Video Game / Shantae and the Pirate's Curse

"Moist the main snail!"

The third game in the Shantae series, released for the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U in 2014, four years after Shantae: Risky's Revenge.

A direct sequel to the previous title, the game starts off with Shantae adjusting to her new lifestyle when Risky reappears. Due to the previous story's events, Risky's pirate crew gained magical powers and turned into Cacklebats, overthrew Risky, and plan to resurrect her former mentor, the Pirate Master. As per usual in situations like this, Shantae and Risky must join forces and defeat the Cacklebats to prevent this from happening.

Gameplay is similar to the previous two games, with two major changes. First, the interconnected Metroidvania world of the previous two games has been replaced with a world seperated into several distinct islands, each with their own overworld and dungeon. Second, Shantae swaps her magical powers for slowly acquiring Risky's items and gaining new abilities with them.

An International Co Production with Inti Creates. Later saw release for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and even Amazon Fire TV.

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This game contains examples of:

• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Ye Royal Sewers under the Sequin Land Palace, an extensive sewer system home to snakes, large mushrooms, waterfalls, several platforming elements, and a secret training ground filled with monsters of various kinds.
• Action Bomb: One of the enemies found in the Abandoned Factory is a robot with a very bombastic death animation, in that it will go out in an explosion of massive, highly-damaging fireballs that travel a considerable distance.

• Alleged Lookalikes: Shantae, Risky Boots, Sky, and Rottytops are all mistaken for the missing princess of the Tan Line Temple and held against their will. Mind you, these are four very attractive women, though with their different (and often fantastic) skin and hair colors, they're not even particularly easy to mistake for each other. The actual princess is short and dumpy, not even slightly similar in appearance to any of the four. Risky threatens the High Priest with violence after realizing who she's being confused with. The townspeople only seem to notice after the princess returns (she was just shopping), and the chieftain remains confused even then.
• After Boss Recovery: Defeating a boss heals Shantae to full health immediately, then places her outside the dungeon, which might still need some travel before she's at the safety of the ship, even with Pirate Flares, so the health is useful. This even applies right after The Pirate Master's first phase.
• Ambidextrous Sprite: Parodied with the Squidsmith, who will toss her hair aside to the other eye when she turns around.
• Ambushing Enemy: Water dragons hide within waterfalls, emerging only when lunging out to ambush Shantae when she passes in front of them.
• American Kirby Is Hardcore: Inverted. The original American promo art features Shantae and the other girls smiling, but when the game was brought to Japan, the 3DS cover◊ shows that Shantae is in a much more serious mood, and Risky Boots is proudly brandishing her pistol.
• Animesque: Even more so than the previous game, especially since the cover and profile shots were drawn by Makoto Yabe.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • You are defenseless in "Run Run Rottytops!", and one hit sends you back to the start of the screen. To make up for this Unexpected Gameplay Change, failure in this section can't subtract from your health bar, and you can't get a game over.
  • Loading a saved game fully heals Shantae.
• Anti-Wastage Features: Auto-potions can't be used at full health, but if the inventory is entered at less than full health, they can be used as many times as you want. Regular Health Potions have no limits on use. Monster Milks don't allow overwriting the same milk with itself.
• Awkwardly-Placed Bathtub: Done for humorous effect when Shantae takes a relaxing bath immediately after the opening battle, using a bathtub located immediately opposite the front door of her home. It isn't until she's in the bath that she finally remembers she doesn't even own a bathtub, and the tub is in fact an elaborate mechanical trap laid by Risky Boots.
• Bad Luck Mitigation Mechanic: At one point, you're required to win three coin tosses in a row to obtain a plot-required item. The third attempt is rigged so you always win all three tosses.
• Batman Gambit: Since Risky couldn't fight against the Pirate Master's plan directly, she gave the Magic Lamp to Shantae, telling her to collect all of the dark magic. She later tell her to destroy it before confronted the Pirate Master, with the assumption Shantae would instead keep it and decide to release it in exchage for Risky's life. In actuality she knew the dark magic would simply convert to light magic that Shantae could use to defeat the Pirate Master.
