Mario is in...Less Games Than I Imagined Actually - Crossover Quest

So, I was looking at some of the previous stuff I'd done to find crossovers, and found that Mario, for being known for doing everything, isn't actually in as many crossovers as I expected. I'm not sure if this is because I'm discounting a lot of crossovers with the Legend of Zelda for already being included, but there aren't that many. There are some though, so let's dive in.

Mario, along with his brother Luigi and Peach (who isn't his brother That would make certain scenes awkward) is in SSX On Tour, picking up a hobby of skiing and snowboarding. I guess he's quite good at it, but I was never really good enough to know.

He's also shooting some hoops with them on NBA Street V3. You'd think with all the exercise he does, he wouldn't be so portly. Maybe it's just all the cake that Peach gives him.

Finally, on the side of Mario sticking himself into other people's games, there's Fortune Street, a Monopoly-esque game that started out as a Dragon's Quest minigame, but eventually became its own thing. Incidentally, the series also features Final Fantasy characters, but not in the same game as the Mario characters.

However, Mario doesn't just sneak into other games. There are characters from other franchises in his own games. Final Fantasy shows up again, this time in Mario Hoops 3 on 3, where a Moogle, Ninja, Black Mage, White Mage and Cactuar turn up to shoot some hoops (wow, I didn't know Mario liked Basketball that much).

And of course, there's the arcade versions of Mario Kart, where he invites quite a few characters from other series to join him on the racetrack. As well as the previously mentioned Pacman, there's also Don-chan, who's from the Taiko no Tatsujin series, a series of rhythm games that only has one game translated into English, which is on the Playstation 2.

Interestingly enough, in the second arcade version of Mario Kart, there's also a Tamagotchi, Mametchi, who you can play as.

You thought I was kidding, didn't you?

So, that's where Mario's gotten around.

Since this was a little short, I'm going to mention something about the Super Smash Bros game I discovered whilst researching this.

Pacman's up taunt is known as Namco Roulette, and it summons one of quite a few characters including at least one character from Dragon Buster, Taiko no Tatsujin, Bosconian, Galaga, Galaxian, The Tower of Druaga, Rally-X, Baraduke, Dig Dug, Sky Kid, Gaplus, Xevious, Libble Rabble, King & Balloon, Valkyrie no Denesetsu and Metro-Cross.

So that's 16 games included in just a single taunt, in a game that in its first installment had 12 characters total. Nowadays, a mere taunt has more characters than an entire game used to have.

That's just... wow.

Crossover Quest: Part One: Smash Bros has All the Franchises

Sorry that this is a day late. I would give an excuse, but frankly, I simply forgot. So to make it up for you (and since I ran out of ideas for theories), I'm going to start something new called Crossover Quest.

The basic idea is that if two franchises have a character in the same game, movie or book, they subsequently have at least one universe that contains both games. So we're going to see how crazy the connections can get.

First: a few rules:

1. It must be a character. Costumes can be remade, as can pictures and buildings. Characters are more likely to be the same person.
2. Yes, crossover games count. You may disagree with this, since that's their point, but I like them. Deal with it.
3. There is no rule three.
4. Profit?
5. Any media counts, except fanart and fanfiction, since that would make it too easy (seriously everything is connected in fanfiction).
6. There might be more rules as I think of them.
7. Franchises will be considered based on if they treat themselves as the same. Pixar and Disney are going to be separate since they treat every movie as an independent one, whilst the Marios will be put together, since they're crossed over often enough it's not worth putting Donkey Kong and the others as their own games.

Some characters (especially Mario) may be featured a lot. Some less so. Either way, it's going to be a fun ride!

So, let's start with the adorable fighting game that might not be a fighting game Smash Bros!

Over the 4 games, there have been characters from a tonne of franchises. Whilst some have multiple characters, we'll just name the most notable (or one I see first) from each franchise to count the entire franchise (sorry Meta Knight).

