Battle Moon Wars is a Doujin game made by the group Werk. It is, as the name suggests, a Pastiche in the style of Super Robot Wars.
Take the three major facets of the Nasuverse: Tsukihime, Fate/stay night and The Garden of Sinners. Then mix them together into a Massive Multiplayer Crossover, and add a duo of original characters on top. Through four acts, what starts as a not-so simple maidnapping explodes into a new Grail War, as one by one, a mysterious enemy is bringing back defeated villains from Nasuverse past, with shiny new power boosts to boot.
Translation Patch so far can be found here.
See also Carnival Phantasm, an official Nasuverse crossover anime focused on comedy.
Contains the following tropes:
- All There in the Manual: You have read/seen The Garden of Sinners, played the Heaven's Feel version of Fate/stay night (which was not in the anime), played Melty Blood, played Fate/Hollow Ataraxia, played Kagetsu Tohya, and read Fate/Zero, right? Actually, the game is pretty good at explaining the major bits, but the sheer Backstory is overwhelming.
- For example, the reason that Saber was able to defeat Nrvsnqr is because his mage self was resurrected as well as his vampire self, and had extended his reality marble with his magic. However, in the Nasuverse, an old famous sword can rip apart magic by having history. Old swords really don't get more famous than Excalibur. Boost that with a Command Seal backed Noble Phantasm; and his magic didn't have a chance. Even more telling is the
Word of God via interview that Saber's Excalibur as the type of attack that is able to kill Nrvsnqr, apparently because it has the sheer power to be able to kill all his lives in one shot.- Another interesting tidbit is in the Melty Blood manual; that had a few lines stating that the general rule regarding "Youkai" in Misaki Town is "Let the Youkai police themselves" and that Akiha Tohno is the Youkai political guardian of the city. The game took those lines and ran with it.
- For example, the reason that Saber was able to defeat Nrvsnqr is because his mage self was resurrected as well as his vampire self, and had extended his reality marble with his magic. However, in the Nasuverse, an old famous sword can rip apart magic by having history. Old swords really don't get more famous than Excalibur. Boost that with a Command Seal backed Noble Phantasm; and his magic didn't have a chance. Even more telling is the
- Anti-Villain: Quite a few actually. After all, Kuu wants to save the world, and some characters wouldn't have followed her if she was fully evil. Apart from her, Caster just wants to find Kuzuki, Kiritsugu and Irisviel are mainly here to see how their children are doing, Aoko is her usual
Chaotic Neutral self, Ilya doesn't really care and helps the heroes on several occasions, and Archer... well yeah. - Art Evolution: The game was released in four episodes over an extended period. The quality of the animation and sprites improves drastically as the game goes on. Compare Haruna's attacks when she first starts the game, and then one of her attacks after getting upgraded in Act 3.
- Now that the 'Perfect Edition' is out, several of the old attacks have been retouched, and among others, Haruna, Takumi, and Nanaya Shiki have been completely redrawn and reworked, now having some of the best looking attacks in the game. Sadly, despite occasionally redrawing the old sprites for some of the new moves, Werk never bothered to completely replace the old sprites. As such, if you do a new move with a character who was there from the beginning (such as 17 Dissection with Shiki), you can actually see the sudden shift in sprites.
- Artificial Stupidity: You know those black spheres near Kuu that use field attacks? If one of your party members - even one they can't hit - is in their range, they will attack, and hit a few of their allies. It is possible to kill the Big Bad without ever directly attacking her.
- Back from the Dead: Most of the villains from the various series of the Nasuverse. Kuu says she "didn't really resurrect them but instead fused the power of the Tatari and the broken Grail to reanimate their existence" but Tomato, Toma-toe.
- Badass Adorable: Every player character, quite frankly. They're slightly less messed up than in the source material, and the visual aesthetic dilutes much of the original darkness.
- Batman Gambit: Kuu counted on the heroes defeating all the villains brought Back from the Dead. Their deaths are all part of the Soul Suppression ritual.
