I'm going for multi!
The mental health field is a complicated one. And fiction writers aren't necessarily fond of complicated real-life concepts. That's why you get tropes such as All Psychology Is Freudian. When even that is too much, you'll see There Are No Psychologists.
But that's obviously quite unrealistic. There are, in fact, psychologists and psychiatrists in this crazy world of ours. And this trope is dedicated to the portrayal of them in fiction. There are three general portrayals:
The Harmful Shrink: Whether this doctor is evil or simply so stupid that he or she hurts the patient, The Harmful Shrink is the worst kind of psychologist. He's cruel and lacks any empathy with his patients. He might be working with the enemy. He'll frequently violate the sacrosanct concept of Doctor-Patient Confidentiality. Expect him to shovel pills down the patient's throat. Shrinks who are less actively malign will still tend to cultivate dependence on themselves in their patients for the purpose of getting more billable hours, even if their therapy is no longer necessary or doing more harm than good. A particularly common subset is grief counselors who do all they can to make sure their patients never recover from their losses and keep going to grief counseling forever.
The Well-Meaning, But Dopey And Ineffective Shrink: Usually liberal and possessed of extraordinary amounts of empathy, this doctor really wants to help you. He'll spend hours listening to your problems. He'll try to avoid pumping you full of psychotropic drugs. But he just doesn't get it. His failing is usually due to a surfeit of compassion. Dr. Love here just can't quite fathom the concept that his patients are anything but great people suffering from problems beyond their control. Frequently seen in the Law Procedural, where he is suckered by the defense into testifying that the brutal and murderous man on trial is crazy and can't be punished, or in Speculative Fiction, diagnosing the hero as insane for reporting (genuine) monsters/ghosts/etc.
The Awesome Shrink: Exactly What It Says on the Tin. But even within this group there are different varieties of Awesome Shrink. He can be compassionate and understanding where everyone before has been cruel to the protagonist. Alternatively, he provides the character in question with the kind of Tough Love he's always needed. Regardless, he's always smart, almost always cool and never resorts to drugs when they're not needed.
Sillier examples of the first two types are often portrayed as bearded men with Viennese accents.
Some works feature psychiatrist characters who bounce back and forth between these categories or multiple psychiatrists who cover different types. And, as always, keep in mind that these categories are somewhat simplified. Not every character is going to fit precisely in one of the three types.
Also, all three types are Truth in Television, which is why seeking therapy in Real Life is sadly so difficult: the people most in need tend to be the least equipped to be good mental health consumers - which is required to get the most out of therapy by knowing what kind of therapy you need and finding a therapist that is awesome (and not the first or second variants, or incredibly judgmental/unable to empathize with one's lived experience) Ending up with the awesome variant on the first try is often not possible even for the financially well off who can choose whomever they want, much less for someone just stuck with whomever their insurance/public assistance will pay. This is one reason why some people might choose to go without therapy, even people with major disorders.
Anime & Manga
Rukia in Bleach is known for loving to draw Chappy the Bunny, being absolutely horrible at drawing, and using her bad drawings to explain concepts with different people being different colors of bunny. Most of the other characters are never really sure what her drawings are supposed to be.
The exception is Aizen. She draws him as a bear.
In Kyo Kara Maoh, nobody ever figures out what Gwendal's knitted animals are supposed to be.
In Azumanga Daioh, not even Sakaki can identify what species her knitted dolls are.
Sakaki: "That one's a dog, and that's a cat... Or is it the other way around?"
The Strawhats' second ship in One Piece looked like a lion, made by Franky. But everyone else thought it looked like a sun or a sunflower. Franky even intended to name the ship Lion Gang Champion though in the end everyone else went with the Thousand Sunny instead.
In an episode of Ranma ?, Akane bakes some cookies for Ranma in a variety of animal shapes, but the results come out so poorly that Ranma's guesses at identifying them are completely off the mark, with Akane getting increasingly incensed each time she corrects him (she eventually gives up: "Are you gonna keep guessing or just eat them?!").
