All Your Base Are Belong to Us

Player 1: Dude, where are you?
Player 2: im in ur base, killing ur d00dz

—Overheard during a game of StarCraft

Ah, the Heroes-R-Us HQ. For some heroes, it's the place they eat, sleep, and generally live their lives; for others, it's a great place to kick back, relax, and have wacky hijinks with their friends while on downtime; and for everyone, it's the perfect place to run to after a failed mission, or at least an especially difficult one. After all, you gotta have a place for your heroes' R&R, and what better place than your very safe and secure Home Base, right?

Cue explosions, warning klaxons, and many "This Is Not a Drill" announcements. Somebody Set Up Us the Bomb indeed.

For shows featuring a Superhero team, a military group, a secret service, or anything else that requires a Mission Control to operate, an attack on their headquarters is a great way to increase drama and tension. When an ordinary mission is botched, the heroes still have some place to return, lick their wounds, and plan their next encounter; but if they lose their homebase? Big morale crusher right there. Not only have they lost a safe haven and one of their biggest resources, but for many heroes, their very home as well.

And if it gets destroyed while the heroes are out (or worse, despite their best efforts), have fun Watching Troy Burn.

This situation is when The Mole frequently surfaces. You can also expect the story's Supporting Characters to have their own (freaking AWESOME) moments, typically tied into their position - the agency's weapons guy will break out the big gun, the university physics professor will cobble together a death ray while the math teacher calculates firing solutions, the magical gardener will animate the topiary animals, etc.

Naturally, this is a great excuse to Trash the Set. If the attack succeeds and the base falls, it could create a Shocking Defeat Legacy. Compare with Die Hard on an X, where at least one character is left to fight back after the initial attack, win or lose. See also The Siege, Protect This House. When the heroes pull this on the villain, it's Storming the Castle. If the destruction is upgraded to the entire city or country, this may be a Throwaway Country.

Often occurs at the beginning of videogames where you must fight Back From the Brink.

If you are looking for a trope related to the phrase "All Your Base Are Belong To Us", see Zero Wing. Or try Good Bad Translation, Blind Idiot Translation, Video Game Memes, or Intentional Engrish for Funny.

Examples of All Your Base Are Belong to Us include:

Anime and Manga

  • Happens rather often in the Mazinger saga, since several of the plans by the Big Bad involve attacking the Photoatomic Institute. The Photoatomic Research Institute from Mazinger Z, the Fortress of Science of Great Mazinger and the Space Science Lab from UFO Robo Grendizer are preffered attack targets and often they get severely damaged, specially the first one. The worst damage the Institute suffered happened in the episode 34 from Mazinger Z, when Genocyder F9 turned the place into smoking ruins. Great Mazinger's HQ was not destroyed in the anime, but in one of the manga versions it was completely obliterated. The heroes were driven out of it and were forced to run away and lie low for a while.
    • Mazinkaiser also features at least four attacks on the Institute, which is finally destroyed in the General of Darkness movie.
  • Occurs in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha's third season during the two-parter "That Day, Riot Force Six". It ended with their base in ruins and Mission Control having to move somewhere else for the final battle.
  • Happens in Full Metal Panic!!'s first season, during the last episodes when the villain takes full conrol of the Tuatha de Danaan.
    • In the yet unadapted novel Tsuzuku On My Own most (presumable, all) Mythril bases get thoroughly trashed by Amalgam forces with their biggest and meanest armslaves. Lots of people were killed and Danaan crew had to evacuate the Merida base in a hurry, without completing repairs and resupply of their sub. With Sosuke off-site, once again trying to save Kaname from kidnapping attempts and, now, Leo's advances. He fails. Unsurprisingly, the book ends on the biggest Cliff Hanger in the series.
  • The Hanagumi lose their theater (which contains their secret base) in this manner near the end of the 26-episode Sakura Taisen anime.
  • In Bubblegum Crisis: Tokyo 2040, the Knight Sabers are driven out of their headquarters when Big Bad Galatea makes the Boomers begin the Robot War.
  • Happens in Mobile Suit Gundam Wing Endless Waltz, in which the villains take over the Presidential Palace / Elaborate Underground Base. In a mild subversion, the protagonist sends visual transmission to the villains, asking if the base's amour works, right before firing his BFG to open the base.
  • Happens in Super Robot Wars Original Generation OVA (later gets carried over to OG Gaiden). An exhibition of new mecha series...nothing could go wrong with that. Except that those new mecha series got their AIs rigged on their own and goes berserk without warning. And the result was lots of casualties, the heroes too late to prevent that, and five of the main characters captured. OG Gaiden adds up with the sudden kidnapping of one civilian in the middle of chaos. Getting their base attacked happens at least once per game throughout the entire series, if for no other reason than the fact that it happens so darn much in other anime series' (such as the ones included in those games).
  • A late episode of Yes! Pretty Cure 5 featured NutsHouse, the store that serves as Pretty Cure's headquarters (and Coco, Nuts, and Milk's home), being turned into a Kowainaa.
  • Late in Tokyo Mew Mew, Quiche kidnaps Ichigo and torments her with a vision of his fellow Quirky Miniboss Squad members attacking her friends at Cafe Mew Mew. After Ao no Kishi bails her out and they run back to base, it turns out to be true.
    • This is just begging to be misread. Hilariously.
  • Happens in Mai-Otome, when Garderobe Academy and Mashiro's brand new castle are hijacked by Schwarz during the Otome graduation/promotion ceremony. The natives of Windbloom were, for lack of a better term, really freakin' pissed that her (in)action led to the downfall of their kingdom.
  • Happens twice in Neon Genesis Evangelion: The attack of Zeruel, who makes it to Central Dogma and gets close enough to stare the bridge crew in the face before Shinji's Foe-Tossing Charge; and, of course, the assault of the JSSDF from End of Evangelion.
    • And let's not forget the time Iruel pretty much took over Nerv's computer system and set the base to self-destruct before Ritsuko stops it with the single, free, uninfected MAGI system.
  • EI-15 in GaoGaiGar was produced from a programmer who didn't get picked to operate the heroes' base. As a Zonder, he infected the base computer itself, taking over all the systems. It took a double Big Damn Heroes moment by Volfogg infiltrating from outside while Entouji, the actual GGG programmer, trying to retake the system from the computer end. On its way out, the Zonder assimilated several spare GaoGaiGar parts, including some that let it mimic and counter GaoGaiGar's moves. Whoops.
    • And then there's the time seven of the Primevals infiltrated the GGG's Orbit Base through a 0.02mm hole in their force field...
  • Voltron: The Castle of Lions comes under attack multiple times in the course of the several series.
  • Happens in Hellsing when the Valentine brothers, Jan and Luke, attack Hellsing HQ with their squad of ghouls. They kill most of the Mooks, but Alucard and Walter dispatch them quite easily. It is then found out that they were members of an army of Nazi vampires who are planning to start World War 3 for fun. And further down the line, it's revealed that Walter was the one who tipped them off.
    • Happens again with Zorin leading an attack on HQ when the Nazis arrive in London. This attack was far more successful, leaving the headquarters in ruins and bringing the Hellsing organization down to three members before being defeated.
  • Happens to the Silvana in Last Exile for a while.
  • In Gatchaman, Galactor finally manages to destroy the heroes' base in episodes 91 and 92. The American Battle of the Planets never reached these episodes.
    • Yes, it did. The two-part "Invasion of Space Center" was a revamp of those episodes. However, since the show had added 7-Zark-7, they had to explain why the robot wasn't destroyed or even threatened by separating Center Neptune into two parts: Space Center and Research Center.
  • In Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, corrupt government officials order the attack on Section 9 headquarters by using Umibozu commandos. Being warned of the attack in advance, the Major prepares for a fake defense and blows up most of the facilities to hide their escape. It didn't help much, though.
  • The original Getter Robo series had the lab destroyed by the Dinosaur Empire just before the final episode.
  • Subverted in Naruto on at least three different occasions:
    • The Orochimaru/Sunagakure attack on Konohagakure during the Chunin Exams arc. After fending off these enemies, the residents of Konohagakure simply rebuild.
    • The Team 7 attack on Orochimaru's base during the Sasuke/Sai arc. Orochimaru simply relocates to a different base.
    • Pain's attack on Konohagakure in which he uses his jutsu to wipe the village off the face of the planet. Due to a Deus Ex Machina, no one (except Tsunade) is seriously injured and...they simply rebuild again.
  • Argento Soma
  • In Part 3 of the five-part finale of the Kirby anime, Dreamland, Kirby's home country, gets attacked by fleets of Destrayer ships sent by Emperor Nightmare and his company, Holy Nightmare Co./Nightmare Enterprises.
  • Both Gravion and Goddannar had episodes where a piece of a destroyed Robeast hitched a ride on the heroes' mecha and started to grow and/or multiply inside their base.