- Berserk Button: Arcueid gets angry perhaps three times in entire game. First, when she gets beaten by Gilgamesh - she is REALLY eager for revenge. Second is when Gaia forces her to assume duties of her Planet Guardian - by fighting Shiki and her group. Third time, is when Kohaku kidnaps Shiki - she swears, that if he is unharmed, she will 'only' break her arm or two - but if he IS hurt, then she will tear off Kohaku limbs one by one.
- Becoming the Mask: Kohaku's goofy persona was a creation to hide her trauma at repeated child abuse. In Tsukihime she's an Yandere who killed her emotions and just acted silly to manipulate others. Somewhere between Kagetsu Tohya and Melty Blood; she is depicted as at least partially being really that way. Oh, she still manipulates others, but it's less soulless. Given that this game is via Melty Blood continuity, it's not entirely certain what in the mythical Satsuki Arc caused that.
- Even in this game, Kohaku's first scene was plotting the "Tohno Family Takeover Plan" and she initially welcomed Saber because "one should never look a gift minion in the mouth." However, Saber grew into her Morality Pet. Heck, even if the original Tsukihime, Kohaku stopped nefarious doings when someone other than Hisui gave her love and loyalty.
- She's still wily, though, as Stage 53 shows.
- Even in this game, Kohaku's first scene was plotting the "Tohno Family Takeover Plan" and she initially welcomed Saber because "one should never look a gift minion in the mouth." However, Saber grew into her Morality Pet. Heck, even if the original Tsukihime, Kohaku stopped nefarious doings when someone other than Hisui gave her love and loyalty.
- The Battle Didn't Count: Much like Super Robot Wars, many of early bosses just ignore it if you drive their HP to 0 (even if their battle screen sprite comments you killed them and you get experience!) and just unleash their nefarious plan anyway.
- Be Yourself: Part of the lesson that Shiki Ryougi gives to Tohno Shiki in gaining strength. There's no need to fight his origins as a Nanaya; merely master it. Kill one's enemies and don't kill one's friends.
- Symmetrically, when Shiki accepts himself, Nanaya starts accepting himself too. In Kagetsu Tohya, he's infuriated to be created as a "mass murderer" in Shiki's dream world. Nobody there was real, so the only person he can kill is Shiki so he can't be a "mass" murderer. When Shiki has his revelation, Nanaya stops caring about killing other people and only wants to kill Shiki or be killed by him.
- BFG: Ciel's Seventh Holy Scripture is kind of iffy since it's not an actual gun (though it's frequently listed under this trope elsewhere, and looks the part if nothing else), but Natsuki wields an anti-tank rifle, which definitely fits. Also examples of Small Girl, Big Gun
- Big Brother Mentor: Takumi places himself into this role: Giving advice, supporting, teasing, and occasionally scolding Shiki and Akiha as need be. His comparisons of them to his little sister at home who is their age clinches it.
- Big Damn Heroes: So very much. Given the source material, it's to be expected. Everyone will suddenly pull someone else's bacon out of the fire at some point.
- Blessed with Suck: Haruna has the power to see possible futures. ALL possible futures. If unsealed, she would be immediately besieged with seeing the countless ways everyone will eventually die. This Vision also makes her particularly weak to The Corruption.
- Bonus Dungeon: Have fun dealing with the "Tohno Family Takeover Plan" should you get all Battle Masteries. Kohaku unleashes the Robopocalypse of Mecha-Hisui's as well as unlocks her Magical Amber form and Saber's Saber Lily form. She somehow takes control of Arcueid and the cast has to deal with five rounds of this. Upon failure, Kohaku breaks out the Easy Amnesia gas. This does, however, unlock those extra abilities in New Game Plus as well as a special item that increases all stats.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Arcueid, usually when in Magical Girl form.
- Character Development: Arcueid, of all people, gets one thanks to Kohaku, of all people. As part of her scheme, Kohaku tells Arcueid, that because she keeps picking up fights with Ciel, she is shortening Shikis life by putting him in much stress. Despite amnesia introduced later by Kohaku, Arcueid still mostly remembers the lesson, although she has no idea where is came from. When Ciel tries to provoke her into another fight by standing in front of Shikis room when Arcueid wants go go in, Arcueid with sarcastic smile reminds her, that Shiki will hate her (Ciel) if she gets violent for no good reason. And then simply walks around her. Naturally, Ciel is utterly shocked that Arcueid behaves like rational adult.