At another time, she sewed a "cute" patch on Happosai's gi (which, unbeknownst to him, contained a "Woman Repellant" scent.) Happosai is delighted at the "cute little piggy," which a flustered Akane claims to be a dog.
And yet another time, Ranma, Akane, and Ukyo try to pacify a rampaging (and ugly as sin) divine horse by drawing a flattering portrait of it . Ranma and Akane's attempts are so terrible that Miss Hinako tries to guess whether they're drawings of shrimp or bugs.
Comic Books
The "What a horrible ugly monster! It's a picture of mommy..." variant is used in Le Chat, a Belgian comic.
Film
Subverted in Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, in which Scott draws a blank circle with scribbles at the top, and it's immediately recognized as a picture of Ramona.
Played fully straight in When Harry Met Sally with Baby Fish Mouth.
Literature
In The Little Prince, the narrator explains how he once drew a picture of a snake that had swallowed an elephant, and all the adults told him it was a very nice hat.
In The Baby-Sitters Club, it is suggested that one say something along the lines of "What a nice picture! Can you tell me about it?" when confronted with a child's drawing, because "you don't want to say 'what a lovely elephant!' and have it turn out to be a picture of their grandmother."
In Just So Stories "How The First Letter Was Written", written language was invented to avoid this sort of confusion, after a picture intended to convey "Daddy has broken his spear, he needs his spare one, and this man who doesn't speak our language will bring it back" was interpreted as meaning "Daddy is being attacked from all sides by men with spears".
In the Eighth Doctor Adventures novel Camera Obscura, everyone who sees the Doctor's attempted map of a London neighborhood wonders about the round shapes he's drawn. Fitz tries to guess what they might be ("trees", "gardens", or "duck ponds") until Anji gets annoyed and sarcastically suggests they're "gigantic pools of jam". Oddly, Fitz and Sabbath both describe them as "puffy". It's never explained what they were actually meant to be.
In Nation, Daphne/Ermintrude sends Mau an invitation to join her for dinner. She writes it out, then, in case he can't read, draws a picture of a stick figure with an arrow pointing towards the boat. Mau interprets it as meaning that, when the sun is at a certain angle in the sky, he's supposed to throw a spear at the boat.
Newspaper Comics
A For Better or for Worse comic has a young Elizabeth showing her father a painting after a day of preschool. Her dad starts to comment on what a nice face it is, until Elizabeth interrupts to tell him that it's just a pizza.
In a FoxTrot strip, Roger and Andy are playing Pictionary. He keeps shouting out obviously incorrect answers as the drawing progresses (including "It's a snowstorm!" before she's even drawn anything), culminating in "It's a Christmas tree in a cereal bowl next to a snake!" and "What's with these 'B', 'O', 'A', and 'T' symbols? Are they Pictionary shorthand?"
Live Action TV
Played with in Stargate SG-1. Daniel and Sam are presented with a thermal image of the symbiote inside of Teal'c, and they play dumb:
Daniel: Oh, that's very good! Did you draw that yourself?
Sam: What is it?
Daniel: That... That's a duck, isn't it?
From Criminal Minds. Morgan looks at a picture drawn by an autistic kid and can't figure out what it is. Hotch makes a glance, says "It's obviously a dog" and keeps on with what he's doing, leaving Morgan absolutely befuddled.
The game show Win Lose Or Draw was basically a game show version of Pictionary. Coincidentally, there were also two official game show versions of Pictionary, but neither was as popular.
Pictionary is played in Community episode Basic Genealogy and the game devolves into a fist fight when an attempt to draw a windmill looks more like a swastika.
In one episode of Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide, Ned tries to paint abstract art and the entire school thinks it's a naked lady. At the end of the episode, he tries again and people see it as a fire truck.
In one episode of Engine Sentai Go-onger, the heroes are stumped, trying to think of a way to defeat the Monster of the Week. When it's Gunpei's turn to offer an idea, he starts his explanation with a drawing of... something.
