Apocalypse Postponed
Tropes
Assembled by brave Troper
rmarques
- All Myths Are True
- Taken to the extreme with God!Thanatos, Izanagi, Amaterasu and Susano-o. They’re all in the DR, are aware of each other’s mythologies and acknowledge them as at least local truth, and God!Thanatos and Izanagi are even DATING.
- Alternative character interpretation
- Mostly present in the protagonists, Ryuji being the most effective example.
- A Man is Not a Virgin
- Averted. While several characters in the DR had sex or at least came close to it, this has little no effect on how well adjusted or capable they are, nor is it usually treated as that big of a deal, save for a few justified examples.
- All there in the manual
- If you don’t check the character’s journals, you’ll miss threads/fanfiction where some/a lot of the character development happens or backstories are revealed. Not friending journals can also mean missing some character development, or at the very least, porn.
- Aborted Arc
- A few, mostly caused by the players that started them leaving/going on hiatus.
- Action Girl
- demifemme is the most obvious example (despite a few Dark Action Girl touches), but really, this could apply to most of the females played in the DR.
- Action Girlfriend
- demifemme and Sadako, but again, most females in a relationship in the DR can count.
- Adults are Useless
- Subverted, despite the overwhelming number of teenagers around, the few adults around (notably Kyouji, Rei and Raidou the 40th) actually get more done in the ways of going back home than everybody else. Played straight in most battle posts, since a lot of the teenagers are much more powerful than the adults.
- Americanitis
- For a bunch of Japanese people, they sure don’t celebrate that many Japanese holidays. And the holidays that are celebrated are usually American, or international holidays celebrated on American dates.
- Author Appeal
- Practically the whole point of this place.
- Battle Couple
- Sadly, subverted. We have couples, most of them perfectly capable of going to battle and kicking ass together… But they rarely do.
- Beach Episode
- VelvetRoom!Thanatos organized a trip to the beach once, when he found a door to Yakushima. It was then cancelled when they were hit by a typhoon.
- Beware the Nice Ones
- Masahiro, just… Masahiro.
- Big Damn Heroes
- Most fight posts have at least one moment like this.
- Blue Bishonen Ghetto
- Most of the characters played are male. And given that the Megaten series IS made in Japan…
- Buttmonkey
- The entire male cast.
- Camp Gay
- Aleph (promised1).
- Cannot Spit It Out
- The P3 cast that knows about Shinji’s death seems quite reluctant to tell the resident Shinjis about the worst side effects of their drugs, and VelvetRoom!Thanatos sure took quite a while to confess to Orpheus.
- Canon Name
- Most people use the names given to the protagonists in supplementary material, usually manga and game guides, even if other names in other material exist (example, the P1 protagonist has three names, depending on whether you go by the manga, Drama CDs or novelization).
- Character Development
- A fair share of it occurs overtime, with demifemme and Izumi being the most notable examples.
- Cloudcuckoolander
- Aleph reaches some… "interesting" conclusions about things that no longer exist in his world.
- Completely Missing the Point
- Arguably, people that play a protagonist and use the name given to him by the manga/Drama CD/novelisation/tie-in novel, and/or take their characterization from these.
- Crowning Moment of Awesome
- The battle that ensued when Cielo lost control of his hunger;
- Nyx Avatar manifesting itself on the DR and the ensuing battle;
- Akihiko’s Persona evolving during that battle;
- Masahiro telling off Raidou the 40th’s Shadow, and returning to his regular form;
- Lisa deciding to fight Erebus alongside Thanatos;
- Yukari telling off two Shadows in a very satisfying fashion;
- While he may prefer to forget it, Masahiro’s concert was pretty awesome;
- Later on, in Mitsuru’s dungeon, Masahiro has yet another CMOA, when his Shadow takes over for a while to summon every single one of his demons against an annoying Shadow;
- And once again, Masahiro gets another one, this time in the Yosuga Invasion thread, where he, Koryu and Tao Tie completely and utterly massacre the army of Angels, Archangels and Powers;
- Honestly, let's just cut the chase and say that whenever they get into a fight, Shura and Masahiro will probably get one of these.
- Crowning Moment of Funny
- The mall’s very first beauty pageant;
- The fanart posts;
- Every time Kyouji joins a thread;
- The cross dressing pageants;
- The maid café post;
- The wheel of misfortune;
- The Elvis Wedding Chapel;
- The Seven Sins Sundays.
- Crowning Moment of Heartwarming
- Everyone going to support Akihiko when he found out his world had gone through the Conception;
- The day Ryoji (i_x_x) got his memories back and his consequent “death”.