- Colony Drop: One of Red Arcueid's attacks involves ripping the moon out of the sky and dropping it on her hapless target.
- Color-Coded for Your Convenience: (Sakura decides to wear darker colors to represent accepting her Shadow elemental powers.)
- Cool Sword: In a universe filled with Cool Swords — Excalibur, Caliburn, Ea, etc. — Takumi manages to compete with the Futsu-no-Mitama, an epic plasma fire magitek two-handed monstrosity straight out of Japanese mythology.
- The Corruption: Oh, take your pick. We've got Nero Chaos, Angra Mainyu, and then the stagnation happening in Misaki City. It's powerful enough to make Haruna physically sick and triggers her Heroic BSoD later on.
- Crossdresser: You can make male characters wear maid dresses or Ciel's vestment. You can even make them wear several at once. How that works is anybody's guess.
- Deadpan Snarker: Caren. Interestingly, this is more her doujinshi Little Miss Snarker personality than Fate/Hollow Ataraxia. She starts getting her original personality back as the plot goes into the Ataraxia plotline, but she's still... dry. Her apparent inability to change facial expressions doesn't help this image.
- Lancer's even better at this. Ciel and oddly enough Hisui (Mainly regarding her sister) get numerous moments of Deadpan Snarkiness.
- Demoted to Extra:
- Assassin: There's even a dummied out Assassin card that increased Arms and critical hits. Alas, no Assassin, no Samurai card to take from him.
- Kotomine. Every other Big Bad and Disc-One Final Boss in the 'verse showed up for the party but nobody invited the Final Boss of two out of three of Fate/stay night's routes? Kuu explains that she didn't bring him back because he would probably try to stop her. It would probably go like this "Hi, I'm Kuu. Would you help me save the world?" *Kirei kills Kuu and wakes up the Devil.*
- Diminishing Villain Threat: Averted for the most part, but somebody apparently thought it funny to degrade Tsukihime's Big Bad, Roa/SHIKI to almost Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain-levels and turn him/them into a weird laser-ninja-thingy, for some reason...
- Dynamic Difficulty: Like in Super Robot Wars, it has Battle Masteries, which are optional challenges for each stage. Do them and the difficulty goes up.
- Evil Is Not a Toy: Averted with Sakura, who starts using Angra Mainyu to power her attacks after her arms upgrade in Act 4.
- Evil Twin: Shiki Nanaya is one of the beings brought to life by the incident. Ciel speculates he's a Tatari clone, but Shiki thinks he's something more. Note, he uses a knife similar to Shiki Ryougi's; not Seven Nights and cannot see the Lines of Death like the one from the Melty Blood games. This is a more direct reference to the Kagetsu Tohya version.
- Later, after learning how to overcome his darkness and defeating that Nanaya, Shiki does fight a copy of Nanaya and notes how it was much weaker than his previous nemesis. Also, Tatari later states it can't be a Master, and Nanaya was Archer's Master.
- Everybody Knew Already: Kohaku very quickly knows everything about Saber through a combination of her own intelligence and the ability to see Saber's dreams, although she pretends to be clueless until Saber is ready to tell her about herself.
- Expy: The fact that several characters are Expies of each other is lampshaded a few times, such as when Touko points out that Shiki Tohno is very similar in appearance to Mikiya Kokutou (from The Garden of Sinners) and Rin remarks that Kohaku and Sakura are similar, as they both share Yandere tendencies and a history of sexual abuse.
- In fact, the Fate/stay night crew are unable to recognize that SHIKI is not actually Shinji Matou; something to his extreme irritation. "Stop calling me that!"
- Fanservice: Any female character's Overly Long Fighting Animation has a good chance of featuring this at some point. Special mention has to go to Shirou and Sakura's combination attack, which features Sakura temporarily changing into a revealing dress that'd be fanservicey enough by itself, then includes bouncing breasts and teases Wardrobe Malfunction in several shots.
