Games
Discover facts about games. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
Games
Ring Around the Rosie has nothing to do with plague
Holding hands and collapsing in a circle is not nearly as morbid as you want it to be. The widely accepted plague origin story involving sneezing and death is…
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Pokémon almost had a very different name
The largest media franchise in human history was almost hit with a massive copyright lawsuit before it even began. Satoshi Tajiri originally pitched 'Capsule…
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Ceramic chips generate higher frequency acoustics than plastic
The denser molecular structure of ceramic tokens causes them to 'ping' rather than 'thud' when clashing together. It is an acoustic signature explicitly…
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Jet Set Radio heavily popularized cel-shaded comic styles
Before everything tried to look like a glossy movie, Sega decided to make their rollerblading graffiti vandals look exactly like a bright cartoon. The thick…
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Orthographic rendering mathematically removes perspective
Depth perception is entirely an illusion created by shrinking objects at a distance. Orthographic rendering intentionally mathematically removes this…
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Why gamers keep admiring their character mid-game
After spending roughly four hours meticulously sculpting a jawline in the menus, you will randomly spin the perspective just to admire your handiwork. It…
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In Super Monkey Ball, you tilt the whole world
You do not actually control the primate trapped inside the transparent sphere. You literally just pivot the entire universe around him, letting raw gravity…
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Post match loser interviews structured to be awkward
Nothing generates audience engagement like fresh misery. Broadcast productions actively force completely devastated teenagers to stand under bright lights…
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The terrifying sound in Amnesia is just squeaky rubber
The horrifying squeals of the terrifying entities lurking in the darkness are literally just the sounds of inflated rubber being uncomfortably squeaked…
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Wordle began as a gift for one crossword-loving partner
While most people just buy flowers, Josh Wardle built an entire viral web sensation. He created the daily word game simply because his girlfriend liked…
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In Katamari, cleaning up means rolling up continents
Cleaning up the universe requires an aggressive disregard for personal property. What starts as picking up paperclips and loose change rapidly escalates into…
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Why a hundred-sided die takes forever to stop
When you put one hundred tiny facets on a sphere, it effectively ceases to be a die and just becomes a golf ball. You roll it, and then you wait an agonizing…
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Hopping diagonally on colorful cubes while swearing loudly
Before games let you explore vast galaxies, they forced you to jump diagonally on a pyramid to turn it yellow. Q*bert was an arcade classic defined by an…
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Why gamers wore ridiculous glowing helmets
Aesthetic dignity is instantly thrown out the window the moment a brightly colored, hideous piece of headgear offers superior protection. You spend the rest…
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Doom chainsaws require gasoline to continuously operate
Ripping and tearing through demon hordes is surprisingly dependent on fossil fuels. Despite being set on advanced futuristic installations, the marine's…
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Build orders require exact timing down to the literal second
Deviating from the sacred spreadsheet of construction timings means immediate execution. If you drop your second barracks at minute three instead of minute…
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Crash Bandicoot collects fruit to gain extra lives
Immortality is cheap if you like tropical produce. Gathering exactly one hundred floating apples magically grants this frantic marsupial a second chance at…
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Why some PlayStation owners turned them upside down
Early models of Sony's grey box had notoriously terrible lasers that would warp out of alignment from basic heat. Players quickly figured out that flipping…
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Why Nintendo cards became Yakuza favorites
The notorious Japanese mafia utilized specialized decks for highly illegal underground gambling rings. They loved the premium thickness of the paper so much…
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Polyominoes dictate strict tile packing mathematics
The logic of packing adjacent geometric blocks into confined grids is mathematically rigid. It serves as a stark reminder that no matter how hard you push, a…
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The musician behind Sonic's unforgettable sound
Fast blue mammals require top-tier musical accompaniment. The studio hired the bassist from the massive Japanese band Dreams Come True to compose the bouncy,…
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Essential movement keys fade entirely from keyboards
After hundreds of hours of frantic strafing, the crucial letters on your peripheral will eventually completely rub off. You are left with four highly…
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The secret code that put blood back in Mortal Kombat
Welcome to the 90s, where corporate cowardice could be bypassed with a simple button sequence. When Mortal Kombat was ported to home consoles, Nintendo…
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Shiny glowing objects signify extreme importance
Critical items emit a blinding, unearthly glow, ensuring you never accidentally walk past the rusty key needed to save the universe.
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