A teen girl meets a stranger who's part of a racing crew only to get tangled up with sinister forces involving her father's job in the police force.
Tropes:
- Abhorrent Admirer: Despite Ingrid’s attempts to stick to Logan, he clearly has no interest in her, thanking Ellie for rescuing him from Ingrid’s grip.
- Anti-Hero: Everyone. Even most of the nicer characters are hardened criminals and will remind you of this when you try to appeal to their morals, Ellie herself gets a lot of people hurt for rather selfish motives, and even the villain could be considered one from his own point of view.
- Badass Driver: The whole cast. By taking diamond options Ellie can become one herself.
- Belligerent Sexual Tension: Ellie and Colt. Some would also say Logan and Colt.
- Betty and Veronica: The "main" love triangle is between Ellie's Archie, Logan's Betty, and Colt's Veronica, with Mona as the Third-Option Love Interest. Depending on the player's interpretation and choices, Ellie can also be the Archie to Logan, Mona and/or Colt, who can also interchange their roles as Betty or Veronica; though in a sense, all three are Veronicas since they're all morally grey at best.
- Big Eater: Ellie can be played like this by not only having a big plate of bacon on her birthday, but also a quadruple-decker grilled cheese.
- Birds of a Feather: Ellie and Colt's relationship is this.
Word of God says that Colt sees much of himself in Ellie, such as feeling pressured to live up to the standards set by their respective fathers and being drawn to a nebulous concept of freedom and thrill provided by the Mercy Park Crew. - Birthday Episode: Chapter 1 starts with Ellie's birthday.
- Bittersweet Ending: In the end, Ellie is able to return to her old life, repair her relationship with her father, and go on to college. However, Mona is arrested and the rest of the MPC except Colt go on the run. The player can spend diamonds to give each of the love interests one final goodbye.
- Break Her Heart to Save Her: Logan often tries to act dismissive and cold towards Ellie as the story goes on, trying to drive her away from the crew for her own safety.
- Broken Bird: Mona.
- Bus Crash: Salazar is killed offscreen by the Brotherhood, which Ellie only finds out secondhand from news coverage of his murder.
- By-the-Book Cop: Ellie's dad is described as such by Jason Shaw, as shown when he gets angry if Ellie told him Jason recruited her as an informant. He was also confirmed not to be part of the Brotherhood.Jason: The guy cares so damn much about the rules... It's people like him who make my job a hell of a lot harder.
- Cassandra Truth: Mrs. Clark doesn't believe Ingrid when she says Ellie was at the party.
- Chekhov's Gun:
- It can be established as early as the second chapter that Kaneko keeps an NOS tank in his car at all times. This is what allows him to sacrifice himself to blow up the police barricade on the bridge.
- The Mar Vista parking lot security cameras, which Ellie uses to expose the Brotherhood.
- Coming of Age Story: For all that it costs her, Ellie goes into the story as a sheltered, naïve wallflower and comes out a confident, Street Smart badass. You get quite a few chances to decide if it Was It Really Worth It?.
- Cut Short: Ride or Die: A Bad Boy Romance is one of the stories that were canceled by Pixelberry.
- Daddy's Girl: Ellie and her father are very close, having the tradition of spending birthdays playing board games together. Mr. Wheeler gets a little sad when Ellie decides to go to a party instead.
- Damn, It Feels Good to Be a Gangster!: Ellie is brought into the criminal life by her attraction to Logan, but it quickly becomes self-sustaining by the fact that she's both good at it and enjoys it.
- Destructive Romance: Ellie and Colt have this dynamic if the player chooses to romance him while acting as an informant.
- The Fellowship Has Ended: All the members of the MPC end up scattering after they take down the Brotherhood, although Colt plans to stay in LA and rebuild his family's criminal empire.
- Fire-Breathing Diner: One of the food options to pick from Vaughn's food truck in Chapter 2 is mango habanero wings.
- Fish out of Water: Ellie is out of her element in the racing world.
- Freudian Trio: Colt could be considered the Id to Mona's Superego and Logan's Ego.
- Gay Option: Mona.
- Hello, [Insert Name Here]: As with all Choices characters, you can name your character, as well as her last name, what you wish, though the default name is Ellie Wheeler.
- Heroic Sacrifice:
- Teppei Kaneko blows himself up in a car he is driving to scare the cops blocking the way, allowing the Mercy Park Crew to escape to safety.
- Mona saves Ellie from being shot by Jason in Chapter 16 by Taking the Bullet for her. She survives, but the story makes it clear she will be sent to prison once her injuries are treated.
