Videogame Facts And Secrets- Mind Is Blown!

[Tobbii]

Silent Hill 3 is canon and contradicts that, so we'll have to go with the undercover cop theory!

True, but a fun thing to note is that Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, which is commonly seen as a non-canon re-imagining of Silent Hill 1, can be interpreted as a What If? Sequel to that ending of Silent Hill 1. Since... Well... Harry is dead throughout that game.

[Gabz Girl]

Speaking of Silent Hill, did you know that the nurses in Silent Hill 4 belch when you kill them. Especially hilarious when you catch them on the stairs and they burp their way down. 8D

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TiDz69EqlFk

I don't even know why they do this, it makes the game less scary than it actually is!

Edited June 25, 2012 by Gabz Girl

[Nintendoga]

In Donkey Kong Country 2, the boss Kleever isn't just a floating Sword, there's acutally a Lava hand holding it for the first half of the fight before it goes Solo.

It's hard to see in this pic, but there is a hand holding it, you can see the sprites in the pic below

In the SNES version it was a random hand, but in the GBA port it was named Kerozene's hand, the new boss you fight at the tower. Nice touch.

Edited June 25, 2012 by Nintendoga

[Chibi]

Here's a funny one. In Banjo-Kazooie, if you enter 3 cheat codes in the sandcastle in Treasure Trove Cove, Gruntilda will erase your save game for being a cheater.

Edited June 26, 2012 by Chibi

[The Tenth Doctor]

Resident Evil 2. In the STARS office, check Wesker's desk 50 times. You'll find a secret film which you can develop in the photo lab. The picture is at 5:00. Wesker seems to have a thing for 18 year old medics.

[SuperStingray]

Here's a funny one. In Banjo-Kazooie, if you enter 3 cheat codes in the sandcastle in Treasure Trove Cove, Gruntilda will erase your save game for being a cheater.

Banjo-Kazooie is a Treasure Trove of these kinds of crazy secrets (see what I did there?)

Everyone whose played this game remembers the Mystery Eggs and Ice Key. Even though the whole Stop and Swop idea never took off, I can't be upset about it, because the artifacts that it left behind really added an interesting enigma to the game.

[Solkia]

Again this isn't really a secret, but it's still fucking hilarious.

[-Robin-]

With one exception, Mewtwo, for all his attested strength as the strongest Psychic-type Pokemon, ironically learns the actual move Psychic the latest out of all Pokemon who can learn the move by level up. In the first three generations, he learned it at level 66 (Slowbro comes in second place in Gen I with a 10 level lead, Xatu in second in Gens II and III by learning it just one level earlier), and he learns it at level 71 in Gens IV and V. Cresselia stole Mewtwo's crown in those generations, learning Psychic 22 levels later.

[Rusty Spy]

In Pokemon Red/Blue, when you fight Blue (your rival) in Lavender Town (the fifth battle), he asks the hero if any of his pokemon died. The weird thing about this is that in the third rival battle of the game, Blue's party consists of a Pidgeotto, an Abra, one of the starters, and a Rattata. Then in the next battle, his party consists of Pidgeotto, Kadabra, an evolved starter, and a Raticate, showing how his Pokemon have evolved. In the fifth battle, The Pidgeotto, Kadabra, and the evolved starter pokemon are still present, with the other two slots being filled by either an Exeggcute, a Gyarados, and/or a Growlithe.

But the Raticate is nowhere to be found...Meaning that somewhere between the fourth and fifth battle, Blue's Raticate may have died (or Blue killed it off, being power-hungry bastard he is)...

I always found this rumor ridiculous. Was it that much of a stretch to simply assume he stored it away in his PC, or even released it?

When the player stops using a Pokemon on their team they don't go a commit homicide.

[JonoD]

I love looking at anti-piracy measures in earlier games. In the case of Psygnosis' Puggsy, it uses a little feature in the megadrive cartridge called SRAM (a feature normally used for saving certain features in a game), but here it's used as an anti-piracy method. In Puggsy's case, if there is something stored in the SRAM, the coding picks it up as being a pirated cartridge and displays a creepy anti-piracy message.

...It also means that you may have some problems playing Puggsy on an emulator (unless you make sure SRAM is disabled).

[Dobkeratops]

On the anti-piracy measures subject, Earthbound features the usual copyright screen locks when the SRAM doesn't match, as well as a region lock "feature".

But, if you get past those and begin playing, the game will stealthy check memory addresses several times during the course of the game and if something is amiss it will bump up enemy encounters to unplayable degrees.

Say, you still managed to progress? Don't worry, the game has a neat last surprise for you: a final memory check happens right before the end boss. This one little checksum will silently nuke all your saved games and crash the SNES.

