Trivia Browser
Collection: Brain Age
▲
4
▼
Dr. Ryuta Kawashima turned down over ¥3,292,377,000 JPY ($22 million USD) in Brain Age royalties, and instead donated them to Tohoku University’s Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer, where he works, to help build a laboratory.
This trivia has been marked as "Not Safe for Work".
It may not be appropriate for all visitors and definitely isn't appropriate for work or school environments.
Click here to unhide it.
It may not be appropriate for all visitors and definitely isn't appropriate for work or school environments.
Click here to unhide it.
▲
4
▼
Franchise: Mario
▲
4
▼
One criticism that the 2023 film "The Super Mario Bros. Movie" received is that while composer Bryan Tyler collaborated with Nintendo veteran composer Koji Kondo to create a score that incorporates orchestrated rearrangements of iconic songs from the Mario franchise, there were too many moments of Illumination-mandated pop songs replacing the score in certain scenes. The most infamous example of this being the replacement of the original composition "Driving Me Bananas", a medley of songs from the Donkey Kong Country games, with a-ha’s "Take on Me" feeling somewhat out of context.
According to Jamey Scott, who worked in the film's sound department, Tyler fought hard to keep his orchestrated rendition of the Super Star theme in the film over the studio's suggestion of Van Halen's "Jump", and succeeded.
According to Jamey Scott, who worked in the film's sound department, Tyler fought hard to keep his orchestrated rendition of the Super Star theme in the film over the studio's suggestion of Van Halen's "Jump", and succeeded.
▲
4
▼
The January 2024 IDW Sonic the Hedgehog comic mini series based on Fang the Hunter revolves around him, Bean the Dynamite and Bark the Polar Bear searching for the mysterious “eighth” Chaos Emerald. This is a reference to the 1996 arcade game Sonic the Fighters (Bean and Bark’s debut game), which erroneously featured eight Chaos Emeralds, each one owned by the eight playable characters.
subdirectory_arrow_right Pokémon (Franchise)
▲
4
▼
Early in the Pokémon franchise's life, the Poliwhirl line recieved a major push in marketing, comparable to that of series mascot Pikachu. Mascot costumes were made of Poliwhirl for promotional events, the Pokémon Adventures manga featured Poliwhirl as one of Red's Pokémon, Poliwag was placed closely to Pikachu on the box art of Pokémon Snap, food and toy lines would near-consistently feature a member of the Poliwhirl line alongside Pikachu even when the pool of Pokémon was as limited as 3 or 4 (with exceptions primarily being ones that also lacked Pikachu), and, most famously, Poliwhirl appeared on the center of the cover of TIME Magazine's issue adressing the popularity of Pokémon.
This could be related to Poliwag being Pokémon creator Satoshi Tajiri's favourite of the original 151 Kanto species.
Comedic video about bizarre Pokémon merchandise showing off many instances of Poliwhirl and Poliwrath merchandise - the nature of Poliwhirl's "mascot" status is discussed at the 13:06 mark:
https://youtu.be/Gri7-XW3no8
ResetEra thread about Poliwhirl that opens with multiple images of Poliwhirl memorabilia:
https://www.resetera.com/threads/pokemons-bygone-mascot.763622/
Video from a Kellogg's fan channel featuring box scans and commercials for Pokémon cereal with Poliwhirl:
https://youtu.be/4kEnxp0ihPI
Pop Tarts commercial featuring Poliwrath toys:
https://youtu.be/oKw6l1Skglc
Kraft Mac & Cheese advert featuring Poliwhirl:
https://youtu.be/Sj5lfgEz_bU
Video featuring a photo of a Poliwhirl mascot:
https://youtu.be/KR5oKvYi_PQ
KFC and Heinz commercials for promotions featuring neither, Poliwhirl nor Pikachu:
https://youtu.be/9HCDPTQGmrI
https://youtu.be/nNc1xl8uoMA
Tajiri talks Poliwag:
https://youtu.be/gplIo-J9Ttc?si=vXRHECazu6kGu4IQ&t=433
https://youtu.be/Gri7-XW3no8
ResetEra thread about Poliwhirl that opens with multiple images of Poliwhirl memorabilia:
https://www.resetera.com/threads/pokemons-bygone-mascot.763622/
Video from a Kellogg's fan channel featuring box scans and commercials for Pokémon cereal with Poliwhirl:
https://youtu.be/4kEnxp0ihPI
Pop Tarts commercial featuring Poliwrath toys:
https://youtu.be/oKw6l1Skglc
Kraft Mac & Cheese advert featuring Poliwhirl:
https://youtu.be/Sj5lfgEz_bU
Video featuring a photo of a Poliwhirl mascot:
https://youtu.be/KR5oKvYi_PQ
KFC and Heinz commercials for promotions featuring neither, Poliwhirl nor Pikachu:
https://youtu.be/9HCDPTQGmrI
https://youtu.be/nNc1xl8uoMA
Tajiri talks Poliwag:
https://youtu.be/gplIo-J9Ttc?si=vXRHECazu6kGu4IQ&t=433
▲
4
▼
One scrapped idea for a Wonder Flower transformation was an eight-heads-tall, life-size, live-action version of Mario that hummed to the background music and exclaimed "Boing" when jumping. This idea was pitched by series composer Koji Kondo, but was scrapped due to it being "hard to see the connection between pre-Wonder effect and during Wonder effect. And it's hard to imagine the gameplay changing much by having Mario turn into a live-action, human proportion version of himself." However, this did end up leading to the Sound Off? badge being created to keep the voice sound effects idea in the game. Incidentally, Kondo provided the voice acting for all of the sound effects included while wearing the badge.