Sosuke: What's that?
Saki: A koinobori? note
Hant: Nope, it's a log.
Renn: I'm sure it's UMA.note [gets stared at] UMA is...
Gunpei: (exasperated) It's a PENGUIN!
The others: No way! This is a penguin?
One episode of The Bill Engvall Show has Paul with a sculpture of himself, only for it to be mistaken for one of Don Cheadle.
The Friends good-naturedly mock Monica for the horrifying "Pictionary Incident," wherein she threw a plate in a moment of frustration at one of her buddies' poor drawing. She insists she was just gesticulating forcefully and the plate slipped out of her hand.
Webcomics
The Chapel Chronicles, in a reversal of the usual trope, Chapel draws an photo-realistic Mona Lisa, but her opponent Fred can't identify it.
In Homestuck, Jade Harley owns a Pictionary Modus. It misidentifies an advanced bass for a mecha, the Tangle Buddies for a pair of gloves with some coins and the Magic Cue Ball for the Magic 8 Ball.
Web Original
A skit from The Whitest Kids U Know has a child showing a picture he drew to his parents. While it appears to be something rather inappropriate (read: penis), he explains to his parents after they fail to recognize that it is actually an elephant. Subverted moments later, when the child shows them a drawing that looks exactly what it meant to be.
Western Animation
Family Guy
"Lois Kills Stewie":
Peter: Stewie, uh, how long you been all messed up and evil like this?
Stewie: Oh, so now you're interested in Stewie. Last week when I made that macaroni picture of an owl, you didn't give a damn!
Peter: That was an owl?
Another episode features a flashback gag where Stewie is actually playing pictionary with a complete stranger. The stranger keeps asking "Is it a jackal? Jackal! It's a jackal!" no matter how many non-jackal details Stewie adds.
Stewie: If it wasn't right the first time, why the hell would it be right the next ten times?!
In Avatar: The Last Airbender, this happens to Sokka several times.
The Simpsons
In "A Milhouse Divided," the Simpsons host a dinner party with a game of Pictionary. Maude Flanders guesses "cornstarch" from three dots drawn by Ned, while Kirk Van Houten is unable to draw "dignity," though Luanne is. Homer thinks that Kirk is also unable to draw "a door".
In "You Kent Always Say What You Want", Maggie and Marge play some amazing rounds of Pictionary against Selma and Patty, but despite Maggie's drawings being incomprehensible, Marge always knows what they are.
The Penguins of Madagascar: Julien and Marlene are missing and Kowalski shows a picture he drew of them to Fred the squirrel.
Fred: Which one's the otter?
Kowalski: This one, obviously. Note the whiskers?
Fred: Oh, I thought that was a cat.
Kowalski: Did I ask "have you seen this lemur and cat?"
Fred: No, that's why I thought it was odd that you drew a cat.
Kowalski: It's not a cat.
Fred: Then why does it have whiskers?
Kowalski: You know what? Forget the otter.
Fred: Cat.
Kowalski: Whatever!
Happened in The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy in a episode in which Dracula's pictionary drawing of Abraham Lincoln is mistaken for successively more absurd things.
A variation in the Phineas and Ferb episode "Put That Putter Away": Candace apparently has such poor handwriting that when she writes the word "busted" on a piece of paper, both Stacy and Phineas mistake it for a drawing of dancing weasels.
Parodied in the Rocko's Modern Life episode "Cabin Fever". Bev Bighead invites Ed to try hand shadow puppetry with Rocko and Heffer, and despite Ed being able to create the unmistakable shapes of "The Thinker", the Eiffel Tower, and a prancing deer, none of the other three can get anywhere close to the right answers. This raises Ed's temper to the point that he causes the Hair-Trigger Avalanche driving the remainder of the episode's plot.
