Fate Unlimited Codes

Fate/unlimited codes is a Fighting Game spinoff of the Fate/stay night series, first released for Japanese arcades in June, 2008, which followed by an Updated Rerelease on the PlayStation 2 in December of the same year, and then ported to the PSP in June, 2009. The PSP version made it to North America and Europe as a downloadable title later that year.

As of June 12, 2012, the game is to be removed from the PSN store due to an expiring digital license. In the two weeks leading up this, the game was available at a discount of half its usual price.

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Tropes used in Fate Unlimited Codes include:

• Awesome but Impractical: Getting Archer to trigger Unlimited Blade Works requires NINE magic gauges. Long story short, most matches don't even last half that long. The super moves that activate based on counterattacking the enemy are also this, given their window of opportunity for being struck before countering is very short. Both, though, have situational subversions. Archer's chants can be used as cancels (resetting a combo), making getting all six for UBW almost incidental. And certain super counters (Archer's Rho Aius, Bazette's Fragarach, and Saber's Avalon) have lenient enough timing that you can watch an opponent start a super, burst, and use the counter in plenty of time.
• Barbie Doll Anatomy: Instead of bothering with panties, Rider just has this under her skirt. Not surprising, given how little it covers.
• Blade on a Stick: Lancer, natch. Leysritt carries a halberd.
• Bittersweet Ending: A few (surprisingly badass ones).
  • Lancer avenges Bazett's death by killing Kotomine and dies afterward.
  • Assassin kills Caster when she uses her last Command Spell and then defeats Berserker single-handedly before dying himself.
  • Caster avenges her master's death by killing Gilgamesh, then defeats the other servants one-by-one (finishing with Berserker). She then sacrifices herself to manifest the Holy Grail and wishes for Kuzuki's revival with her last breath.
  • Leysritt fights on Ilya's behalf after Berserker is killed, fights and defeats Saber Alter and Dark Sakura, but dies herself (Subverted slightly, Ilya apparently receives a new Leysritt later, and develops the same relationship with her).
  • Rider manages to save Sakura by defeating her dark side, and then vanishes as Sakura calls out her name.
• Cat Fight: Luvia's Mission Mode mini-game is a slap-fight against Rin.
• Choice of Two Weapons: Archer can switch between sword and bow. Gilgamesh has two separate fighting styles, one that uses his sword, and another involving magical chains.
• Combo Breaker
• Competitive Balance: Fate/unlimited codes puts Competitive Balance on all the fighters, which consist of both Servants (who have their own power rank differences) and human characters (who have all taken on and defeated Servants, but only under good circumstances).
• Cool and Unusual Punishment: for abandoning her and leaving her to fight the Grail War on her own, Rin turns Archer into a chibi and makes him her "mascot character".
• Corrupt the Cutie: Gilgamesh does this to Saber in his Ending
• Counter Attack: A few characters, such as Caster and Saber, have super moves that only activate when your opponent tries to attack. The most devastating one? Bazett's Fragarach as it nullifies most supers and inflicts massive damage, just be careful if your opponent is Lancer.
• Death or Glory Attack: Each character has a super-powerful "Holy Grail Special Attack" which can only be used when their magic gauge is full and they are reaping the benefits of the Holy Grail. Hit or miss, the attack can only be used once per round.
• Downer Ending: There are also several.
  • Saber Alter's comes to mind--in the end, she personally killed Shirou and also somehow killed a physical manifestation of her un-corrupted side to allow Dark Sakura to take over the world/kill everything/whatever her objective would be after Shirou is dead.
  • Kotomine's ending is just as bad.
  • Can't forget Sakura herself in hers.
  • Bazett's a Shoot the Shaggy Dog story.
• Dub Name Change: Sella is now Sarah, and Projection is now Gravitation Air.
• Easter Egg: Pushing any button during the credits will trigger a longer version of Berserker's EX mission to help pass the time. It can be skipped entirely though.
• Field of Blades: Archer's Unlimited Blade Works is in full effect in this game, Engrish incantation and all.
• Friendly Enemy - A meta-mythological example. Lancer and Zero Lancer, both figures from Celtic Mythology (specifically, Cù Chulain and Diarmuid), have special fight dialogue when they face each other. Their win quotes also reflect this; Lancer comments that Zero Lancer's reputation as a fighter is more than deserved, but chides him on fighting too impulsively, while Zero Lancer gushes on what an honor it was to fight a match against the premier Celtic Badass.
• Full-Contact Magic: Luvia's fighting style, with some wrestling moves mixed in.
• Gainaxing: Sakura and Rider, big time.
• Guide Dang It: None of the walkthroughs or websites that have information on the game seem to be able to agree exactly how the extra characters and other secrets are unlocked.
• Ham-to-Ham Combat: Gilgamesh vs... Gilgamesh.
• Healing Factor: The character who lands the hit that fills up the Holy Grail is able to regenerate lost health as long as it's active. Doing a normal mana burst (as in, not as an attack cancel or Combo Breaker) will also heal a character; in a Shout-Out to the original game, Shirou heals faster than anyone else.
• Jiggle Physics: Of the distractingly unrealistic Dead or Alive variety. You have to wonder how Sakura, Rider or Luviagelita can fight without snapping their backs in half.
• Luck-Based Mission
  • Gilgamesh's EX mission.
  • Some of the "Inflict X amount of damage in a single combo" missions can feel like this. Fortunately there are options to watch the CPU pull it off. The "Land X number of hits in a single combo," however, lack a demonstration option, so be ready to put on your thinking cap.
• Magic Skirt: All characters in Fate/unlimited codes have some kind of black hole under their skirts. It's a bit distracting in Rider's case, as it looks like she's got tar or something on the top of her legs no matter what angle the camera's at. If it's not black, it's just the color of their skin under their skirts. No detail at all, to keep the rating as it is.
• Mini Game: Completing most of the character-specific missions allows you to take part in a mini-game. Some, like Shiro's and Kotomine's, are quite silly.
• Mighty Glacier: Berserker.
• Nintendo Hard: Unlocking the Ultimate difficulty level, which requires 32 wins in Endless Survival. Not too bad for the first 16, then there's a Difficulty Spike right up to Ultimate for the rest of the mode.
• Pinball Projectile: Bazett's Fragarach super move. It does very little damage by itself, but if she lays down metallic spheres before using it, it will bounce off the spheres before hitting its enemy, dealing more damage. Fragarach can be used to its full effect if you bring it up as a Super Counter Attack; just watch out if your opponent is Lancer.
• Plot Hole: Why did Kotomine, whose wish was to see Angra Mainyu born, choose to fight and try to kill Sakura in one of her story battles to see his wish come true when this was only possible if Sakura were alive? Why did Shiro's story follow Unlimited Blade Works, then cut to Fate for the final battle?
• Secret Character: Leysritt, Saber Alter, and Zero Lancer. Zero Lancer is the only character without any story-specific cutscenes.
• Shout-Out: Fate/stay night puts a much different spin on Sasaki Kojiro's Tsubame Gaeshi attack than the normal "really fast downward strike, followed by really fast upward strike." However, Assassin uses that "normal" Tsubame Gaeshi for two regular attacks.
• Theme Music Power-Up
  • Archer finishing the Unlimited Blade Works chant switches the stage's BGM to a remixed version of "Emiya".
  • When Saber unsheathes her Noble Phantasm Excalibur, a remix of "Sword of Promised Victory"^[1] starts playing.
• The Unintelligible: Berserker. Ilya does all of the speaking for him, and his roars are written as unpronounceable gibberish.

1. ↑ Yakusokusareta Shouri no Tsurugi