Comic Books

  • Interesting subversion of this in Kurt Busiek's Astro City, during the "Tarnished Angel" story arc. The protagonist, a minor-league supervillain trying to go straight, has to stage an attack on the Honor Guard's floating home base. (Honor Guard is the AC version of the JLA). He's not trying to blow it up, though—he just wants to get the Honor Guard's attention and this is the only way he can think of to do it. So he blows his way in and then just stands there while the heroes come charging up to defend their home base. (Naturally they are not pleased with his method of getting their attention and they fail to listen to his story or help him the way he'd hoped.)
  • The Xavier Institute of the X-Men has been attacked—and destroyed—often enough that it's the subject of occasional Lampshade Hanging and in-jokes within the comics.
    • So often in fact that it's been outright abandoned at least twice. This just leads to their San Francisco island/Outback village/giant downtown spaceship/mystic lighthouse getting trashed instead.
  • Played with at the end of Batman: Dark Victory when the villains manage to invade the Batcave. However, the villains find it entirely by accident (they're simply trying to escape the chaos in the sewers) and are completely unable to capitalize on their find before Batman and a debuting Robin take them down. Most of the villains probably aren't even aware where they actually are.
    • Used for ironic purposes in Batman: Cataclysm. Pretty much every Waynetech building survived the titular giant earthquake because Bruce Wayne made sure all his building were quake-proofed. Unfortunately, the Batcave and Wayne Manor were not.
    • Played straight in Batman: RIP.
  • In addition to the X-Men mansion, the HQ of the Fantastic Four gets blown up real good on a pretty regular basis (and invaded from the Negative Zone and other fun stuff). It's a downside of not having a secret identity and having your base be a well-known landmark and tourist destination. They usually rebuild it quickly with improvements, but sometimes there are lasting effects: during John Byrne's run on the book, he had Annihilus attack and trash the place while Alicia and Franklin were at home. Franklin's New Powers as the Plot Demands failed to activate and both of them wound up seriously hurt in the hospital for weeks. The FF were very much not happy.
  • Captain America wasn't pleased either in the aftermath of the Avengers storyline "Under Siege", where supervillain Baron Zemo and the Masters of Evil succeed in taking over the team's headquarters.
    • Considering the fact that the Masters not only injured fellow Avenger Hercules, as well as faithful butler Jarvis, but Zemo tried (in vain) to break Cap's spirit by destroying his personal effects, which included the only photo of his deceased mother Sarah, as well as his original triangular-shaped shield, his reaction is probably justified.
    • As a result of this attack, the Avengers ended up moving their base to an artificial island named, naturally, Avengers Island. The fact it's mentioned on this page can probably tell you what happened to it.
    • The New Avengers have a poor track record when it comes to headquarters. Justified to an extent during Civil War and Dark Reign, when they were hiding from Stark's Mighty Avengers and Norman Osborn's Dark Avengers. Avengers Mansion has been a frequent victim.
  • Doctor Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum is similarly imperiled on a regular basis (once while it was serving as the headquarters of the New Avengers). He always comes back to it.
  • The Second Titans Tower, home base of the Teen Titans, was designed to address this problem with the whole above ground building being a hologram to attract enemies intending mayhem.
  • A defining moment in the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mirage comic book: after Baxter Stockman unleashes his Mouser robots, they destroy the turtles' lair, forcing the turtles to relocate to April's apartment. Afterwards, the Foot attack the apartment, setting it on fire and forcing the turtles to relocate to Casey's grandmother's farmhouse in Massachusetts. Said story was eventually adapted in the first movie and second cartoon, with minor changes: in the movie, the Foot are responsible for both attacks, and in the cartoon, the turtles are present for the initial attack (only Splinter is present in the original).
  • Occurs twice in Sonic the Hedgehog, the first when Robotnik learns the location of Knothole and attacks it in the EndGame arc, and the second when Dr. Eggman decides to say "screw it" to his stalemate with the Kingdom of Acorn and rains Death From Above with his Egg Fleet burning it to cinders.
    • Tends to happen a lot with Flynn's run. The Evil Twins of "Moebus" managed to take Freedom HQ (which is all that's left of Knothole from said Death from Above) but this time, they could crash at New Mobotropolis (they got it back). However, with the Iron Dominion figuring out that they could control the helpful AI there, let's just say they press their advantage and take over the city. This time, only a few manage to get out but several of the heroes manage to fight within the city.
    • Then Eggman launches an attack with the Death Egg Mrk. II, which is temporarily interrupted by the Cosmic Retcon of the Genesis arc, and resumes once the retcon is undone. This includes releasing the Titan Metal Sonic to wreck havoc. Oh, and this all coincides with a Xanatos Gambit by Ixis Naugus to usurp control of the city. The former fails; the latter doesn't.
      • And just when they're recovering from this, the Battle Bird Armada attacks the city and destroys the royal palace.
  • This has happened to the Justice League satellite a number of times. At one point, the writers had to promise to not destroy it anymore unless they rebuilt it first.


Fan Works

  • Alphel breifly takes over Mercury's dungeon in a joint strike with Keepers Arachne and Nero, while Nero creates a distraction forcing all of Mercury's minions to fight on a battle field of his choice. The battle is vicious and protracted; but in the end all three are defeated for an epic Crowning Moment of Awesome.
  • My Little Avengers: Loki briefly sets up shop in the Avengers Mansion at the climax of his Gambit Roulette (and the beginning of the story's Darkest Hour), before he and the Dark Avengers move on to occupy the royal palace.
  • Jewel of Darkness: Much like the canon Teen Titans universe, Titans Tower is assaulted several times over the course of the story:
    • First, like in canon, the HIVE trio attacks the tower after supposedly killing Robin and temporarily take it from the Titans.
    • Later, during a three-pronged attack on the city, Midnight sends a couple dozen Mecha-Mooks to assault the tower, though they're repelled by Jinx.
    • Though we don't see it, Mad Mod somehow manages to infiltrate the tower and kidnap the Titans for his "school".
  • Queen of All Oni: During Operation: Steel Lightning, Jade infiltrates Section 13 via possessed Captain Black's shadow before releasing the full force of the sumo tribe as a distraction, so she can steal the other masks from the Vault. It's only through Agent Wisker's unforeseen interference that she's stopped.
    • Drago later breaks into Section 13 (apparently through the air vents, which he calls a cliche) in an attempt to steal the Talismans. Fortunately, Karasu also breaks in, and keeps him distracted long enough for the heroes to show up and scare him off.
  • Ponies Make War has several examples:


Films -- Live Action

"If your quarry goes to ground, leave no ground to go to."