• Mario (...Mario. Yeah, that was obvious.)
• Link (Legend of Zelda)
• Bayonetta (...Baynonetta)
• Captain Falcon (F-Zero)
• Pikachu (Pokemon)
• Cloud (Final Fantasy)
• Corrin (Fire Emblem)
• Duck Hunt (... You've probably guessed)
• Fox (Star Fox. Congratulations Nintendo, you're really creative.)
• Nana and Popo (Ice Climbers)
• Kirby (Yeah...)
• Little Mac (Punch-Out!)
• Lucas (EarthBound)
• Mega Man (Do you really need me to tell you?)
• Mr Game and Watch (...)
• Olimar (Pikmin)
• Pacman (Was there a rule at the start of videogames that you had to name your game after the main character?)
• Pit (Kid Icarus - His name isn't Icarus!)
• R.O.B. (Wouldn't actually be a character if it wasn't for this game! Was literally made so that stores would sell NES', because he's the toy that loves you and isn't going to steal your soul.)
• Ryu (Street Fighter)
• Samus (Metroid)
• Sonic (Okay, I get it, you were trying to copy Mario. You didn't have to copy their lazy naming scheme as well!)
• Snake (Metal Gear)
• Villager (Animal Crossing, and your nightmares)
• Wii Fit Trainer (Wii Fit. I bet you played that once and then forgot about it)
• Miis (Those games you played when you got the wii and promptly forgot about)

So, wow. We've got 26 franchises within one game. Yay! Just some oddities:

The Miis. They're not going to count for anything but their own games, since they're meant to be representations of yourself rather than actual characters.

Pikachu and Pokemon. This will be the games only, not the anime or any mangas, simply due to how different they are. You could argue that Pokemon Yellow puts the anime and games in the same universe, but due to some (major) differences, I'm going to say they're separate.

R.O.B. He's mainly included just out of completion, but we'll say that Stack Up and Gyromite have been included in the universe because of this, simply because, well, you're not really going to get them anywhere else.

Next time on Crossover Quest: Mario really gets around!

How Long Would the Choosing Ceremony Take? - Divergent

Allegiant is being released next week in the UK, so in honour of the thinking girl's Twilight, that's broken the mold of every teen series since Harry Potter by not stretching its final book out into two movies, lets just see how long it would take each year for the Choosing Ceremony.

So, what is the Choosing Ceremony? Basically each 16 year old takes it in turns to walk up, cut their hand and let the blood drip into one of the five bowls on a table. I guess no-one's afraid of blood in this universe.

Honestly, I'd just prefer the sorting hat. This just seems needlessly
insane. I mean, I like the series and all, but still, needless stage fright.

In the books, it's said to take all day, because it's morning when they arrive and the sun is setting when they leave. Could this be possible?

Well, first you'd have to consider how long it'd take for one person to do it. In the movie, they never show how long it takes to get down the steps (because unless they have some mystical teleportation skill never shown, they can't go from near the middle to right at the front in the space of time of one meaningful glance), so lets assume it takes about 40 seconds, considering that some are sitting at the top, which would take longer, and some would spend the time having surprised looks like they haven't had a bunch of people before them do the exact same thing (Tris...).

After that is the actual sorting. This is actually shown in full, by multiple people in the movie. This takes a very short amount of time, about 12-15 seconds depending on hesitation, then about eight seconds of walking off and the stuff being replaced before the next is called.

So, all in all, each person takes about a minute to choose their faction.

The only faction which its shown the number of initiates is Dauntless, which has 34 (33 plus the one who immediately becomes factionless because he doesn't jump). If we assume every faction has equal numbers (despite the fact that means you advertise either having fun and excitement or spending your life studying to teenagers and expect them to equally choose), that means you have 170 people to go through every year (which raises questions about how they survive with a population that has only enough people to fill one year of a small high school born each year). There's also basically a minute of pure talking by the leaders, which is oddly short considering they're meant to be leaders (seriously, look at any ceremony. They will have ages of speaking by random officials, or at least it'll feel like it).

So that's just 171 minutes, or nearly 3 hours. If anything, the amount of time it's taken is far overestimated. Huh, I thought it'd be the opposite way around.

That's still 3 hours of watching people drip their blood into bowls. I'd bring a book. It's about to get very boring after the 20th.

Why Are Mario and Luigi the Only Guys to Save Peach?

So, Mario games are slightly popular, aren't they? And they've all got a pretty similar plot. The plumbers (/tennis players/worst doctor ever/star football players/ party organizers/ morally questionable zoo owner/ Mario has far too much time on his hands, and is never actually doing what his actual job is) are hanging out with the princess, and then she gets kidnapped. Instead of the castle guard sorting it out (which... seemingly doesn't exist? Seriously, you'd think after getting kidnapped... ten times? Peach, it's like you want to get kidnapped.)