In Animaniacs, the Warners play Pictionary with Pablo Picasso. The Warners are unable to decipher his realistic drawings, while their weird-looking doodles leave him flummoxed. When an art dealer arrives and sees the Warner's drawings, he mistakes them for Picasso's and praises his new "Cubist" style.
O'Farrell's attempt at assembling a sketch of the serial shredder in Fillmore!:
Tehama: Okay. What the heck is that?
Fillmore: Uh, no offence, Danny, but that kinda looks like Tiger Woods on a very bad morning.
Ingrid: (squinting) Oh yeah, and that's his elbow...at least, I hope that's his elbow...
Agarest Senki 2 has Weiss facing off against Summerill, servant of the dark god Chaos. He at this point is level 99 and equipped with Veldafard, a very powerful sword. You get to own Summerill in your first fight. After which, a cutscene happens and you get flung over to who knows where at that point. When Weiss recovers, he gets reduced to level one, and you can't equip his sword anymore for some weird reason, not to mention he now has amnesia. Turns out, there's a lot more to that story later on.
In Avalon Code, after receiving the Book of Prophecy, you use it to summon twin "Genesis" swords for a fight, which are very powerful. Immediately after, the Book runs out of power, and the Genesis sword becomes a rubbish rusty old sword.
Baldur's Gate had an illusionist at the very start of the game teach you group tactics along with several midlevel NPC friends (who weren't illusory) against swarms of illusory monsters that would have overwhelmed your character normally but which didn't deal any damage.
In Boktai 2: Solar Boy Django, you start with the very powerful solar gun, Gun Del Sol. It is stolen from you a few screens later. You get it back near the end of the game, but it is damaged and uses many times as much energy as it used to.
Breath of Fire III forces you into dragon mode at the beginning of the game. Your attacks consist of a normal melee attack (which is weak) and a dragon breath attack (which kills all enemies in one hit). In the event that you don't get initiative and the enemy attacks first, you have a 100% counter rate and automatically use the dragon breath attack. The only way to die in the initial battles is to attack yourself a few times (although doing this still advances the plot).
Breath of Fire IV lets you play as the game's Big Bad at certain points in the story, usually near the beginning of each chapter. He's at a ridiculously high level and has the best equipment in the game, giving you a taste of what The Hero can do once he achieves the same level of butt-kicking power. He is not only a ridicolous high level, he is above the level limit your normal party has! Mind, your normal party can have a maximum level of 60. The Big Bad starts of at 60 and will most probably end up at 61 and 62 in the end.
Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter does this in an odd way - the main character is given the power of The Wyrm Odjn, after being 'killed' by Bosch. Using this power, you can do tremendous damage to anything in your way - the catch is that every time you do, The Wyrm takes over a little bit of their soul. When The Wyrm takes over their soul completely... Odjn bursts out of his body violently, ending the game.
Chrono Cross begins with a dream sequence with Serge, Kid and one randomly selected character, at a somewhat elevated level and powers. Perhaps uniquely, it's a premonition, and the party goes through the very same events later in the game.
Crisis Core:
While it didn't exactly dazzle you with power, had the strongest of the 3 basic spells, a decent command attack, and several levels put on Zack for a level with a bunch of soldiers and a Behemoth.
It can happen again later in the game, when Zack is assigned to protect Hojo. A simulation designed to test new materia gives that materia to Zack and forces him into a fight. The materia is quite powerful...and lost as soon as the fight is over. The real kicker is that that materia exists only for that battle - it's completely unobtainable in regular gameplay.
In Devil Summoner Soul Hackers, your first experience with the battle system uses the (level 20) demons of a man named Urabe. Urabe later deletes these same demons to make room for Nemissa, which kicks off the plot and explains why you don't have the same demons when you inherit his COMP.
Digimon World: Dawn/Dusk gives you a full party, and depending on the pack you choose, two Ultimates whom will slaughter everything in their path with little difficulty, even against your rival, who has mons several levels ahead of yours. Even after the mysterious interloper devolves both of them, you still have a level 20 Coronamon/Lunamon and two level 1 rookies with high stats right off the bat.
