Trivia Browser
Company: Atari
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Founders Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney originally wanted to name Atari "Syzygy," only to learn that the name was already taken by a roofing company. Consequently, the pair decided to brainstorm new ideas while playing a round of Go, which Bushnell was experienced in; an issue of Atari's home computer magazine I/O stated that "Their best brainstorming always occurred over a good game and a bottle of beer."
Following this, Bushnell and Dabney decided to name the company after a piece of Go jargon, settling on "Atari," a term used to describe a playing piece that is surrounded on all but one side. "Sente" and "Hane" were also considered as possible names.
Following this, Bushnell and Dabney decided to name the company after a piece of Go jargon, settling on "Atari," a term used to describe a playing piece that is surrounded on all but one side. "Sente" and "Hane" were also considered as possible names.
Page about Atari's relation to Go:
https://web.archive.org/web/20220128094617/https://senseis.xmp.net/?AtariInc
Page detailing the definition of atari in Go:
https://web.archive.org/web/20220128094056/https://senseis.xmp.net/?Atari
https://web.archive.org/web/20220128094617/https://senseis.xmp.net/?AtariInc
Page detailing the definition of atari in Go:
https://web.archive.org/web/20220128094056/https://senseis.xmp.net/?Atari
subdirectory_arrow_right Mike Tyson's Intergalactic Power Punch (Game), Punch-Out!! (Franchise), Mike Tyson (Franchise)
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During development, Kao's name was originally going to be Denis the Kangaroo. This is reflected in some early reviews of the game at the time, which still refer to him as Denis.
Kao the Kangaroo reviews:
https://www.ign.com/articles/2000/12/13/kao-the-kangaroo-2
https://www.eurogamer.net/p-kao-dc
https://www.ign.com/articles/2000/12/13/kao-the-kangaroo-2
https://www.eurogamer.net/p-kao-dc
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The game was originally intended to be the fifth installment of the Super Mario Bros. series, with two leaked prototypes from December 1994 featuring a title screen with the logo Super Mario Bros. 5: Yoshi's Island. Come the final release, and the prefix would be shortened to Super Mario. This explains why the international release was titled Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, as the original Super Mario World was subtitled Super Mario Bros. 4 in Japan.Additionally, the later of the two prototypes features a radically different design for the logo, using a much sleeker and blockier font. The final release would revert to the earlier logo, barring the aforementioned truncated prefix.
December 6, 1994 prototype information:
https://tcrf.net/Proto:Super_Mario_World_2:_Yoshi%27s_Island/ys_romX_0
December 19, 1994 prototype information:
https://tcrf.net/Proto:Super_Mario_World_2:_Yoshi%27s_Island/ys_rom_0_D
Comparison between the final title screens in the Japanese and international releases:
https://tcrf.net/Super_Mario_World_2:_Yoshi%27s_Island/Version_Differences
https://tcrf.net/Proto:Super_Mario_World_2:_Yoshi%27s_Island/ys_romX_0
December 19, 1994 prototype information:
https://tcrf.net/Proto:Super_Mario_World_2:_Yoshi%27s_Island/ys_rom_0_D
Comparison between the final title screens in the Japanese and international releases:
https://tcrf.net/Super_Mario_World_2:_Yoshi%27s_Island/Version_Differences
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Tonic Trouble's working titles were "Ed" and "Hed". The title of the game, having changed roughly 8 times through development, was decided through a vote on the IGN website. The poll is not known to have been preserved, and thus it is unknown what other titles were in consideration for the game.
Ed first name article:
https://www.ign.com/articles/1997/04/05/ed-slated-for-december
Hed rename article:
https://www.ign.com/articles/1997/04/26/ubisofts-ed-gets-new-identity
https://www.ign.com/articles/1997/04/05/ed-slated-for-december
Hed rename article:
https://www.ign.com/articles/1997/04/26/ubisofts-ed-gets-new-identity
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The title for Cartoon Network: Punch Time Explosion originated as an in-joke within Cartoon Network, being shortened from the joke title Cartoon Network: Super Fist Crazy Punch Time Explosion. The original title was Cartoon Network: Superstar Rumble, which had to be changed for unknown legal concerns.
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The originally planned title for Missile Command was "Armageddon", but this name was vetoed by upper management due to issues that children would have with spelling and pronouncing the name. It's also suggested that various members of Atari's upper management didn't know what the word actually meant. As such, the alternative title of "Missile Command" came about.