- There's also the Shiki-Shiki combo attack that quite blatantly shows off Ryougi's ass.
- And Magical Amber's attack
- Fantasy Kitchen Sink: The game opens up with a Mad Scientist Meido who accidentally summons a female King Arthur. This is interrupted by a vampire kidnapping the other Meido, so King Arthur's Meido Master sends her Robot after them; and while the chase is on they're joined by a Mage and the Vampire Moon Princess; who has decided to use her awesome Reality Warper abilities to become a Magical Girl for giggles. This is just Stage 3.
- Final Speech: After you beat Kuu in Stage 49.Kuu: Haruna, I leave everything in your care.
- Food as Bribe: Kohaku generally only relies on this to get Saber to do anything.
- Fusion Dance: Roa + SHIKI = RoSHIaKI the ninja!!! Yes really.
- Gaia's Vengeance: The Earth itself recruits Arcueid to protect Kuu so she can suppress the Devil. Interestingly beating Arcueid and Kuu convinces the Earth they make better guardians anyway.
- Giant Space Flea from Nowhere: The events have all been caused by Original Generation villainess Kuu who is generating a ritual to suppress a Devil that is about to emerge. While the "Soul Suppression" technique was mentioned earlier, the Devil is only mentioned near the end in the game.
- Glass Cannon: Haruna initially, if you don't level up her defense. Shiki Ryougi as well, at least until you activate her True Mystic Eyes ability during battle.
- Gratuitous German: Sakura. Just Sakura. Kaleido Ruby also invokes this in her intro.
- "Groundhog Day" Loop: The events of Ataraxia occur during all of this due to the various dream magics thrown around and quite a few extra players get involved the repeating four days.
- Harder Than Hard : As if the game wasn't hard enough with the Battle Masteries and all, in a New Game Plus, you get to set the difficulty of the game from 0 to 10 with 10 being the highest.
- Heroic Willpower: Sakura's powerup comes when she accepts her Darkness powers and can control them without hurting people.
- 100% Completion: Oh, you want to reach Stage 53 and unlock Saber Lily and Magical Amber? Have fun getting every single Battle Mastery.
- I Choose to Stay: Saber chooses to stay with Kohaku. Kohaku realizes that Saber needs an honorable reason, not only an emotional one, so she uses Akiha as an example of showing Saber leadership. How to handle loyalty, how to handle treachery, how to be a lion at home and a diplomat away. And, incidentally, she can stay with Kohaku as well. Sakura and some broken grail fragments help out with the mana requirement.
- "I Know You Are in There Somewhere" Fight: Shirou to Sakura while Angra Mainyu is attempting to corrupt her. Rin amusingly shows some directness and just tells him to spit it out already and tell her he loves her.
- Intimate Healing: In the Post-Game Bonus stages, Touko comments on how Shirou's healing into his new body is so fast is because he's been getting lots of mana from what he and Sakura do at night.
- Improbable Weapon User: Kohaku and Hisui use a broom and a mop respectively in their attacks.
- * Scoffs* Warcueid hits you with the moon (at least that's how it appears). The moon, people. It can't get any more improbable than this.
- It's Personal: Arcueid picks up a beef with Gilgamesh in Act 4 for not treating her like a Worthy Opponent.
- Jack of All Stats: Ciel and Archer. Ciel is a Super-type unit with some evasion, Archer is a Real-type unit with high HP and Toughness.
- Joke Character / Spoony Bard: Avenger. His main gimmick is to counter every damage he received... but he isn't built for tanking at all, and even if he was, he'd still do less damage than anybody else.
- Lady of War: Several of the characters, including many that use magic rather than weapons. Saber, Caster (to a certain extent), most of the women in the Einzbern family and even Kuu. Her background theme practically oozes power and majesty.
