Video Game / Epic Battle Fantasy 3

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The third game in the main series involves the heroes (along with Lance, now a member of the team) cruelly reduced to Level 0 after releasing an Eldritch Abomination named Akron by poking it with their weapons.

The game now uses a more traditional RPG approach, where the characters walk around a world map, level up, learn new skills (and re-learn old ones), etc. They travel across several locales, do optional fetch quests for Non Player Characters, and get into the occasional minigame.

Play Epic Battle Fantasy 3 on Newgrounds here or Kongregate here. You can also download the game from Steam for free here.

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Tropes:

• Actually Four Mooks: As this entry starts having an overworld to explore, a single sprite on the map represents a group of monsters, so that harmless-looking bush could actually contain a four-wave long marathon battle. Fortunately, the encounter usually shows the strongest monster on the map, so there aren't too many bad surprises.
• Anti-Frustration Features: Battles can be fled at any time, so you can scan enemies without losing a turn. You can also select the difficulty at any time (since you only get achievements for beating bosses on epic).
• Astral Finale: The black hole/space zone in Epic Battle Fantasy 3.
• Barrier Change Boss: Akron in EBF3. You need to see the orbs on his body to find out what he will change to next. Thankfully, once you scan him, you'll be able to see his current weaknesses and resistances for the rest of the fight.
• Beach Episode: A cutscene at Rock Lake has the party indulge in some fun in the sun. Unsurprisingly, Natalie chooses to wear a bandeau... that nearly gets ripped off by a squid.
• Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: The third game's party consists of Matt, Lance, and Natz respectively.
• Boss Banter: In EBF3, the final boss reveals his origins (or what he can remember of them, anyways) and contemplates the purpose of his existence while pummeling the living daylights out of you.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: The Monolith enemies. They are immune to all but two or three elements each, have loads of health, and alternate between moderately effective attacks and whole-party-hitting lasers powerful enough to one-hit-kill which inflict status effects. And they buff each other. Oh, and they always use the laser on their first turn, and unless you manage to stun one somehow they'll continue to all fire them on the same turn for the whole battle.
• The Cameo: NCHProductions' mascot, Meow Meow, appears once again, as both a questgiver in The Town and an unlockable skill. The attack is functionally identical to its EBF2 incarnation, but uses its user's level to determine power instead. The 2016 update would change the skill's name to "NCH's Meow Meow", to make it clear Matt Roszak doesn't own the character.
• Chain of Deals: Jim takes 3 Rainbow Gems for a Charcoal, which looks like a black Ruby, and can't be distinguished on the quest record screen as rewards are in black and white. Yui wanted 2 Jaw Bones and a Charcoal, and gives the Staff called Sentinel.
• Charged Attack:
  • The Protector has two mega-beam attacks: a thunder-elemental one that can stun your party, and a bomb elemental one that dispels your party before dealing damage!
  • Akron has a black hole-like attack that deals massive multi-hit dark damage with a chance of instant death!
• Combat Exclusive Healing: In the third game onward, healing spells can only be used in battle. However, you can walk around to heal HP and MP in EBF3, or even wait around in 4 and 5. If that takes too long, you can use healing items, find the Trauma Inn (third game) or slime bunnies (fourth and fifth game).
• Convection, Schmonvection: Our heroes traverse the volcanic area at the end of the game walking on rusty metal bridges suspended over molten rock and/or boiling lava, without any ill effects.
• Counter-Attack: The third game onward makes it so that various weapons have a chance of making their wielders counter with specific skills when by any attack. The third and fifth games grant such abilities only when the weapons are high enough in level, but the fourth makes countering possible with level 1 weapons (though the chance is increased with higher levels)!
• Do Not Taunt Cthulhu: Not heeding this advice kicked off the third game.
• Don't Touch It, You Idiot!: Yeah! Poke the chained demon lord! Natalie states that she warned the other two not to touch it, but, like always, she was soundly ignored.
• Edible Collectible: The third game's first minigame has NoLegs eat dozens of food items for points.

