YMMV / Solatorobo: Red the Hunter

• Accidental Innuendo: Of the visual sort: The defense system inside Lares, a giant blue-grey Rent-a-Zilla Humongous Mecha, contains a jellyfish-like creature and a sperm-shaped creature. The defense system inside Lemures, a giant grey-pink Rent-a-Zilla Humongous Mecha (stated to be more advanced and complicated than the above) contains the jellyfish-things, some round things that could easily be eggs, and...the sperm-things. Frisky giant robots! For even more fun, the eggs and sperm tend to show up together, and since the main method of dealing with multiple enemies is to throw one into another, you're likely to end up tossing sperm at eggs.
• Alternate Character Interpretation: At the end of the Final Boss, Baion tells Red to finish him off. Is this a typical case of the villain temping the hero to give into his anger, is Baion that irritated from listening to Red's words about not blindly following Juno, or— given how Red and his allies succeeded in foiling his plans and defeating him— did Baion rationalize that he was a failure that needed to be eradicated himself?
• Animation Age Ghetto: Part of the reason why the series Needs More Love outside Japan. Never mind the epic music or well-built world or engaging characters and plot - the game is about a dog guy, so it gets passed over.
• Annoying Video Game Helper: So, so much. Every so often, the game will stop dead in its tracks just so Mission Control can tell you exactly what you already know while you're doing it. This becomes less of an issue late game, but early on, especially during repeat playthroughs, you're forced to scroll through walls of text that does nothing but Narrate the Obvious and Forced Tutorials that is inconsistent on what you can skip. It's even worse during sidequests, where they will flat out tell you what the solution is if you're faced with a puzzle, and unlike the main story missions, these never go away.
• Awesome Music: Chikayo Fukuda of .hack fame returned to compose for this game. See this page for more details.
• Common Knowledge:
  • Those less familiar with the game's story tend to point out the inherent absurdity of how Merveille could be the 29-year-old mother to a 17-year-old Red, meaning that Merveille could only have "given birth" to Red at the age of twelve. This overlooks how Merveille explicitly refers to Red as being created by her as an Artificial Human nine years beforehand (while indeed contributing some of her own cells to do so), not only meaning that he didn't exist before that point, but that he had to have been "born" at the biological age of eight.
  • "Hybrid" does not directly refer to Red being a cross-species of human and Caninu, but rather him being an Artificial Human with special abilities like his "father" Baion is. To confirm this, the art books refer to Nero and Blanck (and Red by proxy) as being "Caninu-based" hybrids, with Baion being a "full human type" hybrid. The term "hybrid" is most likely a reference to how these beings are designed with the unique ability to interface with Juno or Juno-like technology, and developer trivia for the game has similarly given "mixed species made artificially" as a definition for it, noting it as being distinct from "genetic hybrid".
  • To a lesser degree, it's easy to misinterpret Merveille's claim that Red was made "imperfect on purpose" as her designing him to be a failure on purpose, with the idea being that she was Crazy-Prepared and always planning to use Red as a Spanner in the Works against Baion later on. This contradicts the rest of the game and Red's very own character arc about growing past his role as a failure — Red was merely designed to be able to evolve and adapt in ways that the tailor-made Nero and Blanck couldn't, but still for the exact same purpose of controlling the Titano-Machina and summoning Tartaros. Merveille also pleaded with Baion to spare Red and give him the needed time to grow strong enough to succeed in their plans.
• Complacent Gaming Syndrome:
  • The two main stats everyone focus on are Strength and Hydraulics, which is why in most playthroughs online, you see people either raising Hydraulics while dumping everything else or sticking to the Type-C(x) just to get through fights faster.
  • According to the speedrun.com page of the game, most people seem content with simply speedrunning through the first half of the game, either because they don't know (or care) about the second half.
• Crosses the Line Twice: Elh's Gender Reveal scene, for anyone who doesn't merely find it Squick. Red finding out that Elh is a girl through running into her in the shower? Awkwardly discomforting. Red then attempting to take off her Modesty Towel to check out her you-know-whats, only to get slapped right across the face? Hilariously discomforting.
