Video Game / Everlong

An independent freeware RPG Maker 2003 game by Doug "DJC" Carpenter, with a setting best described as a Fantasy Constructed World. Started several years ago as a Final Fantasy fan-game, and has existed in multiple incarnations over time, some of them VERY different from each other, until DJC decided to pull out all former versions and make the latest, much-revised version the "official" one.

Unusual for having, as the name would suggest, an incredibly long playtime no matter which way the player goes about completing it. Add to that a differently-flavored story for this kind of game despite it being full of references to famous and less famous Speculative Fiction works, some very unusual battle mechanics and a thoroughly distinctive dungeon design.

The story starts out by following an elite Cirigoth Blackguard as he attempts to desert from his own army, triggering his meeting with a couple of outlaws at war against the Tyr-Anox invasion force. As the plot advances, our heroes will progressively get involved in events of a much, much larger scale.

Official website is found here. RPGMaker.net link is here.

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Everlong contains examples of:

• Action Girl:
  • Meredith, Julia, and Vixen are all competent fighters in their own rights. Meredith and Julia are Combat Medics, Vixen is a summoner.
  • The vast majority of Tyr-Anox soldiers are women, and they managed to conquer a good chunk of their continent with Cirigoth help.
• Adaptation Name Change: The character named Brad in earlier versions of the game is renamed Azrael in version 3.30.
• Adaptational Heroism:
  • In version 3.30, the Invincible Four were unwilling servants of Expirius and the original Four Heroes to boot. Not so much in previous versions, where most of them were Card Carrying Villains.
  • Likewise, the 3.30 version of Expirius himself comes to regret his contract with Entropy and all his actions were done in an attempt to free himself of the evil god. Though he also falls under Adaptational Villainy when he destroys the Triangle Island base along with several Valiantide members.
• Aerith and Bob: Just look at the names of the characters. On the one hand, you have names like Gerovitus, Daevus, Altair, Expirius. One of the main characters is called Azrael. On the other hand, there are names like Julia, Meredith, Justin...
• Affably Evil: Entropy is surprisingly a good sport for a Greater-Scope Villain: he congratulates the heroes when they're able to resist his last attempt to corrupt them. He even stops his evil plans when the party earns his respect.
• Anti-Grinding: The level cap system. As soon as your characters reach an experience level considered too high for that point in the story, no more random encounters for you. The level cap system is scrapped in version 3.30, but there's an option to lower the EXP and encounter rate as the party gains levels.

• Better to Die than Be Killed:
  • Nergal, a member of the Invincible Four, once tried to kill himself in order to avoid experiencing Expirius's apocalypse. Unfortunately, he ended up being brought back as an undead servant.
  • Similarly, Gerovitus also tries to go out on his own terms by dying to the party in battle, only to become an undead servant too.
• Big Bad: Expirius is the main antagonist of the game.
• Big Bad Wannabe: Emperor Daevus fancies himself as a great conqueror and is indeed a threat for the world's other nations, but he is a small fry compared to the real enemy. Even more now that he's been Demoted to Extra in Version 3.30.
• Big Badass Battle Sequence: The Battle at the White Gate, and a much bigger, playable one with the War of the Eclipse are two long sequences of battle. The first marks the beginning of the war between Cirigon and the rest of the free nations of the world, the second takes place in the sky while the heroes go from airship to airship in order to get to Altair.
• Bittersweet Ending: Every character is able to face the future in spite of their past losses, except Azrael who remains behind in the Abyss in order to atone for being an Unwitting Pawn to Expirius.

• Boss Rush: In version 3.30, the Invincible 4 fight the party one at a time. However, they do it all in one battle, so the party keeps their buffs for the next enemy.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Azrael after having demonic spirits implanted inside of his mind is mind-controlled by Expirius, the Big Bad.
• Chest Monster: Red chests trigger a fight if the player tries to open them and the fight must be won in order to receive the loot inside them.
• The Conqueror: Emperor Daevus's life goal of choice is to try and unite by force all the world under his rule.

