Webcomic / Oceanfalls

A story about a lost kid.

The nightlights are quite captivating.

> Tvtropes: Describe Oceanfalls.

Oceanfalls is a webcomic authored by Nights. It's an Interactive Comic, bearing the format of using reader submitted command suggestions to advance a narrative that uses classic RPG Elements.

It follows the story of a lost human boy named Nino, who awakens in an unfamiliar forest. Due to his amnesia, he doesn't remember why he came to the forest, or what he is doing in it.

It's up to the readers to lead him on the correct path and make the right decisions to avoid the dangers around him, while uncovering the story behind how he ended up lost in the monster's world.

Currently, the comic has its own website where users can comment command suggestions, to be used by the author to advance the story after every update. It also has a Discord server where update notifications and update discussion, theorizing, and fanworks are shared and produced.

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> Tvtropes: List tropes shown in Oceanfalls.

• Amnesiac Hero: Nino. This is later discussed between him and Kaji when he offers advice based on his own experiences with amnesia; mainly that Nino should find the core of who he is so that no matter what happens, whether he gains his memories back or not, he won't lose himself.
• Art Evolution: While it never loses its style completely, the addition of more and more detail is definitely noticeable as time goes on. Just look at this◊ panel from 2016 (fairly close to the start of the comic), and compare it to these◊ panels◊ from 2018 and 2022, respectively.
• Audience Participation: It uses reader submitted command suggestions to advance the story.
• Blatant Lies: Nino and Aria trying to bluff their way past Kotori.
• Blind Seer: The grave of Maya Elwyn, Aria's late mother, is engraved with "The Blind Seer of the Sacred Cenote".
• Bloody Horror: When Nino first finds Five, she is a bloody mess, described to be scratching her skin as if she's trying to peel it off. Made worse by the fact that she is only a child.
• Cast of Snowflakes: Nights has evidently put a massive amount of work into giving every single character unique designs with distinctive personalities.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Kotori remarks that monsters tend to act this way. Corona responds that the Winged are way worse in what they do to eachother.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Every single character has a RGB color that is specific to them, and is always shown when they speak. Word of God states that colors play an important role in terms of the greater story, but leaves it vague as to how.
• Combat, Diplomacy, Stealth: These are the three battle menu options whenever Nino enters a random encounter.
• Domed Hometown: Lady Oshen ended the war between humans and monsters by creating a barrier that simultaneously divided the worlds of humans and monsters, and also sealed both worlds under a massive dome.
• Déjà Vu: A possible interpretation of what happened when Nino used his healing hands on the yellow flowers. But perhaps this is just a mere haze.
• Disneyfication: In-Universe example. Most fairytales heard within the world of Oceanfalls tend to be of the Grimm variety, but one of Aria and Kotori's old hobbies was rewriting them to have more optimistic and happier endings.
• Easy Amnesia: At the very beginning. Nino seems to have forgotten everything just by falling down and hitting his head.
• Eats Babies: While Nino is stuck in the Cave of Illusions, he comes across some crude monster propaganda claiming that humans, particularly the Human Prince, are guilty of this. It was probably aimed at the Seafolk.
• Fantastic Firearms: Reed's built in Quad-Core Blasters are capable of firing gusts of wind and laser blasts. While impressive, they do have limited fuel, and need raw Lampyridite, a metal that releases heat while decaying, in order to fire (similar to using a Radio-Thermal Generator to fuel a prosthetic).
• Fish People: The Seafolk, one of the lesser races, though, they're more on the humanoid side than most examples.
• Go Through Me: Five pulls one of these for Aria, against Kotori.
• Great Offscreen War: There is a mysterious war as part of the setting's backstory, between humans and monsters. Aria's mother died in it. It was ended by the creation of a barrier which divided the human and monster worlds; it is this same barrier that forms a massive dome which traps both worlds inside it. Nino's psychological reaction indicates that he has some dark connection to it.
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Nino and Aria form this dynamic in Act 1 with the former wielding a sword and the latter a bow & arrows. This is later inverted with new party members Meimona and Reed in Act 2, with Mei being equipped with Wolverine Claws while Reed mainly relies on his Arm Cannons.
• Heal the Cutie: Starts with both a literal and an actual one when Nino encounters Five, a mere child. As it turns out, Five was sickly and under the care of a number of friends, but the Evil Prince forces them to abandon her and make her undergo a horrific transformation, a fate common for monsters considered weak. By the time Nino finds her, she's a bloody mess crying and clawing her own skin off. Nino's Healing Hands patch her up and, with love and care from him and Aria, Five recovers and shows her sweet, adorable nature again. That said, it's quite clear that the world isn't quite done bringing misery, and there are a lot of hardships left ahead for her.
