Slamscape is a Vehicular Combat game released for the PS1 and PC in 1996. Its story, as irrelevant as it is, is that you're hot off the heels of a car crash and have been taken away to be hooked up to the SlamScape Remulator, a virtual world gone haywire, where you have to collect the four Orb-IDs in each level and shut the whole thing down. In practice it's closer to a puzzle game than an action game, despite its tagline of "High Speed, High Stakes Action Game", so reading further could count as spoilers for its puzzles.
Tropes featured in Slamscape include:
- Abhorrent Admirer: Played for Laughs in the manual's description of Danger Ranger. It notes that he's The Bully, but also muses it's possible he actually "really, really, really likes you and can't bear a single moment alone."
- Anti-Frustration Features: They're very few and far between in this game, but they are there:
- If a Queen Snagger carries you through the Hailfire Zone of Endless Bummer, the cloud won't rain on you.
- The final level doesn't require you to have a full set of nodes upon completion: all you need to do to win is get the four Orb-IDs.
- Bandit Mook: The Nodesnaggers, flying hooks on helicopters, will frequently swing by trying to take away any Power Nodes you might have on you.
- BFG: The Torp weapon, a powerful single-shot blast that hits hard and can be fired rapidly by mashing the button.
- Circus of Fear: Level 1, Carnivalhalla, obviously.
- Cool Car: The Slamjet certainly qualifies.
- Covers Always Lie: The game's cover features a Shreddy Bear along with an enemy that doesn't actually appear in-game. Said enemy, a car battery with snake-like jumper cables on it, only actually appears in-game as a piece of concept art in the hidden developer FMV
which depicts it shooting electricity. One can assume it was intended for Repsychler and possibly behaved like the Brain Fish Bowls of Uraniumania. - Damage-Sponge Boss: Crabzilla in Endless Bummer, the closest thing to a real boss the game has other than Carnivalhalla's Furious Wheel, requires twenty shots of Torp or two hundred of Shockaball or Ripstar before it'll go down. The Clambake also in Endless Bummer doesn't fight back, but it holds an Orb-ID and an uninterrupted stream of fire is necessary to force it open. Hold up for even a moment and it'll shut, forcing you to restart with it from scratch.
- Down in the Dumps: Level 3, Repsychler.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: Earn is right, as if you miss any of the Orb-IDs through out your playthrough, you're kicked back to the beginning of the game until you collect them all. Only then will you be allowed to see the actual ending.
- Evolving Music: The music changes based on what colors of Power Nodes you have (except in Viva Los Vagrantes) and what threats are around you.
- Excuse Plot: Aside from the intro FMV itself and the ending FMV, the story has absolutely no bearing on anything whatsoever.
- Eye Scream: According to the intro FMV, connecting to the SlamScape Remulator involves a device with two needles that go directly into the eyes. Fun.
- "Get Back Here!" Boss: For a given definition of boss, the Keepaway Crane in Repsychler and the Volleybeasts in Endless Bummer. Neither can be damaged, with the Keepaway Crane instead swinging around to keep you from getting its Orb-ID and the Volleybeasts throwing it to each other to the same effect.
- Giant Enemy Crab: Crabzilla, a giant crab with sunglasses and a conch-cannon that shoots starfish.
- Guide Dang It!: Without the manual, the game is very obtuse and provides no suggestion of what it wants you to do or how you're supposed to do it. In particular, the fact that it's possible to perform a high jump by pressing the jump button twice in rapid succession is very important to being able to reliably collect any one of the Orb-IDs in Carnivalhalla, meaning that if you aren't told about that and don't blunder into realizing it by accident then you'll probably be at a loss for a while.
- Harmless Enemy: The Metrognomes. They can't hurt you at all, and shooting them will send them rocketing straight up into the air.
- Heart Container: The Power Nodes, though they can be stolen by Nodesnaggers or knocked off by various other things including Shreddy Bears. They're also lost between stages, so you'll need to find a new set each time.
- Heavily Armored Mook: Dumpster Longlegs cannot be damaged unless the top of its lid is open. Fortunately, it can be briefly swung open by running into it, and mashing yourself into it from behind will open it up enough to wear it down with the Shockaball just fine.
- Invincible Minor Minion: The Danger Ranger in Carnivalhalla and Uraniumania. Minetraps or Torp can stun it and make it stop moving for a while, but there's no destroying it until Repsychler where you can use a hydraulic press called The Fixer to smash it. It doesn't appear in Endless Bummer, but then comes back with a new paint job in Viva Los Vagrantes, where you can send it off to the same fate as in Repsychler. The Hailfire Zone, a black cloud in Endless Bummer, also counts as there's nothing you can do to get rid of it.