- Large Ham: Arcueid. Whether showing up as a Big Damn Heroes and admitting that she didn't do so earlier because she didn't have a lamppost to show off on or becoming a Magical Girl just for lulz and busting through the Fourth Wall (The Throne of Heroes?) to steal Caster's Staff after she's no longer in the plot, or messing with Gilgamesh just because she can.
- RoSHIaKI, oh so much.
- Let's Get Dangerous!: When Arcueid stops being a Magical Girl is when she shows off her true power.
- Lightning Bruiser: Although Takumi and Saber, as Super characters, can't dodge as well as the likes of Shiki or Lancer, but their high HP, toughness, and movement range allows them to tank at the frontlines with the sweepers unlike some of the Mighty Glaciers.
- Mad Scientist: In this game it is Canon that Kohaku constructs Mecha-Hisui's in her secret lair under the Tohno mansion.
- Magical Girl: Two of them. Arcueid, after watching too much anime, decides to become one. Thus the Magical Girl Phantasmoon is born. She takes Len as her sidekick. Rin, to her horror, gets stuck with her Kaleido Ruby alter ego again...
- With the Perfect patch released by Werk, it got worse. Saber and Kohaku both receive playable Magical Girl forms - Saber Lily from Fate/unlimited codes and the infamous Magical Amber.
- Magikarp Power: Shiro, in the beginning is weak and hard to use. He eventually gets upgraded after telling Archer he rejects his ideals and gains a big boost in stats, a new attack, Nine Lives, and the special skill "Indomitable" which makes him stronger the more he gets damaged, making him a fantastic tank.
- Sakura also gets one of these in Act 4, going from a pathetic artillery character in Act 2, into a tank with amazing ranged attacks which carry some great status effects.
- Mighty Glacier: Akiha has very powerful attacks, but she is slow and takes a long time to advance up the field.
- Mistaken for Gay: In Takumi's path, Arcueid assumes that Takumi is interested in Shiki because "usually Shiki only fights alongside people who are attracted to him." Can't really argue with that logic there.
- Arcueid seems convinced of it enough, to calmly consider killing him if he gets in her way. Shiki senses her murderous intent and freaks out a little.
- And then Akiha reflexively almost accuses him of it. Though she immediately apologizes when Takumi reminds her she invited him to help out.
- Morality Pet: Kohaku is nothing but caring and gentle towards Saber.
- Multiple Endings: More like alternate mid-game. If you do not allow Shiki to kill Satsuki the 3 times she shows up against you, she will die protecting Shiki from Nanaya. If you do allow him to kill her those 3 times, she becomes an unlocked character that you can now use in deployment.
- New Game Plus: Like the Super Robot Wars series, completing one mode let's you get the Secret Character from the other mode. Also, upon finishing the game, one can increase difficulty 1-10 as well as add a special item that increases stats. Unused stat points also carry over as well as certain special abilities should you beat the Bonus Dungeon.
- Ninja Maid: Hisui and Kohaku, plus new character Natsuki.
- Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: RoSHIaKI, a fusion of one of the most powerful vampires and a demon hybrid. He's also a freakin' ninja!
- Normally, I Would Be Dead Now: Kohaku, one of the most normal (relatively speaking) characters in the game takes a blast from Gilgamesh's Ea in Act 4 and comes out pretty torn up but alive and in one piece. Fortunately she has Avalon, the Sheath of Excalibur.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: Kohaku: "I don't recognize the name 'Excalibur', I'm just not good with history!" *Cough*yeahright!*Cough*
- Odd Couple: Kohaku ends up being Saber's new Master.
- One of the underlying themes in Fate/stay night was that Masters tended to summon Servants who lead similar lives to their own.
- The game itself explores this. Saber killed off her emotions as a woman to become "The King" while Kohaku killed off her emotions to become "The Doll." Both wish there was another way.
- One of the underlying themes in Fate/stay night was that Masters tended to summon Servants who lead similar lives to their own.
- One Stat to Rule Them All: One of the ways of undermining the risks of using the glass cannons is to pump BP into Quick (which, in conjunction with your base Evade, determines how successful you'll be at avoiding enemy attacks). As a lot of these characters have high Quick values to begin with, their fragility becomes a non-issue once their dodge rate approaches 100% (usually around 160+ Quick). The Shikis also gain Perfect Evade based on Will increase.