• Big Boo's Haunt: The Cackle Tower, a creepy Genius Loci found on Spiderweb Island. Spiderweb Island itself is populated with zombies, ghosts, and hands reaching out from the grave, while the Cackle Tower contains different kinds of skeletons, bat transforming succubi, and a Giant Spider.
• Blackout Basement: The Pumpkin Fields becomes this near the end of the game when the Pirate Master takes over Sequin Land Palace and covers the island in darkness. All you could see in the area are silhouettes that initially hide the fact that the early game enemies had been replaced with late game ones.
• Bootstrapped Leitmotif: Bolo and Sky's themes in this game are remixes of Harbor Town and Water Town from the original game.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: Any conversation Shantae has with Squid Baron and his fear of becoming a simple filler boss.
• Brick Joke:
  • Bolo installs the front lock of Sequin Land Palace "backwards, upside-down, and inside-out". Later on, he makes the same mistake with the Ammo Baron's Targeting Module.
  • Rottytops tries to add to her hurricane of spider web/world wide web puns from Risky's Revenge, but Shantae stops her.
  • Wobble Bell appears in the Village of Lost Souls. In Risky's Revenge, it was possible to kill the poor puppy; however, Word of God is that pooch has just gotten lost.
  • During the Ammonian attack, Shantae descends down a tower while mooks attack her from below. Each of them, once killed, falls down and off-screen just like in dozens of platforming games. However, once Shantae gets to the bottom, those knocked-out mooks are in a huge pile of bodies.
  • One stretching all the way back to the original GBC game; after a run-in with Risky Boots, Bolo claims he'll never wash his head again. After the Pirate Master's defeat, he narrowly misses catching Risky, and comments that he still hasn't washed his head since that day.
• But Thou Must!: The player isn't allowed to refuse a Hostage for MacGuffin trade. This time, it's for Risky Boots:
  Will you give him the DARK MAGIC?]
  [Yes.] [I've got no choice...]
• Call-Back: The three coloured gamers in the Village of Lost Souls are based on the opponents in the lizard races of the first game. During the credits, they're gambling again in Scuttle Town.
• Cap:
  • The max number of gems that Shantae can hold is 999.
  • The max stack of an item that Shantae can hold is 9.
• Captain Ersatz: You meet a chippendale named Bran-Son by the Palace, and he's one giant He-Man pastiche.
• Cave Mouth: The cave entrance to the Oubliette of Suffering is one with its "teeth" initially blocking the way. It will only open its mouth to stinky ne'er-do-wells.
• Chekhov's Boomerang: The Palace Disruptor Cannon is first used to accidentally open a path into the last Den of Evil and apparently incapacitated for the rest of the game when a component needs to be replaced before it could be fired properly only for it to return at the end of the game during the battle against the True Final Boss when Risky hijacks it and uses it to help Shantae blow the Pirate Master to kingdom come.
• City of the Damned: A sort of "Suburb of the Insufficiently Virtuous", the souls of the dead in the Village of Lost Souls such as Rottytops live on in forgetful ennui. However, the genuinely hellish Oubliette of Suffering is close by, and the area surrounding the village is a Lethal Lava Land patrolled by monsters.
• Collection Sidequest: The twenty Dark Magics you collect from defeated Cacklebats. Getting them all unlocks the True Final Boss and the Golden Ending, which is encouraged by Risky Boot's conversation when reaching the Lonely Grave.
• Collision Damage: Touching enemies hurts Shantae, although for bosses it usually hurts less than their actual attacks.
• Cool, but Inefficient: The Heavy Kick move does a whopping 10 damage per hit. However, it costs 400 gems to learn and has a long wind-up time in which you are vulnerable. In the time it takes to kick, you could squeeze in two hair whips anyway, which causes at least as much damage as the kick.
  • However, for enemies that quickly move after being hit, such as Cacklebats, you will not be able to squeeze in two hair whips, so the Heavy Kick reduces the amount of times you have to hit them.
• Crosshair Aware:
  • During the Ammonian invasion of Scuttle Town, there are some turret gunners across the stage, crosshairs appear where they are going to shoot. Some platforms get destroyed by artillery after Shantae lands on them (or even jumps over them).