Probably one of the most known measures in gaming. Hilariously sadistic.

[Nintendoga]

Since this is a facts thread as well, I'll post this here.

Here's an incredibly long list of almost every gaming studio, developer, and company that has closed down this generation alone

3D Realms - 2009

7 Studios (Activision) - 2011

ACES Studio (Microsoft) - 2009

Action Forms - 2009

Ascaron - 2009

Atomic Elbow - 2008

Backbone Vancouver

Beam Software/Melbourne House - 2010

BigBig (Sony) - 2012

Bizarre Creations (Activision) - 2010/2011

Black Rock (Disney) - 2011

Blue Fang Games - 2011

Blue Tongue (THQ) - 2011

BottleRocket - 2009

Brash Entertainment - 2008

Budcat (Activision) - 2010

Carbonated Games - 2008

Castaway Entertainment - 2008

Cheyenne Mountain - 2010

Cing - 2010

Clover Studios (Capcom) - 2006

Codemasters Guildford - 2011

Cohort Studios - 2011

Concrete Games - 2008

Deep Silver Vienna - 2010

DICE Canada - 2006

Digital Anvil - 2006

EA Chicago - 2007

EA Bright Light - 2011/2012

EA Japan - 2007

Eidos Manchester - 2009

Eidos Hungary - 2010

Empire Interactive - 2009

Ensemble Studios (Microsoft) - 2008

Factor 5 - 2009

FASA (Microsoft) - 2007

Fizz Factor - 2009

Flagship Studios - 2008

Flight Plan - 2010

Frozen North Productions

FuzzyEyes - 2009

Gaia

Gamelab - 2009

Game Republic - 2011

GRIN - 2009

Groove Games - 2010

Helixe (THQ) - 2008

Hudson Entertainment - 2011

Humannature Studio (Nexon Vancouver) - 2009

Ignition London - 2010

Ignition Florida - 2010

Incognito Entertainment (Sony) - 2009

Indie Built (Take-Two) - 2006

Iron Lore - 2008

Juice Games (THQ) - 2011

Kaos Studios (THQ) - 2011

Killaware - 2011

Killspace Entertainment - 2011

KMM Brisbane - 2011

Krome Studios (might still be operating on skeleton crew) - 2010

Kuju Manila - 2009

Kuju Chemistry - 2009

Kush Games - 2008

Locomotive Games (THQ) - 2010

Loose Cannon Studios - 2010

Luxoflux - 2010

Mass Media (THQ) - 2008

Monte Cristo - 2010

Monumental Games - 2012

Midway Austin - 2009

Midway Newcastle - 2009

MTV Games - 2011

Multiverse - 2012

NetDevil - 2011

Ninja Studio - 2009

Nihon Telenet - 2007

Outerlight - 2010

PAM Development (Take-Two) - 2008

Pandemic Australia (EA) - 2009

Pandemic LA (EA) - 2009

Paradigm Entertainment - 2008

Pi Studios - 2011

Pivotal Games (Take-Two) - 2008

Propaganda Games (Disney) - 2011

Pseudo Interactive - 2008

Rainbow Studios (THQ) - 2011

Razorworks - 2009

Realtime Worlds - 2010

Rebellion Derby - 2010

Red Octane - 2010

Redtribe - 2008

Rockstar Vienna - 2006

Sandblast Games (THQ) - 2008

SEGA San Francisco - 2010

Sensory Sweep Studios - 2010

Seta - 2008

Shaba Games (Activision) - 2009

SideCar Studios - 2007

Sierra Online - 2008

Snapdragon Games - 2009

SOE Denver - 2011

SOE Seattle - 2011

SOE Tuscon - 2011

Stormfront Studios - 2008

Straylight Studios - 2009

Team Bondi - 2011

The Code Monkeys - 2011

Titan Studios - 2009

THQ Studio Australia - 2009

THQ Digital Warrington - 2009

Transmission Games/IR Gurus - 2009

Ubisoft Brazil - 2010

Underground Development/Z-Axis (Activision) - 2010

Universomo (THQ) - 2009

Venom Games (Take Two) - 2008

Vicarious Visions California - 2007

Visceral Australia (EA) - 2011

Wolfpack Studios - 2006

Yuke’s Company Of America - 2010

Zoe Mode London - 2009

Zoonami - 2011

Recently

Radical Entertainment - 2012

38 Studios - 2012

Big Huge Games - 2012

THQ San Diego - 2012

Zipper Interactive - 2012

Gusto Games - 2012

4mm Games - 2012

Eden Games - 2012

dtp Entertainment - 2012

Black Hole Entertainment - 2012

Spellbound Entertainment - 2012

Artech Studios - 2011

Dark Energy Digital - 2012

Hudson Soft - 2012

Reakktor Media - 2012

Ubisoft Vancouver - 2012

Good god, this list is depressing, over 138 just this generation alone. There's way too many great studios listed here.