- Honey Trap: Logan is assigned to gain Ellie's trust when Kaneko finds out her father is investigating the MPC.
- How We Got Here: Chapter 1 is about how Ellie got to being in a police chase with Logan. It's all from escaping Brent's party once the police came to bust it up.
- Humiliating Wager: Chapter 3 has the option during a premium choice pool game that the loser has to streak naked down the block from the garage.
- I Gave My Word: If Ellie chooses to bury the hatchet with Ingrid during prom, the latter will promise to dedicate her speech to Ellie during her valedictorian speech. If Ingrid becomes valedictorian, she keeps her promise.
- In Medias Res: The story and character creation for Ellie and Logan starts with them in the middle of being chased by the police.
- Just Like Robin Hood: Subverted. Both Logan and Jason try to justify their crimes by insisting they only target victims who deserve it. (Logan says that the MPC only steals cars from faceless corporations and corrupt men of wealth who earned their fortune cheating the common man, while Jason insists that the Brotherhood only terrorizes other criminals. Both men insist that they never hurt or inconvenience average citizens.) In both cases, Ellie tells them that the Robin Hood parallels do not apply because they're doing it for strictly selfish reasons.
- Like Father, Unlike Son: Teppei Kaneko is patient, calculating, and doesn't want to risk open war with the Brotherhood. Colt Kaneko is arrogant, hot-headed, and willing to commit acts that others consider going too far. Moreover, a premium scene reveals that Teppei isn't entirely proud of a life of crime, which he claims to be born into, so he sent Colt to college in the hopes that he'll avoid this lifestyle. Colt, on the other hand, eventually embraced a life of crime, as shown by his resentment towards Logan being groomed as his father's successor.
- Missing Mom: Mrs. Wheeler is dead before the start of the story.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: If Ellie played informant for Jason in order to protect the MPC from the Brotherhood, it ultimately plays out like this. Jason's task force is the Brotherhood, and Ellie simply ends up tipping Jason off the MPC's plan to betray them. She feels plenty guilty about this, though in fairness things don't go any better if Jason is left in the dark.
- "Not So Different" Remark: When questioned why he went dirty, Jason states that Ellie already knows. That ultimately they're both people with good families, great prospects, and plenty of money, who ended up finding the criminal life oddly thrilling.
- This is reinforced by Jason's ultimate fate if Ellie gets her father on board with her plan. Both Ellie and Jason are ultimately cornered by people using their families against them.
- Oh, Crap!: Everyone has this reaction to Logan putting up Kaneko's car in a race.
- Real Men Eat Meat: Woman in this case, but in Chapter 1, one of the breakfast options is for all the bacon in the house.
- Real Stitches for Fake Snitches: Colt's plan to get the Brotherhood off the MPC's back is to set up one of their members as a police informant and curry favor by turning over the "traitor" to the rest of the gang.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: The love interests are split this way, with Logan (relatively emotional and impulsive, and probably the most moral since Ellie is able to talk him into turning on Colt's kidnapping scheme) being red and Colt (aloof, sarcastic, and intelligent) and Mona (cold, pragmatic, and secretive) being blue.
- Their First Time: Ellie can lose her virginity to one of her love interests on prom night.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Ellie can give one of these to Colt in Chapter 11, stating that he looks down on everyone because he's smart but no one respects him because of his narcissism.
- The Rival: Ingrid is this for Ellie, as they're vying for the position of valedictorian.
- Virtual Paper Doll: Like Ellie, Logan's appearance is customizable between four different faces.
- The Watson: Ellie's role is this for the reader as they, and her, are introduced to street racing.
- "Well Done, Son" Guy: Colt resents Logan because he took over as Kaneko’s Number Two, and feels that his father prefers Logan over him.
- Wham Episode:
- Chapter 12. Jason Shaw and his task force are revealed as the Brotherhood.
- Chapter 14. Mona is working with the Brotherhood (if Logan or Colt is Ellie's prom date) or turns herself in to them (if Mona is Ellie's prom date).
- Wild Teen Party: Ellie goes to one at Brent's house where she soon escapes the police with Logan.
- Worthy Opponent: Being nice to Ingrid in Chapter 14 has her acknowledging that Ellie inspires her to perform well academically, even promising to dedicate her speech to Ellie if she becomes valedictorian.
- Yakuza: Teppei Kaneko looks to be one not only from the Japanese name but the brief glimpse of a tattoo.