  • In the final battle, a crosshair follows you where the giant castle buster cannon will fire. You aim it at the Pirate Master to finish him off.
• Curse:
  • The game revolves around one. Specifically, the Pirate Master's curse that allows him to take control of his crew and those who use his weapons, which is the reason why Risky is willing to work with Shantae.
  • The game also mentions that ancient curses are one of the things you must watch out for when handling relics as poor Barracuda Joe found out when he reads a mummy's curse that petrifies anyone who reads it.
• Day of the Jackboot: Ammo Baron takes over Scuttle Town and starts rebuilding it as a big fortress. Much later, the Pirate Master takes over Sequin Land Palace.
• Degraded Boss: Discussed by Squid Baron after you beat him out of his slump. He mentions he could appear as one to "make you feel real powerful."
• Earn Your Happy Ending: You must collect all 20 pieces of dark magic to see the canon ending with Shantae reacquiring her half-genie powers and breaking the curse on Risky Boots. The last few Cacklebats can take quite a while to locate.
• Easily Forgiven: The last game ended with Risky stealing Shantae’s genie half away and forcing her to destroy it, with help from Rotty and her brothers. Yet this game has Shantae readily teaming up with Risky to stop the Pirate Master and all it takes is a simple apology for her to make amends with Rottytops, Abner, and Poe.
• Easter Egg: Return to Spittle Maze later in the game, and you can find a partial recreation of Dribble Fountain. There's also a hidden enemy gauntlet in the sewers.
• 11th-Hour Superpower: If you get the Golden Ending, Shantae gets her genie powers back during the Final Boss, allowing her to do 999 damage per hit. A slightly lesser example would be Ammo Baron's cannon, which is used to finish off the Pirate Master, but was introduced much earlier.
• Enemy Mine: Shantae and Risky in order to stop the Pirate Master resurrecting.
• Expy: Bran-Son is a pretty obvious one for He-Man; see Captain Ersatz above. He even has the catchphrase when he transforms, "I have gained the advantaaaaaaaaage!"
• Fantastic Flora: The Cyclops Plant boss is a giant plant with "jaws" that houses and protects a large laser-shooting, slime-dripping eyeball that serves as its main body.
• Fire and Brimstone Hell: The Oubliette of Suffering is an underground cavern filled with demonic architecture, rusty cages, and lots and lots of fire and lava, where ne'er-do-wells go to be tortured and whose cave entrance is found in the Village of Lost Souls.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation: The lady by the Squidsmith will offer hints about the Forest's Heart Squid, even after it's been collected. One of them mentions that it makes squeaking sounds, but those can't be heard by the player.
• Giant Eye of Doom: One of the bosses is a plant that has a giant eye that has an eye beam attack. You have to Go for the Eye to beat it.
• Giant's Droplet, Human's Shower: In the Saliva Island stage, Shantae comes across a sleeping dragon-like being called Giga Lummox. Next to it, you can read a sign that states that it might wake up if it picks up the smell of ham. When you drop down two screens below, you'll find two girls, lamenting that the pool they wanted to take a bath in is completely dry. You need to hit the ham that the girls set up on a grill and catch its scent into Shantae's Magic Lamp. When you release it near the Giga Lummox, it will start to drool so much that it'll look like one of the regular waterfalls you can see everywhere around the stage. When you come back to the girls, you'll see them happily playing in the pool, now filled by Giga Lummox's saliva. They don't seem to notice that what they're bathing in isn't actually water, although they do note that the substance is "warm and viscous" and that it smells like bath salts. However, once Tan Line Island is complete, they've left the island, and the little girl in Scuttle Town does known what lummox drool smells like:
  Little Girl: Some older girls just passed through here.
  They kinda smelled like ham and lummox drool.
• Giant Spider: The boss that captures Rottytops in its web, as well as the second end-of-level boss.
• Gilded Cage: When Shantae is mistaken for Tan Line's princess they lock her in a small but ornate bedroom, and the palace guards are instructed to force her back inside if she wanders out.
