Hero, they're never in the same party until Chapter 5. Even then, you can do the game and skip on them altogether, however bad a move this could be.
• Character Level: Often fixed at a certain point, and there's no such thing as Level Grinding. Also, Max starts at level 50, and that's one of the lowest starting levels in the game (aside from Loup and Michiru's 40, and Kelaud's 1).
• Competitive Balance: Absent. While each character is somewhat unique, some are far better than others. The most blatant example is Athor being strictly worse than Xav at everything.
• Contractual Boss Immunity: Averted. Bosses only resist %-health attacks (taking 50% damage from them) instead of being immune to them, and they're not all immune to status effects. Kevin proves even the Invincible isn't so invincible with his Otherworld Energy, which removes her "invincible" status and then inflicts Instant Death on her.
• Diagonal Cut: Bisection and Screen Cut. Stock Break is portrayed as one too.
• Disc-One Nuke: Max naturally knows Blue Thunder Cut from the very start, which can possibly carry you through the entire game. See Game-Breaker.
• Game-Breaker:
  • Blue Thunder Cut: It's a simple skill that costs 24 Fury to deal 19% of the enemy's maximum health (unlike other HP-based attack that use current HP as basis) as physical damage. Where this gets broken (aside from counting max HP rather than current HP) is that it isn't mitigated like other %-health damage (being thunder-elemental), and Max's high attack stat is (usually) vastly superior to his enemies' defense, guaranteeing that it will actually do more than the aforementioned 19%. It's even worse when it can make a Critical Hit. A Blue Thunder Cut critical hit is a One-Hit Kill on Vanessa. It's also available on Wilhelmina as well as M, meaning that it's possible to bring multiple of these to a single turn.
  • Maw's Octaslash also counts. It's easily accessible every other turn if you use Action Charge, and strikes with doubled attack power 8 times. Compare with Michiru's similar-cost skill that hits all enemies four times with normal attack power. Needless to say, picking a team that can buff Maw's attack and decrease enemy defense so he can one-shot bosses with Octaslash is a viable strategy to win easily. What actually makes it so strong is Maw's insane attack.
  • Xav can protect anybody from taking damage until he dies. While this is usually helpful in no-selling early bosses' entire offense, this is extremely powerful in his last possible battle as he will eat six Super Novas from the Invincible in one turn, and not only will he not die (Super Nova cannot kill), he will nullify the influence of the spell on the rest of the team. He tends to die to the moves that come immediately after it.
• Heroes Prefer Swords: Main characters Max, Wax, Xav and Maw have an M.S.P. sword in their locked equipment. Ralph, Hero of Another Story, also uses a sword.
  • Dual Wielding: Max and Xav dual-wield swords, with Max's Fusion Sword and Xav's Key of Hearts (yes, it's counted as a sword). Maw subverts it in that while he dual-wields weapons, his Maw Blade EX isn't a sword, but a claw weapon.
• Katanas Are Just Better: Averted completely. There are two katanas in the game. Michiru has the Muramasa, but she's one of the weakest characters in the game. Max, in The Original had it too, but he changes his weapon lineup for The Sequel, and is far stronger without it, considering he replaced it with the far more powerful Fusion Sword.
• Large Ham: Leeroy. He's the only one ever to get text written bigger, except the Invincible's death cry after her penultimate defeat.
• Last Disc Magic: Easter Egg-only magic features the most overpowered attacks in the game. The Author's Bomb item that one-shots everybody, the extremely powerful but random Meteor spell, Denial of Creation (which works on all enemies despite not working on most your party members), Otherworld Energy (Kevin's Signature Move), and also such a thing as Back Stab, the otherwise script-only One-Hit Kill used by Maw.
• Leeroy Jenkins: Leeroy. Except he is Crazy Enough to Work. Ramming a castle, jumping through a hole in the ground, nothing stops the man. In battle, his attitude is reflected by him having 130% attack and 80% defense.
• Lightning Bruiser: Max has overpowered offense, okay defense (which becomes good when his HP goes from 2600 to over 9000 as the game progresses), and is fast enough to outspeed anyone he's pitted against. His only weakness is his (comparatively) lackluster magic power, but realize that the two attacks he's known for (Super Nova and Blue Thunder Cut) don't use it.
• Limit Break: 100-Fury attacks could be considered this, but for the Author-class characters it's so easy to get 100 Fury (thanks to their Action Charge skill that gives 80) it can barely count.
• Mage Killer: The Author class was originally intended as such, given that their base stat lineup favors Attack and Magic Defense. It didn't go like this at all. All you have to do with them is spam Super Nova.
• Mega Manning: The Invincible. Once she learns Super Nova from having watched the heroes do it on her, she outright spams it.
• Nonstandard Skill Learning: There are a few items that teach skills, but only to limited party members.
• One-Hit Kill: Only done by scripts, on two occasions: Maw's Back Stab on Terra, and Vanessa's end-turn Creation Denial (only on the elementals, Ferenan no-sells it).
  • Easter Egg cheat codes include several, such as using Denial of Creation, which works on everybody, the Author's Bomb item that is a global one-shot, Kelaud learning Back Stab, etc.
  • If you're unlucky enough, as early as Vanessa and Kevin's first fight, he can use Otherworld Energy, which removes invincible status and has 1000% chance (as to avoid the luck stat influencing its sure-hit accuracy) to inflict numerous statuses, including instant death, toxic (poison that negates your healing, also drains MP and makes the afflicted character unable to move, and it never wears off), paralysis, etc... but you'll barely notice all of that because you'll be too busy being dead in the first place.
• One Size Fits All: Dragon Plate armor can be worn by Kelaud and Max (though they're both late-teenage guys), but also Wilhelmina, a woman in her 20-somethings, and Athor, a significantly bigger man than all of them.
• Secret A.I. Moves: M can use Apocalypse and Super Nova as a boss, but not when playable.
• Shields Are Useless: Wax has the Reforged Aegis, but he has less defense than Max who doesn't have a shield and uses the same base stats (because the Fusion Sword inherently gives defense). He still has higher defense than Xav (who has more sustain due to a Healing Factor anyway) and Maw (though this certainly doesn't mean much).
• So Long, and Thanks for All the Gear: Equipping the Dragon Plate to Kelaud during the first fight will cause him to be gone forever with it when he gets replaced by the stronger version of him that you get after the battle.
• Starter Equipment: Inverted with Max: his starter equipment is: Fusion Sword and M.S.P., and also the Golden Star. He also has a Drake Helmet and Dragon Plate, making this set the best he can ever equip. This gives him a total 383 attack, 180 defense, 128 power, 64 spirit, 128 luck, 135 max HP and 128 max MP, which by itself is beyond endgame stats for a bunch of characters. Of course, the most game-breaking equipment comes with Easter Egg-exclusive characters, who start out with Fusion Sword (barring Kelaud Streif, who starts with Kelaud's Tyrfing), Reforged Aegis, Unknown Tiara, Important Character's Cape and Golden Star.
• Utility Party Member: Ella. Bennett also works best as a healer between battles rather than a Combat Medic.
• Villain Forgot to Level Grind: Played straight, since they never win. Even when Kevin gives you like 1 million EXP, he doesn't gain stats between his battles, only battle scripts that make him more of a pain.