  • Variation: In the live-action Ben 10 movie, the scene in which their mobile home is blown up by Eon.
  • Typically the enemy mooks burst into the heroes base and attack the Red Shirts, slaughter ensues, but all (or most) of the named characters escape to fight another day thanks to the heroic sacrifice of countless Red Shirts. Seen in Total Recall, They Live!, and Logan's Run.
  • The final showdown of John Woo's The Killer has the bad guys launching an assault upon the church that served as the title character's primary place of refuge and peace. And just to drive home the point that the church is no longer a sanctuary for him or his love interest, at one point during the shootout, one of the bad guys uses a shotgun to blow the church's centerpiece, the statue of Mary, to smithereens.
  • Blade had this...and killed (indirectly) a main character no less!
    • The feat was zig-zagged in Blade II: the invading vamps wanted to recruit Blade's help. But played straight in Blade: Trinity, also with the death of a supporting character... twice! The Blade series really likes this trope.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean: Captain Jack Sparrow spends half his time getting back or stopping people from stealing his beloved ship, the Black Pearl.
  • In the second X-Men film, General Stryker's forces take over the X-Men mansion. Although this moment of All Your Base Are Belong to Us is also, to some, the Crowning Moment of Awesome for the whole film.
    • In X-Men: First Class, the group move into the mansion in the first place when their previous HQ, a CIA compound, is attacked and destroyed by the Hellfire Club.
  • The opening of the 1995 Ian McKellen version of Richard III begins with a commando attack on the King's headquarters led by Richard of Gloucester, prefaced by an anachronistic Soviet tank crashing through the wall.
  • Happens early on in Sky Captain and The World of Tomorrow
  • Dune, including a Mole.
  • Batman Forever - Two-Face and the Riddler break into Wayne Manor. Two-Face and his thugs deal with Bruce and his girl-of-the-movie while Riddler starts lobbing bombs around the Batcave.
    • And Batman Begins. Ra's al Ghul and his men walk right into the manor as guests of one of Bruce's social events. When he realizes who they are, he's quick to get everyone else out. Good thing, too, as they burn the house down immediately after.
    • In The Dark Knight, the Joker and his henchmen invade Bruce Wayne's penthouse. The trailer for The Dark Knight Rises also sees Bane and his men ransacking Wayne Manor so apparently Christopher Nolan loves doing this to Batman.
  • In the film Battle of Britain, based on actual events, the British air forces have a HQ which controls all fighter squadrons that gets hit and almost destroyed.
  • The Last Starfighter the Starfighter base is destroyed by an attack killing all the Starfighters except Alex, who had returned to Earth
  • In Get Smart CONTROL headquarters is attacked by KAOS.
  • G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Zartan, the Baroness, and Stormshadow lead a Cobra attack on the Joes headquarters, the "Pitt" located underneath the Sahara desert.
  • MIB2, Serlina and MIB HQ.
  • Happens in Independence Day, the aliens take out every major military base in the second day of their invasion, including NATO's headquarters, the president then assumes command and control in Area51, which is a safe haven because of its top secret nature.


Literature

  • All of House Atreides base were belong to House Harkonnen in Frank Herbert's sci-fi novel Dune, with the Harkonnens using The Mole and other treachery to open a gap in the base's defense and attack under cover of night, with imperial troops on loan.
  • This happens in A Song of Ice and Fire when Theon takes Winterfell.
  • The last half of Harry Potter is Voldemort's siege of Hogwarts.
    • Also happened at the end of the sixth book, but not quite as severe.
    • Played straight in-universe when Voldy takes over the Ministry.
  • The siege of Troy, told from the perspective of the Trojans in the Aeneid, is an example of this trope, while it is an example of Storming the Castle, as told from the Greek perspective in the Illiad.
  • The Chronicles of Prydain, book five. Caer Dathyl is destroyed by invincible elite undead, so the heroes attack the enemy while the undead are away.
  • In the Dale Brown novel Flight of the Old Dog, the titular Airstrike Impossible is started prematurely when supposedly Soviet attackers strike at Dreamland.
    • Shadow Command has this happen, with the attackers being other Americans duped by the Unwitting Pawn POTUS.
  • The Yuuzhan Vong captured Coruscant in Star by Star.
  • During the Trauma Conga Line that was The Dresden Files book Changes, this happens twice. First his office building is revealed to have been bought by Red Court vampires years ago, who have inserted explosives into the walls (and put up the rent) and proceed to blow it up. Then they firebomb his home. Also, he's seriously injured rescuing his neighbors.
  • Happens twice in the Percy Jackson and The Olympians. Firstly, in Battle of the Labyrinth, Kronus' army invades Camp Half-Blood via the Labyrinth, causing the titular battle. Secondly, in The Last Olympian, the final battle with Kronos takes place in the throne room of Olympus itself.
  • The Halo novels use the code "blood arrow" to indicate that all friendly positions on a planet have been overrun.