• Gotta Kill Them All: Twenty Cacklebats are scattered through the land for you to hunt down.
• Ground Pound: Granted by Risky's Scimitar. Using it has Shantae rapidly slam into the ground with Risky's blade.
• The Guards Must Be Crazy: The guards in Tan Line Temple alternate between looking towards and away from the path you have to take to escape at regular intervals. It's particularly noticeable because whenever they look away, most of them are staring directly at brick walls and there's literally nothing else worth watching in the rooms they're in other than your way out.
• Guns Are Useless: In terms of fighting enemies, Risky's Pistol is the weakest attack in the game, though its damage can be upgraded to "decent" level.
• Guide Dang It!: One of the final puzzles involves running over spikes using Risky's Boots. This is the only time that this is mandatory, and given that spikes are normally an instant-death in the same matter as an endless void, the only way you'd know to use it is if you've ended up Too Fast to Stop in a similar situation beforehand.
• Hammerspace: Risky's equipment appears out of nowhere when Shantae wants to use it. This includes a pistol, a giant hat, a pirate cutlass, and even a cannon.
• Hat of Flight: Risky's Hat gives Shantae the ability to glide due to its large size and consequently fly whenever there's an updraft.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Shantae's friends think that she's this when they find out that she's teamed up with Risky Boots and that she actually trusts her to an extent; warning her that Risky will stab her in the back the first chance she gets. Even the Pirate Master believes that Shantae's trust is misplaced, but it is ultimately subverted. Risky remains an ally to the very end, because her hate for the Pirate Master is just that strong.
• Hostage for MacGuffin: Near the end of the game, the Pirate Master captures Risky Boots, and ransoms her for the Dark Magic Shantae has collected; but only if she has all twenty pieces.
• Hotter and Sexier: The fanservice is upped quite a bit, with an early island involving a puzzle to get two female travelers to strip down for a hot spring, and a later island being played with all major female characters in Stripperific princess outfits.
• Iconic Outfit: All the promotional material has Shantae in a Jolly Roger bandanna with swashbuckling gear; Risky makes Shantae take it off after only one scene, though the outfit becomes visible when using Risky's pirate equipment. Shantae has it on when she uses the ship alone.
• Inconveniently-Placed Conveyor Belt: Found in Propeller Town, the Abandoned Factory and one in the Pirate Master's Palace. They're actually very convenient since they help you charge up your Sprint Shoes.
• Inherited Illiteracy Title: Two achievements are named "Graet Jobb" and "Prefectionist", direct references to the In-Universe misspelled boss that you need to defeat to attain them.
• Intergenerational Friendship: Well, as close to friends as Shantae and Risky can be (which turns out to be closer than Risky thought). It's also revealed that Risky is roughly twice Shantae's age.
• Irony: Risky deprived Shantae of her genie magic in Risky's Revenge. Here, Shantae gets to use Risky's equipment, which was taken from her by her mutated subordinates.
• I Want Grandkids: Very shortly after hooking up with Barracuda Joe, Sky's parents are already talking about wanting to see the two of them married and producing grandchildren. Sky is quite embarrassed at it all.
• Last Lousy Point: Finding 18 of the 20 Cacklebats are pretty simple by just exploring with new equipment. However, 2 of the Cacklebats can never be found by just wandering. They can only be revealed by slamming into 2 specific walls in the first and last islands. There are some slight hints to this. The underground area in the first island has some rocks that can only be broken by dashing, though this is long after this area has any plot relevance. The one on the last island is right after a long slope you need to dash up, but it's always possible you'll stop dashing before you actually hit the wall.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler:
  • The game's opening has Shantae mention that she's fully human, spoiling the ending of Risky's Revenge.
  • Odd in that even before the game had even been released, but Shantae appears to have her Genie powers back by the beginning of Half Genie Hero meaning the Golden Ending of the game where she finds all of the dark magic and defeats the Pirate Master permanently is canon.
• Lazy Dragon: In the Saliva Island stage, Shantae comes across a sleeping dragon-like being called a Giga Lummox. Short of bringing the scent of ham to it, it's not waking up for anything.