And you can hardly say you're defenseless. You
fight pretty well in Galaxy 2 and your own DS
games. Heck, you can fly! And you have superpowers!

Peach's security issues aside, why is it that when she inevitably gets kidnapped, it's the role of some plumbers to go save her?

Because they're the only ones who can. They're the heroes Mushroom Kingdom deserves, not the ones they need.

It'sa me! Batmario!

The main groups that live in the Mushroom Kingdom, and aren't on Bowser's side are Toads/Toadettes and Yoshis.

There is no way that the Toads could save Princess Peach (yes I know, they did in Galaxy 2, I still don't know why), because, simply put, they'd be instantly stopped. In the first game, Bowser has something that's not really explained that can turn any Toad into a square made of bricks (that's an... oddly specific power, I must admit). With those sorts of odds, they probably wouldn't have volunteers lining up to go save the princess. And if there are people who could do it without a near certain chance of doom, why not use them?

That leaves Yoshis (Yoshies? Yoshii?). But they only really started to exist in Super Mario Bros, by which time the brothers had gotten pretty settled in their part time job of princess saving. So it could be that they didn't actually live in the Mushroom Kingdom until after the events of that game, where they would realise that the mild protection that comes from being in a kingdom with Mario and Luigi is worth leaving their own society.

So, Mario and Luigi are basically the last bastion of defense for the Mushroom Kingdom and most of the (somewhat) good aligned world?

Oh gosh, imagine if Bowser attacked the Mushroom Kingdom whilst Mario was busy being wrongly accused in Isle Delfino. Good job guys, you threatened the safety of a kingdom and all of the Toads because you couldn't be bothered to notice that the guy that arrived literally that day probably didn't commit the crimes that had happened earlier. It's not like he could time travel or anything...

Okay, I guess he can.

Why are the Protagonists of Pokemon Let Loose on the Region?

Happy Pokemon Day! In celebration of 20 years of the glorious little critters, here's another Pokemon theory for you guys to read.

So, the protagonists in Pokemon are around 10-16 years old. AKA, the exact age that kids should be attending school. But everyone's just happy to let them go off gallivanting around the country, catching wild animals to play with.

Why do they not have school to go to? Why are they just letting the kids wander around?

Seriously, kid, where are your parents?

Well, firstly, its implied in Pokemon Ruby, Sapphire and Emerald that because of the long grass, people are completely cut off if they don't have Pokemon. This means that each town in Pokemon has to establish their own way of educating their kids. Whilst some places have schools, most don't bother, especially smaller places such as the starting areas, so it's more likely than not that kids in Pokemon are homeschooled, learning from their parents.

But why are the parents of Pokemon protagonists willing to just let their kid wander off with a random animal after being told some man said it was a good idea. Love letters and fun times with the professor aside, the world of Pokemon isn't exactly the safest place to let a kid loose onto, with the bad guys popping up all over the place to steal your Pokemon, try to kill everyone or expand or reduce the land mass (Archie and Maxie never get invited to the cool villain parties...).

Pokemon battling is institutionalised into society. The gym leaders practically lead any city they're in, and Pokemon have become inherent into the way of life for people of this world, whether it is battling them, using them for unpacking, or having them as fire fighters (Yes. Just look closely at the Sun and Moon trailer, and you'll see Fire fighter Blastoise. Yes, this is very awesome. As is the announcement of Sun and Moon.). Also, you practically need Pokemon to live in this world, otherwise you'd be banned from many of the routes for your own safety due to the wild grass where the Pokemon live.

So, wouldn't it make sense to have an environment where kids could make sure they'd have powerful enough Pokemon to help them with the rest of their life, and they'd be encouraged to do so? It's implied that most kids never get to the Elite 4, they just do a gym or two and decide they want to do something else with their life, and leave. And the fact is, the kids that you follow are the exceptions. For every Red, or Kris, or Serena and Calem, or May and Ethan, or any of the other kids you follow, there's probably hundreds more that did one gym and headed home, or even if they defeated the gym leaders, wouldn't have the nerve to go face the Elite 4.