Live Action TV

  • The Power Rangers have this as a once a season tradition.
    • All three seasons of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers has it. The Green Ranger attacks and pillages the Command Center in the first two seasons, while Rito and Goldar plant a bomb that destroys it in the third.
    • At the end of Power Rangers Turbo, Divatox and her Piranhatrons launched an all-out assault upon the Power Chamber and ended up destroying it, but got recalled by Dark Specter, who had captured Zordon, before she could take over the planet, prompting the Rangers to pursue her into space and kick off Power Rangers in Space.
    • After that, "villains attacking the base" became a staple of the Grand Finale. Lightspeed Rescue, Time Force, Ninja Storm, and Dino Thunder all include scenes of the Rangers' base (and, in some cases, home) being spectacularly destroyed. Lost Galaxy played with the format by having the heroes purposefully self destruct their spaceship base to deter their enemies.
    • In the Non-Serial Movie Ivan Ooze strolls in, wrecks the place, and tries to murder Zordon all the while lamenting having missed the black plague, the Spanish Inquisition, and the Brady Bunch Reunion.
    • The series in which the Rangers' base is invaded but survives, we must add in Lost Galaxy (ship destroyed as well as most of station, but city dome of station gets relatively gentle landing), Wild Force, SPD, Mystic Force, and Operation Overdrive. That leaves Space, the ship did get invaded once during Space, just not in the finale.
    • Inverted in Jungle Fury: Casey gate-crashed the villain's hideout, beat the Big Bad out of his host body and then dragged said host body out. The Ranger's base, situated in a Pizza Parlor, is left untouched.
    • Power Rangers RPM had Tenaya 7 cause havoc by detaching her robot hand and sneaking it into the Rangers' base early on. Just a few episodes later, it happened again when a wedding being held in the Rangers' base got crashed, and it officially reached Running Gag territory when Tenaya invaded it again just two episodes after the "wedding". After that, though, the base stayed relatively untouched until the Grand Finale and its obligatory Trash the Set.
    • Only Power Rangers Zeo does not feature this trope, or its inverse (Storming the Castle).
  • One of the cooler episodes of The Sentinel involved the Cascade police station being taken over and held hostage.
  • Every incarnation of Star Trek has done this with the various Cool Starships. Otherwise the various away teams would have been safe as soon as they could take a transporter out. Of course, this meant that they had the worst transporter room security ever.
    • One Original Series episode had an escaped prisoner (who turned out to be something else entirely) hiding in a crate of medical supplies, and making it all the way to the bridge without getting caught. It's a good thing the mentally unstable prisoner hadn't decided to shoot Kirk with his phaser.
    • Also, Khan took over the ship in "Space Seed", and the Kelvans took it over in "By Any Other Name".
    • One season of Deep Space Nine had the station being occupied by the Dominion. Gul Dukat seemed happy to get his office back, though, since from where the Cardassians sit (or at least Gul Dukat sits), the Federation pulled an All Your Base on them.
      • Also, this trope was inverted in a third season episode of Deep Space Nine. Sisko, Jake, and O'Brien accidentally set off a Cardassian counterinsurgent program which was "inadvertently" left in the station computer. This set off an increasingly ridiculous chain of hopeless death traps, with each successive death trap growing increasingly more fatal and overengineered each time the crew attempted to defeat the previous death trap. The kicker was when Dukat himself couldn't even disable the program.
    • The Borg pulled a "All Your Captain Are Belong To Us" by assimilating Picard, then shortly having the Borgified Picard send a message that "You have no chance to resist; make your time" to the Enterprise.
      • ...and they took over the Enterprise, or at least part of it, in First Contact.
      • More embarrassingly, a group of Ferengi pirates snagged control of the ship using secondhand Klingon war surplus in "Rascals".
    • You get the picture by now, but for thoroughness' sake: psychic aliens took over the title ship in Voyager in "Waking Moments", after a fashion: the entire crew was trapped in a dream version of the ship in which they had taken over. Only Chakotay and the Doctor remained in the real world.
      • The crew members under the control of the Lotus Eater Machine tried to keep Seven and the Doctor from keeping them from flying straight down the monster's throat. They were still in control of the ship, but they were definitely Not Themselves.
      • The second season finale had the Kazon-Nistrim taking over the ship outright and stranding the crew on a nearby planet, leaving their only chance to take it back in the hands of Tom Paris, Lon Suder, and the Doctor.
      • The Doctor (can you tell he finds himself in a lot of Die Hard on an X situations when this happens? Being a Projected Man has its advantages) and another EMH had to take back a ship the Romulans had invaded.
    • And in Enterprise, we can't forget the numerous times the Suliban have been able to get in and out right under their noses. They're a slippery bunch indeed. They also had to deal with the Borg once.
      • And the Ferengi.
  • A regular occurrence on Stargate SG-1, to the point where it is subverted in a later season: the final test for prospective team members is a simulated Die Hard scenario, complete with alien infiltrators and noble (yet harmless) sacrifices. In contrast with most other examples however, Stargate Command is designed and operated with the expectation that hostile forces would frequently attempt to invade, up to including a Self-Destruct Mechanism into the base design from the get go.
  • In what is possibly the silliest usage of this one, the Torchwood episode "They Keep Killing Suzie" has the team locked in by a crazy man reciting Emily Dickinson. It makes slightly more sense in context.
    • And in Children of Earth, the base (along with Jack) is completely blown up. Jack does better in the long run.
      • Also in Children of Earth: the government has Thames House, a super-secure building designed to withstand all sorts of attacks by closing down completely. Cool, eh? Except if you invite the enemy in, and they proceed to use these very characteristics to kill everyone in the building, just to make a point.
    • In "End of Days", as part of a plan to release a giant demon, Bilis infiltrates the base's holding cells to kill Rhys.
  • The third season of the current incarnation of Doctor Who has the Master take over the TARDIS, then subsequently the flying UNIT headquarters. Oh, and the entire planet.
    • The 1996 movie also shows the TARDIS being overtaken by The Master and his accomplice.
  • In season 7 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Buffy's home becomes a literal base for their Superhero team, complete a The Mole (The First, impersonating one of the Potentials), multiple sieges and examples of set trashing, until the end of the season, which climaxes with the ultimate Trash the Set.
    • This is also what Adam did to The Initiative in season 4.
    • Played with using the Watchers' Council---their headquarters are attacked right as Quentin Travers is announcing their plans to go to Sunnydale and help Buffy fight the First.
    • For the first three seasons, the school library was where they always went to research, train, and plan for the upcoming confrontation with evil. Being (1) public space, and (2) the location of the Hellmouth, bad guys came there looking for a fight pretty frequently.
      • Got one of the more low-key, if still very creepy, uses of this trope in the third season finale. The Main Characters are all gathered in the library, discussing how they should bring down the Mayor (the latest Big Bad), when, Speak of the Devil, he comes in through the front door, not to attack them or interrupt their plans in anyway, just to see how they're doing and deliver a few threats while he's in the neighborhood.
  • Hard not to spoiler this simply by writing the show, but in Angel the Angel Investigations building is blown up at the end of Season 1, to be replaced by the Hyperion Hotel starting in Season 2.
    • Inverted in the final season of Angel, in a case of "All your Us are belong to our Base" -- the Angel scooby gang ends up working for the bad guy law firm and setting up shop in their office building.
      • And one episode plays it straight, with Wolfram and Hart being invaded by cyborgs.
    • Lampshaded late in Season 5.

Angel: Call security, put 'em on red alert. Nobody gets in this building without clearance from me. I want a guard at every entrance, every elevator, every stairwell. Cover the whole building.
Harmony: (shrugs) OK, but you know how that never works?
Angel: Harmony!
Harmony: On it.

  • Modified in the new Battlestar Galactica, mainly the miniseries: the Cylons don't exactly occupy battlestars. Rather, they take over control of them through the computer networks.
    • Season 2 begins with a Cylon boarding party attempting to take over the Galactica, and in season 4, Gaeta's mutiny succeeds in doing just that, giving Adama and Tigh a Die Hard In Space opportunity
    • Played straight with New Caprica, where it's all your planet are belong to us.
  • Multiple examples on 24: During the course of eight seasons, attacks on the CTU included: detonation of a bomb, release of a canister of chemical weapon into the ventilation system, assault by a mercenary squad and activation of an EMP weapon. And these were just direct attacks, other minor hindrances to the protagonist consisted of computer viruses, various power plays and internal investigations.
  • The Goodies both played this trope straight and parodied it: they had a recurring base which featured almost any room you pleased behind the same two doors (thanks to Chroma Key), a window that turns into a video screen when you pull down the blinds, a huge 1970s computer, and so forth. Graham's Gadgeteer Genius status meant that they also had similar bases on ships or planes in certain episodes.
  • A heartbreaking example in Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future: the good guys' home and base of operations, the Power Base, contains not only their living quarters and military facilities, but also vital information regarding human settlements, hidden sanctuaries, and resistance leaders—all of which Lord Dread covets. When he finally succeeds in deciphering the access code to the Power Base's transport gates, he sends Blastarr and a small army of Biodroids to conquer it, all while four members of the Five-Man Band are kept busy elsewhere. In the end, Jennifer "Pilot" Chase is mortally wounded and chooses to detonate the Base's reactor instead of letting its information fall into Dread's hands. And then the series ended.
  • In one episode in season one of Alias, SD-6 headquarters is taken over by a team of baddies led by a guest starring Quentin Tarantino.
    • Also in season 5. APO HQ is bombed by The Mole/Magnificent Bastard, Sloane.
  • This happens too often in NCIS, whose base of operations is the Navy Yard, DC. You have to wonder how trained badass terrorists like Ari have to go to such trouble to infiltrate the place when any serial killer or stalker can just walk in bold as they please. Possibly lampshaded in one installment when Gibbs wants to shut the base down due to a serial killer's threat:

Vance: "Gibbs, I don't know if you've noticed but we run the navy out of the navy yard."