IGN article:
https://www.ign.com/articles/koji-kondos-mario-wonder-pitch-was-a-super-tall-live-action-mario-that-said-boing
GamesRadar article:
https://www.gamesradar.com/after-39-years-nintendos-legendary-composer-put-his-voice-in-super-mario-bros-wonder-when-his-idea-for-a-live-action-mario-with-human-proportions-was-rejected/
https://www.ign.com/articles/koji-kondos-mario-wonder-pitch-was-a-super-tall-live-action-mario-that-said-boing
GamesRadar article:
https://www.gamesradar.com/after-39-years-nintendos-legendary-composer-put-his-voice-in-super-mario-bros-wonder-when-his-idea-for-a-live-action-mario-with-human-proportions-was-rejected/
▲
4
▼
In Issue 206 of Nintendo Power, a joke claimed that the "true" identity of the Chainsaw Man from Resident Evil 4 was Toad from the Mario franchise.
subdirectory_arrow_right Hanjuku Hero 4: 7-nin no Hanjuku Hero (Game), SaGa: Scarlet Grace - Ambitions (Game), Bahamut Lagoon (Game), Live A Live (Game), Hanjuku Hero Tai 3D (Game), The Final Fantasy Legend (Game), Square (Company)
▲
4
▼
Among Japanese RPG fans, there is a group of female characters that are generally disliked by the audience, being referred to as "The Three Great She-Devils of Square". The reasons why these characters are disliked varies, but largely revolve around them betraying the main hero(es) in some way. The two generally agreed-upon members are:
• Princess Yoyo from Bahamut Lagoon, the childhood friend of protagonist Byuu and set up as his love interest, only to instead get together with another character, General Palpeleos.
• Alethea from Live a Live, who due to the machinations of the chapter's villain Streibough, came to believe the protagonist Oersted (who she was meant to marry) had abandoned her, and commits suicide after witnessing him murder Streibough. This leads to Oersted becoming the game's overall antagonist, Odio.
There is some debate as to who the third member of the group is, but the list of candidates include:
• Mileille from The Final Fantasy Legend, who was introduced as the leader of a resistance group alongside her twin sister Jeanne, only for it to be revealed that she had been working for Byak-ko the whole time.
• Rinoa from Final Fantasy VIII, largely due to her personality and lingering feelings for her ex-boyfriend Seifer, though she ends up with protagonist Squall in the end. Note that this pick might be due in part because of how divisive the game is in general.
• Catholine from the PS2 Hanjuku Hero games, due to her ugly and obnoxious nature, as well as constantly forcing herself onto the hero.
The group term would later be referenced in SaGa: Scarlet Grace - Ambitions, which featured an enemy team named "Lady Power", that consisted of three female demons with names that reference Yoyo, Alethea, and Milielle (though the former two were known as "Jojo" and "Alicia", respectively).
• Princess Yoyo from Bahamut Lagoon, the childhood friend of protagonist Byuu and set up as his love interest, only to instead get together with another character, General Palpeleos.
• Alethea from Live a Live, who due to the machinations of the chapter's villain Streibough, came to believe the protagonist Oersted (who she was meant to marry) had abandoned her, and commits suicide after witnessing him murder Streibough. This leads to Oersted becoming the game's overall antagonist, Odio.