The protagonists are the ones you follow because it's a rare occurrence, that happens at most, every few years. And even when it does happen, even if people aren't so used to the idea that kids battle, they'll just think, well, it sorted itself out. The protagonists are the exceptions when they have an interesting journey, and the others, well, they just become the next cashier at the Poke-Mart.

And if you wonder, why are they seeing the weird things, well, if it was another person seeing it, we'd be following them, wouldn't we?

So have a great Pokemon Day, maybe play a little of your favourite generation.

Now, who's looking forwards to Pokemon Sun and Moon?

Why Minecraft is a Post Apocalyptic Wasteland

So. Minecraft. The happy game where you build things and mine and craft. Lego without the pain (seriously, do not step on Lego). But could it really be something darker? Could it actually be a post apocalyptic wasteland, where your character is the only survivor that hasn't been mutated beyond all recognition?

Well, yeah, because otherwise I'd be talking about something else, like My Little Pony or something (probably not My Little Pony, but who knows?). But what proof do we have for this?

Lets look at Steve?

This Steve? That wasn't a question,
his name just makes it look that way.

Notice something that makes him different from all the other villagers in the world of Minecraft?

His nose. Namely he's like Voldemort and doesn't have one.

Do you know what shares this trait? Zombies.

They also wear the exact same clothes as him, have the same sized eyes and are practically just Steve? with a different paint job. Now, notice the shape he has instead of a nose. He has two points that are darker than the rest of his skin. Do you know who also have that?

Skeletons. That makes it so that both of the mobs with the same sort of face as Steve? are the undead ones, with only villagers being the living ones, with mutated huge noses. Steve?'s the only one like him in the game (unless you go on multiplayer mode but shh. Logic isn't cool here.)

Plus, there are signs that there was once civilisation. There's the dummied out humans, and the mineshafts, jungle temples and desert temples. This implied there used to be a civilisation,but somehow it got destroyed, except for the mutated villagers who hide in their wooden huts, waiting for their old friends, who have been turned into the undead, to destroy them and turn them into one of their own.

But where did this come from?

Well. when you defeat the Ender Dragon, the credits have two people talking about the meaning of life. Among other things, this implies that the End wasn't naturally part of the Minecraft world. The End being around is actively corrupting to the world, as more and more Endermen enter the main world and more and more Ender portals are being let off, ones built by the original civilisation that came before, but got destroyed... by the mysterious voices?

Maybe?

I might be wrong. Comment if you think something else caused it, and if so, what is it?

Where do Elsa's Powers Come From?

From the completely powerless King and Queen, a child is born with the power to control ice, create clothes and even turn snowmen to life. The question is... how?

And I know the answer.

If you listen to the songs taken out, in particular Spring Pageant, it's quite obvious that there's an ancient troll prophecy (and a director who's more than a little full of himself). The basics are that an ice queen will splinter the land, curse it with unending Winter and it'll only end with a sword sacrifice (sound familiar).

Now, you may just say that that doesn't really count, because they were taken out of the film, so we're going to go into the film now for more evidence.

When the trolls talk about Elsa's powers, it's asked how the heck she got them, and the rock trolls are vague as heck, saying that she could be born with them. Or cursed. The emphasis clearly shows that it is a curse, and the only hint of anything that could curse her is the prophecy.

Seriously guys, you just had to have a prophecy didn't you. You weren't
 happy enough being love experts, you now had to curse people.

But then, why did the prophecy occur then? It's never stated that it'd happen in a specific generation, just that it would happen. Sure it could just be chance.

Or it could be that dumb flower from Tangled.

Yes I'm talking to you. You're not getting out of this by glowing.

When the flower grew, the energy got transferred into the Earth by the witch singing the healing song. From there, it could have spread out, and, driven by the prophecy, been absorbed by the one person alive it could apply to.

Elsa.

With the energy absorbed through a different way, being attracted by the prophecy instead of the flower, it would have caused her to develop different gifts. However, the inherent healing would be there, but suppressed by the prophecy's power to make her into an ice queen, explaining how she could make Olaf and Marshmallow. And when the prophecy was weakened, the power of the sun could take more power, making it possible for her to warm Arendelle and bring all of the flowers back to life (because lets be honest here, those flowers were not surviving otherwise). But she still kept her ice powers, due to the chaotic nature of the prophecy attached to them.

I still don't know where the clothes design part came from though.

Why don't the Other Avengers Get Involved in the Films?