.hack//INFECTION has Orca, Kite's first Party Member. Good news, everyone! He's one of the strongest players around! Nothing can stop us now! Wait, who's this white-clad girl? What's with that book she gave him? And now we've got a new monster carrying a Cross Q-Stick who's immune to Orca's attacks. Uh oh...
Dragon Age II begins with Varric telling a somewhat exaggerated story about Hawke. During the first ten minutes or so of the game you play as a veritable god with Regenerating Health, extremely quick Cooldown times on all your powers, Infinity Plus One Swords, and the ability to vaporize darkspawn by looking at them funny. Eventually Cassandra (Varric's audience) calls BS, whereupon Varric rewinds a bit and tells her the real story...
Dragon Quest V has the Hero's father Pankraz accompanies you early in two points of the game with Sephiroth-like strength. He can wipe out all monsters before you can attack. You'll be awarded with exp. and even heals you after battle.
EarthBound has your player character engage in his first boss battle with his bug-like guide, Buzz-Buzz, circling him around. You also have two somewhat helpful NPCs with you as well (Picky and your Dog), as well as one totally useless one (Pokey). Because of Buzz-Buzz's great and awesome PSI abilities, you are basically invincible for the first few minutes of the game. Then Buzz-Buzz gets swatted by Pokey and Picky's mom, who thinks it's a bug. Now you are all alone.
Fallout 3, as well as the first two games to a lesser extent, occasionally allow the player to come into possession of a powerful late game weapon early on. However, ammo for it is often limited to a point it cannot be used regularly until much later. For example, A3-21's plasma rifle, one of the most powerful weapons in the game, can be acquired as early as level 3, but the microfusion cells it fires are highly uncommon early in the game (unless you know exactly where to look), and the repair parts in the form of other plasma rifles to cannibalize on are practically non-existent until around halfway around the main quest.
Final Fantasy II gives you the horrendously overpowered Minwu after playing for a short time. The catch is that he specializes in White magic, meaning he can heal you and protect you, but damage is not his forte. In this way, you're allowed to level up your characters without too much worry about death.
Final Fantasy III tricks you into thinking you're getting this: the game starts in a cave, and you have to kill the boss to escape and begin the game proper. Fortunately, you're given a number of Antarctic Wind items, which have the same effect as the Ice2 (or Blizzara) spell, and the boss just happens to have a weakness to ice. Nevertheless, you're not actually more powerful ( and you should save those items for the much more difficult Jinn boss that's coming up).
The original version of Final Fantasy IV shows Cecil taking out monsters with powerful attack items in an automated battle at the start of the game. The DS remake changed this by placing the player into a real battle with the aforementioned attack items in the inventory, presumably assuming that the player has played the original and remembers the items. Or the player can just take out the monsters themself, using regular attacks. On a longer term note, you have Tellah, who joins you on two separate occasions. The first time, he arrives with low-level magic that just so happens to be the weakness for everything in the dungeon you'll face, a powerful healing spell, an MP recovery spell, and an MP pool that, for the time, is ridiculously huge. The strategy for the game quickly becomes, "Have Tellah kill things." The second time you meet him, he starts off unchanged (and rather weak for the point you're at), but soon after gains access to nearly every spell in the game, many hours before you would ever normally see them, with spells so ridiculously powerful that he is capable of soloing bosses. His MP pool, however, remains unchanged, meaning he can only crack off about three of the highest level spells before needing to recharge. The strategy thereafter becomes, "Conserve MP until we get to the boss, then have Tellah kill things."
Final Fantasy IV The After Years gives Ceodore two comrades who have better gear than what he starts with, Fira and Cura in their spell lists, and a Band that destroys everything in the dungeon. You lose them soon after, though you do gain The Hooded Man. Later, you take control of Magic Knight Cecil, who has White Magic and better stats then Ceodore at the time. If you're smart, you'll strip him of his gear and give it to Ceodore.