There is some debate as to who the third member of the group is, but the list of candidates include:
• Mileille from The Final Fantasy Legend, who was introduced as the leader of a resistance group alongside her twin sister Jeanne, only for it to be revealed that she had been working for Byak-ko the whole time.
• Rinoa from Final Fantasy VIII, largely due to her personality and lingering feelings for her ex-boyfriend Seifer, though she ends up with protagonist Squall in the end. Note that this pick might be due in part because of how divisive the game is in general.
• Catholine from the PS2 Hanjuku Hero games, due to her ugly and obnoxious nature, as well as constantly forcing herself onto the hero.
The group term would later be referenced in SaGa: Scarlet Grace - Ambitions, which featured an enemy team named "Lady Power", that consisted of three female demons with names that reference Yoyo, Alethea, and Milielle (though the former two were known as "Jojo" and "Alicia", respectively).
▲
4
▼
Before his career took off as an indie developer, Toby Fox used to play Super Smash Bros. Melee competitively under the old username 'Radiation'.He is currently the only known competitive Super Smash Bros. player to have a character he has created represented in the series. Alongside the release of Banjo & Kazooie as a fighter, a Mii costume based on Sans from his game Undertale as well as an original remix of the song "Megalovania" were both added to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate on September 4th.
There's not much info about Toby Fox playing competitive Melee as he doesn't talk about it publicly too often, the VoD provided is the only publicly-known footage of him playing a set to my knowledge:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nzh3NUO4szE
According to people, he was known as a bit of a local celebrity due to his work on the webcomic Homestuck, though that is more hear-say than anything definitive.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nzh3NUO4szE
According to people, he was known as a bit of a local celebrity due to his work on the webcomic Homestuck, though that is more hear-say than anything definitive.
▲
4
▼
The European version of Donkey Konga contains a cover of the song Tubthumping by Chumbawamba. The lyric "Pissing the night away" is censored as "Kissing the night away", but "He drinks a Whiskey drink, he drinks a Vodka drink. He drinks a Lager drink, he drinks a Cider drink" remains uncensored despite the game's 3+ rating.
▲
4
▼
In 1993, Alfred Chicken publisher Mindscape attempted a publicity stunt by having Alfred Chicken run for a seat in the UK Parliament in the 1993 Christchurch, Dorset by-election, having an actor in an Alfred Chicken costume appear at the British House of Commons constituency of Christchurch as votes were read out. The Alfred Chicken Party ranked at second last with 18 votes, exceeding the Rainbow Alliance (a party intent on abolishing Parliament) by 2 votes. The Alfred Chicken Party, and the "Buy The Daily Sport Party", were cited years later by the Liberal Democrats as a reason for increasing the number of signatures required for a party to get on a ballot.
▲
4
▼
Ed Boon revealed that he had hoped to include John Wick from the franchise of the same name as a guest character in Mortal Kombat 1, but that said plans didn't work out. While the exact reason why is unknown, it's worth noting that John Wick's actor Keanu Reeves had said in 2021 that he did not think the character was a good fit for the Mortal Kombat series.
subdirectory_arrow_right Glover 2 (Game)
▲
4
▼
In 2018, an indie studio named Golden Mushroom claimed they were working on a sequel to Glover for the Nintendo Switch. However, it was soon discovered that they had only applied for the trademark to the name "Glover", and not the copyright, meaning they didn't actually own the rights to the IP. In reality, the copyright had been acquired by Piko Interactive, who had purchased it from Atari SA (the company that had purchased Hasbro Interactive in 2001).
▲
4
▼
In late 2018, a trailer for the film's sequel "Ralph Breaks the Internet" premiered on TV as part of Disney Channel's "Movie Surfers" series. The first half of the trailer used almost 40 seconds of cutscenes from the 2012 Wii game based on the first movie, and used unreleased higher quality renders of these cutscenes rather than the compressed footage released in the game. This trailer also features a noticeably bad, ad-libbed narration from an unknown actor portraying Ralph; this actor does not sound like the original film's actor John C. Reilly, nor the soundalike actor used in the Wii game and commercials Brian T. Delaney. Considering the overall confusing cheapness of the trailer, it's not known why the show's producers chose to use unreleased HD renders of these cutscenes instead of footage from the first film, which they had to have had access to and would have matched the visual quality of the film's sequel better.