• Eldritch Abomination: Akron, the demon. After being awakened, he makes a black hole in space and causes a volcano to erupt, along with warping space and sending the protagonists to the town.
• Eye Beam: Akron's fire spell. Oddly, until he's severely damaged, his eyes are actually hidden under mummy bandages. How he manages to cast this fire beam without burning through them is anyone's guess.
• Final Boss, New Dimension: Akron is fought in a black hole in both appearances.
• Flavor Text: For some of the Food, after their functional text, some Equips, and all Misc items. For example:
  • Gold: You can buy stuff with this!
  • Food:
    • Pumpkin:
      Heals an ally for 1,500 HP. Great for Halloween.
    • Coconut:
      Heals an ally for 5,000 HP. Kills more people than sharks.
    • Watermelon:
      Heals an ally for 10,000 HP. Smash it at the beach.
    • Garlic:
      Heals status defects. Is disgusting.
    • Burger:
      Fully heals HP and MP. Boosts fatness.
    • Pizza:
      Fully heals all living party members. Tastes real good.
  • Misc:
    • Brick:
      Put them together to build something.
    • Herb:
      A common plant used for medicine and recreation.
    • Red Potion:
      A bottle of... monster blood?
  • Equips:
    • Cat Ears:
      Kawaii cat ears.
    • Breastplate:
      Heavy knight armor with high defence.
    • Soldier Helmet:
      Standard foot soldier's helmet. Protects from bombs.
    • Army Jacket:
      Standard army jacket.
• Flunky Boss: Every damn boss in the third game is this. Even the Pyrohydra, who at first seems to avert it by being a Wolfpack Boss instead, starts summoning minions when reduced to one head. The fourth game turns it into an advantage, since every enemy killed gives you Summon Points.
• Foreshadowing: Akron's being created by Godcat gets a fair bit of this in the third game. A statue of him is visible in the Kitten Ruins (only as a shadow, naturally), and several of his Boss Banter lines refer to Godcat.
• Game Over: The third game displays a random message, usually containing a Shout-Out. It also shows a giant mass of bones against a dark background with each of the heroes' default weapons visible. The music also changes to a short, sad theme, formerly accompanied by a vocal "FAIL!". A full list is provided below:
  "Thou art dead."
  "Better luck next time."
  "And they were never seen again"
  "But the future refused to change."
  "Tonight, we dine in hell."
  "Some can't wait to die!"
  "Bah! Only a flesh wound!"
  "The weak lose their freedom to the strong."
  "Don't play this with your monitor off."
  "But alas, all good things must come to an end."
  "This losing screen is merely a setback!"
  "How much longer are you gonna admire that dirt?"
  "Jesus saves... after every level."
  "You are out of usable Pokemon...You blacked out!"
  "The Game, you just lost it."
  "Fission Mailed"
  "Looks like you got your head handed to you."
  "Another one bites the dust..."
  "Cool story bro."
  "People die when they are killed."
  "Annihilated!"
  "Someone set you up the bomb."
  "Hey, who wants to see a dead body?"
  "You've met with a terrible fate, haven't you?"
  "And then there were none."
  "That's all folks!"
• Getting Hot in Here: While in the desert, Natz complains that she'd prefer the snowy terrain than this heat:
  Lance: Take your top off!
  Natz: What??!?
  Lance: Who said that? Wasn't me.
• Hailfire Peaks: Multiple:
  • Enemies in levels in the third game onward tend to be themed around a single type of elemental damage, weak to it early on, but enemies further in are resistant to it.
  • Environmentally, Glacier Valley in EBF3 is a straight example, as towards the end of it you come across a volcanic plain.
    • Possibly justified in that a volcano is erupting due to the final boss’ presence, turning what would normally be a snowy mountaintop into Lethal Lava Land.
• Heart of Happiness: One of Natalie's victory animations has her saying a pink heart symbol.
• Hyperactive Metabolism: The third game replaces potions with various food items. This has the side effect of making pizza incredibly rare.
• Idle Animation: The players' faces blink in the party menu from time to time.
• Inescapable Ambush: All of the the third game's bonus areas, unlocked by earning many medals, have ambushes that trigger when you walk onto specific tiles on the map rather than interacting with enemies. Averted, however, in that you can flee them at any time and even access the chests that these encounters guard, no combat whatsoever.
• Infinity +1 Element:
  • Bomb. There are huge stretches of the game where almost every enemy is weak to it, and almost nothing actually resists it except a few fire enemies; most importantly, it is the weakness of every clay and golem enemy, who otherwise rarely match in the elements they aren't immune to, and all three monoliths, which each are immune to all but two or three types. Lance gets two bomb weapons and two bomb specials regardless of weapon, and they'd all be solid choices even without the element. In the hands of enemies it's nothing special, other than being hard to recognize. Unfortunately, in the fourth game, Bomb got much more balanced than before. Still not a bad element, as none of the monsters you usually encounter can absorb it.
  • Poison in the third game. It would stack multiple times, stacks would not disappear, most monsters can't dispel poison stacks, and at nine stacks, even bosses would drop dead after a few rounds. The downside is that a good deal of monsters are immune (though most of them are weak to Bomb anyway). Poison was nerfed in the fourth game, with stacks dropping by 1 each round and damage scaling much less with the monster's max HP.
• Innocent Fanservice Girl: In EBF3, there's a naked girl in Rock Lake who gives you a quest. She doesn't seem to notice (or care) that she's stark-naked. There's also a naked man, but he doesn't exactly fit:
  Matt: Don't come any closer, gramps. You'll scar this girl for life.
  Natalie: Too late. D:
• Kill One, Others Get Stronger: The Pyrohydra's remaining heads will receive massive buffs each time one head dies.