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According to character designer Gregg Mayles on Twitter, after the announcement that King K. Rool would be in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, a character that Gregg had named and designed the actions of, he revealed that the character was original called "KOMMANDER K. ROOL" and that Donkey Kong Country was originally to be called MONKEY MAYHEM. He also mentioned that the "K." in K. Rool does not actually stand for anything and the name itself is only intended to be a play on the word "cruel", though he joked that the initial could stand for something mundane and off-character, such as "Keith".
In addition, Gregg's brother Steve, who designed the look and visual design for the character, also revealed that the programmers thought King K. Rool was "too big" and too taxing on the game's memory, and thus several frames of the character's animation had to be dropped as a result.
In addition, Gregg's brother Steve, who designed the look and visual design for the character, also revealed that the programmers thought King K. Rool was "too big" and too taxing on the game's memory, and thus several frames of the character's animation had to be dropped as a result.
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This is the first game in the Dragon Ball: Budokai Tenkaichi series to be released under its original Japanese name (Dragon Ball: Sparking!) in the overseas version of the game.
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The Art of Fighting ending, which was a continuation from the ending from The King of Fighters XIV, features Khushnood from Garou: Mark of the Wolves. However, his name changed to Marco in this ending, which was his original name in the Japanese version of Garou: Mark of the Wolves. This was likely due to The King of Fighters XIV's director, Yasuyuki Oda, and art director, Nobuyuki Kuroki, asking on a livestream with SNK community manager KrispyKaiser if the fans would like his original name in future games. The chat overwhelmingly preferred the name Marco.
Livestream:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EB9xLs8AAc0#t=679
King of Fighters XIV:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gTYseXKfqY
King of Fighters XV:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jv8xIkzCLY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EB9xLs8AAc0#t=679
King of Fighters XIV:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gTYseXKfqY
King of Fighters XV:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jv8xIkzCLY
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After Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door's announcement in 2003, some Mario fans incorrectly believed that the character of Madame Flurrie was going to be the ghost of Bowser's wife, based off of her character design and Japanese name. This is due to Flurrie's Japanese name, "Cloudia", sounding a lot like "Clawdia", a popular urban legend name for the Koopalings' mother supposedly created by the Mario fan website "Lemmy's Land", as well as Flurrie sharing a hair style with Ludwig and lip-shape with Wendy, who were at the time considered Bowser's children by Nintendo.
subdirectory_arrow_right The Joy of Creation: Classic (Game)
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On March 25, 2024, Nikson revealed that the game's title was being changed from "The Joy of Creation: Ignited Collection" to "THE JOY OF CREATION". This meant the game was no longer a bundle, but drawing inspiration from the original Story Mode and Reborn titles to make THE JOY OF CREATION its own game in the series. Nikson claimed that the first title never fully resonated with him after deciding against including the Classic mode as a part of the games to remake. He made the change to emphasize that it was an entirely new project re-imagining elements of earlier games in the series instead of a remaster or update, which he felt did not quite capture the essence of the game.
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Checkered Flag was originally called Checkered Flag 2 (referring the previous game with the title on Atari Lynx), before being changed to Redline Racing and finally Checkered Flag, positioning it as a remake/port instead of a sequel.
St. Format Issue #59 (Page 62):
http://www.atarimania.com/atari-magazine-issue-st-format-issue-59_185.html
http://www.atarimania.com/atari-magazine-issue-st-format-issue-59_185.html
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In the Japanese version's commentary with the game's composer Hitoshi Sakimoto, he stated that the original name for the song "Remnants" was "zun zurizuri zunzun" in reference to the rhythm of the opening motif. However, this name was too long, and it was shortened to "zun zun".
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The go-to term for the initial conflict of the Star Fox series, as told in three different installments (Star Fox on SNES, Star Fox 64, and Star Fox Zero), is the "Lylat Wars". This name originates from the original PAL release of Star Fox 64, where it was renamed to Lylat Wars due to trademark issues (similarly to why the first Star Fox was renamed to "Starwing" there as well). In comparison, its 3DS remake, Star Fox 64 3D, would retain the Star Fox 64 moniker in all regions. Nintendo would later actually canonize the "Lylat Wars" moniker as the official name of the conflict against Andross' forces in the opening prologue to Star Fox Zero.
