Sine Mora



"''Holding in his hands a giant sieve

Time stands ever sifting

He sifts through worlds, he picks them out

Not with regret, but with delight

He grieves only those that fall

And those that fall deserve to fall

Time spares no pity for offal

Waning nations, cold worlds',

Broken lives' miasmal desire

It's death they deserve - and nothing less.''"

Sine Mora is a side-scrolling Bullet Hell Shoot'Em Up game developed in a collaborative effort by Suda51 at Grasshopper Manufacture, and Digital Reality (creators of Sky Drift). It was published by Microsoft on March 21st, 2012.

This 2d shooting side-scroller has a twist involving time control. There are no lives, nor does getting hit cause you to immediately die. Instead, players have a time meter constantly counting down. Destroying enemies adds time, while getting damaged removes time. This gives beginners more chances to make mistakes, but in advanced play, players need to constantly destroy enemies while not getting hurt to avoid the time running out. The airplanes in this game have different times of Time Capsules that have different time control effects, such as slowing the game down to avoid damage, or rewinding time, even after death.

Another thing that makes the game unique to the genre is the amount of depth that went into the game's chilling, tragic story and setting. The story is set in a Diesel Punk alien planet called Seol, with two major warring factions: The Empire and a time-controlling civilization known as The Enkies, with the story starting with the Enkie's obliteration. The story directly revolves around the actions of two different groups of Anti Heroes devastated by the recent events. Leading one group is Ronotra Koss, who seeks revenge against The Empire for the death of his son, Argus Pytel, dragging Myryan into the conflict via blackmail. The other major group is the last of The Resistance, consisting of Durak, Akyta Dryad, and Lynthe Ytoo. The language spoken in the game is Hungarian, telling a tragic story of revenge and genocide.

After players finish the Story, more hardcore players can try their hand at Arcade Mode, which only has two modes, Hard and Insane.

Sine Mora contains examples of:

