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Brain Training
Games which are made and marketed with the specific purpose of helping the player improve their mental abilities.
Appears in 27 games
First appeared in Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day!
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Xbox Live Arcade Game Integration
Items, experience, outfits, and/or gold earned in an Xbox Live Arcade game are transferred to the larger disc game.
Appears in 12 games
First appeared in Wolfenstein 3D
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Licensed Soundtrack
Games that incorporate licensed music from popular bands and musicians for their soundtracks.
Appears in 368 games
First appeared in Super Locomotive
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Kill to Death Ratio
A comparison between how many kills a player has made and how many deaths they have suffered. A staple of multiplayer FPS matches as an at-a-glance measure of performance.
Appears in 108 games
First appeared in Doom II: Hell on Earth
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Permanent Death
A concept where the game must be restarted if you are killed. It is a mechanic found in most arcade games, but the term is usually used in reference to the RPG genre where the mechanic is less common, particularly "roguelike" games as well as strategy games such as Fire Emblem or Final Fantasy Tactics where characters die if they are defeated in battle. Often used as a significant plot device.
Appears in 163 games
First appeared in Space Invaders
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The Tediz
A race of engineered teddy bears with a short temper. They were created by Professor Von Kriplespec
Appears in 2 games
First appeared in Conker's Bad Fur Day
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SCUMM
SCUMM is an acronym for Script Creation Utility for Maniac Mansion. SCUMM is scripting language developed internally at LucasArts to help streamline the creation of graphic adventure games.
Appears in 52 games
First appeared in Maniac Mansion
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Disc Streaming
A technology that allows a game to continuously load information off a disc while the player is in game to prevent loading screens.
Appears in 45 games
First appeared in No-Ri-Ko
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Shinigami
Shinigamis in the fiction of Bleach are individuals organized in ranks that escort the souls of the dead from earth to the Seretai, the city of the afterlife. Higher ranked shinigamis are charged with the protection of this city.
Appears in 14 games
First appeared in Bleach: Heat the Soul 2
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Spiritual Successor
When a developer creates a game that could be perceived as a new instalment in an existing franchise that they've worked on before, but doesn't share the same name due to licensing issues or other reasons, it's called a spiritual successor.
Appears in 103 games
First appeared in Hokkaidou Rensa Satsujin: Ohotsuku ni Kiyu!!
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Anti-Hero
A protagonist who lacks some or all of the qualities traditionally seen as heroic.
Appears in 241 games
First appeared in Lupin III
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Self Destruct Sequence
Often a timed sequence where players must escape a building, spaceship, planet, etc... before it explodes.
Appears in 34 games
First appeared in Cosmic Chasm
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Sidekick
Sidekicks, different from partners, are less powerful, less important characters who support the main protagonist and generally stick by their side.
Appears in 185 games
First appeared in Mario Bros.
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Virtual Reality
Games that have you going into a computer generated virtual universe.
Appears in 131 games
First appeared in Tron
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Mini-Boss
An opponent that typically appears around the halfway point in a level. Mini-Bosses are more formidable than the average opponent, though normally not as tough as the end-level Boss.
Appears in 284 games
First appeared in Dragon Buster
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Strategic Dismemberment
Strategic dismemberment allows players to separate an enemy's limbs from its body without killing it, disabling limb-specific functions.
Appears in 31 games
First appeared in Bushido Blade
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User Created Mod
A mod is a user-created patch that alters any part of a game, or adds new content to it. At the extreme, "total conversion" mods can change the game so much that an entirely new experience is created.
Appears in 140 games
First appeared in Legend of the Red Dragon
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Lock On
Lock On is a game mechanic that allows the player to automatically center the character's aim on a target, usually done with a toggle or a press of a button.
Appears in 189 games
First appeared in Kidou Senshi Gundam Part 2: Tobe Gundam
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Flanking
A combat maneuver in which one attacks or threatens the side of an enemy unit or formation. Used primarily to negate cover or gain a tactical advantage by attacking from an unexpected direction.
Appears in 49 games
First appeared in Ground Control
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Tower Defense
A type of gameplay where the player chooses and builds autonomous towers to protect a location from waves of enemies.
Appears in 175 games
First appeared in Hoi Hoi
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The Locked Door
It's the designer's go-to guy. If they want to steer a player in a given direction they'll lock an in game door and force the player to find a way to either unlock it or find an alternate route.