• Lethal Lava Land: The Oubliette of Suffering, which features lots of lava to avoid as part of its nature as a Fire and Brimstone Hell analogue.
• Let Us Never Speak of This Again: Sky's reaction to the hijinks on Tan Line Island if she's spoken to after the island is completed:
  Sky: Promise me we'll never, ever speak of those embarrassing desert princess outfits again.
  Shantae: I promise!
  [Shantae in desert princess outfit and Fascinating Eyebrow]: You mean this one, right?
  Sky: ...
• Levels Take Flight: Propeller Town is a massive structure flying thousands of feet in the air, requiring several careful jumps across flying platforms and hanging chains, and a few areas where you must use Risky's Hat to navigate through some air currents.
• Literally Shattered Lives: There's a man on Saliva Island standing next to his petrified bride-to-be. When you find the Petrify spell, you take it to him and he promptly petrifies himself instead of reversing it. Then he and his fiancée crash through the floor and shatter. "Whoops" indeed. Averted in the end, as the credits show them both to be alive and de-petrified.
• Magic Music: Implied, since all genies have magic and The Pirate Master likely only knows them by their powers. He calls one a "songbird".
• Malaproper: Shantae's attempts to talk like a pirate.
  "Moist the main snail! Keel the port blubber!"
• Mechanical Monster: The Steel Maggot (Patent Pending), a giant, robotic maggot that serves as the boss of the Abandoned Factory.
• Mercy Invincibility: Running into a wall during a scimitar dash knocks Shantae backwards, but also gives her a generous amount of invincibility frames.
• Mistaken for Special Guest: Shantae gets mistaken for the Princess of Tan Line Temple. As do Sky, Rottytops, and Risky Boots. For added hilarity, the real Princess looks nothing like them.
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: Bolo. He gets fed up about being treated like a good-for-nothing screw up and joins the Techno Baron. Eventually subverted in that he causes more harm to the villains trying to be useful than working with Shantae, and he switches back to the good guys soon after.
• Multiple Endings: Two of them:
  • The Golden Ending requires hunting down all 20 Cacklebats. The Pirate Master decides Shantae really is worth fighting, steals his weapons back, and powers up to his final form. After a brief scrap, the Pirate Master offers a trade: the Cacklebats' dark magic for Risky's life. Luckily, the dark magic has turned back into Shantae's light magic, and together a re-powered Shantae and Risky Boots destroy the Pirate Master once and for all.
  • If you don't get all the Cacklebats, the Pirate Master leaves Shantae with all the gear and leaves. Risky then takes her cursed gear back and swears that she will take the Pirate Master down before she is cursed completely. Shantae is not happy with how everything turned out, but still believes Risky was truly trying to take her master down with her help.
• Mythology Gag: The cursed sarcophaguses that you must track down are identical to those that contained the "Spanky Joe" enemy from the unfinished Game Boy Advance Shantae game, who chased after and attempted to catch Shantae, then comedically spanked her over his knee if successful. For those who saw footage of this humiliation on Shantae's part via Wayforward's Half-Genie Hero twitch streams, it seems to be an intentional joke that when they crop up in this game, Shantae makes a particular point of refusing to open these sarcophaguses whenever she encounters one.
• New Game Plus: "Pirate Mode", where you start the game with all of Risky's pirate gear.
• No-Gear Level: The first time at Tan Line Temple, Shantae is mistaken as their princess and was changed into a skimpy princess outfit and her items were taken away. Escaping from the cell is easy enough but getting spotted by the large armored guards forces you back to the cell and start over again^note Though if you get far enough you can unlock the cell's front door, and the guards won't re-lock it, cutting down on the penalty for failure; even picking up new items during the level won't let you use them. It is very frustrating for some speed runners.
  • "Run Run Rottytops!" takes "No-Gear Level" to its logical conclusion: you are completely and entirely defenseless, turning the level into an obstacle course.
• Noodle Incident:
  • We never learn exactly why Brandon decided to hold aloft his sword and shout that phrase.
  • Shantae apparently nibbled Sky's last Library card to oblivion due to being nervous about something. What made her nervous is never elaborated on.