- Killer Teddy Bear: The Shreddy Bears. They're tough enough that the Shockaball and Ripstar can't take them down, but they can be reduced to loose stuffing with Torp or a Minetrap. Very fitting in the latter case given that Minetraps are modeled after bear traps.
- Low-Speed Chase: The Hailfire Zone is an area with a number of umbrellas, an Orb-ID, and an ominous black cloud that chases you and rains damaging droplets of water on you. If you creep through the zone slowly, though, the black cloud will follow you but won't rain on you.
- MacGuffin: The Orb-IDs are the primary one, but the Power Nodes also count due to it being necessary to have a full set when leaving each level to reach Level 5, Viva Los Vagrantes.
- Mooks Ate My Equipment: The Dumpster Longlegs will wander around and take anything it happens along for itself, including Power Nodes on you if you give it the chance. Blowing it up will release everything it found plus whatever it already had when the stage started, such as Power Nodes or Torp.
- More Dakka: The Ripstar is the hold-to-rapid fire weapon, and obtained in packs of 100.
- Palmtree Panic: Level 4, Endless Bummer, even containing a shark despite the lack of any bodies of water to be found.
- Personal Space Invader:
- The Queen Snagger, which normally just flies around picking up and moving whatever it wants to wherever it wants, is plenty capable of grabbing your Slamjet and hauling you over to the exit gate at the center of the map. Sometimes it's possible to shoot it and free yourself, but other times you'll just have to wait until it lets you go on its own.
- The aptly-named Energy Leech is a small, y-shaped, hopping creature that clings to your vehicle and sucks your health. There's no way to shake it off; all you can do is wait for it to detatch on its own.
- Piñata Enemy: The Dumpster Longlegs again.
- Pinball Zone: Level 2, Uraniumania, for having pinball bumpers that can send you flying around if you run into them.
- Pushy Mooks: The Danger Ranger has no weapons, but is quite insistent on bumping into you.
- Puzzle Boss: The rule rather than the exception, as the only things that hold an Orb-ID and actively fight back against you are the Furious Wheel in Carnivalhalla and Crabzilla in Endless Bummer and Viva Los Vagrantes.
- Ramming Always Works: Repsychler has the assembly of Beyond Toasterdome and Cog Native protecting an Orb-ID. Neither can be damaged by your weapons and the former will take off half of your longest possible health bar if you bump into it, with the solution being to ram Cog Native at full speed to make it crash into Beyond Toasterdome and destroy them both.
- Ranged Emergency Weapon: The Shockaball. While perfectly viable for general use, it lacks the convenience of being able to just hold the fire button that Ripstar has and the power of of Torp.
- Respawning Enemies: Only Nodesnaggers, Queen Snaggers, and Finito in Endless Bummer. Anything else that's destroyed will stay gone, which is very important to alleviating pressure in Viva Los Vagrantes in particular. Given that Nodesnaggers are the only renewable source of health pickups, their respawning is something of a give and take.
- Secret Level: There's a level accessible only by password which shares its name with Endless Bummer and lets you play as a different vehicle known as the "Groove Machine" in lieu of the Slamjet used in the rest of the game, though it functions identically. There's no hope of completing it, as one of the four Orb-IDs needed to open the gate appears to be missing in its entirety.
- Tactical Suicide Boss: The Metrognome Mothership. It routinely spews Metrognomes, which are the only thing capable of destroying it. It'd be much safer if it simply didn't do that.
- The Most Dangerous Video Game: The SlamScape Remulator itself.
- Threatening Shark: Or rather Threatening Shark Fin in the form of Finito in Endless Bummer. You never see if there is a shark underneath it, but considering the massive damage it can do if it crashes into you it's probably better that way. Worse still, while it can be destroyed with Torp it'll be back in a matter of seconds.
- Upgraded Boss: Level 5, Viva Los Vagrantes, features the return of the Rotospoke from Carnivalhalla, the Metrognome Mothership from Uraniumania, the Keepaway Crane from Repsychler, and Crabzilla from Endless Bummer. In particular, the Rotospoke and Keepaway Crane are much bigger than they were in their initial stages, requiring an adjustment of tactics to get their Orb-IDs again. The Metrognome Mothership is also larger than it was in Uraniumania, though given how it has to be attacked this really is not to its benefit.