- One-Steve Limit: The One Shiki Limit doesn't exist. There are three people in this game with the name Shiki (four if you count Shiki Tohno's "Nanaya" personality; they only refer to him as "Nanaya" though).
- Original Generation: Haruna, Takumi, and Natsuki all work for an organization called "Shin'i." They generally use Magitek in order to prevent the supernatural from preying on humans, as well as encourage cooperation and co-existence between the neutral supernaturals. Anybody or anything magical, good or bad, get termed as "Youkai." Vampires, Servants, etc. Including themselves. However, they are considered small potatoes against the big players of the Nasuverse like the Mages Association and the Church. They have only been around in the last 50 years and only active in the Nasuverse region the last 10. They are, however, more native to Japan than either of those organizations and have ties to the general supernatural community such as the Tohno family.
- In the first chapter we see them taking orders from a housecat named Mike. Mike is never shown again, although Takumi comments that he is their trainer. There are also some name drops to other members named Megami (weapon maker) and Tsukiyo, but they never show up.
- Kuu is a feared ancestor of Haruna's.
- In the first chapter we see them taking orders from a housecat named Mike. Mike is never shown again, although Takumi comments that he is their trainer. There are also some name drops to other members named Megami (weapon maker) and Tsukiyo, but they never show up.
- Power Creep, Power Seep:
- Normally, characters like Shiki and Shirou would be crushed by the insanely powerful Servants, despite their special skills. And the Servants in turn would be taken out by Arcueid without her even breaking a sweat. For purposes of Game Balance they evened things out. Plus it's awesome to have Hisui kill Nero Chaos with a mop.
- Also, all of the One-Hit Kill attacks (Gae Bolg, Point of Death, and others) now simply do high damage.
- Power Limiter: Haruna has several built in; to only be released for short periods of time by Natsuki.
- Precision F-Strike: Caren busts out with TWO f*** s in Stage 53.
- Psychic Powers: Certain members of the Mochizuki family have strong powers of Precognition. Archer explains that they work in a similar way to his and Shirou's Projection magic, meaning they can be applied to Clairvoyance and Postcognition as well.
- Purposely Overpowered: Arcueid when she finally drops the Magical Girl idea and starts fighting seriously is horribly broken. She is among the most powerful beings on Earth, after all.
- Even when fooling around as a Magical Girl, she's still easily one of the strongest player characters before upgrades because Arcueid is just that powerful.
- The Rival: Magical Girl Arcueid and Magical Girl Rin (spoofed to hell), Arcueid and Gilgamesh, Takumi and Berserker.
- Road Cone: One can either choose the "Super" (Takumi) or "Real" (Haruna) route; most of the game is the same but the Super route deals more with the Tsukihime side while the Real route is more Fate/Stay Night. Bonus characters from each can be carried over into New Game Plus.
- And regarding Road Cone franchises: Not much of a problem on the Tsukihime side, since Melty Blood has established a sort of canon for them to follow. But on the Fate/stay night side, they decided to follow the Heaven's Feel route. This also makes Saber being with Kohaku less awkward.
- Although in the BMW-verse, both SHIKI and Roa are canon. And both are revived at the same time. Don't... try to think about it too hard; the game mostly hides the implications behind Rule of Funny.
- And regarding Road Cone franchises: Not much of a problem on the Tsukihime side, since Melty Blood has established a sort of canon for them to follow. But on the Fate/stay night side, they decided to follow the Heaven's Feel route. This also makes Saber being with Kohaku less awkward.
- Rule of Cool: Word of God states the odds of multiple people possessing the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception at once are something on the order of trillions to one and other Nasuverse works have established that Kara no Kyoukai and Tsukihime exist in different continuities. But come on, them getting a Combination Attack is too awesome not to have.
- Rousing Speech: Haruna gives one just before the final battle. See the Crowning Moment page for more details.
