A calamity is coming and you embark on a journey to stop it. You only have 400 years.
400 Years is an Adobe Flash Puzzle Game, developed by scriptwelder and released
on Kongregate on February 6th, 2013.
It puts you in the role of a being of stone who wishes to avert calamity within 400 years.
Tropes present in this game:
- Determinator: The protagonist is willing to spend every last one of the 400 years he has to avert the disaster. Everything from trudging along the bottom of bodies of water to letting the years tick by in order to get trees to grow to a satisfactory height.
- Easter Egg: There is a gravestone past the volcano accessible only with a little effort (and chestnut seeds). It reads as follows: Here lies a traveler between worlds, whose name is unknown. May his curious soul find a way home, like you have found his resting place. Apparently, it's a reference to A Small Talk at the Back of Beyond, another game from scriptwelder.
- Gentle Giant: The protagonist is very big compared to the average villager.
- Heroic Sacrifice: The protagonist ultimately uses his own body to plug an active volcano, preventing it from erupting and destroying the local civilizations. Then again, the lava doesn't seem to hurt him. The chance of rescue is small, but he can wait.
- Insurmountable Waist-Height Fence: The protagonist can survive any fall, he can climb trees, but a vertical wall half his height is impassable. Possible solutions include: waiting for humans to expand and to build a bridge; planting a tree and waiting for it to grow; searching for an underwater passage; waiting for stalactites/stalagmites to grow into a pillar; waiting for fishermen to lower a net; waiting for water to freeze, picking the right spot and waiting for ice to melt...
- Multiple Endings: There are two: A good ending that occurs if the protagonist stops the volcano before 400 years pass and a bad ending if he doesn't do so within 400 years, which dooms mankind.
- Nigh-Invulnerable: Thanks to being made of rock, the protagonist can survive any fall, stay underwater indefinitely and stop a volcano by using himself as the plug.
- Not Evil, Just Misunderstood: Whenever the protagonist walks or moves around humans, they run away in a blind panic. The protagonist is not only not a threat to the humans, but is actively working to save mankind from extinction.
- 1-Dimensional Thinking: The protagonist will rather wait for years until the right moment comes for him to pass an obstacle, than try to find a way around it.
- Overly Generous Time Limit: Although the time limit to reach the volcano is "400 years", you can perfectly complete the game in less than 200 (even on your first attempt)
- Plug the Volcano: The ultimate goal of the protagonist is to prevent a volcanic eruption, which he can do by plugging the crater using his own body as the plug.
- Rock Monster: The Player Character appears to be a Moai head with legs. Being made of stone, he is immune to harm as well as being able to survive the passage of time. Unfortunately, the humans still see him as a walking rock monster and react accordingly by running away in fear.
- Technology Uplift: The protagonist at one point teaches starving hunter-gatherers by planting grain for them. He gets across a lake by waiting for them to use the grain to build a town with a bridge.
- Time-Passes Montage: One of the protagonist's abilities is to simply wait out the change-of-seasons and the passing of years. It's a necessity for solving some of the puzzles that bar your progress.
- Waiting Puzzle: Several of the puzzles require you to just wait until the season is right, or until something grows over time.
- What You Are in the Dark: The protagonist is willing to sacrifice his life for the future well-being of possibly billions of people as well as future civilizations. And no one will ever know.