One question I constantly see popping up is "Why the heck doesn't <insert Avengers character here> just ring up <insert other Avengers character here> and get them to help them out?" Well, since I love the Avengers movies (and secretly want to befriend Tony Stark to get a suit, but that's another matter), I'm going to try and explain for each movie why they didn't just get the others involved.

For the ones before the Avengers were set, it's quite simple. They just don't know each other yet. Especially for Captain America: the First Avenger, since most of the members aren't even born yet. That just leaves Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World and Captain America: The Winter Soldier (since seriously, how would they even get involved in Guardians of the Galaxy?). The rest of the time, the main reason is that it just happens too fast for them to get message out and get the Avengers Assembled in time.

Black Widow and (maybe) Hawkeye

This isn't a movie, but a reason why neither get involved in some of the movies (admittedly, Black Widow gets involved rather often). They're both Shield Agents outside of the Avengers, and as such have work to do, with isn't necessarily going to clean up the Avengers mess. Plus the army may specifically ask the two of them to stay out of certain situations, for reasons that could include wanting to save them for more important situations, wanting to send in the army or Iron Patriot instead, or simply (especially in Black Widow's sake), not exactly trusting them to put the government interests above their own (especially during the Winter Soldier, when Shield were against Captain America).

Iron Man 3

You might not have noticed, but Tony Stark has a huge frigging ego. Even he admits he doesn't play nicely with others. So why would this guy, who's being personally targeted, ask others for help? It just doesn't fit his characterisation to phone up and call for help. Even if it did, he's also suffering from an extreme case of PTSD from the Battle of New York, and so probably wouldn't want to get involved with anyone from that (since a symptom of PTSD is wanting to avoid events that remind you of the trauma, and so he could be avoiding going into battle with any of the Avengers because of that). This could also be a reason why Iron Man isn't present in any of the other movies: he's simply refusing so that he can get over the Battle of New York and get himself emotionally better so that it's possible for him to appear in Age of Ultron. Even then, he's not going to be able to contact the rest of the Avengers most of the time, since he's asking a huge favour of the kid in the first place, without bringing all the Avengers in to raid his house. Whilst it could be argued that the Shield ones could be brought in when Iron Patriot was, it's possible that they were just doing another job at the time or Hawkeye could be taking leave to spend with his pregnant wife.

Thor: The Dark World

The first part is set in other dimensions, and its considered extremely unusual for a human from Midgard to travel to any other dimension. None of the other Avengers have the ability to travel through dimensions, so they couldn't come to help him even if they wanted to. His friends wouldn't necessarily know the Avengers, and if they did, they probably wouldn't have any way to contact them and by the time Thor himself got back he was too busy to contact them. Plus the fact that he ends up battling Malekith through multiple dimension, and having seen what happened to Jane when she went through the portal, he probably wouldn't want the others entering the portal for the same to happen to them and for him having to deal with a bunch of unconscious bodies whilst dimension hopping. While this is excluded for Iron Man, Thor is a nice enough person to not ring his friend up and say "Hey, I know how the last time you travelled through a portal caused you PTSD, but I want you to come and travel through a bunch of portals and do exactly what happened last time, want to go for falafel after?"

Captain America: the Winter Soldier

He's wanted by Shield. That counts out Hawkeye (Black Widow is actually involved, and might even persuade him not to get involved for his family's sake). Plus it means that Shield are probably tracking him and the people he might contact, including the Avengers, or at least he might believe that they can, so he doesn't want to risk it. In addition, in the movie he finds out that Hydra's using satellite lasers to eliminate anyone that might go against them, so he probably wouldn't call them once he finds out due to being a nice enough guy to not make his friends the target of satellite lasers! Geez, I thought we trusted Captain America to be the nice guy. Nice guys don't attract death lasers to their friends, especially when they might not be able to find him fast enough to actually help without giving enough information that Shield can find him and arrest him for being a fugitive for reasons.

Now you may argue that the hero themselves don't need to call the Avengers up for them to be summoned, but most of the films have the heroes relying on secrecy and so there wouldn't be anyone who knew enough to phone the others, but not be busy enough to get all the Avengers set up.

So yeah. Reasons. Lots of reasons. By the way, Antman and Deadpool have the same reasons that the earlier Avengers movies do, that they probably don't have the Avengers phone numbers to call them up to help.