- Secret Character: Satsuki and Mech-Hisui are unlockables. Satsuki's usable on one stage even if you don't unlock her. Also, if you get enough Battle Masteries, Aozaki Aoko will join you on the final stage.
- Getting every single Battle Mastery, then beating Stage 53 and creating a New Game Plus will allow you to use Saber's and Kohaku's Magical Girl forms, Saber Lily and Magical Amber.
- Shout-Out: Tons. Every Mook is a shout out to some anime, game, or show. Plus several characters attacks are Shout Outs to Super Robot Wars and other Mecha shows, here's just some of them.
- Takumi is a walking shout out to Sanger Zonvolt, complete with A SWORD THAT SMITES EVIL! He also visually resembles Shiro Amada.
- Berserker viewing Takumi as a Worthy Opponent wouldn't be remarkable in and of itself... except that one of his attack animations copies the style of Wodan Ymir's Colossal Blade.
- Haruna's second attack (before it was updated in the Perfect Edition) is a near imitation of Ibis Douglas's RaMV attack, but adds in the F91's VSBRs.
- Phantasmoon's attacks are a homerun shot and the Inazuma Moon Kick.
- Then Phantasmoon Eclipse uses the Spirit Bomb (unless it's a Stoner Sunshine).
- And when Arcueid eventually drops the magical girl shtick, her new basic attack becomes Cat Hand Smash, which is all but identical to Vikungfu's God Hand Smash.
- Two more references to Vikungfu in the double Shiki combo mimicking Vikungfu and Jet's combo, and Saber Lily mimicking Vikungfu's strongest attack of SRW fame with her Excalibur/Caliburn dual-sword attack. If that wasn't enough, remember all those scenes with Phantasmoon appearing out of the blue to give a heroic speech and kick some ass? Players of Super Robot Wars MX and Super Robot Wars IMPACT should be able to notice just how much Werk loves Machine Robo.
- Arcueid, Ciel, and Akiha have an insanely powerful combo attack called "Final Typenic Special" a reference to the common combo attack in Super Robot Wars called "Final Dynamic Special" which involves Mazinger and Getter robots.
- Speaking of Mazinger Z, Mech-Hisui comes complete with a lawyer-friendly Jet Scrander.
- Gilgamesh pulls out the Goldion GUNhammer for one attack.
- Several of the enemy monsters are thinly veiled Shout Outs to other series. For instance, three enemies are quite clearly the Paper Sisters from Read or Die. There's also enemies based on the Getter Robo types (complete with a Black Getter, a Shin Getter who has Meioh for some reason, and even a pink one labeled "Live Version"). note
- If you DO get Sacchin, she comes with Bakunetsu God Finger from G Gundam. Likewise, Shirou and Sakura later get a pastiche of the Sekiha Love Love Tenkyoken.
- There's Lyrical Nanoha in Kaleido Ruby; her Prism Hammer attack bears an uncanny resemblance to the many incarnations of Vita's Graf Eisen and the animation for Schweinstein even features an Intelligent Device-esque assembly sequence.
- Ciel's best attack is a variation on Kyosuke Nanbu's Trump Card.
- The special item gained from beating the game once, the "Abnormal Agonist" seems to be a reference to the main character of Nasu's new novel series, DDD aka Decoration Disorder Disconnection.
- Magical Amber's attack cut-in does not really strike anything fancy outside of a panty shot, until when Akiha, Shiki, and Hisui have a portrait that looks similar to the All-Out attack of Persona 4.
- The attack itself is also a shout out to Eureka Seven.
- RoSHIaKI's High Mega Cannon attack of Gundam ZZ fame yet. Not to mention the emblem on his forehead...
- No one seems to care about old shows. Here's Hisui and Kohaku's combination attack.
- Speaking of old shows, Nrvsnqr gets the Jeeg Breaker.
- Aoko's attack has her yelling "RIDER KIIIIIIICK!"
- Phantasmoon's "In the Name of the Moon." Also, the magical girl movie that Shiki and Arc were watching is an obvious reference to Cutey Honey.