• Death by Irony: Emperor Daevus is known for having made talks offerings to lure his potential enemies, before backstabbing them. He is literally backstabbed and betrayed by his Dragon with an Agenda Altair. Bonus points for this happening when he was planning another dubious negotiation.
• Decoy Protagonist: Azrael is the first playable character, but is eventually booted from the party for most of the game. Glen could be considered the real main character, but even that is not clear-cut, though the other characters consider him to be the most suitable leader due to his pragmatism.
• Defeating the Undefeatable: They're called the Invincible Four for a reason though they let the protagonists win during their first fights. Uber Daemon and Khaer Magnus may also count.

• Demoted to Extra: Before the latest version of the game (v.3.30), and as he is the Disc-One Final Boss, Emperor Daevus had an important presence in the first part of the game: the story would regularly cut to him scheming with his assistants. All of his scenes before his assassination were cut out of v3.30.
• Developer's Foresight: If you win the Hopeless Boss Fight against Expirius via the rebirth system or by setting all enemy stat multipliers to 0.1%, he'll paralyze the entire party and win anyways.
• Difficulty Levels: Version 3.30 allows the player to adjust percentages for enemy stats, though they're given easy, default, and hard presets. There's also an auto mode that adjusts enemies relative to the party's strength.
• Disc-One Final Dungeon: The fleet of airships during the War of the Eclipse, and later Nemus Aevum forest, are long levels that appear to be the climax of the story, but aren't.
• The Dragon: Lord Altair is Emperor Daevus' second-in-command and field agent, but ends up literally backstabing him. In reality, he's Expirius' second-in-command.
• Duel Boss: Justin fights General Aries in a one-on-one duel during the War of the Eclipse. If you so choose, Dynamo can be one for Willis.
• Eldritch Abomination: Pandemonium and Uber Daemon have no known origin or purpose, are terrifyingly large and strange-looking and are among the most powerful creatures in the whole game.
• The Emperor: Emperor Daevus of Cirigon is well... an emperor. He also wants to conquer the rest of the world.
• The Empire: Cirigon is an empire that wishes to expand.
• Empty Room Psych: Tyr-Anon castle, after being abandoned, becomes very confusing and paranoia-inducing: no treasures, no fights, no PNJs. Just empty rooms. In fact, the only living soul the heroes encounter is Gerovitus himself in the throne room, because Altair and his forces have already killed everyone else.
• Enemy Mine: Briefly between the heroes and Gerovitus, who gives them useful informations about Altair and Expirius because Altair betrayed him.

• Even Evil Has Standards: Dokkalfar, a greedy scrooge of a dragon, is terrified of what kind of world Expirius will create.

• Evil Former Friend: In version 3.30, Expirius was once Ipsirion, a friend to the Four Heroes, which is why they weren't willing to finish him off once and for all.

• Excalibur in the Rust: The equipment of the Four Heroes lost much of their power and the Valiantide plan to restore them. The villains steal the gear to unlock the Pure Lands and the party fails to steal them back. However, version 3.30 allows the party to revisit Auctus after getting the Aetherius and take back the equipment for real. By placing them at the top of the White Shrine and then beating Expirius at the top of Atlantis, the equipment will be restored to their full power.
• Extended Gameplay: The final side quest, though designed for the New Game Plus mode, is accessible immediately by picking the Continue+ option after the Epilogue.
• Faux Affably Evil: The NPC, Hammond, reveals that Altair truly enjoys the suffering of others underneath his suave exterior.
• Foil: Colonel Justin with General Aries. Justin is a commoner, Aries a nobleman. Justin is polite and friendly towards his allies (even if they're commoners), Aries is scornful towards everyone who's not Emperor Daevus, even Gerovitus (who is the leader of an ally kingdom). Justin fights in the front lines, Aries supervises his army from a distance. Unsurprisingly, the two are mortal enemies.
• Four Is Death: The Deathblow move hits 3 times, dealing up to a targets Max HP - 4.