Fact.

Edited July 1, 2012 by Nintendoga

[Katzii]

Hudson Soft is the saddest loss of them all for me, I think.

[Coral]

Very depressing to see Hudson Soft as one of the companies shut down. Loved the Bomberman series to death. Kind of glad it's not entirely gone since the company has been taken over by Konami but still...

Anyway, Rare used to be a company well known for toilet humor in their games. Whether it was subtle easter eggs in kid's games or actual M rated content that made up the game, they always found a way to put something humorously eyebrow raising somewhere. Banjo-Kazooie games are no exception! Since there's a bunch of 'em, here's some videos someone made that collects a lot of them, though certainly not all of them.

Edited July 1, 2012 by Coral

[KHCast]

In Kingdom hearts Bahamut a well known summon from Final Fantasy was going to be a summon in the game. They actually have data of it in the game, but only on the command menu sadly. They didn't program him into the game yet...(around 1:23 is were you'll see his name.)

Oh I was also not going to be the main character of the series. My friend Donald was!

Other kingdom hearts stuff that you might be interested in is that In Birth by Sleep the jungle book was to be a world in the game.

But for time reasons couldn't fully finish it.

In 358/2 days Pranksters paradise was going to be a world. they actually have character talking sprites of the fox guy and his dumb friend!

Edited July 1, 2012 by Sora

[Thigolf]

Very depressing to see Hudson Soft as one of the companies shut down. Loved the Bomberman series to death. Kind of glad it's not entirely gone since the company has been taken over by Konami but still...

Nope, Konami absorbed them completely, Hudson itself doesn't exist anymore.

@Sora: Mickey was also intended to be the main character at one point (which I wouldn't have minded, Mickey in 348/2 Days is badass).

[Solkia]

Hudson soft went down?

I really liked them D:

[Milo]

No one's has probably mentioned it at all because anyone who's a Sonic fan likely knows about this, but regardless, the hidden images/messages in Sonic CD, with the most infamous one (can be seen at the bottom left) being a strange Japanese message (the message reads "Fun is infinite at Sega enterprises -signed, Majin, which roughly translates to Devil") with a wallpaper of Sonic with a humanoid abomination for a face. Accompanying the image is the game's boss music on (with the EU/JP soundtrack it isn't too bad, but the USA one...well, see for yourself in the video below):

Edited July 1, 2012 by Zinos

[SchemingMinor]

If we are to talk about anti-piracy measures pulled by the developers and the strange things they cause, then look no further than the methods used by Insomniac on Spyro: Year of the Dragon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZinR10DC3-Q

Early on the developers at Insomniac realized that it took hackers roughly a week from the release date on Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage for pirated copies to surface. To combat this with their next installment, Insomniac made it as frustrating and time consuming as they possibly could by manipulating the checksum values. To top this off, they totally made debug impossible to get on the game and turned it into one giant booby-trapped labyrinth so that crackers could not pinpoint the exact location where coding needed to be patched. Adding insult to the already frustrated crackers their method was to taunt the person as much as possible through glitching, missing items, and random language text on European versions.

So how long did it take hackers to create a full-functioning patch? Two months.

http://www.gamasutra...ates_at_bay.php

So, then how about something that is not piracy related then? Keeping with the Mario RPG tradition at the time Mario and Luigi Superstar Saga has a couple of them including previous game references and newly found sprites of Wario, Link, Samus and other famous Nintendo faces (albeit with bad pallets) who were supposed to make a cameo in the game at Starbeans Cafe to produce some special yet helpful trinkets for your party to use - they went so far as to even create dialogue which is found in the game's coding but no word on why it was removed and replaced with E. Gadd at the last moment.

http://www.mariowiki...a/Beta_elements

So about this game, how much brotherly love do you think Mario has for Luigi?

Nothing says brotherly love like a swift punch in the family jewels.

After hammering Mario and by preparing yourself for the high jump, Mario can take out all of his adventuring rage by punching Luigi straight in the balls. Oh, and you gain coins by physically abusing your little brother.

You can drain his health by one point until it is down to one HP. And you thought Wario was sadistic when it came to getting his finances...

That'll show him the next time he wants to sucker punch you in the back of the head with a blue spiny shell in your next Grand Prix.

Another thing I have been hearing? Waluigi was supposed to be the final boss of Mario DDR. The Alpha and Omega of all things rhythmic and fabulous. Pretty obvious with anyone who has played the game (all ten of us rabid Mario junkies) no wonder Bowser seemed like he was shoehorned in at the last moment. However I am still wondering if anyone actually has hacked into the game to find out if this is true?