• Difficulty Spike: The Boss Rush quests after the end of the game. The game proper gives you a very generous amount of health throughout, so dying is not a big issue for the average gamer. There are save points before the bosses restoring your health. The Boss Rush, however, gives no recovery spot whatsoever and increases the damage the bosses need to be defeated, making it much harder than the rest of the game. At least the bosses are split into two different quests.
  • The difficulty for said battles is laughable easy once you realize you can customize Dahak in the middle of any battle, inserting those dusty-old revive parts you can get out of the Hermit Crab Fishing Game, or similarly switching modes. Not to mention that each time you win either quest, you get 5 P-Crystals allowing you a chance to open a new slot for Dahak and make the battles that much easier.
  • The first battle against the Howler gang can be this, as it involves going on a narrow platform littered with ticking bombs, picking one up and throwing at an airship before it or one of the neighboring bombs go off. Oh, and the airship keeps firing them at you all the while.
• Enjoy the Story, Skip the Game: While the gameplay itself isn't bad by any means, the loop can get monotonous, especially with the sidequests having extreme issues of stop-and-go pacing. The story is seen as the strongest point of the game, especially by Part II, with many stating that Solatorobo feels more like a glorified Visual Novel than it does an Action RPG.
• Fanon Discontinuity: The writing staff behind Solatorobo aren't particularly fond of permanent character deaths, and would usually do whatever they could to avoid it (such as Merville's planned death being scrapped) or retcon it (such as Nero and Blanck surviving their executions by essentially becoming data within the DAHAK). While fans didn't seem to mind the previous two too much, "Forest of Healing" is seen as something that shouldn't even be entertained as canon, due to it involving Bruno having an Unexplained Recovery and being Easily Forgiven. The last we saw of Bruno in-game, he was absorbed into Lares and was taken down along with the entire beast below the fatal Cloud Sea with no means of escape, so him somehow living long enough and remaining incognito within Samoyede and feeling remorseful for his For the Evulz behavior was seen as a massive stretch. Likewise, many has also taken issues with, and chose to ignore, the idea of Grumpf surviving and being redeemed as well, considering he had a massive rusted engine dropped onto his ship and taken to the Cloud Sea while still trying to bomb the Basset orphanage.
• Fridge Horror: Elh seems relieved when she loses her immortality, because it means she'll age along with everyone else and won't end up in a Mayfly–December Romance with Red. However, Red is a Hybrid, and Baion, the original Hybrid who provided DNA for all the others, is well over 350 years old. Maybe she should have kept it after all! Though it's never stated whether Baion's "children" inherited his immortality or not, so it's possible the horror isn't quite as bad as you might have thought.
• Game-Breaker:
  • The Dahak Mk II and Trance aren't much of one by themselves, but once Red learns to "Trance" at will, he gains the ability to launched ranged attacks when in Trance mode. This makes fighting Bruno and other bosses absolutely trivial in New Game Plus runs. The Type-R's Spiral Floater technique can also be this against the first half's bosses, as their powerful ground-sweeping attacks can't touch you at all while using it.
  • Either of the flying mechs you obtain from completing the Virtual Training Simulation are miles above the others in the Air Robo GP.
  • Even the Boss Rush is a cinch once you realize you can change mech parts at will, including those that essentially give you an extra life.
• Growing the Beard: A strange example as it all happens within the same game. While the first half does contain lots of interesting worldbuilding and memorable interactions, the overall plot wasn't really seen as anything special, partially due to the Disc-One Final Boss, Bruno, lacking any real motivations for villainy outside of For the Evulz. Once the second half rolls around and Baion takes over as the Big Bad, then everything about the game shoots from "Good" to "Amazing".