• Oculothorax: The Cyclops Plant boss, a giant, floating, laser-shooting, slime-dripping eyeball protected by an equally large plant.
• One-Time Dungeon: Once you complete the Run Run Rottytops section of Spiderweb Island, you can't replay it in the current save file. If you try to enter that section again, Shantae refuses and says, "There's no way I'm going back in there."
• Our Dragons Are Different:
  • The Massively Misspelled Monstrosity named Dargon, a long-necked, armored, wyvern-type dragon boss of the game's Fire and Brimstone Hell. Besides having the traditional wings and fire breath, it also has a spiked ball on its tail that it uses to destroy the platforms Shantae uses in the boss fight.
  • The Giga Lummox is a giant, green, wingless dragon found sleeping in the Salive Island stage, which Shantae needs to entice into drooling in order to fill a pool.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Shantae uses Sky's library ID card. The guard notices that her hair and face are different, and still lets her go through because the camera adds a few pounds.
• Planet Heck: The Village of Lost Souls appears to be set in an active volcano. It at least has a very hellish look to it.
• Playing with Fire: One genie mentioned by The Pirate Master is a "fire spouting hothead".
• Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: "I take adorable little squids, and MELT. THEM. DOWN!"
• Puny Parachute and Improvised Parachute: Risky's Hat, which acts as Shantae's glide mechanic.
• Quad Damage: Monster Milk increases Shantae's attack power by five points, and Super Monster Milk increases it by ten. Neither one affects the Risky Boots weapons.
• Random Drop: All enemies have a loot table governing what they can drop at what rates, such as the Sewer's snakes, which have a high chance to drop Flesh Pops.
• Re-Power: In the Golden Ending, Shantae's genie magic is restored.
• Real Men Wear Pink: Bran-Son sees no reason why men can't have purses, or at least that's his "enchanted phrase" that turns him into a superhero.
• Recoil Boost: Risky's Cannon can be used to perform up to three jumps in mid-air by firing it downwards.
• Remilitarized Zone: Scuttle Town becomes this at the start of the game when the Ammo Baron invades, with plenty of soldiers, Gatling guns, missiles, and mines to go around.
• Retraux: The Dibble Fountain labyrinth appears as a bonus dungeon in its classic sprite graphics with the enemies in the modern sprite graphics.
• Respawning Enemies: Most enemies respawn upon the screen losing visuals of their spawn point, but others are more aggressive about it, respawning on-screen, but drops never stop being possible, at least:
  • Zombies of Spiderweb Island come up from the ground endlessly.
  • Reapers of The Village Of Lost Souls reappear in the same exact location.
• Roundhouse Kick: The Heavy Kick which can be purchased in the item shop. It has a slight delay but it does more damage than a single hit of a hair whip attack. It is an attack that is either Difficult, but Awesome or Awesome, but Impractical.
• Save the Villain: Part of Shantae's motivation for taking on the Pirate Master is to rescue Risky Boots from him, even agreeing to give up the dark magic she's gathered in order to save her.
• Sequence Breaking:
  • This is all over the place in Pirate Mode. Having access to all of the endgame movement options (particularly the Cannon's quadruple jump) absolutely trivializes dungeon layouts, as well as eliminates some chunks of backtracking, since you can reach areas and grab keys and Plot Coupons as soon as you pass by them. It's entirely necessary if you want to meet the speedrun requirements.
  • You can skip through the Very Definitely Final Dungeon using a jump-higher-than-normal oversight with Risky's Hat in tandem with Risky's Cannon.
  • Risky's Boots usually require some running room to charge up, but a trick called the "Risky Shuffle" can be used to charge them in place by walking back and forth using both the D-Pad and analog stick. This allows them to be used virtually anywhere, and in particular allows you to skip the elevator puzzle in Oubliette of Suffering.
• Shackle Seat Trap: The opening scene shows Shantae taking a bath in her home while reminiscing about the consequences of her previous adventure. Then she remembers she doesn't own a bathtub and shackles appear, imprisoning her.