- Cute Shotaro Boy
- The child versions of male teenage/adult characters seem to aim for this.
- Deadpan Snarker
- foggy_lightning
- Demonic Possession
- Sadako has been possessed by Izanami on more than one occasion.
- Depraved Bisexual
- Dante and Kyouji. The latter is more of a depraved pansexual.
- Doing it for the Art
- The backstory that goes into some of the AUs is staggering. And of course, this very list. ETA: And this website.
- Drugs are Bad
- Played BRUTALLY straight in icyfeisty's canon update.
- Everything’s Better With Drugs
- Played straight, subverted and deconstructed all around icyfeisty, especially on her dungeon.
- Everything's Cutter With Kittens
- Saitou got a lolcat for a pet. Who later on bred a lot of lolkittens.
- Faux Action Girl
- Female party members that do not participate in any combat thread end up becoming a minor example of this.
- Fetish Fuel
- Oh let’s see… The maid café event, the cross dressing contest, the animal body parts event, Raidou the 40th and Kyouji the 3rd’s conversations about sex with demons, the very concept of the DR, Lust Sunday…
- Freak Out
- Again, Masahiro. After the Angel Invasion, he proceeded to go around and kill the remaining Angels by using Lilith’s Allure ability to make them trust him… And then behead them. Oh, and that was after going on a rampage on the angels. He also expressed a desire to torture one of them, but he didn’t do it because it’d take too long. And of course, God!Thanatos cop massacre when he went to rescue icyfeisty.
- Freud Was Right
- Most of the DR’s muns are females playing male characters, and the demon that has had the most accounts in the DR is Mara, the famous giant green penis on a chariot.
- Gender Flip
- Runner-up prize of the cross dressing contest, also a main difference in some AUs.
- Genre Savvy
- Quite a few characters have shown signs of this. ETA: A new character, metafiend, is a Hitoshura AU built around this very trope.
- Hammerspace
- Everyone has a lot of things in their pockets. Lampshaded by crackednads when Izanagi pulled a whiteboard out of his pocket.
- Hannibal Lecture
- Played straight with the Shadow selves, and the rare instances in which Nyarlatothep and Takaya interacted with their castmates. A variant of this was also present in the post where one of the Ryojis (i_x_x) turned into the Nyx Avatar in the DR, where he kept trying to convince people that letting the world end was for the best. Its actions also included sending Minato (sees_minato), Ryuji (x_x_i) and Shura (demifemme) visions of what their life would be like if they let him finish his job, and they were then reborn. Subverted by Masahiro, since he ended up giving his Shadow a lecture.
- Hot Amazon
- demifemme. Let’s face it; her badassery is part of her appeal.
- Hotsprings Episode
- The characters ran into some hotsprings, what, twice now?
- Hilarity Ensues
- Too many times to count.
- Hikaru Genji Plan
- Somewhat played with in Izanagi and Amaterasu’s backstory, where they were in a relationship and almost had sex before Amaterasu remembered her true identity.
- Ho Yay
- … Where do I even begin?
- Informed Ability
- Some characters, especially those of the Persona cast, never get to actually use their powers in the DR.
- I got better
- Any and all Minatos that are post end-game. Ryuji and his Ryoji actually had this happen to them twice!
- Limited Wardrobe
- Unless otherwise stated, assume any and all characters from the Persona series are wearing their school uniform.
- Memetic Mutation
- greekreaper is usually referred to as ThanaGod or ThanaDuck. ETA: Or ThanaToast, or Toast.
- Mind Rape
- Sadako and two of the Juns suffered this, the former at the hands of Izanami, the latter either by Nyarlatothep, or an unknown entity. Several other characters suffered a minor example of this when the Midnight Channel showed them the last thing they wanted to see. Several of them actually felt the same way they did or would have when the event happened.
- Mistaken for Gay
- Narumi was mistaken for both gay AND paedophile, in a conversation with one of the Hitoshuras and Dante, where Narumi’s slang confused them.
- Moe Anthropomorphism
- Given the way they’re usually played, Ryojis somehow managed to become a Moe Anthropomorphism of Death.
- Most Fanfic Writers Are Girls
- Most of the DR’s muns are female. Ironically enough, one of our few male muns is better known for playing a female character.
- My name is Inigo Montoya
- During Raidou the 40th’s dungeon, Masahiro had one of these moments (in fact, that’s how we learned his name). His Shadow then had one during his dungeon.