  • At the end of Episode 11 of Season 4 of "Dexter", the Trinity Killer casually walks into Miami Metro Homicide, peruses the evidence being collected to catch him with bemused glee, and confronts Dexter in his lab, learning his real name and violating a space Dexter considered safe.
    • On a smaller scale than is usual for this trope, Dexter pulls this most episodes with his victim of the week: Taking control of a place they had felt secure, sometimes only symbolically by putting up tokens of their criminal life and asserting dominance, other times literally taking control of their home base (a scrap yard, a cabin in the everglades, a shrink's office, etc.)
  • In Flashpoint, an old sergeant of the team came by to visit. Only to take someone hostage when things didn't go like he planned.
  • Babylon 5, due to its nature, is threatened in one way or another almost every episode. However, there are at lest three examples of large-scale invasions by boarding parties.
    • In Babylon Squared, Sinclair experiences a flash forward of the Shadows invading B5 (this was later Ret Conned to be what would have happened if Sinclair had stayed on B5 instead of becoming the Minbari Ambassador).
      • Disputable that this was a 'retcon.' Word of God has stated the destruction of B5 was 'always' the intended endpoint of the series. And Sinclair was always going to become Valen.
    • In Severed Dreams, Earthforce likewise boards the station in what becomes a very bloody struggle between them and station security.
    • A View From The Gallery, which follows two random maintenance personnel as they go about their jobs...in the middle of a battle where aliens board the ship.
  • Attempted in Firefly, "Objects in Space", where Jubal Early successfully boards Serenity, knocks out and/or locks most of the crew in their quarters, and holds Simon at gunpoint throughout his complete search of the ship. Unfortunately for him, the ship fights back, when River pulls the same stunt on him.
  • Done twice in Merlin, when Morgana takes over the castle of Camelot.
  • Kamen Rider Dragon Knight - Tired of being subtle, Wrath and Strike go to the bookstore, hold Lacey and Trent hostage, and then tear the place to pieces in a knock down, drag out fight with Len and Kase. (Technically, the bookstore isn't an offical base but it is treated as one by the four good Kamen Riders (Len, Kase, Kit and Kase)
    • also suffered minor damage when Kit, Len and Chris nearly fought with Axe and Spear in the bookstore in an earlier episode, but at the end of the series, it was replaced by a better and bigger bookstore.
    • It is also inverted with 'Storming the Castle' at the end of the season, when the Kamen Riders storm Xaviax's mechanical fortress. (though the only thing they really destroy is the shield generator and Xaviax)
    • Kit's apartment, which serves as a 'base' for the Kamen Riders as well, remains intact.


Video Games

  • The name of this trope comes from the intro of Zero Wing, which begins with an organization (or person?) known as "CATS" taking over the bases of the player's organization and attacking the ship the player is stationed in. The badly translated line became an Internet meme in late 2000 after a flash animation used it.
    • Zero Wing is still one of the most popular games among the emulation community, despite being neither spectacularly good nor spectacularly bad; just because people want to see All Your Base Are Belong to Us in its original context.
  • The Base Defense in the X-COM series is one of the more harrowing missions there is, especially if you didn't properly design your base. Not only does failing or quitting that mission mean you've lost the base (and if that was your last one, the game as well), but you lose any facility that was heavily damaged in the firefight as well.
    • Don't forget that you're often fighting terror units, who, with the exception of the Muton and Floater ones, are fearsome opponents, and have a battleship load of supporting aliens. You would not believe how much psionics are used in some of those. And they have blaster bombs.
      • And, if it doesn't happen to be the base that houses your elite squaddies (or they are out on a mission at the time), you often have to fight with a cobbled together band of scrubs.
    • Just to add annoyance, game's 80 item limit can cause troubles: Instead of high-tech heavy plamse weapons your rookies might end with beginner rifles and pistols, if you haven't sold them. Ever tried to kill a muton armed with plasma using conventional weapons?
  • Half-Life 2 features this. No less than twenty minutes after the player reaches the well-equipped and well-hidden resistance base outside of City 17, the Combine fly in with their helicopters and start shelling the place with headcrab canisters. The base is lost, and the survivors relocate to the White Forest Base, where, incidentally, the same thing happens. Only this time, the rebels win.
  • Freelancer, it's safe to say, beats this trope to death, then reanimates its corpse as a zombie and does it again. Almost every friendly base, capital ship or space station Trent steps onto in the story mode is likely to come under heavy assault within minutes. And he visits a lot of them.
  • Partly subverted in Suikoden V. where letting the enemy succeed in invading your base without any resistance is the correct choice, as it's part of a Batman Gambit by The Strategist to wipe them out with minimal losses.
    • Also played...mostly straight at the game's beginning, where, after one extended playable flashback and a few missions about the kingdom, the heroes return to Sol Falena's palace, only for it to be attacked by the Godwin family and their ninjas. A possible subversion occurs, however, in that not only did the heroes suspect something was coming and prepare for it (including by dosing themselves with antidotes before the feast because they knew full well there'd be sleeping drugs in the food), but actually looked like they were going to win against the attack. But then the Queen's mad with power moment got out of control, as she went from vaporising the attacking ninjas to reflexively vaporising her husband...Things just went more and more wrong from there.
  • While most games in the Mega Man series end with the titular robot invading Dr. Wily's (or, in the case of the sequel, Sigma's) fortress to take him out, Mega Man X 3 started with an attack on the Maverick Hunters Headquarters.
    • Dr. Light's lab in Mega Man 7 also gets attacked.
    • The first Mega Man Zero game also had a mission where you had to repel two attacks on the Resistance Base.
    • And so does Mega Man ZX.
  • The PC game No One Lives Forever 2 features a sneak attack on the good guy base...by mimes. With guns.
  • The video game adaptation of The World Is Not Enough has James Bond fighting terrorists that invaded the MI 6 headquarters, even though this never happened in the movie (the HQ was attacked by a remote bomb, but of course you can't shoot that so that makes for bad gameplay).
    • Bizarrely they did do this in the next film but it was a VR simulation.
  • The N64 game Perfect Dark features a level where once again, the enemy sneak-attacks the good guy HQ.
  • Happens in Freedom Fighters: by the middle of the campaign, your base is taken over, and you have to find another place where you can run La Resistance.
    • For what it's worth, the main plot of Freedom Fighters is that Russians pull a Sneak Attack Coup on New York City, and the actual game is you in a Die Hard situation.
  • The first hour or so of Metroid Prime 3 consists of a Space Pirate attack on both the ship you're on, and the base on the planet you're orbiting.
  • Occurs in the Command & Conquer games several times, in which Kane hacks into the player's character communications to taunt him following an attack on the good guys. It's most apparent in the Tiberian Sun GDI intro, which is eerily similar to the intro of Zero Wing.
  • This occurs in one of the later Gamma Campaign missions of Warzone 2100. NEXUS, the Big Bad intruder virus created by disgruntled Mad Scientist Dr. Reed hacks into the Project's Synaptic Links(which were also developed by Reed) and begins taking control of the player's units and structures.
  • The second level of Halo 3 is a textbook example of this, and in true Bungie fashion you traverse the majority of the base three times. Still fun though.
    • Also happens in Halo and Halo 2, with the Pillar of Autumn and the Cairo defense station, respectively.
    • In fact, the two examples of Halo 2 and Halo 3 are just smaller battles in the greater All Your Base Are Belong to Us battle for the Earth itself. Also, the "Pillar of Autumn" moment of Halo 1 had you running away from an earlier All Your Base Are Belong To Us moment on the planet Reach.
      • Also happens with Sword Base in Halo: Reach twice before the planet itself is glassed. And you do get set up the bomb the second time.
    • Bungie's earlier Marathon series starts off with you aiding in the takeover of an alien ship during their invasion of your colony. The sequel has you performing a planetary invasion of your own from it until the ship is taken over by a hax0ring AI, and you instead flee to a makeshift planetary base camp.
      • ...which is then belonged to walking bombs disguised as humans.
  • Both Star Trek: Elite Force 1 & 2 have levels like this, on the Voyager and Enterprise, repectively. In the second game, you even have to fight off enemies on the outside of the ship.
  • Mass Effect 1 had an interesting twist on All Your Base Are Belong to Us, with the base in question also being The Very Definitely Final Dungeon.
    • Mass Effect 2 had another variation: All Your Ship Are Belong To Us. Twice. And the first one completely destroyed the original Normandy, and the second almost completely wiped out the crew of the Normandy SR2.
      • The final outcome, depending on your last decision, is either All Your Collector Base Are Destroyed By Shepard, or All Your Collector Base Are Belong To Cerberus.
    • And now, to complete the trifecta, Mass Effect 3's trailer has All Your Earth Are Belong To The Reapers.
      • And later in the game All Your Citadel Are Belong To The Reapers. Again.
  • Neverwinter Nights 2 has an entire quest arc dedicated to such antics: should you choose to aid the City Watch, it falls to you and your compadres to expel sundry unsavory characters from the Docks district. If it were anything other than your own city it would be more like Storming the Castle.
    • And then there is the scene in between acts 1 and 2 where the Githyanki storm the Sunken Flagon and kidnap Shandra (again)
  • Lunicus had you and your buddies striking out from the titular hidden moonbase to fight an alien occupation of earth. It gets invaded later in the game, allowing you to hijack one of their boarding craft to pull an Independence Day.
  • Neverwinter Nights 2 has assault on Crossroad Keep.
  • The last mission in Soldier of Fortune II: Double Helix takes place at the Shop HQ, which has been taken over by the main terrorist organization.
  • Irrational Games' Freedom Force features giant robots attempting to destroy the Freedom Fortress, and a successful invasion of Giant Ants.
  • For the first half of Silent Hill 4 your apartment is a haven where you can heal and rearm. In the second half of the game it is overrun by ghosts who can hurt you by proximity, and who will contribute to giving you a worse game ending if you don't clear them out.
  • Final Fantasy XI has Besieged, wherein the city of Al Zahbi is, from time to time, overrun by beastmen. There's also an infamous 3-month period where the cities in "Wings of The Goddess" were faced with constant invasions because the enemies in Campaign were so damn strong it was nearly impossbile to hold any areas so city invasions wouldn't happen. Additionally, in one scene during the Battle of Jeuno mission arc, the Allied Forces of Altana are presented with an ultimatum from the Beastmen Confederacy. The orc presenting the surrender treaty says outright "You press seal here. Then all your Jeuno are belong to us". After the player and other npc heros break up the meeting, that same orc yells "You have no chance to survive! Make your time!" One wonders what the game's japanese script had in the same scene.
  • In Knights of the Old Republic, the Ebon Hawk was inviolable to anything less than a full squadron of Sith fighters plus a poorly timed bathroom break/bikini-wearing spouse/cardiac arrest (or all three); the sequel, well...not only do you have to keep Sith troops out of it with a turret, but later, it suddenly fills up with pissed-off slavers for you to kill, and even intrusive Sith who can pull a Face Heel Turn and even become a romantic interest, depending on how nice you are.
    • KOTOR 1, the Jedi Enclave on Dantooine is razed by Darth Malak's forces after you complete three planets.
  • In StarCraft, the Zerg can infect a Terran Command Center, seizing control of it, and use it to produce Infected Terran units.
    • Not to mention the big plot points where the Zerg take over, oh, let's see: Chau Sara (to start the game), Mar Sara, Tarsonis, Aiur, Char, ...
      • And Antiga. (Nobody remembers Antiga...) Not to mention the Jacobs Installation (All Your Base's Secret Intel Is Belong To Us), the Amerigo (All Your Spaceship's More Secret Intel Is Belong To Kerrigan), and one incident in the novels where Raynor shipjacks General Duke himself, ending up with the Hyperion.
    • The eminently quotable Michael Liberty had this to say about this state of affairs:

