Mickey's taking this for a spin.
"Come on, Tails! Let's jump into that tornado!"
— Sonic, Sonic Shorts: Windy Valley
In a video game, it's not uncommon to have levels high up in the air, but how do we spice it up? By having it take place in a tornado, of course! Who cares if tornadoes are probably one of the most dangerous and common natural disasters? It's cool, it's surprising, and that's all that matters! Usually, you are told to not get near a tornado, but here, you just jump right into a whirling adventure!
In reality, being able to survive a tornado, let alone the violent, strong winds that surround it from a mile radius would barely be possible, but not in this case. You simply have to find a way out of the whirlwind and you'll barely have a scratch done on you. Usually these types of levels have strong winds, almost everything flying around and at you, or said debris being your main ways of navigating the twister to remind you that you're in a tornado.
Compare Do Not Touch the Funnel Cloud and Gusty Glade. Sub-Trope of Level in the Clouds.
Examples:
- No One Lives Forever 2 has a trailer park hit by a tornado; you have to fight off ninjas inside one of the trailers as its picked up by the twister and beginning to disintegrate.
MMORPG
- In Final Fantasy XIV, Garuda, the Lady of the Vortex, is fought in the Howling Eye, an Ixali stronghold wrapped in violent winds of Garuda's own creation. The winds are so powerful that only Cid Garlond and his Enterprise outfitted wtih a specialized aether disruptor are able to penetrate the tornado, as anyone else would be torn to shreds if they so much as approached it. Garuda will also shrink the arena with her Eye of the Storm ability, bringing the walls of the storm closer and damaging anyone who touches them.
- The "Twister" mini-game in Sonic Shuffle involves Sonic and his friends being carried through a tornado, all the while collecting rings and avoiding debris.
- Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze: The Frantic Fields level starts in a windy savanna while a storm looms in the distance. Halfway through the level, you get transported to the eye of the hurricane, with floating debris serving as platforms.
- Kirby: Squeak Squad
- The stage select screen of Nature Notch shows its first two stages taking place in a cave inside a tornado.
- The penultimate stage of Cushy Cloud in appears to take place in a tornado with clouds and lightning in it. This also applies to the boss fight against Mecha Kracko immediately afterwards.
- The Secret Level in Mickey Mania, The Band Concert (only found in the Genesis, Sega CD and PS1 versions), takes place inside a tornado where Mickey must jump from crate to crate to reach the end.
- As you progress through New Super Mario Bros. U, Peach's Castle slowly gets surrounded by a magic tornado. The entirety of the final world takes place in it.
- Two thirds into Sonic Adventure's Windy Valley, you are sucked into a tornado. You escape it by ascending to the top of it.
- Vectorman:
- The final stage, aptly named "Twist and Shout," and Final Boss battle in Vectorman 1 is a battle against Warhead inside a tornado. The stage starts by slowly being sucked up the funnel cloud, dodging and/or blasting furniture, before reaching the top of the funnel cloud, where you balance on roofs while shooting Warhead.
- A more subdued version in Level 18 of the sequel (Named "Shout and Twist") takes place in a desert with a tornado raging in the background, blowing you around while you move.
- Final Fantasy 2: After the destruction of his airship, the Emperor summons a cyclone with a castle riding on top of it to destroy every city that stands against him. You need to summon a hiryuu/wyvern to fly into the tornado and reach his castle.
- Ace Combat: Assault Horizon has the mission called "Category Five", where the Player Character, being a batshit crazy Ace Pilot that he is, pursues The Dragon's fighter jet into the eye of a category 5 hurricane off the coast of Florida and dukes it out with him inside.
Non-Video Game Examples:
- The Wizard of Oz. Probably the most famous example of all. After Dorothy's house is pulled up into the tornado, she sees animals, objects and Miss Gulch flying around outside. The whirlwind carries the house all the way to Oz and drops it onto the Wicked Witch of the East.
- In Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs Flint gets caught in a spaghetti tornado. He panics as he takes a short trip within the other debris of the al dente funnel cloud before comically ending up safely on the ground while still screaming.
- In the last book of The Seventh Tower, the Big Bad is confronted in the eye of a gigantic omniscient Genius Loci whirlwind in the Spirit World. The main characters have to drop in from above, since the whirlwind itself is powerful enough to strip flesh from bone in an instant. However, it spares Adras and Odris the Storm Shepherds, since they're its distant descendants.
- In The Dying Earth, the "Call To The Violent Cloud" spell summons a 'pillar of boiling black smoke' which will transport its summoner where directed. It's necessary to tell the Cloud you want to arrive alive.
- Dead Fantasy II. During the big battle at the end, Rinoa casts a spell to create a huge tornado. The combatants enter the tornado and fight inside of it.
- Sonic Shorts parodied the Sonic Adventure example above, providing the page quote.
- Synodic Reboot: Upon his entry to the Medium, Kristan's house is surrounded by a stationary storm
, preventing him from simply leaving to explore his Land. Instead, he has to climb his built-up house to reach a Gate to transport him somewhere else in the Land.
- In an episode of Godzilla: The Series, the Monster of the Week was a giant shrew that controlled a huge tornado, apparently from a Freak Lab Accident involving experimental nuclear wind energy. A battle with this shrew took place inside the tornado.
- In one episode of The Simpsons, Patty and Selma are caught in a tornado and seem to find it quite relaxing.