Now for a bunch of other movies to come out so I have to do this all over again!

Why can't Pokemon use the Abilities in the Pokedex?

I know, yet another Pokemon theory. Sue me, I just love the franchise so much (please don't, I don't have enough money for that). Anyway, lets just get on with the theory.

The Pokedex has hyperbole. Like a lot of hyperbole.

Macargo is as hot as the sun! If you look at Shedninja from the back, it'll eat your soul! Any punches and kicks merely slide off Goomy! Heck, even look at my last theory, where we explored the weirdness of Hitmonchan hitting as fast as a bullet train.

But why? Clearly these aren't true, as that would seriously break the game, as fighting types wouldn't have a hope against Sliggo, and your character would probably be very, very dead (along with potentially the rest of the world).

Well, I have three theories for why this happens, all of which could be possible. Starting with the first (because, you know, that's how lists work):

That's what you get when you get ten year old kids to make your scientific documents.

In Pokemon Red and Blue (and probably Yellow, but that's just anime Pokemon, so nyah (just kidding...please don't hurt me genwunners...).). Professor Oak decides to push a ten year old out into the world to fill their Pokedex and list every single type of Pokemon in the region, so that he can spend more time writing letters to your mum instead of doing actual Pokemon Professor work. So you go off and start to fill the Pokedex. Now, being a ten year old lad, he's not going to know about scientific rigorous experimentation, and even if he did, he's probably not going to care. He's here to battle and win, not do tests in controlled environments and all that faffery. So he's going to want to make his pokemon seem cool and awesome and put loads of legends and things he thinks it would be cool for Pokemon to be able to do. So that's how you end up with Pokedex entries about how his water mon can destroy entire cities (...Gyarados...). However, the only problem is that this is only the plot of Red and Blue, and other games have slightly more responsible Professors who push the kids out into the world to learn about Abilities, or simply just to learn stuff in general because they saved them from a Zigzagoon and so are mature enough to travel around a huge region (I did only say slightly), but it could be that that was done before by other ten year old kids, we just didn't see them, because they didn't have to deal with people stealing Pokemon and destroying the world and such.

The Pokeballs weaken Pokemon

It might just be that when a Pokemon is put inside a Pokeball, it weakens their powers to the point where they aren't able to do the crazy stuff that they would be able to in the wild. This is actually obliquely referenced in canon, where in Pokemon Platinum, Diamond and Pearl Chiron uses the Red Chain in order to capture the Legendaries, as to prevent them from having their powers suppressed by ordinary Pokeballs. This would also be possible, because through the games you see them being handed to nursery school children (which is a seriously bad idea, but anyway), so it would be done by the Pokemon League and all sanctioned Pokeball creators in order to prevent the children from accidentally killing someone or themselves with a Pokemon they found.

They purposefully don't use the abilities themselves for whatever reason

Pokemon fights in the game are more like sporting sparring matches, rather than all out brawls, with set rules (such as only one attack per turn and you can attack or heal - not both). Therefore it wouldn't be desirable for them to outright murder the opponent's Pokemon, neither for the Pokemon (because you know, they're sentient beings who would probably know if they killed another being) nor for the Pokemon trainer (they probably wouldn't be allowed to continue doing league fights). Therefore, a desire for fair play and actual sport in Pokemon battling would cause the trainer to teach the Pokemon to not use their most ridiculously unfair advantages and for Pokemon to stop themselves from hitting too hard or attacking too badly, as they want to have an interesting battle rather than just brawl. This could be backed up by the Pokemon League, as they could set rules on things that Pokemon can do in actuality, but won't be allowed to do in Pokemon League battles, with the risk of the Pokemon trainer losing their ability to battle gyms, and it would be such an inherent part of their culture that Pokemon follow those rules when they belong to a trainer that no-one challenges or breaks them, not even the bad guys.

Personally I prefer the first theory, but you can make your mind up. I swear I'll do a different thing next week (hopefully).

How Hard Can A Hitmonchan Punch?

This is just a short theory today guys, as I'm really busy. I might make another post later if I have time, but don't count on it.

Now, in Pokemon Y and Pokemon FireRed, the Pokedex says that Hitmonchan "throws punches that are faster than a bullet train". But how hard does it actually punch? And how fast would a Pokemon trainer see their precious Pokemon speeding past them?