• Healing Hands: Nino's ability is this. He uses it to undo Five's Painful Transformation.
• Hello, [Insert Name Here]: Nino gets assaulted by all the wrong names entered by readers before his actual name is revealed.
• Horned Humanoid: Monsters are mostly human in appearance, but have red eyes and one horn on their forehead. Seemingly, they have claws which manifest under strong emotions such as anger and stress.
• Hyperspace Arsenal: As per the RPG Elements, nobody questions how they can store more than they can reasonably carry and pull items seemingly out of thin air.
• Innocent Innuendo: Happens twice in the same conversation courtesy of Aria and Mei. When the party heads to bed for the night...
  Aria: We've all had a long day, yeah.
  Meimona: It was fun, don't talk like that!
  Aria: Maybe in some part, but... There were too many death scares during a single day for my liking, really. At least I can finally rest for real, though! And I can't believe I'm sleeping with other humans!!
  Nino: Uhh...! Aria, that's... uhhmm...!
  Reed: ...A very poor choice of words.
  Aria: What? Did I say something wrong?
  Nino: ...Augh... no, nevermind.
  Aria: Whew, well, I'm so glad to be here right now!
  Meimona: Guys, the closet has pajamas by the way!!! Also, I call dibs on the left bed! Shoo, Reed! This is my spot!
  Reed: How come you get to choose.
  Meimona: It's first come first serve, slowpoke! So you can just take uhh... wait. Aren't four beds not enough? Obviously, MY boyfriend sleeps with ME, so that leaves, umm...
  Nino: You guys... phrasing... please.
  Reed: (Why don't you just get your head outta the gutter.)
  Nino: (Don't give me that, hypocrite.)
• "It" Is Dehumanizing: In his first encounter with Five, Nino and the narration both exclusively refer to Five as "the BANISHED MONSTER" or "it." This is dropped once she's healed back to normal.
• Keep the Reward: Subverted and played for laughs. After Nino and the rest of the group make peace with Kaji and save his reputation by getting Mei to turn herself in in exchange for letting them all go, Lacia and the other Seafolk offer them rewards to help them on their journey. Nino, and everyone else besides Reed, pretty much instantly rush after her to claim their "free stuff". The narration lampshades this.
  And this is probably where a REAL HERO, whatever that means, would be all like, "oh, my fair maiden, your words were more than enough to aide me on my journey!"
  But not THIS guy.
• Lemony Narrator: Hoo boy yep, but Played With, in that it's in 2nd person rather than third person.
• Madness Mantra: Kotori repeats "Whatever happens, happens" when things get tense with Suvillan.
• Magic A Is Magic A: In the world of Oceanfalls, everyone possesses an ability tied to their very existence. These abilities are formed during an awakening, usually a crucial moment in a young persons development. Diana in a flashback explains further. Abilities work by an outside input prompting the creation of an ability by the soul. The ability is then given form by the mind, which is then released through the body to create various effects. Because of this, no two abilities are ever exactly the same. Additionally, all abilities have restrictions and powers tied to them, but the only way to know these is by experimenting.
  • The average power of abilities varies depending on race. Humans naturally have the weakest abilities, and Monsters are more powerful, but Winged abilities are stronger than both and can awaken more than one to boot.
  • Later on, it's made clear that some people just can't awaken abilities at all, but the effects of this vary depending one's race. Humans are physically completely fine, and only lack an ability; Monsters are born weak and sickly, and usually die within a few years of being born; and Winged with no ability instantly die upon spawning. Nino points out the correlation that more power means more dependency.
• Meaningful Name: Enough to warrant its own page.
• Mood Whiplash: Just as Aria and Five are attacked by a spirit that starts mimicing Nino, we cut to Nino and Mei, exactly where they left off: Mei holding Nino in her hands while they run away from Kaji and the Sea Patrol.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: It's easily missable, but Five calling to Aria that she's about to be attacked by a spirit.
  Five: W-Wait! B-Behind- Behind you!!
• Our Monsters Are Different: So far all monsters seen are mostly human in appearance, except with red eyes and a single unicorn-like white horn, and dark claws. They tend to have more powerful abilities than most humans, but are much more dependent on them to live.
• Our Spirits Are Different: Spirits are a major danger in the monster world due to their illusory abilities, and mostly survive off of the negative emotions of those they torment, but can and will consume souls if they believe a great danger is coming. Thankfully, spirits can be killed by physical attacks like any other creature. They also mostly talk in Black Speech that is represented in the comic by Morse Code, but nobody In-Universe can understand. It's later revealed that Kotori is able to understand them somehow, and even commands them to go after the main party.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Aria's monster disguise involves using her mirage to change her eyes red and stick a horn on her head. And that's it. Justified though, as those really are the only physical differences between humans and monsters.