Michael Liberty: We had the advantages of interior lines of supply (that's military for "surrounded") and native terrain (that's military for "we're fighting them in our living rooms").

  • World of Warcraft rewards players for successfully attacking the opposite faction's capitol cities and killing their leaders. Opposite faction players will generally organize a defense, resulting in an epic battle.
  • Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, if the player character is a Fighter, and takes up responsibility of D'Arnise Hold afterwards, he has to prevent one of these.
    • Come to think of it, this happens before hand when you liberate it from the bleedin' Trolls.
    • PC Mage also gets one of these, thanks to Amn's Mage-hating society.
  • Ratchet and Clank Up Your Arsenal features Dr. Nefarious's new-And-Improved army attacking the Star Ship Phoenix.
    • And in the final level, Ratchet and Clank get their revenge by infiltrating Dr. Nefarious' base. All alone, though (although Captain Qwark shows up for a bit in the end).
  • Ace Combat 5 the neccesary-to-spoiler-tag scene where your new base is sunk by two sub-launched missiles. Before that, the first three levels of the game are the build-up to and execution of an attack on your first base. Later on, the bad guys (who weren't actually bad) also attempt a seaborne invasion.
    • Zero tops this with the XB-0, a Belkan superweapon attacking and disabling your base
  • In the final SWAT mission of SWAT 2, the game's Western Terrorists have invaded Metro Station, killing one of the major NPCs during a cutscene and putting the Chief of Police's life in peril.
  • Tenchu. The Azuma village in part 2. Gohda castle got torched in parts 2 and 4.
  • At the beginning of The Witcher, the witchers' castle is attacked by bandits. While they get their asses kicked, they do manage to steal the secret witcher-making potion.
  • Inverted in the penultimate scenario of Super Robot Wars Z. You've just taken over the Big Bad's Dragon's Evil Tower of Ominousness in the previous mission, and now you have to fight off the forces sent to take it back.
  • Fawful really goes all the way in Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story; taking over both Peach's and Bowser's respective castles after putting both out of comission.
  • Allowing the enemy to reach your starting stronghold in the Ogre Battle games is an instant Game Over.
    • Not so much in the March of the Black Queen - you lose the level and take a big reputation hit, but you can try again with no other consequences. The only Game Over condition is the death of the main character.
  • No mention of Lunar Knights? Eddie and Ginny take up the role of CATS and assault the Guild's base in Old Culiacan in the wake of Margrave Rymer seeing the Purifex Cannon in operation from the business end. Save Ernest and Kay, the Guild evacuates to the inn and, later, to their old ops base. The vampires are on the defensive from there on out, so no repeats.
  • One of the final missions in Dungeon Keeper 2's campaign has an interesting version. You are set up against the goodly King's right-hand man Lord Pureheart and his map-spanning fortress with an overpowering number of guards and other heroes only a single alarm away from your Dungeon Heart. Your base is tucked in a very meager niche of diggable rock to prevent traditional means of building up power and your resources in general are limited. The correct strategy is to slowly and quietly block off (with the help of the just-unlocked Secret Door) and take over the castle, starting from the outlying torture dungeons and storerooms while picking off and converting the patrolling guardsmen to your side one at a time. Ideally, after the entire castle has been silently subverted, the siege ends with the former heroes launching a massive attack into the Lord's throne room at the very core of the castle. Surprise!
  • Red Faction: Guerrilla: In the middle of a missions the game pulls a swerve: without warning the mission is aborted and you have to race to save a safehouse from a full-on assault. The safehouse is wrecked and your commander is killed.
  • Hyrule Castle has been taken over by the forces of evil a total of 4 times yet, twice by Ganondorf, once by The Legend of Zelda the Minish Cap's Vaati and once by The Legend of Zelda a Link To T He Past's Agnahim. It might have something to do with the fact that Hyrulean Guards tend to be morons. Notably Averted in Spirit Tracks, despite the set up being perfect for it, with the Princess being invisible and all.
  • In Dead Rising, the zombies start to encroach on your safe zones, appearing in the warehouse and elevator in greater numbers as the game proceeds. Following the main plot missions will eventually lead to commandos taking over the mall and your original safe room. Though Frank inverts this by taking over the enemy's secret hiding place and hiding there for the remainder of the game.
  • In Super Robot Wars Compact, Jaburo gets attacked by Emperor Muge Zolbados in Scenario 21: God Bless Dancougar
  • Oni has this happen in its 6th chapter, just after losing Muro's trail in chapter 5.
  • In the endgame of Dragon Age Origins, the Darkspawn attack Redcliffe and Denerim. You get to Redcliffe just in time to save the castle and everyone in it. Denerim isn't so lucky. By the time your forces get there, the Darkspawn have already established a foothold in the burning city and presumably killed everyone who couldn't escape in time.
  • In several of the Ys games, the game's main town gets occupied by the enemy and its residents captured.
  • Mechwarrior 4: Black Knight features a nasty one. While you're out on patrol after taking a big bite out of the enemy war machine, House Steiner betrays your mercenary outfit and launches a surprise attack on the base. In the ensuing chaos, Colonel Badass and Mission Control are both killed, many survivors are taken prisoner, and you pretty much only make it out of there with a few civilian trucks plus whatever gear your Humongous Mecha squad had equipped at the time.
    • Theoretically any mission in Mechwarrior 3 can become this if you position your Mobile Field Base too close to the bad guys.
  • Chapter 1 of Adventure Quest Worlds' main storyline involves the good kingdom of Swordhaven coming under attack by the Shadowscythe Empire's army of the undead. And then Drakath, the leader of the forces of Chaos, interrupts the battle between Good and Evil, kills Sepulchure, the former leader of the Shadowscythe, blasts down Shadowfall, and then he threatens to destroy everything that both Good and Evil love and end the world in chaos and destruction.
  • Samurai Warriors: The first game in particular had castle sieges, parts of the game where you infiltrate the enemy stronghold and kill the enemy. This was not a popular gameplay mechanic and so the castles became part of the main war map itself, and depending on whose story battle you were following you had to either invade or repel an invasion on your home fortress. The most iconic of this is the siege of Honnoji, in which Mitsuhide Akechi turns against Oda Nobunaga,
  • In Adventure Quest Worlds, the main villain of its recent Skyguard storyline is a guy named Master, who plans to infiltrate the Skyguard to cause enough mayhem to make Drakath decide to make him the next Lord of Chaos. Shortly after the Skyguard induction ceremony ends, an attack is launched against the Skyguard Academy, and the academy is being invaded by Chaobolds, Bronze Sky Pirate Draconians, and an Inbunche waiting at the academy's cafeteria. And that's not all - Invidia, one of the Skyguard's newest recruits, could actually be The Dragon to Master, the Dreamweaver, in disguise. They do look familiar, after all...
  • In Duke Nukem: Zero Hour, the Player Headquarters is invaded by the aliens in the Bad Future.
  • This happens twice in Bastion. The first time is when Zulf learns the origin of the Calamity and goes on a rampage in the Bastion before leaving. The second is when he sends his fellow Ura to invade the Bastion near the end of the game.
  • The Reconstruction, towards the end. The world is devastated by floods and a volcanic eruption, then the Big Bad destroys what's left. As a result, Wadassia, the city where most of the cast hails from and the main base of their operations, is reduced to ruins, in addition to every other city on the planet. Since the main character is heavily devoted to Wadassia, this also causes him to have a major Freak-Out.
  • Assassin's Creed series loves this trope:
  • Happens in Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds.