Edited July 1, 2012 by Kintobor

[Milo]

Try again. That's fake, this is the real one:

http://youtu.be/fZOd_gFld9c[/media]

The only difference is the pitch of some parts of the music. And if you believe the suicide rumours, well you've probably found Mew under the truck too.

To be fair, the video says the music is from the beta version of the game.

[Gabz Girl]

Wait, Hudson Soft has closed down? Bloody hell, I didn't even know... <=( Also sad to see Radical Entertainment on there and Pandemic, even though they closed down a few years before.

Speaking of Pandemic, their very last game The Saboteur (a very good game btw!), which is supposed to be set in WW2 Paris has a song in it called Feeling Good. However, this song didn't come out until 1965, many years after the 1940's! It's still a great song though. =P

[Coral]

Nope, Konami absorbed them completely, Hudson itself doesn't exist anymore.

Well yeah, that's what I meant. It was simply merged. The company itself may not exist anymore but the rights and intellectual property are now Konami's. The reason I'm not entirely sad to see them go is that I hope that Konami will actually use that property sometime in the future. From the looks of things, Bomberman may be doomed to a mobile only fate but I guess that's better than nothing.

Speaking of Bomberman, originally he was robot searching for freedom and humanity. After he finally escaped from the bomb factory, you'd be congratulated and that was that. By the next game (Bomberman 2), a new Bomberman made an appearance that caused all sorts of trouble for the original Bomberman. Whether he too was once a robot or always was like that is a mystery. Eventually by the game Mega Bomberman (or Bomberman '94), Bomberman was retconned into living in his very own world, including its own history and culture, called Planet Bomber.

The original game has been rereleased and remade in various games, including Bomberman's very own infamous super realistic game akin to Sonic '06 called Act Zero. Another remake was simply titled Bomberman for the PS1, but it was renamed Bomberman Party Edition when it came to the States.

[SchemingMinor]

Continuing our little Mario expose, Wario and Luigi were the only two characters to get a losing voice clip change in Mario Party.

Why? Because NOA considered that it could run the gamut of being blasphemous to their audience.

Wario's OH MY GOD sacrificed itself on a pyre to give us D'OH, I MISSED. I can't tell which is more meme worthy.

It would only take a nine year gap between this game and Mario Strikers: Charged/ Football for Nintendo to loosen their anal-retentiveness on Mario characters screaming the word 'god' in upset.

Speaking of obscenities, we are all aware of Waluigi's infamous crotch chop "WAAAA I'm Waluigi SUCK MY DIIIICK I'M WAAAALUIGI" victory in the same titular Mario Charged series, but aside form Wario telling everyone to visually kiss his ass in a couple of games that's where all of the obscene hand gestures lie within the Mushroom Kingdom...

...right?

Well, Bowser was the original bad boy to trailblaze the obscenities street and actually had his sprites changed for his not so family friendly victory in Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars.

Uncensored on the left, censored on the right.

He hangs out a milk bars and asks roving street women to heal his hearts.

Along with this curious gesture, the title of Peach's mysterious and quite embarrassing item was changed from XXX to ??? which in both versions leaves it up to the player's imagination what the offending object actually is, much like Birdo's "vibrating buddy" in Captain Rainbow.

Edited July 2, 2012 by Kintobor

[Carbo]

Did You Know Gaming? has kicked off their YouTube Channel and has now been inducted into NormalBoots.

[Coral]

Lol. Wario saying omg is almost as golden as D'oh I missed! I laughed more than I should've. Hehe.

So, palette swaps! We all love palette swaps, don't we?

Same character, different color, usually used to represent either a stronger/weaker version of that character in an RPG or to make life easier for people playing mirror matches in fighting games. However, sometimes game designers use this as a slight nod to fans in the know about a series' history.

The black pallete swap for DK in this example seems to make a slight reference to Chunky Kong from DK64.

Perhaps a coincidence? Well maybe. It starts becoming very frequent coincidences after you realize the red palette swap resembles DK's original colors from his arcade debut. The blue color looks like a nod to the bears (the sad, gloomy one) from DKC3.

The green one stumps me to be honest, however the white color has an interesting possible reference. Anyone who has played DKC1 may have come across it after messing around in-game and came up with a similar glitch as shown in this video:

^{I'll admit that looks so wrong in so many ways!} But you'll notice that after doing the glitch successfully, DK becomes a white-ish color. Same goes for Diddy. Also who can forget Diddy's pink palette swap? Dixie anyone?

*rainbow flies in* The More You KNOOOOOOWWWW!!!

Edited July 3, 2012 by Coral