Unrealism
Video game concept
Any tags that describe elements that are not necessarily game-like but still do not adhere to reality.
Alternate names: Logic errors, Elements of convenience
Related group
Video game
Game-like elements
Child groups
| Absolute armor | Armor, energy shields, etc. provide absolute protection for the wearer until they have been completely obliterated. | 1991 / 2020 | 37 games | |
| Air control | Player has abnormal amount of control over movement while in air. | 1990 / 2022 | 110 games | |
| Bloodless | Despite characters getting shot, stabbed, or otherwise mutilated, there's no blood. | 1975 / 2019 | 98 games | |
| Dissolving corpses | The bodies of recently slain dissolve or otherwise rapidly disappear immediately or soon after death. | 1990 / 2019 | 152 games | |
| Dissolving items | Dropped items, powerups or other objects of interest disappear after a short time. | 1989 / 2018 | 52 games | |
| Falloff death | Falling out of the play field results in death. As opposed to transitioning to a different area. This can coexist. | 1983 / 2013 | 11 games | |
| Flat space | Space, despite its lack of any limitations on movement and positioning, is depicted as a flat expanse of nothing. | 2000 / 2017 | 43 games | |
| Homing boulders | Projectiles that one would not ever expect to home on their target do so. | 1998 / 2023 | 53 games | |
| Intangible allies | Player character's allies are as intangible as thin air, allowing the player character to pass through them without effort. | 2000 / 2017 | 30 games | |
| Intangible foes | Your enemies and other non-allied characters can be passed through as if they were air, or nearly enough. Does not relate to them being immune to being harmed by shots, punches, etc. | 2007 / 2016 | 8 games | |
| Laser bolts | Within the depicted mythos, LASER weapons fire bolts of light rather than end-to-end connecting beams that hit their target in an instant. | 1978 / 2024 | 94 games | |
| No Corpses | Any living thing killed in the game simply disappears at the moment of death. | 1989 / 2015 | 3 games | |
| No crashing | Regardless of what happens or what the player tries to do (or fails to do), crashing into vehicles, obstacles, etc. is largely impossible. Usually involves the character/vehicle sliding off/around the crash target. | 1 game | ||
| No fall damage | Falling down from a significant height does not cause damage or any other similar inconveniences. | 1982 / 2023 | 611 games | |
| No friendly fire | Shooting at or beating up your allies or possibly even neutral parties has absolutely no effect (don't get hurt or even act as if anything is happening), if the game even allows you to try. | 1992 / 2016 | 57 games | |
| Nonsensical gear | The equipment characters take makes no sense, usually by wearing or wielding unusually large number of same type of items such as 3 swords or 2 breast plates. | 2003 / 2014 | 12 games | |
| Old skool security | Security that can be circumvented by observing a pattern and following it, regardless if this is actually a security system. | 1998 / 2018 | 24 games | |
| Old skool surveillance | Surveillance system that clearly leaves holes in what they're surveying. Often with security cameras that show their view cones and move about in predictable patterns that leave holes through which the player can slip by. | 1999 / 2016 | 42 games | |
| Penalty imposed for harming non-combatants | Penalizes player(s) if they in any way harm players or game characters who are not fighting against the protagonist(s). | 1979 / 2017 | 55 games | |
| Penetrating explosions | Explosions pass through matter that is not destroyed or moved by them, causing harm to things that should've been safe. In other words, explosions ignore indestructible level geometry and other things that should shield from them. | 1997 / 2014 | 7 games | |
| Random damage | Any damage dealt is more or less unreliable, done in video games as a simulation of old P&P RPGs and other tabletop games where it was an abstraction of how hard and where something hurt, but has spread out to areas where it was not intended. | 1983 / 2023 | 206 games | |
| Relentless guards | Any NPC, possibly all regardless if they're involved, are incapable of losing track of you once they find you sneaking around and pursue you indefinitely, even trying to do so when they're utterly incapable of ever reaching you. | 1997 / 2017 | 7 games | |
| Rocket jumping | A jump boost achieved with the use of explosives, commonly a rocket, detonated right at your feet. | 1991 / 2024 | 54 games | |
| Safe weapons | Weapons that should harm the player or their allies when employed improperly - such as grenades or other explosives - do not. | 1993 / 2016 | 24 games | |
| Sand sea | Sand behaves like water when convenient, such as animals/monsters swimming around in it or people sailing on the sand with ships. | 1993 / 2019 | 11 games | |
| Sight relay | What one person sees, is seen by their allies too. Commonly occurring as extended range for anything that has longer range than their own sight radius, thus others function as cheap spotters for them without actually relaying any target coordinates. | 2006 / 2016 | 7 games | |
| Space friction | Spacecraft are required to be in constant acceleration to maintain speed. | 1987 / 2017 | 18 games | |
| Spectacular force | Getting punched, shot, or otherwise hit with something has a habit of sending people flying rather spectacular distances. | 1 game | ||
| Tethered projectiles | Projectiles move with the one who shot them. The effect is similar to carrying a translucent pipe in front of you and shooting through it, turning/strafing causes any projectiles still in the pipe to move with you in relation. | 1995 / 1999 | 2 games | |
| Threat indicator | Has some extra HUD or gameplay element that shows the protagonist is in danger even when the player does not know it. Often with several degrees of danger, from NPC suspicion, recognition, search, pursuit, to all out alarm. | 1998 / 2018 | 50 games | |
| Unconvincing armor | Characters, especially females, wear armor that's unconvincingly sparse in body coverage and protection, much like a bikini, or is thin and form-fitting like a bodysuit. | 1982 / 2018 | 66 games | |
| Upgrades: Carry capacity | Player can upgrade or otherwise permanently improve the player character's carry capacity. | 2008 / 2023 | 7 games | |
| Upgrades: Health | Player can upgrade or otherwise permanently improve the player character's health. | 1987 / 2015 | 18 games | |
| Visible LASERs | Non-weapon grade LASERs are peculiarly visible to normal human sight. | 1978 / 2020 | 87 games | |
| Water jumping | Player can somehow jump from water surface without having anything solid beneath their feet to produce that jump. | 1996 / 2018 | 32 games | |
| Woundless | Getting shot, stabbed, punched, etc. leaves no visible marks. | 2001 / 2014 | 9 games | |
| X-ray electrocution | Getting electrocuted, struck by lightning or such causes characters to become transparent except for their skeleton which often becomes luminescent in turn. | 1987 / 2024 | 54 games | |
| Zero ground-level gravity | On ground level gravity has no effect, causing movement uphill and downhill to work at even pace. | 1993 / 2013 | 2 games |