< Game Breaker

Game Breaker/Platform

Game Breakers in platform games.

  • Bionicle Heroes seems to have included this in order to avoid frustrating young fans: if you collect enough LEGO elements to fill up a meter at the top of the screen, you automatically enter Hero Mode, in which you are invincible, have double firepower, have a track playing over and over again, and can activate certain gold things (making it necessary to beat the game). The catch? These elements are EVERYWHERE and the required number is exceedingly low except in certain parts of certain boss fights; if you have any selectivity at all (even unintentional) about when you pick up pieces, you'll be invincible for about 4/5 of the game, so the challenge disappears.
  • Cream in Sonic Advance 2 renders every boss powerless as her Cheese attack move will always hit from any distance during the fight. Simply pressing B repeatedly without even moving can guarantee an easy victory.
    • Cheese does that in every single Sonic Advance game, trivializing all but the Super Sonic bosses.
    • In Sonic Advance 3, all you have to do is choose Knuckles as your main character and Tails as your partner. This combination increases both Knuckles' gliding ability and Tails' flying ability to an insane degree and allows you to beat most levels easily.
    • Tails is cheap thanks to the fact that his Spinning Tails attack does damage to the boss from below, considering most bosses are designed to be hit from above.
    • Really, in the retro Sonic the Hedgehog games, Super Sonic is a Game Breaker. Faster than normal Sonic, can jump higher, and is invincible to everything bar death pits, crushing and drowning. The only drawback is that once your rings run out you're defenseless unless you managed to pick up a shield, but rings are easy enough to come by, especially in Sonic 3 and Knuckles. Speaking of which, Hyper Sonic, Super Tails and Hyper Knuckles are even more Game Breaking because of their abilities. Hyper Sonic can destroy all enemies on screen by double-jumping, Hyper Knuckles can do it by gliding into walls, and Super Tails's Flickies will automatically home in on and destroy any enemy near them. Bosses with Super Tails become a joke because all you have to do is just stand there and let the Flickies do all the work for you. Super Sonic is such a Game Breaker that it's easy to see why Sega made it an Eleventh-Hour Superpower in their newer games.
      • Super/Hyper Sonic becomes an even worse Game Breaker in Sonic 3 & Knuckles once you pick up the electric shield, which magnetically pulls rings towards you, and as long as you can move through the level consistently quickly, you can pretty much stay Super/Hyper through the whole level.
      • Also, even without Super/Hyper Sonic in Sonic 3 and Knuckles, each of the shields in the game trivialized bosses and several levels. whether it was the fire shield to allow players to stand underneath most bosses and jump. or the electric double that ruin the whole point of the boss being out of reach. Heck, even Sonic's Insta-Shield's reach is just enough to break several boss battles if you time it correctly.
      • There is one instance of Super Tails backfiring. His swarm of Super Flickies automatically targets enemy units. But the Death Egg Act II boss can only be hurt by using the gravity-switching elevators to knock its drone units into it. This is next to impossible when they keep getting destroyed by Super Flickies. So he's broken in a good way and a bad one.
      • The Super and Hyper mode were 100% completion type bonuses which took a while to unlock and gave you the true ending, so it was seen as an award for doing so (the first Sonic had emeralds but no Super/Hyper mode and they added in there to reward the player) so it doesn't intrinsically ruin a normal runthrough of a game, and it *is* optional. It might have been removed because using it at insane speeds on casual stages would have been more difficult. The lightning shield did make some fights easier (like the fire shield did on fire bosses since you were immune to all of their attacks), but the game wasn't a cakewalk with it. So YMMV.
      • In Sonic The hedgehog 2, All seven Chaos Emeralds could be gathered on the first level via a bug in which you chose Sonic Alone in the options, started the game, and jumped into the warp gates to finish each Emerald Stage. This (naturally) allowed you to breeze through the game casually, the only challenge being the final level, in which the player has to fight Metal Sonic and Dr. Robotnik with no protection. Could be an example of being broken in both ways.
      • What do you mean bug? There's enough checkpoints in Emerald Hill Zone to get all the emeralds!
    • In Sonic Heroes, there was Team Rose who was supposed to be the game's version of easy mode, but they took it to the next level considering that their boost charged up extremely quickly, and once it was at full power, their special boost destroyed all the enemies in the vicinity and powered them up even further by instantly raising each character an entire level, which made reaching the max level of 3 all too easy. Combine this with the fact that their levels are about half the length of the other teams levels, and you have absolutely no reason whatsoever to struggle to beat their portion of the game.
    • From |Sonic the Hedgehog 2006 we have Sonic's Purple Gem custom action, which turns Sonic small by holding down a button. It may seem like a novelty at first with the high price of 14,000 Rings, but you'll realize why it's a Game Breaker. While small, Sonic's Homing Attack is replaced with an infinite double jump. This allows you to pass some sections of Action Stages just by double-jumping or easily find Silver Medals. And you can buy this ability right before Sonic's final level.
      • Oh, and on a lesser note, Sonic's Red Gem custom action, which slows down time. Including the in-game timer, making it a bit easier to S-rank some missions.
