Oddworld/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • And the Fandom Rejoiced:
    • The news in 2010 that there will be new Oddworld games, and a Play Station 3 remake of Stranger's Wrath.
    • To a lesser extent, the OddBoxx was released in Dec. 2010, featuring all four Oddworld games for PC.
  • Broken Aesop: In Abe's Oddysee, we're told that Scrabs and Paramites are sacred creatures that lost respect after being farmed for food. So what's the best way to show your respect for them? By trampling through their sacred grounds and killing any that provoke you or stand in your way of course!
  • Complete Monster:
    • The website bio of the Vykkers (here) implies them to be this, though as far as gameplay goes, they are really no worse than the other villains.
    • Molluck is no better. He's willing to cause genocide just to make profit.
    • And Sekto. He hunted the Steef race for sport, causing them to become endangered
  • Demonic Spiders:
    • In Exoddus, the Fleeches are these leech-like creatures that will kill you with five hits. They're asleep, but wake up if you make anything resembling a sound (unless you're invisible). Problem is, the stage setup is such that if you don't perfectly time when you turn invisibility on, you're dead. When you have invisibility. Not to mention that they are very adept climbers and VERY fast movers.
    • During the first game, you will come across bats flittering about now and then. There is no indication that they are anything more than harmless background scenery - until you touch one and die instantly. They cannot be killed, and sometimes enjoy flittering around timing-based jumping puzzles.
    • In Munch's Oddysee, Vykker Sawbones. They kill you in 3 hits, are fast, have a lot of health, and usually come in groups.
  • Kinetic Weapons Are Just Better: Granted, possession is cool, but Stranger and the Sligs make a good case for this trope.
  • Nightmare Fuel: Seeing various creatures get shot, sliced up by meat grinders, beaten to death, crushed by meat carcasses, electrocuted, eaten, or blown up is not for kids. Oh, and the bad ending of Abe's Oddysee is a more graphic version of one of the above.
  • Porting Disaster: Although the problems had mostly been patched, the PC ports of Munch's Oddysee and Stranger's Wrath were definitely this. When a Crysis-grade computer struggled to run five-year-old Xbox games whose graphics haven't been upgraded besides higher resolution options, not to mention control problems with the former, something's horribly wrong.
  • Tear Jerker: The opening to Munch's Oddysee is pretty sad.

Munch: My name is Munch, and I've been singing for them ever since. But nobody sings back.

  • Too Good to Last
  • Ugly Cute: This game pretty much runs on it.
  • Villain Decay - In the first game the Glukkons are going to have their slaves chop up their other slaves and sell them all as meat, killing and eating every Mudokon they could get their hands on in what amounts to genocide. In the second game, they have blind Mudokons dig up the bones of already-dead Mudokons as a secret ingredient in a vending machine drink, and use electric shock to make other Mudokons cry as the other ingredient. It's more cruel in some ways, but they're not killing anyone. (Because they can't, with Rupture farms rendered inoperable) In the third game, the Glukkons do things like trying to cut down a forest to make toothpicks. At this point some of the Mudokons have even willingly joined the Glukkons to make some money!
    • This seems to be intentional. Molluck was an evil bastard who enjoyed the challenge of killing his workforce. His subordinates in Exoddus don't really care about what happens to the Mudokons, so long as the moolah train keeps rolling in. (With the exception of the Brewmaster, who is obsessed with torture to make the best brew). In the third, everyone's just happy with the Mudokons being slave labour. It's the Vykkers who are looking for some suffering to inflict on everyone.
  • Wham! Line: A minor example; first time players following the LED tutorials (which recommend running straight for the exit) will be shocked to be met with a sign stating those they failed to save will be executed should you fail to backtrack for them all.
  • The Woobie - Poor Abe...all of the sympathetic characters in the series are this, really.