Final Fantasy VI gives Terra a pair of soldiers and powerful Magitek armour until the Esper is found, at which point the armour is destroyed and both soldiers are lost. Note that you only get Magitek armour again for a single (and a second, optional) sequence. And just like the beginning, only Terra can utilize the advanced functions (i.e. anything beyond Healing Force and Fire/Ice/Thunder Beam).
Final Fantasy VII does this about six hours after the game begins, when Cloud is telling the story of his trip to Nibelheim with Sephiroth. Sephiroth has a six slot linked weapon, and a six slot linked armor piece, along with mastered materia coupled with All materia, in addition to a ridiculously high strength rating and the inability to be touched by enemies (all attacks default to 0 damage). Needless to say, if and when you find yourself in battle, he kills everything before you can even act. And then we all know what happens next...note
In Final Fantasy X, in the rematch against Sinspawn Gui, himself being a fairly challenging boss, especially for new players, the game gives you a party of White Magician Girl/Healing Hands Yuna, Badass Longcoat/...just badass in general Auron...and Seymour. Seymour is perfectly capable of winning this fight singlehandedly without a scratch on him, and everything he does (asides from his character-specific Overdrive, naturally) is something the player will be capable of doing.
Final Fantasy XII had you play as Reks who, while still only Level 1, travels with a small squad of Dalmascan soldiers, most notably Captain Basch, who will kill everything that isn't boss-strength in one hit, and one soldier that throws around healing potions to anyone who ever needs them, and never runs out. Then you change to his little brother Vaan. To put in perspective, you have to grind to at least level three in the first area to survive the sub-boss you have to face upon taking control of him. Also, you are introduced to the wonder and glory of the greatsword weapon class through the guest party character Vossler—you won't have effective greatswords of your own for quite some time. Another example is Lamont/Larsa, who has unlimited Hi and X-Potions, and isn't afraid to use them. During your first trip with him, dying isn't much of a concern.
Final Fantasy XIII inverts this trope to drill the combat basics into the player. See Second Hour Superpower.
Final Fantasy XIII-2, on the other hand, plays this straight, starting you off as a very powerful Lightning before you switch back to Serah. To put it in perspective, Lightning has roughly ten times as much HP as Serah does at that point.
Midway through the first Fossil Fighters game, the at-that-point Big Bad gets their hands on a godlike superbeing from ages past named Frigisaur, and plans to use it to freeze the world. In order to combat it, you resurrect an Olympus Mon named Ignosaur. Ignosaur has insanely powerful moves, is resistant to all attacks, and has stats that are high even for a max-leveled vivosaur (when your own are likely still pretty far from maxed). You can play around with Ignosaur, but as soon as you beat the boss, he vanishes from your party. The only way to get Ignosaur (and Frigisaur) permanently isn't available until the Playable Epilogue.
Golden Sun: Dark Dawn has this when Isaac and Garet join your party for a bit and let you borrow their Djinn. They let you have enough Djinn to use at least a level 3 summon, but when combined with their Djinn, you can summon a level 4 one. After they leave the party, they take back their Djinn too, putting you back in square one.
Inazuma Eleven 3:
Inverted where the opening cutscene shows off some of the awesome power of the rivals you'll be up against, as well as foreshadowing little bits of the plot involving those characters.
Subverted for a first few matches. Your character do have evolved skills and game breaking abilities, however, these players have horrible stamina, and get tired after a few uses of specials, usually even before the first half ends.
The opening section of Infinite Space, which also doubles as the tutorial, has you fighting a couple of easy battles as the dread space pirate Valantin, at the helm of his awesomely powerful battleship Corsair, capable of basically annihilating anything you point it at. After this sequence is over and the rest of the introduction has played out, you're left as a teenage boy at the helm of the good ship Daisy, a converted civilian vessel.