Tropes exclusive to the MV version:

• Adaptation Expansion: In a way, since it will add skills and change the way M behaves.
  • However, there are many moves that are actually taken out of some characters' arsenal.
• Cast from Hit Points: Maw's Killing Arts and Magic skills are this.
• Competitive Balance: This version will emphasize this comparatively to the VX Ace version.
• Non-Standard Skill Learning: Characters will have to gain class experience to learn their skills.
• Shout-Out:
  • The four main characters are modeled after the four main classes of Final Fantasy. Most of the new skills for these four are almost copy-pasted from the base material. With:
    • Max as the Warrior with his new Magic Sword skills, War Arts self-buffs, and overall physical attack inclination.
    • Wax as the Black Mage with his new repertoire now full of offensive magic.
    • Xav as the White Mage with his healing skills.
    • Maw as the Thief with his Glass Cannon stat lineup.
  • Max's shield is called "Triforce Shield".
  • Xav's armor is called "Hallowed Armor".
  • Saylia's shield is the RITO Shield.
  • Ralph's King's Shield is named after Aegislash's Signature Move.
  • Wilhelmina ripped nearly all her equipment from Final Fantasy IX. Specifically, pieces of equipment that can be stolen from Beatrix.
  • Loup gets the Gladius dagger from the same game.
  • Ella's hair equipment is named "Flower Lady's Headband".
• Status Effects: While not all are standard in the way they work, Maw has a wide array of them.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Ulrika returns since the issue with sharing Saylia's sprites is moot now.
• Tragic Keepsake: Implied with Loup's headband, named "Louiah's Memento". This is also why he gained a pink headband: it's this one.
• You Don't Look Like You: Many characters would've had a redesign with MV's character editor.
  • Max changed his hair to feature a ponytail rather than just long hair.
  • Wax uses his The W-Team in Patina Castle design, with bangs just like Maw, except they cover his other eye.
  • Maw's coat, instead of being pitch-black, would've changed to a dark shade of green.
  • Saylia uses her Kelaud and the Sky Tower MV design, meaning she no longer has a headband.
  • Wilhelmina's haircut changed to a short bob.
  • Loup uses his The W-Team in Patina Castle design, meaning he has Facial Markings instead of a scar, and he gained goggles and a pink headband.
  • Michiru uses her The W-Team in Patina Castle design, with a primarily black and white outfit with some red.
  • Alala gains a shoulder-baring new outfit, with a white Badass Cape, which is a far cry from her red and pink outfit from the VX Ace version.
  • Athor uses his The W-Team in Patina Castle design, so his hair is now white instead of a faded brown and he gets an old-looking armor.
  • Ralph got brown hair and older looks as to signify the passing of time since RPG Maker VX came out.
  • Bennett is bald. Not that we knew whether he had hair before.
  • Ylva's hair is even shorter.
  • Ella traded her nun outfit for a black and white robe and has a flower headband.
  • The Invincible traded angel robes for white armor.
  • Vanessa gained hair decs and cat ears.
  • Kevin changed to grey armor with golden lining.
  • Kitty looks late-teenage instead of childish.

Tropes associated with The W-Team in Patina Castle
SPOILERS unmarked! You have been warned.

• And the Adventure Continues: The ending has The W-Team simply "head to the next town to see if they need some problem-solving".
• Better to Die than Be Killed:
  Queen: "You will never kill me! Not if I die first!" *jumps off the top of her castle*
• Expecting Someone Taller: The NPC who called the W-Team is disappointed by what she sees.
• Friend to All Children: A side-event shows Loup helping out a girl who faints while working. Similarly, the man in charge of the factory at that time takes care of her and does not punish her for stopping to work.
• HP to One: Actually, Queen's HEX puts your HP to 6.
• Never Found the Body: Averted. Even though Queen falls off-screen, she hit a pillar on the way down, confirming that she's dead, and the W-Team walk past her, seeing that she's really dead before leaving.
• Red Herring: An NPC says "Queen may have defeated me, but I'll be back!". He doesn't help.
• Spin-Off Heel Syndrome: Xav is mentioned as an off-screen heel, as the guy in charge of overseeing the chase on the W-Team.

• Would Hit a Girl: Since the final boss is Queen...

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