Star Fox Zero prologue where Fox mentions the "Lylat Wars":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8vgF1mSj5c&list=PLAV-xzjVBR0Wr2JIdD02pefR7CLz18wg2
Lylat Wars page on NOE website:
https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-64/Lylat-Wars-277897.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8vgF1mSj5c&list=PLAV-xzjVBR0Wr2JIdD02pefR7CLz18wg2
Lylat Wars page on NOE website:
https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-64/Lylat-Wars-277897.html
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When the game's logo is shown in the intro of Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, the word "BATTLE" has a shining effect, which is another video file overlaid over the 3D logo. There are two versions of this video, one with Japanese kanji and another with Latin script, however due to an oversight, the shining effect will only show Japanese kanji overlaid upon the English text. This would be fixed in the 2012 rerelease, but only for the English language, so other languages with an English logo still experience the error.
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Adventures of Tron was released in Europe as Adventures on GX-12 without the Tron license. The only difference between the two versions is that the title screen was removed.
AtariAge:
https://atariage.com/software_page.php?SoftwareID=2215
Cutting Room Floor:
https://tcrf.net/Adventures_of_Tron
https://atariage.com/software_page.php?SoftwareID=2215
Cutting Room Floor:
https://tcrf.net/Adventures_of_Tron
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According to Final Fantasy XVI's creative director/scenario writer Kazutoyo Maehiro and the game's producer Naoki Yoshida in a 2023 IGN article, in the Japanese version of the game, Chocobos are referred to as "uma" (馬), which is the Japanese word for "horse". Initially, neither Maehiro or director Hiroshi Takai considered using Chocobos in the game at all, because according to Maehiro, "when thinking about the story, the worldview, and a feeling of reality, a horse just looked better as a silhouette when straddled." Yoshida elaborated that horses fit better when building a world based on European medieval gothic fantasy:
Despite this explanation, Yoshida still instructed the development team to include Chocobos in the game in an effort to stay faithful to the series' long-standing elements. The Japanese version also still refers to them as Chocobos and horses interchangeably. Maehiro stated that he tried to tie the Chocobos into the history of Valisthea through partnerships with its people, in an effort to create something culturally familiar. He justified this by stating that in Japanese, they "sometimes refer to a car as 'legs', or not having a car as 'having no legs'; and in the same way, the people of Valisthea refer to Chocobos as 'horses'." He subsequently implied that actual horses may exist in other regions in the game's world, but that in Valisthea, Chocobos function as their regional equivalent to actual horses. Localization director Michael-Christopher Koji Fox also stated that he decided not to refer to Chocobos as horses in the game's English translation:
The terminology in the decision to refer to Chocobos as horses resulted in confused or joking reactions from Japanese players online, since this is not the first time Chocobos were referred to as horses in the series. In the original 2010 release of Final Fantasy XIV Online, the kanji characters for horse and bird (鳥 , "tori") were used together as "horsebird" (馬鳥) in the Japanese script in place of the standard katakana for Chocobo (チョコボ). At release, several other katakana terms were replaced with kanji symbols, with some terms existing in-game as written in Chinese rather than Japanese. Square Enix offered several conflicting explanations for the changes, including the need to "build atmosphere", and to consolidate terminology with the then-upcoming Chinese-language release, but these did not help as the change caused an uproar among Japanese players, resulting in Chocobo being reincorporated into the Japanese version's script in a future update. The controversy would later be referenced in the 2013 reboot of Final Fantasy XIV Online through a piece of dialogue spoken by Golden Uma Doshin, a Quest NPC found in Central Shroud as part of the limited time quest "Turn Around, Beautiful":
"In reality, horses are animals that can build strong partnerships with humans. We share a long history with them. Weapons involving horses also appear more realistic. Especially with the improvement in graphics being so remarkable, there is a chance that it becomes difficult to lie or deceive viewers, in a good way, and as a result, may impair the sense of immersion. Chocobos are based on birds, which first of all means they don’t stand on four legs, and that makes them more difficult to mount. When compared with a horse it might not feel as stable to ride a Chocobo, and their wings aren’t big and strong enough to take you to the sky, either."