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The plan of the Big Bad is to use the CODA protocol to exterminate the Caninu and Felineko due to believing them to have fallen into the same trappings that old humanity did eons ago. For the longest time, people assumed that he was referring to the Hundred Lilies War mentioned in the in-game Library (which itself seems to be a Fantasy Conflict Counterpart to both The Hundred Years War and the Mongol conquests of Eurasia), but those who played Fuga: Melodies of Steel might start to think he was on to something the entire time.
  • On the flip side, Red states to Baion that despite the flaws of both the original humans and the two races that succeeded them, the former were only able to destroy themselves because Juno gave them the power to do so, and because said power meant that they no longer needed to help one another. The Fuga: Melodies of Steel series reveals that an organization of humans known as Crusade actively attempted to fight back against the stratification and self-destruction that Juno subjected humanity to in an attempt to prevent societal collapse. While they succeeded in creating anti-Juno weapons like the Taranis, they failed in their mission statement to "revert the world back to human domination", between both issues they experienced in weapon development and the Reset making their work All for Nothing.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Elh referring to her deal with Red at the beginning as a "contract" - A line that becomes particularly hilarious (or chilling, depending on who you ask and considering certain in-game events) considering a certain anime that premiered a mere 3 months after Solatorobo's Japanese release...
  • In addition to being a Gendo Expy, Baion looks disturbingly like Grandpa Flit, especially with the hair. Once again, the game was released months before AGE was even announced.
  • Lares looks a lot like Bionis. Even better is that the sequel takes place in a World in the Sky situated above a "Cloud Sea". And it's even more egregious in that the Xenoblade games are in a setting revealed to be Earth All Along.
  • The game ends each chapter with a To Be Continued arrow that transitions in across the bottom edge of the screen, a year or two before JoJo's Bizarre Adventure made it signature for their anime adaptation. And then CyberConnect2 was hired to make two games based on that series.
  • In the second half, Outside of some conversations with NPCs, Bruno is scarcely mentioned ever since his death and Opera taking over as the leader of the Kurvaz. In other words, they don't talk about Bruno.
• Ho Yay: You'd be forgiven for thinking that Cyan was ready to get into Red's pants after observing his first series of matches in the arena.
• It Was His Sled:
  • Elh is a girl, which is something most people know due to the way this was revealed.
  • Bruno is NOT the final boss, and the game has a second half that goes all in on the world's origins and Red's backstory. It's meant to be a shocking reveal, but due to the game's obscurity, it instead became a main selling point from fans to encourage discussion. It doesn't help the European version launched with this secret out in the open on its cover.
• Last Lousy Point: The Library Book you get from one of the sidequests is filled with lots of background lore and details about the series' mythos... but you have to work for it by doing a lot of menial tasks such as breaking stuff or going fishing for a long time. What makes it worse is that you are only given a vague progress bar to indicate how much work you need to put in, and doing one playthrough isn't even enough to fill one of the four category bars.
• Mainstream Obscurity: Solatorobo has notoriety across the gaming community for being one of the rarest DS games of all times, popping up on multiple "Rarest DS Games" lists, with loose copies costing at least $100. Asking people if they actually played it is a different story, as most people seem to be more aware of how expensive copies go for rather than what actually happens in the game.
• Memetic Mutation: The Gratuitous French voice clips that occasionally play during cutscenes are particularly endearing to the fans, with most people taking to Red's "Nom du Chien!" and the like.
• Memetic Personality Change: People tend to portray Baion and Merveille's relationship as outright Interspecies Romance to get a quick laugh. Expect the occasional "I miss my wife, Red" to show up, too.
• Nightmare Fuel: Red receiving The Order, causing him to go mad and brutalize Nero and Blanck (after they've given up) and almost choke Elh to death. The worst part is that you're forced to control this sequence.
• Player Punch: Having to control a brainwashed Red to kill Nero and Blanck after they've already given up.
• Popular with Furries: For obvious reasons, kemono fans and furry fans are both fond of the characters.
• Recurring Fanon Character: There's a relatively popular Rule 63 version of Red out there called "Scarlet".
• Spiritual Successor: Mega Man fans should take solace knowing that this is the closest they'll ever get to a Mega Man Legends 3.