• Graceful Loser: In the ending, Entropy congratulates the heroes for overcoming his final attempt to Mind Rape and tempt them.
• Greater-Scope Villain: The fallen god Entropy is the one responsible of Expirius' corruption, but it's the latter's actions that drive the plot.
• Gun Nut: Dynamo, big time. His arsenal includes a wide variety of guns and he sees nothing wrong with sabotaging a ship in the middle of a storm while he's aboard to force Willis to fight him to get it back.
• High-Altitude Battle: The War of the Eclipse takes place both on the ground and in the skies, between airships, although the heroes only take part in the airship battle.
• Hopeless Boss Fight: One unwinnable fight against Altair happens early on, as the story needs the characters to be captured by the Cirigoth Empire. Two with Expirius follow suit. In v3.30, the first fight with Expirius was cut out.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Depending on Glen's dialogue choices with potential love interests, the girl that doesn't win can feel this way, as shown during Entropy's Mind Rape sequence where he taunts them about their unrequited love.
• I'm a Humanitarian: Aegir's lieutenant ate the human guards.
• Jerkass:
  • Commander Lysander, in spite of working for the Valiantide, is a very unpleasant person: a haughty Commander Contrarian.
  • General Aries is also a massive dick towards his own allies, with his haughty and scornful personality.

• Loads and Loads of Sidequests: The sidequest frequency is fairly consistent until you get the Inceptum, which then opens up sidequests all around the globe. Amusingly, one sidequest involves gathering several books that contain information about most of the other sidequests.

• Magic Knight: Azrael and the Cirigoth Blackguards in general are accomplished swordmasters and can also use magic.

• Mind Rape: Entropy puts the party through their best dreams and worst nightmares. It's implied he did the same to the Invincible Four to force their cooperation.
• Missing Secret: The gate guards of Revirdok will not let you inside the city because of the nasty crisis going on. At no point in the story will the area ever open, no matter what you do in the game.
• The Mole:
  • Azrael is an unwilling one for Altair due to being possessed by a demon.
  • Vixen and Willis are set up as obvious ones thanks to their obvious lie about working for Gaius, who's merely a figurehead in the Valiantide. In a subversion, while Vixen was working for the Unicon, she never told them anything about the party because she knew defeating Expirius is far more important than petty politics.
• Mook Horror Show: The prologue (Azrael's escape) is this for Cirigoth and Tyr-Anox soldiers: Azrael slaughters the terrified soldiers one after an other.

• Non-Action Big Bad: Empereor Daevus, before he's revealed to be a Disc-One Final Boss, is the man who threatens to conquer all the nations of the world, but he's a politician, not a fighter.
• Optional Party Member: In version 3.30, there's a sidequest to recruit Cirus, who needs a Chronoprism to be freed from Expirius's time prison.
• Orcus on His Throne: Emperor Daevus almost never leaves his palace and prefers to let his generals (like Aries) do the dirty work.

• Pragmatic Villainy: Emperor Daevus is willing to spare Valiantide prisoners and negotiate with his enemies in order to build good PR and make them let their guards down. He also advises his army to avoid needless destruction to the lands they conquer, since it would be hard to milk these lands for resources otherwise. Unfortunately for him, Altair and the Invincible Four care less about winning the war efficiently and more about causing enough bloodshed to revive Expirius.
• Professor Guinea Pig: Ament is a Mad Scientist who experimented on himself.
• Proud Warrior Race Guy: General Gerovitus of Tyr-Anon has shades of this. He has a Might Makes Right philosophy and therefore believes that the strong should rule over the weak because their strength makes them superior
• Rape as Backstory: In an older version, Julia describes going through this experience, and it seems to have heavily damaged her psyche. This backstory is now only very lightly implied and this character has a separate backstory.
• Real-Person Cameo: A side quest lets you fight "Osama". However, version 3.30 replaces his boss battle with a Blob boss, which killed him first.
• La Résistance: The Valiantide are a underground network fighting against the Cirigoth Empire's yoke.
• The Revolution Will Not Be Vilified: Averted. While the Valiantide fights against Cirigoth oppression, they sometimes use decidedly questionable methods in their struggle against the Cirigoth empire, a few warriors in their ranks have been reported to commit full-fledged criminal acts, and one of the higher-ups you get to meet is an unbelievable Jerkass. Not so extreme, however, that it counts as The Revolution Will Not Be Civilized.