Despite this explanation, Yoshida still instructed the development team to include Chocobos in the game in an effort to stay faithful to the series' long-standing elements. The Japanese version also still refers to them as Chocobos and horses interchangeably. Maehiro stated that he tried to tie the Chocobos into the history of Valisthea through partnerships with its people, in an effort to create something culturally familiar. He justified this by stating that in Japanese, they "sometimes refer to a car as 'legs', or not having a car as 'having no legs'; and in the same way, the people of Valisthea refer to Chocobos as 'horses'." He subsequently implied that actual horses may exist in other regions in the game's world, but that in Valisthea, Chocobos function as their regional equivalent to actual horses. Localization director Michael-Christopher Koji Fox also stated that he decided not to refer to Chocobos as horses in the game's English translation:
"I remember seeing it in the script and remarking, 'You're saying 'horse' here. You're sure that's OK?' But Maehiro said, 'Yes, this is what we wanted to do.' In English, we never really wanted to use the word horse, because Chocobos and horses are entirely different. It just sounded weird to us in that sense. But we do use words like 'steed'; and I think 'courser' [a medieval word for a warhorse,] as well."
The terminology in the decision to refer to Chocobos as horses resulted in confused or joking reactions from Japanese players online, since this is not the first time Chocobos were referred to as horses in the series. In the original 2010 release of Final Fantasy XIV Online, the kanji characters for horse and bird (鳥 , "tori") were used together as "horsebird" (馬鳥) in the Japanese script in place of the standard katakana for Chocobo (チョコボ). At release, several other katakana terms were replaced with kanji symbols, with some terms existing in-game as written in Chinese rather than Japanese. Square Enix offered several conflicting explanations for the changes, including the need to "build atmosphere", and to consolidate terminology with the then-upcoming Chinese-language release, but these did not help as the change caused an uproar among Japanese players, resulting in Chocobo being reincorporated into the Japanese version's script in a future update. The controversy would later be referenced in the 2013 reboot of Final Fantasy XIV Online through a piece of dialogue spoken by Golden Uma Doshin, a Quest NPC found in Central Shroud as part of the limited time quest "Turn Around, Beautiful":
"Chocobo... chocobo... chocobo... Nothing but horsebirds in this stable. A sight to disturb Eastern eyes, to be sure."
IGN: Chocobos are Called 'Horses' in the Japanese Version of Final Fantasy XVI:
https://www.ign.com/articles/chocobos-are-called-horses-in-final-fantasy-xvi-japanese-version
Censored Gaming: In The Japanese Version Of Final Fantasy XVI, Chocobos Are Called "Horses":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AT-QpAwkqQ
Destructoid: Final Fantasy XIV text issue turns Chocobos to Horsebirds:
https://www.destructoid.com/final-fantasy-xiv-text-issue-turns-chocobos-to-horsebirds/
Final Fantasy XIV Online wiki articles:
https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Golden_Uma_Doshin
https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Turn_Around,_Beautiful
https://www.ign.com/articles/chocobos-are-called-horses-in-final-fantasy-xvi-japanese-version
Censored Gaming: In The Japanese Version Of Final Fantasy XVI, Chocobos Are Called "Horses":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7AT-QpAwkqQ
Destructoid: Final Fantasy XIV text issue turns Chocobos to Horsebirds:
https://www.destructoid.com/final-fantasy-xiv-text-issue-turns-chocobos-to-horsebirds/
Final Fantasy XIV Online wiki articles:
https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Golden_Uma_Doshin
https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Turn_Around,_Beautiful
Platform: Xbox One
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"Xbox 720", a popular preliminary name given by fans and the press to the hypothetical Xbox 360 successor that would eventually become the Xbox One, was the official working title of the hardware according to a leaked Microsoft corporate slideshow from 2012, a year prior to the console's announcement.
Tweet summary:
https://twitter.com/idlesloth84_/status/1751946565223112994
Original slideshow PDF:
https://files.catbox.moe/xyabnx.pdf
Video on document leak:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NPUHdpT3yo
https://twitter.com/idlesloth84_/status/1751946565223112994
Original slideshow PDF:
https://files.catbox.moe/xyabnx.pdf
Video on document leak:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NPUHdpT3yo
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A prototype for Color a Dinosaur shows that the game was originally called Paint Me! and used black backgrounds instead of white. Despite the title not signifying that the game features dinosaurs, there is nothing to suggest that the game was ever going to feature any pages other than dinosaurs, as all the pages on the prototype are also dinosaurs.