- Near the beginning when Saber doesn't understand how the same caster was summoned this war, caster replies saying "Who was it that said it again? 'there are no such thing as coincidences, only inevitability.'"
- In a more subtle example, Saber's Invisible Air Combo is taken from one of the Crossbone X1's attacks in Super Robot Wars Alpha 2.
- Three enemies that have blatant Product Placement of famous colas assume the shape of Aura Battlers, particularly the Dunbine.
- With the exception of Kabuto, there are moe versions of Gattack and Sasword, with Gattack being represented by Luvia-lookalike, she even uses a forklift throw to make it even more blatant.
- Takumi is a walking shout out to Sanger Zonvolt, complete with A SWORD THAT SMITES EVIL! He also visually resembles Shiro Amada.
- Shown Their Work: If it's not a Super Robot Wars reference, then rest assured it's something from the manual. Even Kohaku's love of video games is from Kagetsu Tohya.
- Small Girl, Big Gun: Natsuki seems to be using an Anti-Tank gun as her standard weapon. Fortunately her Youkai ability is Super-Strength.
- Spectacular Spinning: Saber Lily's main attack involves creating a second sword out of the back of Caliburn, and basically spinning the enemy to death. And it is awesome.
- Super Move Portrait Attack: Comes with being a game based off the SRW series.
- Super-Strength: Takumi. How strong is he? He can match Berserker, AKA Hercules, in strength. The Magical Two-Handed Laser Blade helped.
- Tamer and Chaster:
- The game as a whole, considering it borrows all of its canon from games or novels originally rated adult, manages to be teen rated content wise at it's absolute worst, partially due to the art style and partially due to the nature of the Compressed Adaptation of the various plots.
- Instead of being someone whose only way of giving mana was blood and other fluid exchange that a Synchronizer can give and the typical way for a Servant to receive from a non-Mage; Kohaku somehow has a Ley Line (which supposedly requires years of training to create) with Saber that simply transmits mana through proximity. Saber only once in the beginning notes that somehow Kohaku has "something similar enough to Mana" and Kohaku wonders if that's her Synchronizer status.
- Through His Stomach: Saber loves eating and Kohaku loves cooking. Kohaku has no problems using this to get anything she wants from Saber. She is nice about it. Amusingly Shirou warns Kohaku not to go overboard with cooking because Saber never, ever forgets a dish. Kohaku smiles, nods, and then does the exact opposite.
- Time to Unlock More True Potential: Shiki Tohno goes through this at his request to be his "Nanaya" self.
- Unbroken Vigil: Shirou attempts this on Sakura after they rescue her but she really is okay; just tired. Rin scolds him to go outside. Saber for Kohaku, after Gilgamesh slams her with an attack where everyone thought she was rendered permanently brain damaged.
- Worthy Opponent: Berserker seems to regard Takumi as one of these. Even with his Mad Enhancement killing his sanity, Ilya comments that he wanted to fight Takumi a second time at the end of Act 3.
- Vampire Refugee: Satsuki and Sion. Sion handles it better due to alchemic research on the subject and her old Sire not caring as much.
- The Very Definitely Final Dungeon: Stage 51 takes place inside a devil. If you've unlocked Stage 52, it's on a regular snowy field, complete with a snowman. if you've unlocked Stage 53, it's in Kohaku's Underground Dungeon.
- 13 Is Unlucky: In both the Super and Real paths, Stage 13 features the first major boss fight in the game, against Nrvnqsr Chaos.
- Weirdness Censor: Ilya has a castle in Misaki City that nobody ever notices. It's specifically mentioned that there's magic on it to prevent Muggles from paying attention. Rin remarks that it's one of her "smaller" castles.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Kuu, a major role model of Haruna's until she found out that there was nothing she wouldn't sacrifice for the greater good. The Soul Suppression Ritual, for example, would have levelled the whole city and killed millions of people, and Kuu didn't even bat an eyelid. It would have also completely nullified the Devil that was about to emerge which supposedly would have killed more; and her original plan would have sealed herself with it.
- World of Badass: It's the Nasuverse as a Super Robot Wars game. They couldn't dodge this trope if they tried.