▲
4
▼
If the New Donk City Hall stage loops three times, or a music track from the game Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker is playing, Captain Toad will cameo on the stage. This references Super Mario Odyssey where Captain Toad will occasionally appear.
subdirectory_arrow_right Sonic The Hedgehog (Franchise)
▲
3
▼
In The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog, when Sonic is found presumed dead on the ground, the pose he is laying in is a reference to a meme within animation circles known as the "Family Guy Death Pose". This pose is frequently used throughout the animated series of the same name created by Seth MacFarlane, which became criticized in later years for utilizing cheaper animation. This is not the first time this pose was referenced in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise; the first time being in Issue #3 of the IDW comic book miniseries "Sonic the Hedgehog: Imposter Syndrome", where the character Surge collapses into the pose at one point.
Trailer for the game:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iC8sIhr-z5I
Sonic the Hedgehog: Imposter Syndrome Issue #3 (Page 9; info and source provided by chocolatejr9):
https://readallcomics.com/sonic-the-hedgehog-imposter-syndrome-3-2022/
Know Your Meme article:
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/family-guy-death-pose-peter-falls-down-the-stairs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iC8sIhr-z5I
Sonic the Hedgehog: Imposter Syndrome Issue #3 (Page 9; info and source provided by chocolatejr9):
https://readallcomics.com/sonic-the-hedgehog-imposter-syndrome-3-2022/
Know Your Meme article:
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/family-guy-death-pose-peter-falls-down-the-stairs
▲
3
▼
In 2022, the English rock band Arctic Monkeys released a song titled "Sculptures of Anything Goes", featuring the following lyric in the last verse of the song:
This lyric became the subject of news articles when fans on the music lyrics website Genius initially determined that it was referencing the obscure Nintendo DS game City Life DS, which only released in France in 2008 and the United Kingdom in 2009, and did not sell as well as previous games in the City Life series. Fans theorized that the difficulty in finding a copy of the game referenced in the lyric stemmed from Nintendo eventually discontinuing the DS family of systems to support future consoles. They also cited the closure of the Nintendo 3DS/Wii U versions of the Nintendo eShop as another possibility, but this was unfounded as City Life DS was only officially released as a physical cartridge and not part of the Wii U Virtual Console's Nintendo DS library.
However, it was confirmed in an interview with the band's frontman Alex Turner by Rolling Stone Germany on the day the song released that the lyric was not about City Life DS. He attributed the lyric to the works of author David Foster Wallace, most likely as a reference to his book "Infinite Jest" where the characters consume entertainment in the form of cartridges, which could also be referring to Turner's growing struggle to appeal and relate to Arctic Monkeys' audience from their earlier years as their sound and image changed later on.
"The simulation cartridge for City Life '09 is pretty tricky to come by."
This lyric became the subject of news articles when fans on the music lyrics website Genius initially determined that it was referencing the obscure Nintendo DS game City Life DS, which only released in France in 2008 and the United Kingdom in 2009, and did not sell as well as previous games in the City Life series. Fans theorized that the difficulty in finding a copy of the game referenced in the lyric stemmed from Nintendo eventually discontinuing the DS family of systems to support future consoles. They also cited the closure of the Nintendo 3DS/Wii U versions of the Nintendo eShop as another possibility, but this was unfounded as City Life DS was only officially released as a physical cartridge and not part of the Wii U Virtual Console's Nintendo DS library.
However, it was confirmed in an interview with the band's frontman Alex Turner by Rolling Stone Germany on the day the song released that the lyric was not about City Life DS. He attributed the lyric to the works of author David Foster Wallace, most likely as a reference to his book "Infinite Jest" where the characters consume entertainment in the form of cartridges, which could also be referring to Turner's growing struggle to appeal and relate to Arctic Monkeys' audience from their earlier years as their sound and image changed later on.