• Shifting Sand Land: Tan Line Island, a desert area home to Scorpion People, quicksand, and a Fantasy Counterpart Culture of Egypt.
• Showgirl Skirt: The Space Princess outfit is like the Dancer outfit, but the skirt just wraps halfway behind the waist.
• Slippy-Slidey Ice World: Frostbite Island, which has Shantae contending with slippery slopes she needs to jump over and highly-damaging timber werewolves.
• Smart People Wear Glasses Or possible a case of glasses make people smart. Shantae gives Bolo a pair of X-Ray specs to help his near-sightedness. After putting them on, Bolo notes that while his vision hasn't improved, he suddenly feels smarter. He then proceeds to thoroughly examine the fossil Shantae brought, correctly identifying it as a death mask.
• Sprint Shoes: Risky's Boots let Shantae move fast enough to run against Inconveniently Placed Conveyor Belts, dash over lava, and sprint up icy slopes. This can be combined with Risky's Scimitar for a devastating dash attack.
• Squick: In-universe, Shantae has this reaction when she fills up a pool with dragon drool.
• Stupidity Is the Only Option: The Ammo Baron wants to fire a shell at Sequin Land Palace, and the only way to advance in the game is to give him the cannon's Targeting Module. Thankfully the shot misses.
• Swamps Are Evil: The Village of Lost Souls and an entrance to Fire and Brimstone Hell can both be found deep in Mud Bog Island.
• Take Our Word for It: The Ammo Baron does a quick sketch of the Ammo Town uniform he plans for Shantae. We don't get to see it, but we do see the deadpan reaction of the already Stripperific title character.
  Shantae: That's... small.
• Techno Wreckage: The Abandoned Factory, a mass of rusted and frozen-over machinery home to various kinds of robots and Inconveniently Placed Conveyor Belts.
• Temple of Doom: The Lost Catacombs, an ancient ruin found under the deserts of Tan Line Island. Shantae will need to contend with the Scorpion People and giant mantises currently inhabiting it, as well as various spike and descending ceiling traps.
• Temporary Platform:
  • During the Ammonian Army's invasion of Scuttle Town, some of places Shantae lands is targeted by a crosshair and gets destroyed just after.
  • Some areas have a long platform made of crumbly rock platforms that slowly crumble as Shantae stands on them. They crumble faster than she can walk, however, so she needs Risky's Boots to actually cross without falling.
• Turns Red: Squid Baron 2.0. Inverted visually, since he's red by default but dons a set of light blue metal armor.
• Tyop on the Cover: Parodied by Dagron, the Massively Misspelled Monstrosity. The achievements for defeating it with or without taking damage continue the gag with "Graet job" and "Prefectionist" respectively.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: It is implied that because Risky took Shantae's genie power away in the previous game, it allowed the Pirate Master who was originally beaten by the Guardian Genies to resurrect.
• Villain with Good Publicity: Zigzagged with the Ammo Baron. Everyone and their mother knows he's blatantly shady, but the law is technically on his side for the majority of the game.
• Vent Physics: Used in conjunction with Risky's Hat to ascend you to new heights or keep you afloat.
• Very Definitely Final Dungeon: Pirate Master Palace, or rather Sequin Land Palace corrupted by his evil.
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Played for Laughs. The Heart Containers this time are made by killing cute little Heart Squids. There's even a Steam achievement for collecting them all and not using them.
• Womb Level: The top half of Sequin Land Palace after it becomes Pirate Master Palace.
• World-Healing Wave: The first wish Shantae grants is the Mayor's in the ending, changing the Pirate Master's Palace back to Sequin Palace, and removing the Ammo Baron's redesigns from Scuttle Town.
• You Can't Thwart Stage One: Shantae spends the whole game hunting down dark magic to keep the Pirate Master from coming back. He comes back anyway.
• You Shouldn't Know This Already: It's possible to pick up Bran-Son's enchanted sword early (usually during a New Game Plus, though pixel-perfect jumping can also cross the hallway in question), but he refuses to take it back until it's plot-relevant.
• Your Size May Vary: Risky's Hat is small enough for Risky to wear but also large enough for Shantae to use as a parachute.

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