• Kleptomaniac Hero: In the third game, you can actually walk around in a world map. And thus, this trope is born. Lampshaded in Glacier Valley if you go to an igloo. Matt will wonder if the Vikings will mind if you take their stuff, Lance will say that you'll need to anyway if you want the treasure hunter medals, and Natalie will try to get them to stop stealing everything. Lampshaded yet again when you come across another unlocked tent in Volcano Peak, at which point Natalie agrees to steal things.
  Lance: "You've changed."
  • Lampshaded early on if you find the "secret" back area of the shops where you can loot the shopkeeper's treasure chests. Natz will question if it's stealing, and Matt will only reply "Just take it and run!"
• Kung Fu-Proof Mook: Skull Ghosts make their return from the first game, this time sporting complete immunity to physical damage. Conversely, Lava Slimes are completely immune to magic damage.
• Life Meter:
  • The enemies' are in the bottom right of the battle screen.
  • The party's is shown in the menus, and in the bottom left of the battle screen.
• Magikarp Power: Another are the soldier jackets and helmets in EBF3, which you start out with and which resist bomb-type attacks (which no enemy has for the first half of the game). When fully upgraded, they drop medipacks and air strikes nearly every other turn.
• Mythology Gag:
  • The presence of the Light Warriors sculptures becomes a bit funnier when one realizes that Roszak previously worked on a popular series known as "Attack of the Black Mages", the fifth of which marked the appearance of his current artistic style (as well as Natz's debut).
  • There is a NPC named Mao in Glacier Valley who will say a line from Roszak's first animation, "I no speck england".
  • When the Ancient Monolith uses an energy beam on the party, Matt will say that he once knew a spiky yellow-haired guy who shot beams like that, referencing FFBattle. Or the first EBF. Or Final Fantasy VII.
• New Game Plus: In the third game, it's possible to start a new game while retaining your levels, skills, items, etc. It is very satisfying to go through again and easily destroy every single boss that gave you trouble previously.
• No One Gets Left Behind: Humorously averted in the third game. Matt expresses fear over crossing an unstable bridge, and Lance just says that the party isn't coming back for him if he falls.
• Notice This: Several instances in the third game.
• Number of the Beast: In EBF3, there's a treasure chest early in Volcano Peak that contains 666 Gold as well as a couple of crafting items.
• One-Hit Kill: Introduced in this game is the Instant Death status effect, used by a handful of regular enemies, and usable by the players via a handful of methods. As its name implies, it kills instantly upon being inflicted.
• Patchwork Map: The third game is more obvious, having a tundra right between a desert and a beach. You can even see the ground quickly transitioning from one biome to another at the very edge of the screens.
• Power-Up Food: Soft drinks, beer, and milk provide temporary buffs in battle when consumed.
• Rare Candy: Choco Cornets, Yoghurt, Bacon, Beef, Cakes, Chocolates, Lollipops, and Gummy Bears each raise stats permanently.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: Akron, though said seal turns out to be absurdly weak. Godcat is the one who sealed it.
• Shoot the Medic First: Discouraged with the Woolly Mammoth boss in EBF3; killing any of the healing mooks he starts the battle with will likely replace them with a Viking Monolith, which is far more aggravating than merely healing. And since the mammoth's most exploitable weakness is poison, and maximum poison does more damage than can be healed...
• Superboss: There are 5 "hidden rooms", one in each world except Space, blocked off by NPCs who refuse to let you through unless you have collected enough medals. These rooms contains lots of treasure chests, as well as invisible enemies that guard the chests and normally come much later in the game. When faced at the corresponding points in the game, they can easily cause a Total Party Kill in just a few turns. The kicker? Inside the volcano hidden room, you'll face off against: 2 waves of Evil Worms & Evil Tails, normally summoned by Final Boss Akron, Level 50 bushes, on a game where Level 30 is the default level Cap, and where it takes New Game Plus and astronomical amounts of EXP to reach that kind of level, and finally notorious bosses in Mook clothes Viking, Ancient, and even ''Cosmic'' Monoliths, all at Level 40.
• Taking You with Me: The Runes in EBF3, which are summoned by the Protector boss, will launch themselves at you and explode when at low HP, dealing minor damage to the entire party. Runes in EBF4 exhibit similar behavior, but only target one player.
• Trauma Inn: In the third game. It's free, although Natalie pointed out that it wasn't a very good one.
• Unintentionally Unwinnable: In the third game, a bug may cause the Pyrohydra to respawn, preventing you from returning to the town shop to get items (which are very much required to beat it).
• Updated Re-release: The Steam release of EBF3 has a few tweaks, including an enemy wave counter, better visibility of enemy stats, different game speed options, and a buff to Lance's defenses. No new content was added, however.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: In the third game, the Wooly Mammoth boss can kill the party within a few turns if you're not careful. It basically serves to teach that there are more aspects to gameplay than attacking and using spells.
• Walk It Off: From the third game onwards, walking around gradually heals you. If you're too lazy to go back to the city, you can just walk around in a circle.
• With a Friend and a Stranger: The party setup in EBF3. Matt and Natalie had been traveling by themselves for over two games, while Lance had joined the party at the end of the second game, generally being a bother to Natalie, the friend.
• Writing Around Trademarks: In the Updated Re-release, several NPCs that were explicit references had their names partially censored. Additionally, the music played by Power Metal was changed from Dragonforce's "Through the Fire and the Flames" to a royalty-free track (although Matt's dialogue for using the skill for the first time remained unchanged).

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