Arctic Monkeys - Sculptures of Anything Goes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQsrIxyoJdE
City Life DS release dates:
https://web.archive.org/web/20180109182552/https://www.gamespot.com/city-life-ds/
Alex Turner Rolling Stone Germany interview:
https://www.rollingstone.de/arctic-monkeys-alex-turner-im-grossen-interview-zum-neuen-album-the-car-2508705/
Speculation news coverage:
https://www.nme.com/news/gaming-news/arctic-monkeys-sneak-an-obscure-nintendo-reference-into-the-car-3333593
https://www.gamesradar.com/an-obscure-nintendo-city-builder-has-resurfaced-on-the-new-arctic-monkeys-album/
https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2022/10/random-arctic-monkeys-song-potentially-makes-obscure-ds-city-builder-reference
https://indigomusic.com/pop-cultures/arctic-monkeys-made-a-subtle-nintendo-reference-in-their-track-the-car?amp=1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQsrIxyoJdE
City Life DS release dates:
https://web.archive.org/web/20180109182552/https://www.gamespot.com/city-life-ds/
Alex Turner Rolling Stone Germany interview:
https://www.rollingstone.de/arctic-monkeys-alex-turner-im-grossen-interview-zum-neuen-album-the-car-2508705/
Speculation news coverage:
https://www.nme.com/news/gaming-news/arctic-monkeys-sneak-an-obscure-nintendo-reference-into-the-car-3333593
https://www.gamesradar.com/an-obscure-nintendo-city-builder-has-resurfaced-on-the-new-arctic-monkeys-album/
https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2022/10/random-arctic-monkeys-song-potentially-makes-obscure-ds-city-builder-reference
https://indigomusic.com/pop-cultures/arctic-monkeys-made-a-subtle-nintendo-reference-in-their-track-the-car?amp=1
This trivia has been marked as "Not Safe for Work".
It may not be appropriate for all visitors and definitely isn't appropriate for work or school environments.
Click here to unhide it.
It may not be appropriate for all visitors and definitely isn't appropriate for work or school environments.
Click here to unhide it.
▲
3
▼
▲
3
▼
The South Korean version of the game (released two years after the original Japanese edition) contains eleven unused maps not found in any other release, featuring fully 3D environments which do not line up with any locations present in the finished product. All assets related to these maps are dated after the game's Japanese release, with intervals ranging from five days to just over three months. Additionally, the maps' texture names are written in Romanized Japanese rather than Korean, indicating that they were not created by Nintendo of Korea.Two of these maps, kri_04 and kri_05, additionally feature various cat NPCs, all drawn in substantially different art styles compared to not only each other, but also the final game. Each one is named after a developer from the Super Paper Mario staff: yamada_neko02 (Koichiro Yamada), koba_neko (Sayuri Kobayashi), tuka_neko (Naoko Tsukamoto), and kawa_neko (Chie Kawabe).
Of these four, kawa_neko is the most unique, and was apparently designed as a player character. Firstly, the cat's name is only given to its mesh, with its sprite instead being named bc_all.1. Additionally, kawa_neko features an animated tail and a mesh that is centered on the ground rather than the middle of the room. Furthermore, new_neko_18, a redesigned version of kawa_neko with white fur instead of black, can be found in kri_08, kri_09, and kri_10; new_neko_18's mesh is explicitly labeled "PLAYER" in the data for these maps.
Taken together, all of these elements imply that these early rooms were created as a proof-of-concept for an original project by Intelligent Systems that ended up cancelled for unknown reasons.
▲
3
▼
Due to a programming error, the player has a random chance of accessing debug mode in Super Mario Bros. 3 (specifically the one from the NES version of the game, which is carried over to the Super Mario All-Stars port). The debug mode only activates if a value of 80 is stored at the RAM address 7E0160, which can be manually edited by a devkit.
The NES version initializes the equivalent RAM address to 00 whenever the game is turned on, preventing the player from encountering debug mode during the normal course of play. However, due to an oversight, this does not occur in the SNES version, resulting in Super Mario All-Stars reading whatever value is generated by the console itself. Because this value is randomized during bootup, this means that the game has a small chance of activating debug mode in Super Mario Bros. 3 on a retail unit. While the theoretical probability of this occurring is 1/256, it can vary depending on the console's build and the power grid that it is connected to.
The NES version initializes the equivalent RAM address to 00 whenever the game is turned on, preventing the player from encountering debug mode during the normal course of play. However, due to an oversight, this does not occur in the SNES version, resulting in Super Mario All-Stars reading whatever value is generated by the console itself. Because this value is randomized during bootup, this means that the game has a small chance of activating debug mode in Super Mario Bros. 3 on a retail unit. While the theoretical probability of this occurring is 1/256, it can vary depending on the console's build and the power grid that it is connected to.
The Cutting Room Floor articles:
https://tcrf.net/Super_Mario_All-Stars_(SNES)#Old_Debug_Mode
https://tcrf.net/Notes:Super_Mario_All-Stars
Supper Mario Broth video, the description of which includes an explanation for the oversight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjiVoXiRo1M
https://tcrf.net/Super_Mario_All-Stars_(SNES)#Old_Debug_Mode
https://tcrf.net/Notes:Super_Mario_All-Stars
Supper Mario Broth video, the description of which includes an explanation for the oversight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjiVoXiRo1M