Biggest "Troll" Level/Area?

[Hemiak]

Some games hold your hand. They send you out into the world fully prepared to take on all challenges and succeed. Some games are more open and you can stumble into areas you probably shouldn't be facing for a long while.

A good example of this is the first Dragon Warrior. Around level 3 or 4 you're tasked with heading through this cave. If you make a wrong turn you end up fighting this level 13 Green Dragon, which will one shot you. Since you have to rest at an inn to save your game it's entirely possible that you might end up having to start over completely at this point. There goes 2-3 hrs, and was a huge wake up to people playing their first RPG.

What really inspired this thread however is Dark Souls 1. You arrive at the 2nd bonfire of the game, level up for the first time and set out to conquer the world. If you turn around and head uphill you go to the level appropriate area. However if you turn the other direction you end up in a graveyard with significantly tougher enemies. Even worse, if a curious adventurer decides to investigate the stairs and elevator directly in front of them they end up in New Londo. Not only is this a much higher level area, but the enemies can't even be hit unless you're using a specific item that there's no way you know about.

Experienced players can use this to their advantage to get better items/weapons, but for a new player who hasn't done research, either location is going to lead to a quick and painful death.

What other games have nasty surprises built in for the unaware?

[starcrunch061]

Some games hold your hand. They send you out into the world fully prepared to take on all challenges and succeed. Some games are more open and you can stumble into areas you probably shouldn't be facing for a long while.

A good example of this is the first Dragon Warrior. Around level 3 or 4 you're tasked with heading through this cave. If you make a wrong turn you end up fighting this level 13 Green Dragon, which will one shot you. Since you have to rest at an inn to save your game it's entirely possible that you might end up having to start over completely at this point. There goes 2-3 hrs, and was a huge wake up to people playing their first RPG.

What really inspired this thread however is Dark Souls 1. You arrive at the 2nd bonfire of the game, level up for the first time and set out to conquer the world. If you turn around and head uphill you go to the level appropriate area. However if you turn the other direction you end up in a graveyard with significantly tougher enemies. Even worse, if a curious adventurer decides to investigate the stairs and elevator directly in front of them they end up in New Londo. Not only is this a much higher level area, but the enemies can't even be hit unless you're using a specific item that there's no way you know about.

Experienced players can use this to their advantage to get better items/weapons, but for a new player who hasn't done research, either location is going to lead to a quick and painful death.

What other games have nasty surprises built in for the unaware?

 

Great, crappy memory of the past.

 

Another modern example is Dark Souls 2, when you go under the castle and OHMYGODWHYAREALLTHEMISSILESGUIDEDNOW?!?!?!?

 

Tri-Ace is just the king of this. Throughout history, their difficulty jumps are legendary. If you have ever played Valkyrie Profile without a guide, just look at some of the ridiculous bosses. My favorite is Barbarossa, who just nukes you to oblivion, and if you happen to beat him (which, again, if you haven't been preparing, is very difficult), HE COMES BACK TO LIFE AND FIGHTS YOU AGAIN. Moreover, if you don't fight him in chapter 6, he disappears forever, as if to say SCREW YOU FOR NOT TAKING YOUR MEDICINE WHEN YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO.

Edited October 20, 2015 by starcrunch061

[NICK16_06]

This is what Dark Souls did to me the first time.

[NetEntity]

Final Fantasy II is the one of the early kings of this trope, you wander off only a few pixels away from the path to the next dungeon to explore a little, and suddenly encounter legions of enemies that easily able to OHKO your entire party. Well, at least it helped not to get lost.

[Hemiak]

Forgot to mention that FFXII had a couple things like this, though not nearly as bad.

When crossing this plain, in your early teens I believe, you see this cave. If you go inside there are these level 37 lightning unicorn things....

In almost every early area there was one or two monsters like 30+ levels above the average. :/

At least you could see the monster levels before you engage in that game.

Edited October 20, 2015 by Hemiak

[starcrunch061]

Final Fantasy II is the one of the early kings of this trope, you wander off only a few pixels away from the path to the next dungeon to explore a little, and suddenly encounter legions of enemies that easily able to OHKO your entire party. Well, at least it helped not to get lost.

 

Another great example of the past that I only got to play in the PS2 era. Akitoshi Kawazu never really understood how leveling worked.

 

In the same vein, that designer would go on to make Saga Frontier, yet ANOTHER game that trolled the player mercilessly.

[Sigma999]

When I first played Dark Souls my 1st time on 2nd bonfire I also went straight to The graveyard and Fight The skeletons and I I was thinking" What The hell? This game is so Hard , i'll never gonna pass from here neither finish The game" .

Conclusion : I find The right path and got The damn platinum.

[PREDRAG-K]

Dragon's Dogma had one with the first escort quest. So in this game enemies don't scale to your level. Meaning, if you go out exploring at level 5, you'll likely get destroyed by high level enemies. The game has main quests, and side quests (you pick these up at the bounty board). None of the quests tell you what level you're supposed to be at to finish them.

So early into the game, you unlock the use of the bounty board. And one of the first missions available is an escort quest. Take the chief of the city to a place called Shadow Fort. Sounds easy enough. It takes a little while to walk there, fighting off enemies as you go. Then, once you're near the fort, you have to run through a small forest. In the forest is a sleeping Drake. Needless to say, he kills you in one hit. You fail, and have to restart at the last save or checkpoint. That's how you learn to never explore the world, until you are ready to kill dragons and chimeras and cyclopes and whatever else is hiding out there.

[ShadowGandalf]

I fell into the Graveyard trap on Dark Souls (PC), and died a few times there before realising there were other ways to try. I never found the New Londo entrance until much later but still ended up attempting to fight without the right item. I escaped that one. All this was recorded and is on my YT channel. *shadowgandalf*

[JaM]

Forgot to mention that FFXII had a couple things like this, though not nearly as bad.

When crossing this plain, in your early teens I believe, you see this cave. If you go inside there are these level 37 lightning unicorn things....

In almost every early area there was one or two monsters like 30+ levels above the average. :/

At least you could see the monster levels before you engage in that game.

oh.. how could I forget that T-rex in very early of the game

 

first thing pops in my mind is Shinryu-in-a-box in Final Fantasy V... that is located in the same area where you fought Omega... 

[NerdRage04]

The Last Remnant had a huge difficulty spike durring the first big boss battle. It starts you off with easy 2 Vs 3 or 3 Vs 3 battle but then it does this huge war which can get chaotic and confusing for newer players.

All of the death levels in Sound Shapes. I don't know why they are 40+ rarity (probs cause of all the cloud saving) but my god those were brutal.

The very first Monster Hunter was just horrible. You get hit by a monster and you lose half your health and fall to the ground. Then the monster tails swipes right as you get up or tackles you. Rinse and repeat till you are dead. I could hear the game laughing at me!

[Dragon-Archon]

Demon Gaze also has something like this. It only tells you what the attack and move buttons are and basically throws you into the lion's den. Enemy levels or health aren't displayed and when you wander into the wrong area, the party gets wiped out with a single attack,

 

 

Yeah i remember when i was looking for that Zodiac Spear... i ran away from the Necrohol of Nabudis at the speed of sound.

That sounds really familiar . Same thing happened to me in the dungeon were the espers Zodiark and Ultima are.