Some games arguably play fair in their noble attempts to bait players into an untimely demise. Others employ nefarious and nearly inescapable methods. Dying in an unfair manner may suck in the moment, but it at least gives us, the poor unsuspecting targets, something to laugh about later.
To that end, from Tomb Raider to The Lion King, here’s a list of some of the most unfair traps in video game history.
Tomb Raider’s Golden Death Trap
If you’re into Greek Mythology, chances are you’ve heard about King Midas. He was a Greek King who had the power to turn everything he touched into gold. One thing about young Tomb Raider players, however, is that they were likely unaware of the great tales of old because they were too busy playing the great tales of the new.
In the first Tomb Raider, there’s a room where we can see and climb a giant hand statue. Sadly, climbing it turns Lara into a solid gold statue and awards players a free trip to the Game Over screen. Turns out that’s the hand of King Midas. A hand turned inexplicably huge and retains the man’s powers even after death.
Bonus points in cheekiness for whoever decided to call the game’s special edition Tomb Raider Gold.
The one-kick skeleton in Dark Souls
This is, in my opinion, both the most unfair and the funniest trap in the entirety of the Souls series. In the Tomb of the Giants, below the Catacombs, there’s a very tight passage that’s all wall on your left and a deadly cliff on your right. Oh, there’s also a skeleton archer at the end, shooting arrows at the player.
The immediate threat naturally demands all of your attention, so first-timers will usually raise their shields and slowly move toward the skelly archer. Nice idea, but unfortunately, the devs put a very sly skeleton in a really small aperture to the player’s left. His job? Just to kick players and have them fall to their deaths.
This is Dark Souls at both its nastiest and at its most hilarious.
Exploding Armadillo in Ninja Gaiden 2
Not too long ago, Ninja Gaiden, not Dark Souls, was our go-to when we wanted to get a nice fix of humility. Just like in Dark Souls, most bosses in Ninja Gaiden 2 are what we call “tough but fair”. The fiery armadillo, however, is not. This boss is already pretty challenging by itself, but it somehow becomes even worse upon death.
Unlike many bosses in the Souls series, which actually get weaker when damaged, dropping the armadillo’s health to zero only makes him hit harder. Upon death, he explodes in a manner that’ll kill anyone who doesn’t immediately press block.
I’d be okay if this were to come from a bomb-shaped creature like the, uh, bombs, in the Final Fantasy series, or even from an unstable robot, but a nuclear explosion is something I never expected out of an armadillo.
The Lion King’s second-level monkey madness
Many never beat The Lion King for the Sega Genesis or SNES because they got stuck on the second level. You’re likely to think that, well, if it’s this hard, you don’t even want to sit around to find out how much more difficult the rest of the game will be. Well, it turns out that it isn’t.
The devs put an exceedingly difficult section in the second level because of video game rentals. Yes, this is no conspiracy theory. The game came out when video game rentals were a big deal, and Disney feared players would rent the game once, beat it, and return it without paying full price.
The devs “solved” this problem by making it nigh-impossible to beat for anyone without a guide, and still pretty damn hard even for people willing to spend the time you need to solve its weird monkey-based puzzle.
Fake safe zone in Final Fantasy XII
Do you know how in most Final Fantasy games, the sight of a save point feels like a light at the end of the tunnel?
Well, not in one very specific and very tough dungeon in Final Fantasy XII where the game presents players with a green save crystal (instead of a blue or orange one). Green is a color we often associate with pastures and health and good stuff, so green is probably safe, right? Wrong. This save crystal is actually a rather powerful mimic (crystalbug) that does its best to take down your already weakened party.
How dare Final Fantasy destroy our trust in crystals, the thing that it has always been all about?
Fake cry in No More Heroes
No More Heroes features a battle against Charlotte Birkin, aka Bad Girl. Once the players inflict enough damage upon her, she’ll fall down and begin to cry. This will look like a great option to get some extra damage in. Yes, hundreds of games have told us that we should totally hit bosses with everything we have when they’re staggered — but it might not be.
Trying to damage Bad Girl when she’s really down will hold good results. Too bad that she also has a fake crying animation that she’ll put to great use. Attempting to get an attack in while she’s like this will result in her hitting players with an Insta-death move.
The entirety of Sen’s Fortress in Dark Souls
The original Dark Souls caused a lot of headaches due to its tough bosses and even surprisingly deadly regular enemies. Still, it features another element that makes it easily the hardest game in the series: Sen’s Fortress.
Seemingly inspired by an old PS1 game called Deathtrap Dungeon, Sen’s Fortress is just a gauntlet of, well, deadly traps. It’s such a devious place that it even has its only bonfire hidden from players. I love Sen’s Fortress, but I can totally get why Miyazaki and Co. never featured anything similar in any other game in the series.
The entirety of Tomb Raider 3
I thought about putting the later boulder traps in the first game in here. I also considered listing the gauntlet of traps from the Great Wall of China level in Tomb Raider 2. Still, I think it would be unfair to not just mention the entire third game in the series because it really is just an endless gauntlet of death.
The Tomb Raider games of the PS1 era were challenging. They required players to do a lot of detective work and also featured some rather unfair traps you could only beat via trial and error. Still, nothing could prepare even the more die-hard fans for what they were about to encounter in Tomb Raider 3. It was filled the game with unforgiving traps that killed players immediately and forced them to reload.
This game was deadly even in moments when previous TR games merely posed a nice challenge. In Tomb Raider 3: Tomb Harder, most jump miscalculations will land you not on a casual redo, but in Lara falling to her death.
Whereas all other games in the series give players some time to explore their surroundings and get accustomed to the environment, Tomb Raider 3 features its first deadly trap around three seconds into the game. No joke.
The torture sequence in Metal Gear Solid
Regardless of how well you’re playing, the bad guys will still catch you at some point in Metal Gear Solid.
That’s not even the most unfair part, either. Getting caught lands Snake in a torture chamber. He then has to either press a button as quickly as possible to resist and keep his health bar from reaching zero, or simply give up. Giving up immediately dooms players to the game’s bad ending, but there’s an even worse possibility. If you try to resist and fail, MGS gives you no continue option. The only reward players get for their misplaced bravery is the solace of a final Game Over screen.
That’s especially bad for people like me who beat the original MGS before he got to buy a memory card.
