# Best works with the dumbest plot elements

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-works-with-the-dumbest-plot-elements/790326>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [July 2, 2017, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-works-with-the-dumbest-plot-elements/790326 "2017-07-02T02:26:41Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 79

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**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\
**Post date:** [July 4, 2017, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-works-with-the-dumbest-plot-elements/790326/79 "2017-07-04T09:46:33Z")

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Can I mention the Professor Layton games? [I had a rant ages ago](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=10921821&postcount=1)about the first one:

> [@Professor Layton and the Curious Village - a small rant (story spoilers)](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/professor-layton-and-the-curious-village-a-small-rant-story-spoilers/488936/1):
>
> **WARNING: the following contains story - but not puzzle - spoilers.**  
> Okay, I’ve finished the game (apart from Puzzle 135, which continues to frustrate me) and I have to say that that was one of the most depressing stories I’ve encountered in a long time.
> 
> The Professor and Luke “rescue” Flora from the Tower (which she could leave at any time, mind you). The Professor becomes her guardian, and she elects to leave her fortune behind so that the “people” of the village can continue to go on as before with their (artificial) lives.
> 
> Or, to put it another way:
> 
> [ul]  
> [li]A young girl has been given away to a strange man as a prize for solving a bunch of puzzles. I’m fairly sure that’s illegal in most Western countries.[/li]  
> [li]Bruno, the only other actual human in the village, who has been keeping up all the robots out of devotion to Flora and her late father, is now condemned to stay in the village on his own and continue to repair the robots (which appear to break down frequently, judging by the number of “disappearances” mentioned earlier in the game).[/li]  
> [li]Bruno will have to do this without his workshops, which were in the Tower, which is now a pile of rubble.[/li]  
> [li]And that’s assuming Bruno got out of the collapsing Tower (which he probably did - Luke escaped from a point much further from the exit, and the drawbridge crank turned up at the end which Bruno had).[/ul][/li]  
> Nice.
> 
> Did I miss anything?

Don’t get me wrong - I enjoyed the puzzles but that was a pretty honking big plothole. Nonetheless I tried the next two games…which also had enormous issues appearing at the end.

In “The Diabolical Box/Pandora’s Box”, it turns out that the whole time they were in the town they were hallucinating…but weirdly both the Professor and Luke were having the _exact same hallucination for days_, which is stretching credulity to the limit.

In “Unwound Future/Lost Future”, we discover that the bad guy is Clive, seeking revenge for the explosion which killed his parents. In the end Clive is sorry for his crimes and promises to atone. Unfortunately his “crimes” include tearing a massive hole in central London, which would have killed tens of thousands of people. Good luck atoning for that one, Clive. How many evil masterminds will that spawn?After that, I gave up.

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