      • Also, it's possible to skip large sections of Omega's levels thanks to a bug with his hover function. Essentially, pressing the hover button in midair makes Omega cancel all vertical momentum briefly. This means that, by rhythmically pressing and releasing the hover button, you can make Omega fly. This also allows Omega to visit places he isn't even supposed to go, including Shadow's section of Wave Ocean (you even get Shadow's dialogue!) and Sonic's, though the latter has no enemies to fight.
    • Super Sonic returns to his Game Breaker status in Sonic Colors. Though sort of an Infinity+1 Sword due to how long it takes to get him (you have to first obtain all Red Star Rings, which there are five of in every stage, then you have to complete all the Game Land stages, which are seven stages with three acts each), getting him will tear the game apart. The main reasons being that for one, he can boost infinitely, for two, you get a 2000-point "Super Sonic Bonus" every second you spend in Super form, and for three, just using him in a stage means you're guaranteed an S-rank, no questions asked.}}
    • Super Sonic has similar attributes in Sonic Generations, too (both Classic and Modern). They attempted to Nerf him by making his rings decrease much faster than before, but when you have infinite boost, obtaining rings rapidly isn't hard at all.
  • Kirby Super Star: The Hammer. Just... the Hammer. And there's also the Stone if you'd rather defend yourself than abuse the Hammer's laggy but still overly powerful Up+A.
    • The Hammer? That's nothing. Get a second player in the Helper position, and get him the Copy power. Realize he is almost literally unkillable short of huge play mistakes - T.A.C. (the name of the Copy helper) can vanish at will, every time he copies a power (and he can ditch and re-copy at will) his health refills completely - and, if the enemy is un-copy-able, has a decently damaging attack that turns lightning-fast as long as he's near the enemy . Picking up Stone and letting T.A.C. deal with everything without any risk of dying got many players through the Arena in record times.
    • Let us not forget the original Kirby Game Breaker - the Hi-Jump ability in Kirby's Adventure. While in the main stages it was just a funny ability only useful in certain levels, against bosses it became a destruction machine: the combination of invincibility frames and the fact that it has you leap far outside most boss' range of attacks meant that if you were good at timing you could beat pretty much any boss silly without ever taking a hit - the ability could be used both offensively and to dodge things, and the only boss that wasn't made a complete breeze by this were the digger, with whom it's tricky to both attack with Hi-Jump and leap out of attack range, and Meta Knight, who says "screw you" to your Game Breaker and forces you to fight on his level.
    • If your talking about Game Breakers, then you have to include the bomb. It's fast, easy to aim, easy to find, and one of the most powerful basic abilities in the game. Most bosses are a joke when using the bomb, and it's even funnier when Poppy Bros. Jr is your partner for double the bombing action.
    • Don't forget Plasma, which is just stupidly strong when fully charged...and you can charge it while defending.
    • More limited than the others, but Stone can be used to easily blow through The True Arena introduced for Super Star Ultra. Thanks to doing good damage, being easy to hit with, and granting invincibility that can be switched on at any moment, the only bosses even remotely a problem with it are Kaboola (an Unexpected Gameplay Change boss not too hard anyway) and Galacta Knight.
    • The Mirror's offensive power via its dash attack, when combined with a high shield defense that reflects all projectiles, is pretty overpowered in the hands of a patient player.
    • Also, using the Wheelie Rider ability (which is only done with a Wheelie helper) with either two players or one player with the right controls (a modified controller or remapped controller) is nigh unstoppable. Getting around the fact that you're using two controllers (two players that are well coordinated fills this out amazingly), and you've got great mobility and a very powerful projectile attack that can be aimed in eight directions and a very high rate of fire.
  • Kirby's Dreamland 2. Coo + Parasol. The resulting tornado attack provides invincibility frames and an easily maneuvered hitbox. It's so bad that angry Propeller Bombs (which normally One-Hit Kill the animal friend) can be destroyed by it. Needless to say, Coo and the combo itself deserved to be nerfed in KDL 3; Coo is harder to control there, and the combo can actually be pierced by certain attacks, at least including the nose poke counterattack by Whispy Woods.
  • Kirby Squeak Squad's Tornado power. Just...that power. It is overpowered to the point of insanity. You are effectively invincible while using it, you fly with easy controls while using it, it lasts forever, does absurd contact damage, and the kicker? The frame it ends, you can start another tornado. Quite possibly the most definitively broken power in the history of Kirby.
  • Hal Laboratories designed the U.F.O. ability in Kirby's Adventure to smash the game's balance to pieces; it grants hovering and a versatile attack with four levels of charge, the last level of which tears bosses to shreds with only a couple hits. That's why they wisely decided to make the U.F.O. ability wear off after one stage, and on top of that made the Little U.F.O.s that grant the ability the only enemies in the game that never respawn. Unfortunately though, they neglected to catch a glitch that allows Kirby to be a U.F.O. for the entire game.