Martian Elder: "A rapid offensive to (the humans') social and economic heart should prevent any significant opposition."

    • The Martians actually do this twice. The first time (a direct assault on London, shown during the intro movies) it backfires because they underestimate the humans' firepower. They then change their landing site to Scotland, which works much better - whichever side you play the campaign as, the Martians will be in control of most of Scotland by the end of the first week or two.
  • Twice at the beginning of Deus Ex Invisible War. First the Tarsus base in Chicago gets destroyed by a Templar Grey Goo bomb, then the Seattle base comes under attack by the Order.
  • The Game of the Ages: You should have suspected this would happen as soon as you got a look at all the castle's defenses.
  • At the beginning of Space Quest I, Roger's ship is captured by the Sariens, all crew members killed except for him, the Star Generator stolen, and the Self-Destruct Mechanism activated.
  • Towards the end of Lust Grimm, succubi invade the village of Back Cover. You defeat their leader while the villager's leader Herman performs a Heroic Sacrifice to get rid of the remaining succubi.


Webcomics


Web Original

  • In The Gamers Alliance, the Yamato Empire and the Clergy of Mardük launch a surprise attack on the Aisonian capital Myridia during the Yamatian Invasion arc and end up taking over the city. Later the Proninist Party and the Northern Horde pull this off in Maar Sul City and Vanna, respectively, during the Godslayer era.
  • Whateley Academy has had its (in)famous Halloween attack. No students actually died, but this was primarily due to most of them being incapacitated right from the start and the attackers being under orders not to actually kill any students except their assigned targets anyway; the campus security forces weren't as lucky.
  • The PPC's headquarters has been invaded repeatedly, though the 2006 attack and prelude to the 2008 invasion were the only ones that had any real success.
  • When Tarot attacked the sattelite base of the Global Guardians in force, it resulted in the near death of two Guardians, two civilian contractors who were onboard, broke the base into pieces, and knocked those pieces out of orbit. The parts of the base that didn't burn up on re-entry crashed into the Pacific and Indian Oceans.
  • The Anti Cliche and Mary Sue Elimination Society's base of operations, the Library Arcanium, is taken over by the Sues in "Insert Red Skies Twilight Here".
  • The season 2 finale of We're Alive ends with the fall of the Tower.
  • The Gungan Council has Naboo being the headquarters of the Jedi. This makes it a frequent target for attack, with the most prolific one being the year-long "Theed Under Attack."
  • In Greek Ninja, Ariadnio, the school Sasha Hunter is attending, is invaded. In the battle between the opposing forces that follows, her teacher is killed and thus, the story begins.