Kingdom Hearts II had an early boss fight in which you fought with two keyblades. It also had one with an inordinate number of reaction commands. The latter taught you how to use them. The former was just a teaser, and the ability wouldn't be regained until you went to Yen Sid's Tower.
The Hentai RPG Knights of Xentar starts your character at the lower-mid levels, with decent stats. However, the moment we're done with the introductory area, the plot depowers you and strips you nude.
Legacy Of Goku II uses a "flash-forward" version, taking full and clever advantage of a plot point in the show... the alternate future where the androids have destroyed everything. You play as Trunks, at a fairly high level (but unable to go Super Saiyan yet). And future (Bad Ass) Gohan runs you through the basics of your power and Ki Attacks, including, as mentioned, a failed attempt at going Super Saiyan. Then you're released to chase after Gohan just in time to see him killed by the Androids. Then in the cutscene, Trunks goes Super Saiyan in a rage, the screen flashes white, and you end up in the present, as Gohan, at Level 1, with none of the power or Ki abilities he and Trunks had in the future.
Lufia & The Fortress of Doom starts the player off with a party of very high-level characters, taking on one of the most powerful beings in the game's universe. This turns out to be a flashback that sets up the story for the rest of the game.
The prequel Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals has the very same battle and ends with its immediate aftermath.
In the first dungeon of Lunar: Eternal Blue, Lucia has incredibly strong magic until you leave the dungeon (at which point plot/the Big Bad strips them from her), which she'll eventually get back later in the game. This is actually very useful, since you can use her to level up your other characters to make the upcoming boss fight much easier.
In the first chapter of the Flash game MARDEK, the main characters pretend that they are legendary heroes, and the tutorial is played through using their extremely powerful imaginary personas.
The Neverwinter Nights module Kingmaker starts you off at level 10 with four level 10 allies in a War Sequence populated by enemies that would be moderately challenging for a level 2 character. Then you get killed and resurrected at level 2, and have to choose two of your allies to resurrect alongside you.
In Pok?mon XD: Gale of Darkness, you start the game in a battle where you have a Level 50 Salamence squaring off against a Level 50 Metagross. After the battle you realize that it was just a sim battle and you actually own a Level 10 Eevee instead.
If you go to the Arena for a tutorial in Resonance of Fate, your party will have access to a hero gauge with 8 bezels or so in it. When you start actually playing the game, your hero gauge has only 3.
The first chapter of Riviera: The Promised Land is Ein (our hero) and Ledah heading to the title country. Ledah carries one of the two Unbreakable Weapons in the game, heals far more health than he can be damaged for each turn, and is capable of doing about 200 damage a hit (which is usually instant death), and both characters are far stronger than their foes. Once you complete the chapter, Ein gets zapped away, ending up with his stats cut in half when he lands in Riviera proper.
Secret of Evermore:
It gives the player character the bazooka, one of the strongest ranged weapons in the game, in the very first fight. However after going into an escape pod afterwards and landing on Evermore you lose the bazooka and have to fight your way to the next village with... a bone.
Halfway through the game, this trope strikes again. You meet someone that found your bazooka, and he gives it back to you for free - with one round of ammo. You can buy more ammo from the guy that sold you the bazooka, but the cost is extremely prohibitive (1000 gold coins for 10 shots, compared to 1000 creditsnote for 50 shots later).
Before your first boss fight in Shin Megami Tensei you can fuse your dog with a demon and get the very powerful demon Kerberos, who will obey you even though you're far below his level 43. (Usually demons won't obey someone who's lower level than them.) After the fight, he unwisely attacks a teleporter station and vanishes. Later you can catch up with him in Tokyo Land, though unless you carry a specific item he will be Brainwashed and Crazy. With it, though, he's healed and rejoins you. The trick is revisited in the sequel, set thirty years later, with the same Kerberos, although more justified: The Madame lends him to you to track down a rogue scientist, and returns to her when you're done. After Valhalla District is devoured by Abaddon, he'll join you again permanently, even if you're still underleveled - he recognizes your strength and potential, and he wants revenge on the people responsible for killing his master.
Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Children: Book of Ice/Fire takes place sometime after the events of Demi Kids, and for a couple minutes you have what would have been a relatively powerful party by storyline standards. However, one of the Big Bad's henchmen does something to reset your level, your Guide's rank, and destroy the device that holds King-class demons.
In Spectrobes, you begin the second game by having everything you obtained in the first game stolen. You technically get it back.
Star Ocean: The Second Story has one of the two primary characters start out with a futuristic (and powerful) energy beam weapon. It doesn't take long for it to run out of energy, and the game doesn't provide a way to recharge it.
During the battle tutorial in Star Ocean Till The End Of Time, the main character has a ridiculous amount of HP and MP, but has only about a tenth of that in the first real battle. This is explained in-game by the tutorial being a video game within the game's world. (This is also foreshadowing.)
Suikoden II starts you off with Jowy and Riou, the two main characters. Although they are relatively weak, being only level 1, they have access to the devastating Combination Attack "Buddy Attack", which hits every enemy without fail for as much damage as they would inflict with two regular attacks. Needless to say, the enemies that survive the attack are quickly killed.
Suikoden IV, with Lazlo and Snowe having access to the powerful Friendship attack at the beginning of the game. It only targets one enemy, but is more than enough to take out any bosses you meet with two or three shots.
Since the main hero in Suikoden V is a prince, he gets to spend much of the first part of the game with a party of strong allies, including the kingdom's most powerful bodyguard, who is compelled to leave him midway through the game. (The hero still has his own personal bodyguard and aunt as permanent tagalongs, until plot events remove them from gameplay as well.)
The prologue of Tales of Innocence gives the player control of Asras for one easy battle. Asras controls are quite different from any other character you actually play, even his own reincarnation.
Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World has the player start with Richter in his party, who can take down any of the first-dungeon enemies with ease. He leaves after about twenty minutes and only rejoins for four other brief periods in the game, and that's assuming you do the sidequests.
Tales of the Abyss has powerful spellcaster Jade join you during a seemingly Hopeless Boss Fight. Jade is at level 45, at a time when your two other characters will be lucky to be at level 6, allowing you to defeat the boss very easily. Shortly afterwards, aboard Jade's ship, all his powers are suddenly sealed, and he goes down to level 3.
In Tales of the Drunken Paladin, Anebriate starts off with the maximum amount of gold, experience, etc. After a Curbstomp Battle, you lose everything and get to stare at your old items when they pop up from time to time in NPC shops.
Tower Of The Sorcerer has you starting out with the Holy Sword and Holy Shield, which you promptly have to hand over to the Big Bad in Tower 3, and get thrown in prison. Luckily, there's a friendly thief (oxymoron much?) who will get you out, albeit with you unarmed.
In the older computer RPG Ultima VII Part II: Serpent Isle the player starts off with a good set of gear from the previous game, including the Infinity+1 Sword from the previous game's Expansion Pack, the Blackrock Sword. This sword can kill any foe in one hit. Upon setting foot on the titular Serpent Isle with all of the amazing gear from the first game, you and your party members are struck by magical lightning that swaps all of your gear (and your party members themselves) with otherwise innocuous objects, leaving you alone, wielding such things as a pumice rock and a furrier's cap. However, each item is a clue to where the corresponding powerful item ended up.
Vacant Sky has the Villain Shoes variant; you start out controlling Sandarga, Vastale, and shortly afterward Weapon, all of whom are fairly high-powered right from the start
Dunban in Xenoblade provides this, with you controlling him in the opening whilst he wields the Monado, the game's titular weapon. He later temporarily rejoins the party for an early segment of the game, still wielding the weapon, and while he relinquishes it to Shulk before the end of that segment, he's still likely to be around 10 levels higher then the rest of the group and far stronger then them even without it. He rejoins for good at a point where everyone is likely to have caught up to him in level.
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