  • In Kirby Return To Dreamland, the Tornado returns and is more powerful than ever with increased power and invincibility frames than before, it makes most levels and bosses a breeze. This is even extremely powerful on EX-mode, to the point of almost being a requirement to beat all of the challenges on that mode.
  • In the NES game Super Turrican, the wheel form can easily be seen as this. In this form, not only are you invincible, but you damage any enemies you touch. The only downside is that it's kind of hard to control, but not so hard that you can't blitz your way through 90% of any given level without ever standing up. And it makes most boss fights an utter joke.
  • In Ratchet and Clank, the RYNO often qualifies. In Tools of Destruction there is even a warning in the upgraded verion's description that it is a game breaking weapon and use of it may make the game no longer fun.
    • The Rift Inducer of Ratchet and Clank Up Your Arsenal (and later A Crack In Time) is this for any small to medium-sized enemy, which are instantly sucked into the black hole/eaten by Fred the Eldritch Abomination. It's totally worthless for Giant Mooks and bosses though, at least the UYA incarnation.
    • The Groovitron immobilizes every enemy -- including bosses -- in range via uncontrollable dancing. In normal play, the game prevents you from abusing it by giving the device a tiny ammo capacity and making it replenishable through purchase only (or finding ammo in non-respawning Raritanium chests). Tools of Destruction's challenge mode, on the other hand, unlocks the Golden Groovitron, which has infinite ammo.
    • The (Heavy) Bouncer in Going Commando and Up Your Arsenal. It launches a massive ball that hits For Massive Damage, then splits into about 50 smaller bombs that all hit for equally massive damage. This allows you to clear entire areas with ease and turns the final boss of Going Commando into a joke. Furthermore, in Going Commando the ammo clip is absolutely massive, and with all the ammo crates lying around replacing 5-8 ammo per ammo pickup, you're unlikely to ever run out of ammo for the thing (since, remember, a single shot is usually more than enough to clear out an entire room). They tried to nerf it in Up Your Arsenal by lowering the ammo amount, but it still hits just as hard; it's only prevented from being a true Game Breaker in that game by the presence of other weapons that are more broken than itself (see Rift Inducer above).
  • Spelunky: While the game can be so Nintendo Hard that nothing truly breaks the game, having the luck to acquire a jetpack in early levels can render a great many of the challenges moot. Combine with the shotgun and a host of other gear, and you're golden.
    • Likewise, the scepter -- while replacing the powerful shotgun -- is a homing, one-hit-kill on just about everything short of the final boss.
      • If you have the kapala, the shotgun is even more gamebreaking due to the sheer amount of blood it can generate, rendering you nigh-invulnerable even to that angry shopkeeper near the exit.
    • The tunnel man is a definite gamebreaker. With the unbreakable mattock you can get tons of money early on to spend on shop items and avoid a ton of enemies. Getting to the city of gold with a jetpack becomes almost trivially easy, and the last boss can be avoided a lot easier as well. Even though it's impossible to attack while jumping, he starts off with no bombs or ropes and only 2 health instead of 4, playing as the tunnel man is still a lot easier.
  • Metroid, while generally averting or subverting this trope where it can, has several tricks that can lead to this. Infinite bomb-jumping and wall jumping are common tricks among the fans that can lead to sequence breaks; with enough skill and knowledge of where to apply abilities, one can entirely break the game. One example; in Zero Mission getting the Super Missiles before making it to Kraid destroyed him as even a minor threat; three super missiles kill him before he even manages to attack once.
  • Super Meat Boy has Steve from Minecraft in the PC version which makes numerous levels extremely easy since he can create and destroy tiles at will. Often many other characters can break individual levels.
  • Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier has the Armageddon plane weapon, especially in the Hero-Mode-only plane known as the Jaguar. Without even fully upgrading the Judgment missiles it fires, it is possible to clear out pretty much any major aerial fight barring bosses in one big Macross Missile Massacre (and bosses are still fairly easy to disassemble). Let's put it this way: "hunt the transport" missions from pirate radio towers are set up so you have about four minutes to finish them. The Jaguar fitted with a block of 4x Level 4 Armageddon can complete that particular raid in twenty to thirty seconds, and that includes the flight from the tower to the target. And this is without the infinite ammo unlockable.
  • In the Flash RPG side-scroller game The Last Stand 2: Union City, the player character can recruit one of two companions that will accompany them (until either both characters or just the player character are killed, rendering them unusable) for the rest of the game. Normally, you can equip them with a weapon and they will be able to fire unlimited rounds. This includes the RPG, which can be found fairly early in the game. Give this to a companion, and you'll never have to worry about random hordes attacking ever again.
    • Due to the game respawning zombies after you leave a screen, the player can conceivably grind kills at the very beginning of the game to earn achievements (and, consequently, enough skill points to level up their characters far above the requirements for most of the game). Sure, the game stops awarding you after a certain point once you've leveled enough, but the tens of thousands of XP points you receive once you nab the achievements (some of which can be accomplished with 20 minutes of grinding) will give you an unbeatable advantage for most of the game.
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on the NES: The 'ninja scroll' special weapon.
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