  • Brought up and justified again with Meimona's disguise of a cowboy hat and sunglasses. Her luck-based powers stop anyone from recognizing her.
• Player Party: As the comic uses many RPG tropes and mechanics, this is an obvious one. Nino himself, of course, is one, and Aria becomes one later. Later, one of the remaining slots gets filled by Meimona, while the last one is filled by Reed.
• Proud Merchant Race: Nino's interactions with the monsters in Redtulip Town give the impression that all everyone cares about is money.
• Second-Person Narration: Unsurprising, due to its MS Paint Adventures influences, though, they mainly extend to this and the interactivity.
• Ship Tease: Word of God has outright stated that Nino will, at some point, get into a relationship with someone, and someone he's had emotionally close moments with as of the beginning of Act 3. Because of this, a number of moments could be interpreted as this, but especially with Aria and Mei.
  • Between Nino and Aria:
    • Shortly after the two meet, there's quite an emphasis on them Holding Hands.
    • When Aria is applying her disguise to Nino, she has to lay her hand on his forehead and asks Nino to hold still. Nino immediately gets a small but noticable blush and Aria notices him fidgeting.
    • After Nino wakes up from his Nightmare Sequence, Aria checks up on him, resulting in this exchange:
      Nino: Aria?
      Aria: I'm glad you're awake!
      Nino: Hey! Uhhhh... Am I in your bed?
      Aria: Yup, but—
      Nino: OH UH SORRY FOR INTRUDING IN
      Aria: Nonono, it's fine, really! It's no big deal, I don't mind! You seemed really tired, so I thought I'd let you get some rest.
      Nino: ...Thanks for that.
    • When Aria asks Nino and Five to leave her behind, Nino calmly tells her that she's blaming herself for things that were never her fault, and if anything, he deserves the blame. Aria rejects blaming him, and Nino agrees throwing the blame ball will do nothing to fix their situation, but goes on by saying that not only does he have to repay Aria for saving his life, he also genuinely wants to continue being friends with her.
    • Sadly, Nino forgetting Aria after nearly being killed by Corona seems to have put an anchor on the two being any closer than friends.
    • After they reunite and finally get a chance to interact unimpeded, what's the first thing Aria does? She hugs him while declaring how happy she is to see him again, and that she thought he was gone forever. Also notable is that, just after she first hugs him, his Ahoge is sticking straight up. Unfortunately, it becomes tearjerking rather quick when Nino makes it completely clear he doesn't remember her.
    • At first, Nino attempting to manipulate Aria into taking the group to the monster world seems like the death of the potential pairing. But it turns around once Aria makes it clear she recognizes his manipulation, but instead of being angry, she feels bad for him. Since he felt he had to trick them into going along with his plan, Aria becomes worried that he's lonely. After Nino explains himself, Aria comments how using manipulation to get everyone a good result will muddle his role in helping earn it, all while saying that he can trust her. This has such a profound effect on Nino that he shows worry for Aria letting herself be used so easily. When Aria misses the point, Nino outright yells that leaving herself so vulnerable will result in someone taking advantage of her, but agrees to think about her words of advice.
• Title Drop: Parodied when Nino falls into the Cave of Illusions.
  Suggestion Prompt: Nino: Did you just Ocean-fall?
  WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN-
  THIS IS NOT EVEN AN OCEAN-
  AND-
  NOW IS NOT THE TIME-
  • Invoked by Nino himself later when Kaji interrogates him.
    Kaji: An' well, where'd you come from, weirdo?
    Nino: I came from...
    Suggestion Prompt: Nino: Say "THE SEA" as loud as possible.
    You nearly say "THE SEA" as loud as humanly possible, but then you almost instinctively pause for a split second. You feel like the universe brought you to this very spot for a better answer than that. It would want you to answer with something thematic, something more appropriate, yes...
    Something like...
    Nino: THE OCEAN
    Yeah. Like that. That satisfies a few unknown forces out there.
• Verbal Tic: Five speaks slowly and with lots of pausing and hesitation, but she does this less over time. She also speaks exclusively in third person.
• Videogame Caring Potential: Due to the RPG-style nature of the webcomic, Nino choosing to help Five is played as this In-Universe.
• Wham Line: Just after Nino remembers that he came to the monster world to achieve something and becomes determined enough to wake up, the very next update makes it clear that he doesn't remember everything.
  Suggestion Prompt: Nino: ARIA! OH NO!
  Who the hell is that??
• Weird Moon: The moon in Oceanfalls is both crescent-shaped and perfectly habitable, with a small but vibrant ecosystem living on it. It is also intrinsically tied to the life of the current monarch, and changes colors when one monarch dies and another is born.
• Winged Humanoid: The Winged, revealed to be able to awaken more than one ability.
• Would Hurt a Child: While Winged society in general is said to be brutal on all of its constituents from a young age, special mention goes to Cetus, who attempted to publicly execute an adolescent Corona and threatened to painfully sever her wings with a whale-bone saw.
• You Wake Up in a Room: Well, "an unfamiliar place" technically.

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