 * The Alcoholic: Koss.
 * Alternative Calendar: The Enkies founded the first calendar of their world, with Circles being the largest time unit, essentially replacing years. The Empire founded it's own calendar, banning all others.
 * Anachronic Order: The story is told mostly in a straightforward timeline, but later bounces back and forth as flashbacks and  occurs.
 * And I Must Scream:
 * Animal Motifs: Girai is a robot resembling an Orangutan.
 * Anti-Hero: Pretty much the whole cast, but Koss is a definite Type V. Doesn't give a damn about anything but his revenge, is hellbent on murdering every single member of the Cobalt King crew despite only one of them having anything to do with his son's death, and his plans include blackmailing a rape victim.
 * Attack Drone: Myryan's special ability, Gemini Drone.
 * Badass Furry: The entire cast. Until the characters start cursing and telling their terrifying story of treason and genocide, you would never know it was a Suda51 game.
 * Battleship Raid: The Prologue.
 * Because Destiny Says So
 * Becoming the Mask:
 * Blue Blood: Durak.
 * Broken Ace: Koss
 * Broken Bird: Durak,  who can't have children, and has been devastated over it.
 * Bullet Hell
 * The Chosen One: Enky, the first and greatest of the Enkies.
 * Continuing Is Painful: Not as severe as say, Gradius, but if the player takes a hit, they drop weapon upgrades, and scrambling to retrieve them can cause the player to recklessly take more damage.
 * Crapsack World: The earth quakes violently everywhere, The Empire kills off their elderly ritualistically, both the Empire and the Enkies have a strict caste system that rules over it's subjects. And the Empire pretty much encompasses the whole planet.
 * Darker and Edgier: The characters are reminiscent of Star Fox, but the story is much more mature and tragic.
 * Death by Irony:
 * Diesel Punk
 * Disabled Hottie: Myryan, in universe, is popular for her beauty, despite losing her voice due to larynx cancer and having to wear a voice box around her neck to speak.
 * Downer Ending: Both the normal and Golden Ending.
 * Dynamic Difficulty: The story mode has a casual setting for beginners, and provides lots of time boosts for casual players. Advanced players can change the story to Challenging Mode, and finally, Arcade Mode exclusively has two difficulties, Hard and Insane.
 * Dysfunction Junction: Pretty much the whole playable cast.
 * Everything Trying to Kill You
 * Evilutionary Biologist: The Empire's policy on family is that
 * Face Death with Dignity:
 * Fairy Tale Motifs: The spider boss is called Tsuchigumo, a mythical spider that spreads plagues.
 * Flower Motifs: A rose is the Sine Mora emblem, painted on the Enkie rebels planes.
 * Free-Love Future: The Empire are extreme polygamists and The Enkies are monogomists. The empire has as much children as they can and kill their elderly while the Enkies have traditional relationships of monogamous civilizations. The Empire calls this heresy.
 * Handicapped Badass: Koss and Myryan. Myran speaks through a voice box due to throat cancer, and although you won't know it until you look at him on the character select screen, Koss has no legs.
 * Hoist by His Own Petard:
 * Hurtbox Dissonance
 * Hunter of His Own Kind: The Collaborationists are Enkies against the Sine Mora beliefs. Nationalized by The Empire, they use their time control abilities against the Enkies, helping the Empire fight them and round up Enkie slaves for The Project. Koss, Argus, Myryan and Lynthe got their start as Collaborationists.
 * Interspecies Romance: Koss is a bison and his son Argus is a wolverine, then there's, so it's likely this is accepted in the Sine Mora universe.
 * It's All About Me: Durak.
 * The Empire itself might count as well.
 * Keeping Secrets Sucks:
 * Last of Her Kind: Akyta is the last lower-class Enkie, and Durak is the last of the upper class. Myryan is also Enkie, secretly and successfully nationalized by the Empire without knowing her true abilities.
 * Living MacGuffin: The Enkies.
 * Love At First Sight: Lynthe Ytoo thoroughly discusses it in the Alternative text,
 * Macross Missile Massacre: Argus Pytrel's Seeker Missile ability.
 * The Magic Goes Away:
 * Manipulative Bastard: Koss has no problems blackmailing Myryan Magusa into serving him.
 * More Dakka
 * My God, What Have I Done?
 * Akyta fights the last boss,
 * No Antagonist: The Empire is pretty much the main villain, but they practically already rule the planet already. Several of the playable characters acknowledge that they are on one side, and perspective, of their conflict. Koss and Myryan are on nobody's side but their own. The Resistance is more directly toward fighting the Empire to save the Enkies, rather than harm the Empire.
 * Only One Name: Durak, because she is an upper class Enkie, who only have one name.
 * Poison Mushroom: There is one fake item that is dark blue with "???" on it. Touching it causes a Piano Drop, killing you. Doing this at least once is a requirement for the final promotion achievement.
 * Powered by a Forsaken Child: The Project imprisons and enslaves the last of the Enkies exclusively for creating a Time Control center. This center is used both as a weapon and for predicting tectonic shifts on the planet's volatile surface.
 * Rape as Backstory: Myryan Magusa.
 * Reactor Boss: The Final Boss.
 * Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated:
 * Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Pretty much everything Koss does is exclusive to his own desire for revenge. Even as he
 * Scary Dogmatic Aliens: The Empire are the Dirty Communists, and the Enkies are The Fundamentalists.
 * Set Right What Once Went Wrong: Of all people, it's
 * Shoot'Em Up
 * Smoking Is Cool: Argus and Lynthe smoke.
 * Stable Time Loop: In the Golden Ending,
 * Start of Darkness: Koss losing his son. Later,
 * The Fatalist: Every single Enkie.
 * Time Master: The Enkies.
 * Time Travel: The Enkies can travel through time on a whim, making them very elusive targets for The Empire.
 * Timey-Wimey Ball
 * Title Drop: Sine Mora = "Without Delay." It is the name of the Enkie time travel school, and the final line in the story.
 * Timey-Wimey Ball
 * Title Drop: Sine Mora = "Without Delay." It is the name of the Enkie time travel school, and the final line in the story.


 * Villain Protagonist: Koss.
 * Wave Motion Gun: Lynthe Ytoo's special ability, Zebaoth Driller.
 * Wrench Wench: Myryan Magusa.
 * You Can't Fight Fate
 * Your Days Are Numbered: Quite literally, the Enkies live knowing the exact day they will die, with the first Enkie predicting the exact moment their race goes extinct, down to the day and hour. A kind of bible called The Book of Days to Come keeps the moment each Enkie dies, in writing.