Western Animation

  • Happened a few times in the Justice League series. From the dream invasion by Dr. Destiny to the C.A.D.M.U.S. attack led by Galatea, the Supergirl clone.
    • They use the Batcave as a back up base and that was also raided at one point.
  • H.I.V.E. took over the Teen Titans' base in the very first episode of the cartoon, and to say the least, it certainly wasn't the last time such an event took place. One notable occurrence was when Slade attempted to destroy the base, but it turned out to be a Batman Gambit to have Terra earn the Titans' trust by saving it.
    • Befittingly, the Titans East's base would later be taken over in their debut episode.
    • Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo movie started with a supervillain blatantly assaulting the Titans Tower with explosives.
  • Beast Wars had an episode where a Starscream-possessed Waspinator spearheaded the (temporary) takeover of the Maximal base.
    • Later, Rampage destroys it, by 'shoving it off a waterfall, forcing the Maximals to find a new base.
  • In Avatar: The Last Airbender, the Fire Nation takes over the city of Ba Sing Se, effectively conquering the Earth Kingdom and forcing the heroes to go incognito after escaping the city.
    • Earlier in the series, Aang, Katara and Sokka arrive at the city of Omashu only to discover that it has fallen to the Fire Nation.
    • More true to the trope is the Siege of the North, when the Northern Water Tribe, secure for generations, was subjected to a massive assault when the Fire Nation learned Aang was there.
      • Although in that case, they successfully defended themselves. Having a giant koi fish fight for them certainly helped.
  • Happened to the Superfriends at least once, and almost certainly more.
  • In the Kim Possible episode "Ill Suited", Kim and Ron are eating at Bueno Nacho when Professor Dementor attacks. Notable because Dementor says the following line: "All your battlesuit now belongs to me!."
    • Let's not forget "So The Drama", where Drakken took over the Bueno Nacho corporation...
    • And that in both the movie and the grand finale her house gets totalled.
  • Also occurred in Danny Phantom when the hero's Local Hangout were violently invaded by the Guys in White by order of Vlad who bought the franchise briefly to torment Danny.
  • A variation appears in proper English in the Static Shock episode "A League of Their Own" (part one). After Static blasts down the buzzsaw-handed cleaning robot, Brainiac says "You only delay the inevitable. All of this base will soon belong to me."
  • Sector V suffers this a lot, as their treehouse is taken over/destroyed/stolen by their archenemies, The Delightful Children, turnips, Santa's Elfa Strike Team, and their own organization being manipulated by The Mole.
  • Happens several times on ReBoot, particularly since the heroes' headquarters doubled as the control post for the entire Mainframe.
  • Happens all the time on Code Lyoko. Not surprising considering the enemy's physical form is also the computer they use for their operations (at least until Season 3).
  • In one of the rare moments in Transformers Armada where he wasn't holding the Idiot Ball or having the Autobots' newest gimmick ruin his plans, Thrust managed to draw the Autobots out to the battlefield, see that none of them had the Requiem Blaster, and then invade the now-unguarded Autobot base to steal the blaster while leaving Starscream as sacrificial decoy. It worked, but Starscream wasn't happy about it.
  • Aside from the adaptation of the comic book story referenced above, the second Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon had this happen again, when Karai attacked the turtles' second lair, completely trashing it and forcing them to relocate to a third lair.
  • Happens in the Hunter's Moon arc of Gargoyles with the destruction of the Clock Tower by the Hunters.
  • Between Season 2 of Transformers Generation 1 and Transformers: The Movie, the Decepticons take over Cybertron.
  • Occurs in the first season finale of Generator Rex. Van Kleiss and his henchmen hijack the keep, and ram it into Providence Headquarters, then go to town on the place. Predictably, dozens of Red Shirts die in this episode.
  • In the DC Super Friends short, Joker takes over the Hall Of Justice with help from Gorilla Grodd and Mr. Freeze.
  • In the second season finale of Superjail, The Ultraprison crew has taken over the titular jail while the main cast and other prisoners have been on their cruise and got lost for two months.
  • In the Thundercats 2011 episode "Omens Part Two," the Catfolk-populated magical kingdom of Thundera, stuck in Medieval Stasis, and skeptical of the existence of so-called "technology" is conquered in one night by their enemies the Lizards, who have been supplied with technological superweapons by dreaded ancient enemy Mumm-Ra. Heroes the Thundercats must flee and go Walking the Earth in search of Ancient Artifacts that will stop him.


Real Life

  • Any number of real military forces have had this happen to them. Either because of surprise or defeats on the battlefield, the defenders find themselves fighting in their own front yard. At the end of the war, this may be combined with a Bolivian Army Ending for the losing side. Can also happen at the beginning of a war.
    • Perhaps the most famous example of an opening All Your Base Are Belong to Us is the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor and the Philippines that pulled the US into World War Two.
    • Doolittle Raid. Two U.S. carriers launched a small fleet of bombers that firebombed Tokyo in early 1942. Tactically, the raid was not too important as nothing important was damaged and over half the bombers were lost, but it did a fantastic job of boosting U.S. morale and lowering Japanese morale in the capital city, in addition to forcing the Japanese to hold back many of their forces to defend the Home Islands from further attacks.
    • Kind of the point actually. Firebombing Tokyo made the Japanese realize that their "Sacred" nation was vulnerable to attack, made them divert resources to protect space the allies had no real immidiate interest in and weakened them on other fronts, making them easier to defeat in battle.
  • Another (in)famous example is the Tet Offensive of 1968, where a massive sneak attack managed to breach the perimeter at some of the "safest" places in Vietnam.
    • And ended in the complete destruction of the Viet Cong as a cohesive fighting force. Although a surprise, and political turning point, the attack was not a military success.
  • Second Ypres - the Germans almost, almost got through the British defenses with the help of poison gas. It came down to second-line troops attacking German Guards regiments, convincing the Germans that the British were still strong and causing them to back down). A captured German officer, asked what stood between his force and success, was told "Divisional headquarters." A small cluster of administrative staff, whose job is normally to plan battles and order supplies, were the last line of defense.
  • The Battle of the Alamo in 1836.
  • The Netherlands in World War II. In 3 days, when the first defenses reached the border, the German forces were already in the middle of the country. This happened mostly because the classic Dutch strategy of flooding part of the countryside provides an excellent defense against land-based troops - but the Germans had paratroopers. Oops.
    • Similar the invasion of Denmark during which German forces crossed the border in the early morning and paratroopers took control of the Danish air bases. Some hours later German bombers dropped leaflets over Copenhagen, which pretty much said "All your base are belong to us!", and by noon the government had surrendered. The trope was played even more straight with the simultaneous invasion of Norway. Oslo's impressive naval defenses kept the German navy at bay for long enough to secure the kings escape into exile. Once he was safely away, the troops surrendered. Or retreated into hiding.
  • The Fall of Constantinople, which finally ended the reign of the Byzantine Empire. Oddly, the Ottomans won when someone forgot to lock one of the city gates.
  • Von Lettow-Vorbeck, leading the German East African troops during World War I. While having successfully defended East Africa against about 1.000.000 men with 14.000 soldiers, he was by no means close to being defeated in 1918, when he was informed that Germany had already capitulated.
  • Sometimes All Your Base can be an advantage: at one point during the Seven Years War, the Austrian army took advantage of the Prussian army's absence fighting the French to capture the province of Silesia. When the Prussians eventually responded it was to discover they were outnumbered 2:1 on a battlefield of the Austrians' choosing. Unfortunately, the site they had chosen near Leuthen happened to be the Prussian Army's peacetime training ground, and the resulting familiarity with the terrain made the Prussian victory almost hilariously one-sided.
    • And then the Austrians did the same thing to Napoleon on the Marchfeld.
    • Speaking of Napoleon, he tried to do this with the infamous failure that was his invasion of Russia, and in a Subverted Trope, was turned back right before entered Moscow. Then, as we all know, Hitler tried to do exactly the same thing over a century later.
  • This has happened to Poland too many times to list, especially Krakow. There's a reason it's considered The Chew Toy in European history.
  • In retaliation for the destruction of York (now Toronto) in the War of 1812, the British invaded and burned Washington. This is seen as both a Crowning Moment of Awesome and Crowning Moment of Funny in Canada because, well, it's Canadians invading another country.
  • It should be pointed out that it was not by the Canadians who burnt Washington, but rather the professional British army, not Canadian militia
  • During World War II the Royal Navy pulled one on the Italian navy with a torpedo plane assault on the Italian fleet in Taranto's harbour, disabling three battleships and showing to the world that the raid on Pearl Harbor was possible (both Taranto and Pearl Harbor having water shallow enough that the use of aircraft-launched torpedoes was thought impossible).
  • During World War I Italy had Gabriele D'Annunzio, who pulled it twice: first time he led a torpedo boat raid on the Austrian fleet in the harbour of Bakar and left a mocking message (it doesn't count as the Crowning Moment of Awesome both because the Austrians placed torpedo nets to further protect their ships and later an Italian torpedo boat would sink the Austrian flagship after accidentally meeting it on patrol), and then he led a flight over Vienna to drop propaganda leaflets just prove they could bomb the enemy capital if they just wished so (cue Oh Crap for Vienna's people).
  • The Italian Navy's Crowning Moment of Awesome during World War II was one of these: with some of the original manned torpedoes, the Italians penetrated Alexandria harbour and mined two battleships (including the flagship with admiral on board) and a tanker (there was no carrier, so they mined another target), disabling the battleships and damaging the tanker and a destroyer (collateral damage).
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