• Stoic Woobie: Elh. Despite having her home burned to the ground, carrying guilt for both her first Rite of Forfeit nine years ago and having to trick Red into going along to Save the World, and feeling incredibly lonely due to all her "normal" friends growing up and dying around her, she takes forever to warm up enough to even mention the subject, much less actually show any signs of breaking down about it - and then, only for a moment, before it's back to business as usual.
• Surprise Difficulty: One downloadable quest has Red help out with teaching orphans fire drills. It starts with a really cliché safety quiz ("What do you do when a stranger asks you to come with him", etc.) and a small obstacle course with fire hazards. It ends with a much more difficult obstacle course with fire everywhere, falling debris and crabs trying to kill you.
  • Fridge Brilliance: Since the only reason Red had to run that course is because he was running his mouth and bragging about how easy the first one was, it's logical that the course was nigh-impossible, just to put him in his place.
• That One Sidequest: The Air Robo missions are definitely one of the rougher parts of the game, caused by the stiff controls, awkward boost crystal placements, unforgiving AI, and the fact that you were basically screwed if you're hit with the stun missile pick up or so much as brush against the walls. One of the members◊ tried to tell Hisashi Natsumura, the person responsible for the Air Robo GP races, about all of the issues the mode had, but he brushed them off, partially because he was bad at the races himself.
• Values Dissonance:
  • The Fanservice where Red walks in on Elh showering as well as the unlockable photo where Elh and Chocolat wear provocative cheerleading uniforms sticks out as sore spots within the game to westerners, given that Elh and Chocolat are physically young teens. To a lesser degree, there's the Ship Tease that Red has with Elh— while the age gap isn't that massive (three years, which isn't uncommon in Japanese media), some westerners still find it discomforting.
  • The scene where Red learns that Elh is a girl has him make a deal about how she should "act like one" instead of confusing him. While the context implies that Red's moreso upset that Elh thrusted him into a Sweet on Polly Oliver situation (and his anger towards such is portrayed as unwarranted regardless), the scene itself can come off as especially sexist or transphobic by today's standards. Red's general discomfort around apparent Camp Gay character Alman can also come off as unfortunate in hindsight.
• Viewer Gender Confusion: Elh Melizee◊ looks like a girl (despite that skirt over slacks look being claimed as boys' clothing by Red), but gets referred to as a boy by the characters in the game, and in the Japanese script uses male pronouns. Later, it's been revealed that she is a girl after all.
• Viewer Species Confusion: Chocolat◊. Her extremely short muzzle and pointy ears really make her look cat-like. This may be a remnant of when she was originally designed as a felineko before being changed to a caninu late in production.
• Vindicated by History: The game launched with little to no fanfare in the west, accompanied with negative assumptions that it's a "game for the Furry Fandom". Nowadays, it holds high acclaim, and used loose copies of the English version of the game can fetch hundreds of US dollars. And used, loose copies of the European English and Japanese version are only marginally cheaper.
• What Do You Mean, It's for Kids?: The second half of the game openly deals with genocide and world-wide war, and Never Say "Die" is averted even though Villain: Exit, Stage Left is firmly in play. It's rated A in Japan ("all ages" or the equivalent of E/3+, though Japan lacks a "secondary A" category equivalent to E10+/7+), and G in Australia (where, weirdly enough, it does have an equivalent to E10+/7+ with a PG rating). Other countries did give it a slightly higher rating (E10+ in America and 7+ in Europe), though the bright graphics might suggest otherwise to those who don't look too close. A review mentioning things parents might find upsetting curiously fails to mention any of this story and only points out that the gameplay violence is quite cartoonish.

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Hanasanaiyo, kono tsunaida te o^note I'll never let go of your hand
Donna unmei ga hikisakō to^note No matter what fate does to tear us apart
Hitori ni shinai hata ni iruyo^note I won't let you be alone, I'll be right beside you
Kibō no hoshi ga mimamotteru^note The star of hope is watching over us