Tricky was born a child of the EarthWalker monarchy on the planet Sauria, somewhere on the edge of the Lylat System. His parents were the king and queen, and they reckoned that was justification enough for him to be called prince. Prince Tricky it was, then; although what, exactly, inspired the name "Tricky" has since been lost to the ages. It's probably a popular name around there. Like Barry or something.

Tricky's childhood was ill-timed, however (admittedly not his fault), coinciding as it did with the unexpected ripping apart of Sauria in its entirety; a catastrophic event that put the entire local planetary system at risk and scared the shit out of everyone with enough sense to realise what was going on. Tricky's confusion at this turn of events was only heightened when it turned out to be the doing of a bunch of SharpClaws—a rival tribe lead by the preposterous General Scales—who'd raided the EarthWalker-guarded Krazoa palace and nicked the SpellStones holding the planet together.

As if that wasn't confusingly disastrous enough, before long the SharpClaws had become the dominant bunch on the slowly-falling-to-bits world, and at some point Tricky was captured by a couple of their grunts and dragged off to Ice Mountain (a fairly self-explanatory locale).

Happily, though, he was rescued when space adventurer Fox McCloud arrived in his capacity as a cosmic environmentalist, hoping to get all that business with the unstable-to-breaking-point planet well and truly sorted out. Tricky joined Fox on the ensuing adventures about the dying planet, during which they were able to gather the requisite SpellStones from the SharpClaws' hands (well, claws) and, in theory, restore order to the place.

In practice, the planet wouldn't simply glue itself together as hoped, and what was actually required, as it turned out, was the added influence of the Krazoa spirits (long story short, god-type guys from long ago; hey, I'm no theologian, what do I know?) who had the power to reverse the SharpClaws' damage. Searching for the spirits, Fox went alone to the Walled City—a broken-off segment of the planet which, incidentally, housed Tricky's father—returning upon success to exchange his farewells with Tricky. Tricky was made an honourary member of the Star Fox team as Fox left, hoping to reset the planet to its original configuration. Tricky later learned that the whole debacle had apparently been the doing of notorious space primate, Andross, but was fairly unsurprised to learn that the Star Fox guys were able to shoot his face to pieces, removing the threat for good (Star Fox Adventures).

This wouldn't be the fist intergalactic threat Tricky would have to deal with, though. Actually, intergalactic threats would become an ongoing annoyance in Tricky's life, and to this day he just wishes outer space would leave him the hell alone and let him get on with the business of being a triceratops. Which has enough problems in itself. Even so, a year-and-a-half and several growth spurts later, Tricky and his fellow Saurian natives found themselves fighting off hoards of invading Aparoids—a race of mind-bending space parasites, hell-bent on poisoning the universe—who'd descended upon their planet at, frankly, the most inconvenient moment possible. Tricky's royal parents were just about finished rebuilding civilisation after all that SpellStone malarkey as the onslaught came. They were killed, along with countless others, as the Aparoids utterly decimated the place. The Saurians found themselves threatened with a dinosaur's least favourite thing: extinction. As for Tricky, heir to the Saurian throne (or whatever the sauropod equivalent might be, I dunno), he did the only thing he could think of: he sent out a distress signal vaguely hoping for, say, the Star Fox team or someone.

Sure enough, the Star Fox guys—already engaged in the Aparoid resistance—came to Sauria's aid. They were able to repel the Aparoids from Sauria after a suitably gruelling shoot-out around the planet; Tricky was there, waiting, deleriously happy to see Fox again. In the aftermath, Tricky leapt out to greet Fox in a manner that could only have been described as "mildly irritating". Tricky even expressed a desire to join Fox on his space travels, but quickly realised he had a planet to rebuild (again). They said their farewells in what may or may not have been their final encounter (Star Fox Assault).

"May or may not"? Yes, it's a cunningly ambiguous phrasing which coincides neatly with the most cunningly ambiguous period in Tricky's life. Some accounts suggest Fox did return to Sauria—honeymooning with his occasional love-interest Krystal—presumably meeting Tricky once more. Some accounts say that's a load of old bollocks and definitely didn't happen (Star Fox Command). But one thing which all accounts do agree upon (except the ones that don't; ignore those) is this: there came a time when Tricky relinquished his Saurian kingship to set off and away among the stars. Maybe he stowed away on a cargo ship or something. He's quite inconspicuous for a MASSIVE DINOSAUR. Anyway, his completely undocumented wild interplanetary adventures are unlikely to become known any time soon, but one thing's for certain: he eventually landed on the planet Earth and made his home on a medium-sized island off the coast of Africa.

Some scientist guy once told me that the dinosaurs are all extinct. But that's obviously not true. You shouldn't let things like "facts" and "evidence" confuse you. Tricky's new home was a haven for presumed-dead creatures of the Earth; he was surprised at how well he'd managed to fit in. He later learned that the live, talking dinosaurs he'd met were the doing of local genie Taj, who'd got bored one day and simply magiced them into living sentience. "Works for me", thought Tricky.

And so, Tricky decided to settle down in what became known as Dino Domain, Timber's Island. He made friends with other oddball talking animals hanging around the place. Bluey, a massive walrus with exquisite dress sense. Bubbler, a massive ocotpus who's alright once you get to know him. Smokey, a fairly normal-sized dragon with a bizarre accent. Odd bunch, by all accounts, but they got along like a fire station on fire.

And then one day, the island was unexpectedly terrorised and vandalised by an enormous space pig-genie. Wizpig, as he was known, went on a mad rampage, destroying homes, casting spells and generally making the residents' lives a hell of a lot rubbisher. Wizpig then proceeded to magically possess Tricky and his friends into doing his piggy bidding. Tricky was made the guardian of the Dino Domain racetracks (Timber's Island was famed for its exquisite racetracks) and forced to stand in the way of anyone seeking to break his spells.

Fortunately, Timber the tiger—nominally the owner of the island while his parents were away—was able to string together an anti-Wizpig campaign of animal racing pals, including DK Island's now-famous Diddy Kong. The band of racers joined forces to break Wizpig's spells through the power of racing and eventually Tricky was confronted by Diddy Kong at his mountain (he had a mountain, by the way). The two raced, Tricky lost, twice, and that was all it took to break Wizpig's hold on him. Timber, Diddy and the others went on to beat Wizpig on his home planet, which Tricky felt was pretty much the best result he could've hoped for (Diddy Kong Racing).

Alas, this didn't stop Wizpig returning yet again for a revenge assault on Timber's Island ten years later. Wizpig wasted no time in bringing Tricky under his influence once more and, rather bizarrely, proceeding with exactly the same plan he'd tried the previous decade. Of course Diddy Kong, equally aghast at Wizpig's predictability, returned to free Tricky from the piggy influence once more, and eventually defeated the pig in a suspiciously similar manner. Tricky was understandably annoyed, but nobody seemed to mind so it's all fine (Diddy Kong Racing DS).

Tricky continues to live in Dino Domain to this day, with his two youn'uns (presumably via an Earth-native triceratops; god knows how interplanetary insemination works but... apparently it does!). Will he ever return to Sauria? Will we ever find out how he flew to Earth to begin with? What's the deal with his horns anyway?

WE CAN NEVER KNOW.