Appears in 362 games
First appeared in Castle Wolfenstein
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Psychic Ability
Psychic abilities are featured in many different video games and in many forms, from the PSI powers of Ness from Earthbound to the mind-reading abilities of Psycho Mantis from Metal Gear Solid.
Appears in 89 games
First appeared in Psychic City
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Skill Stick
Skill stick is a concept used in hockey games to accurately immitate using a hockey stick by moving the right analog stick in certain directions and gestures.
Appears in 8 games
First appeared in NHL 07
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Mount
Animals that can be ridden by players to get around faster.
Appears in 141 games
First appeared in Gun.Smoke
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Alien Invasion
Games with stories that involve aliens invading another planet.
Appears in 261 games
First appeared in Space Invaders
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Transformation
A transformation is a different stage or form for something. Usually an upgrade.
Appears in 400 games
First appeared in Fathom
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Character Class
Classes are different archetypes and playstyles that players can choose to play their game with.
Appears in 461 games
First appeared in Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord
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Lightning Manipulation
The ability to control the direction and/or behavior of lightning; this may also be connected with the ability to generate lightning. Many games involve characters with lightning element attacks. These are unique because of their potency with water.
Appears in 171 games
First appeared in Mega Man
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Big Head Mode
An option that makes the physical character models in the game have enormous heads, and occasionally equally oversized arms. Usually accessed through a cheat code.
Appears in 65 games
First appeared in NBA Jam
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Instagib
Instagib is a gametype in many first-person shooter games where a single shot can instantly kill an opponent from any range
Appears in 20 games
First appeared in Quake II
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Super Bouncing
A multiplayer glitch in Halo 2 that allowed players to "bounce" to previously unreachable areas of various multiplayer maps.
Appears in 2 games
First appeared in Donkey Kong Country Returns
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Hit Points
An numeral indication of how much damage a character can sustain. The loss of all hit points results in the death of the character or another penalty.
Appears in 740 games
First appeared in DND
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Death Knight
A fallen knightly champion (often a Paladin) who has returned as an undead. Not to be confused with Black Knight (though a character can certainly be both). Most commonly seen in High Fantasy roleplaying settings like Dungeons and Dragons and WarCraft.
Appears in 15 games
First appeared in Champions of Krynn
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Cocoadile
You may not think it when the Sour Cocoadile barges into your garden with jaws gnashing, but it's an easy- going and helpful Piñata once tamed. Even if it never overcomes its regrettable weakness for waterfowl.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Cluckle
Not usually to be found roaming the wilds of Piñata Island, Cluckles can be be picked up at the local pet emporium. Their hatching instincts and desirability to predators (harsh but true) should justify the expense.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Cinnamonkey
Cinnamonkeys don't need much in life, just a reliable supply of their favourite foodstuff and easy access to trees for swinging and climbing purposes. Maybe also a suave hat, depending on the circumstances.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Chippopotamus
The Chippopotamus needs such a specialised living environment - and so much food - that attracting one could involve a redesign of the entire garden. Be sure that your other Piñatas don't get under its feet...
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Chewnicorn
The stuff of Piñata legend. Most gardeners can only dream of a Chewnicorn resident, so strict are these gem-hungry creatures' requirements. However, their healing touch is a great reward for all that hard work.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Candary
Clearly Sparrowmints do like butter. So much so that minimal effort will prompt their evolution into a brand new species: the musically inclined Candary, friend of the Diggerling (but not such a fan of the Buzzenge).
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Buzzlegum
Barely keeping its bulbous body aloft, the Buzzlegum drifts lazily around the garden. If treated with care and properly equipped it can produce valuable honey, but beware of its ongoing feud with the humble Raisant.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Buzzenge
The steely Buzzenge tends to pretty much ignore all non-winged types of Piñata. It's an efficient hunter of smaller birds as long as it rules the roost, but may struggle when other birds of prey begin to arrive.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Bunnycomb
Easy to attract to your garden, but just as easy to lose to the appetite of a Pretztail, the Bunnycomb has no real option but to live life for the moment. Favourite food: root vegetables, favourite colour... orange.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Barkbark
You're unlikely to find a more visibly, unreasoningly happy Piñata than the Barkbark. To get best results, take everything you know about canine likes and dislikes and put that knowledge into practice here.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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Bonboon
While not too keen on its fellow simians, the Bonboon does have a definite talent for calming trouble in the garden. Of course, its troublesome Sour nature will need to be suppressed with a lesson in humility first.
Appears in 3 games
First appeared in Viva Piñata
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