• Sacrificial Lamb: Eve, Justin's fiancee is killed off right after her introduction and a few lines of dialogue, to give Justin a motivation to fight the bad guys for the rest of the game.
• Sacrificial Lion: Over the course of the story, important characters are killed off at key moments of the game.
  • Both Azrael and Cirus are killed in older versions of the game, only to be spared by v3.30. Cirus dies in a Heroic Sacrifice to help the heroes and, later, Azrael kills himself to prevent Expirius from controlling him more and atone for his past as a Black Night.
  • Logan, one of the few reasonable Valiantide leaders, is killed in Expirius's assault on the Triangle Island Base in order to show the threat of the Big Bad.
• Secret Test of Character: Logan pretends to have received a message from Gaius concerning Vixen and Willis's orders, causing them to confess about who they were working for. Then it turns out everyone else already dug up that information beforehand and they decide to give the two another chance for telling the truth.

• Smug Snake: Dokkalfar acts like a high and mighty dragon, but he caved in rather easily to the cult's demands and he isn't even that hard compared to other optional bosses.

• Skill Point Reset: Skill point reallocation has absolutely no penalty, making it easy to customize the characters for any situation.
• Story Difficulty Setting: The game allows the player to change between normal and story mode outside of dungeons. If the player enters a dungeon in story mode, they can avoid all random encounters, can use healing points to reach the level cap of the area, or choose to skip the boss. However, this doesn't work for bonus dungeons, which are normal mode only until the boss is beaten.
• Straight Edge Evil: Tyr-Anox law has a rather suprisingly puritanical mindset in some areas, for instance cracking down against prostitution.
• Suicide by Cop: A possible interpretation of Gerovitus's decision to fight against the heroes after their brief Enemy Mine moment insteand of cooperating further. He knew Altair was going to kill him anyway because he knew too much, so he decided to die by his own terms in a fight instead of waiting for Altair to silence him, in a Better to Die than Be Killed kind of way.
• Summon Magic: Drakeor and Vixen can summon dragons and members of the 13 deities respectively.
• The All-Seeing A.I.: If you play cards with Swank or play Blackjack at Isla de Sol, the AI will gain this ability if you bet too high. This leads to the opponent either folding if you have a better hand or calling your bet if you have a worse hand.
• Trauma Inn: A rather literal case, as the amount of money you get charged for depends entirely on the amount of HP your party members are currently missing.
• The Unfought: Emperor Daevus is killed before the heroes can confront him.
• Tragic Monster: In version 3.30, all of the Invincible Four. They were once the Four Heroes, only to be corrupted and controlled by Expirius and Entropy. In their last encounter, they can only tell the party to kill them and free them from their servitude.
• Undying Loyalty: General Aries is deeply loyal to Emperor Daevus. It's especially noticeable because he's the only known high-ranking Cirigoth officer who didn't conspire against him.

• The Unreveal: We never really find out why Azrael chose to desert from the Cirigoth army.
• Unwitting Pawn: The Cirigoth Empire and Tyr-Anon were manipulated by Expirius and Altair. Namely, they were used to create enough bloodshed to help release Expirius from his interdimensional prison.
• Updated Re-release: This game went through several major updates, with v3.30 being the most recent one.

• War Is Hell: Keen's short tale of the Cirigoth invasion is anything but pretty, and enemy Mooks sometimes act in ways that are certain to make the more sensitive-minded players uneasy...

• Wham Episode: The whole sequence at Red Carpet Square. The heroes infiltrate it disguised as Cirigoth soldiers, hoping to get a shot at Emperor Daevus and save Logan, only to witness Altair kill Daevus and all witnesses except them after the Emperor talked about negociating with the coalition of nations allied against him, since Altair wants the war to continue. He then takes control of the Cirigoth Empire. This allows the heroes to realize that Daevus isn't the real threat and the war itself is part of Altair's biggest scheme.
• What Measure Is a Mook?: During their infiltration in Tyr-Anon Castle, Sammy and Azrael mercilessly slaughter all Tyr-Anox soldiers that they encounter. However, when they defeat General Gerovitus (a named character), they decide to spare him because it would be "bad" to kill someone who's unable to defend himself. Justified for Azrael, since he's already influenced by Expirius and Entropy. Not so much for Sammy and Glen, who are very easily convinced to spare the man who's a threat to the entire continent (and swears he will have his revenge). And then, when they leave the castle, they continue to slaughter the Tyr-Anox soldiers.
• You Can't Thwart Stage One: Of course, no matter how hard the heroes try to prevent it from happening in the first part of the game, Expirius is going to reappear in the real world.

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