- Official Couple
- Kyouji’s Good Side/Everyone. On a more serious note, the most common/influential/prolific couples in DR have been Ryoji/Minato, Souji/Naoto, and Raidou the 40th/Kyouji the 3rd. Demifemme/Female!Futomimi also count, since they have all but eloped by now.
- Ooh Me Accent's Slipping
- Masahiro’s accent slipped at least twice when something (usually involving gay_scar) has baffled him so much he forgets to hide it. He did decide to stop hiding it recently though, only to go back to hiding it when he came back after being canon updated.
- Original Generation
- The recent Imagine player characters. Taken to the extreme where two of them are actually children of two canon characters.
- Pals with Jesus
- Perfectly possible with the Devil Survivor protagonists. Hell, you can go all the way to pals with God.
- Paranoia Fuel
- Averted. You’d think the brutal death of one of the Minatos would make everyone a bit more cautious, but other than a small mention of the event by sees_minato when he was apprehensive of Argilla’s gun, and Ryuji when the number of Minatos was brought up a few days later, the event has been all but forgotten.
- Panty Shot
- Yes, this was somehow pulled off in a fully text based medium! When Kanami kicked a Yosuke, it was mentioned that he could have caught a glimpse of her lacy boxer briefs as she walks away.
- Put on a Bus
- What happens to every character whose mun no longer plays in the DR. It's usually assumed that they somehow managed to go back to their world.
- Really Seven Hundred Years Old
- Just how old is Kyouji supposed to be, anyway? And Lucifer… And all the Gods…
- Ruined Forever!
- According to some people on the first SMT Anon meme, the DR's been ruined forever for a while now.
- Running Gag
- The Moose, and greekreaper being the God of ducks. Came to its logical conclusion in a thread in yukarchery’s journal, where he literally became a duck.
- Screwing Yourself
- Sorta. Zeronato toyed with this idea, having found himself attracted to the female protagonist of P3P. Rather minor example though, compared to the alternatives as far as female P3 Protags go.
- Shut up Hannibal
- Deconstructed repeatedly in the first Shadow selves posts, subverted by Sadako, since she literally said that her Shadow was right. Played straight by Yukary (yukarchery) twice, with Izanagi and Shouko’s Shadows.
- Shut Up Kiss
- When he first arrived to the mall, Kyouji kissed Raidou the 40th while she was lecturing him about usage of his arm terminal in the DR.
- Squick
- Incubus’ proposal to sees_minato, Kyouji and Raidou the 40th’s conversations about sex with demons.
- Tall Dark and Bishoujo
- Sadako.
- Team Chef
- Shinji (busstopsign).
- Team Mom
- Lilith shows signs of this, although she seems more interest in acting motherly towards the children than anyone else, and Rei had to temporarily take the role to give the girls a talk about access to birth control in the DR.
- Tearjerker
- The scene where one of the Ryojis “died”, and Shura insisted that he was his own person rather than just a manifestation of Nyx until the end. Shura’s “labour” and the thread with Masahiro definitely qualifies. The complementary fic to icyfeisty's canon update.
- There Are No Therapists
- Doubly subverted. There WAS a therapist in the DR once (the adult Akihiko that was a doctor was also qualified in psychology), but he never actually did anything, and he doesn’t post anymore, so…
- The Woobie
- demifemme, just demifemme.
- Too Dumb To Live
- Subverted, while greekreaper shows tendencies of this due to his lack of knowledge of the modern mortal world, he’s an immortal incarnation of Death, so… he’s not dying anytime soon. He got better, anyway. Also, one has to wonder how did Aleph survive his one and only trip to the TV World, given that he was convinced it was all a TV show scenario.
- Tsundere
- Lucifer, especially towards Aleph, VelvetRoom!Orpheus towardsVelvetRoom! Thanatos.
- Viewer Gender Confusion
- In-universe example. At a first glance, demifemme and silentafterglow don’t really look much different from their male Hitoshura and P3 protagonist counterparts. Taken to the extreme with trulytheprince, a Naoto who is identical to his female counterpart in everything but the voice.
- Walking Shirtless Scene
- A rare female example with demifemme, who rarely wears a shirt, making males that meet her for the first time rather uncomfortable.
- Yaoi Fangirl
- Margaret (spiralbrooch) is one, to the point where she writes and draws doujinshi of Orpheus and Thanatos, among others. According to an OOC comment in one of her posts, Shouko is one too. And of course, there’s the muns.
- You ALL Look Familiar
- Self explanatory.