Well, first we have to look at the speed of a bullet train. The maximum speed on the Shinkansen (a Japanese railway line) is 320km/h or 88.8889m/s.

Now we have our speed, so we need the acceleration. This involves the suvat equations. For these we need to have 4 of the 5 involved, but we only have 3. So, we need to know the distance, which is about equal to the length of his (her? its?) arm. At 1.4m, Hitmonchan is about the height of a ten year old. They (Yay, found a word!) seem to have average proportions (so not stupidly long arms) but for some reason, people aren't going around measuring ten year olds' arms. So, just from eye-line (because there's no way I'm counting pixels) it looks like their arms are about half the length of their bodies, which is 0.7m.

So then we use the equation v^2=u^2+1/2as and put in the numbers to get

88.8889^2=0^2+1/2ax0.7

7901.23654=0.35a

a=22574.9615429m/s^2

Whoa. That's a big number.

So we then put it into the F=MA equation (Force = Mass*Acceleration) Luckily the Pokedex tells us the mass (due to an oddity where most people call mass weight.) which is 50.2kg.

So 22574.9615429x50.2=1133263.06945N

Whoa. Even bigger number.

So, that's how hard Hitmonchan punches. But how fast can it send a Pokemon flying?

Just for fun, we'll use the lightest Pokemon, that isn't like a balloon Pokemon or something that could get a little faffy. This happens to be the 0.1kg Flabebe.

Aww. Lets send it flying!

So, momentum = mass x velocity. We know the velocity to be 88.8889m/s^2, but since he's not jumping and headbutting the Flabebe, we can't use Hitmonchan's mass. From what it seems, his hands are reasonably proportioned boxing gloves. We'll assume they're competition gloves, which weigh about 0.226796kg. 88.8889x0.226796 = 20.159647kgm/s.

So divide that by the mass of the Flabebe, and it'll go flying off at a speed of 201.59647m/s, making it the fastest that Hitmonchan can get a Pokemon to go.

Needless to say, I think a trainer would be a little annoyed if Hitmonchan did that in an actual battle.

The Pokemon League Controls the Paths!

Hi, today we're going to be discussing the idea that the Pokemon League are in charge of the paths in a given region and that's why you need to do certain things in the game. But first, we need to go on a little tangent.

My Little Tangent: Thinking Randomly is Magic: Why Do Pokemon Need HM Moves?

For some HM moves this is pretty obvious: sure your Pokemon can swim, but can they do it with a 10-16 year old on their back without dropping them into the water? However there are some moves that seem pretty pointless.

For example, why do you need Cut? Surely any sufficiently powerful Pokemon can cut down a small shrub? Especially considering they can have much more powerful moves than the wimpy base power of 50 that the HM provides. Even some of the Pokemon that can and can't learn it seem a bit silly.

Can't learn cut. Seriously

Can learn cut, despite lack of arms.

But it could be that the Pokemon world legally requires Pokemon trainers to only use Cut on the shrubs in the path, and no others. But why? That requires explaining of the big theory that underlines everything.

The Pokemon League controls a certain route around each and every region that has the Pokemon League Challenge, and requires Pokemon Trainers doing the challenge to follow the set path, as to make sure they went to the gyms in the right order.

This would explain why they would only let you use Cut on shrubs. After all, they would want the shrubs to grow back, so that they would block the next Pokemon Trainer to go down that path unless they had the required Gym badges.

This would also explain why you need Gym badges to use certain HMs in the overworld. It's part of the rules that your character signs up to by taking on the Pokemon League Challenge. We just never see it because... seriously, no-one even reads Terms and Conditions for real life stuff, they wouldn't do it for a video game.

In addition, if the Pokemon League rules meant you could only go on certain paths, they could also limit access to Pokemon Trainers to certain areas of cities, so that the city isn't overloaded by trainers going everywhere, which would explain why there are so few houses and no shops in what are meant to be large cities. In addition, there could be paths in these parts of the city (that aren't shown because the player will just never need to see them) which the NPCs use, since they aren't taking the challenge and thus aren't limited like the player character, which would also explain why people could live in places like Pallet Town without dying of utter boredom, and how there can be tourists without Pokemon.

Plus, the trainers that stand on the path could have been paid by the Pokemon League to battle trainers that pass by, as well as maintain the area - especially what level Pokemon are in the area. How else could Dejourner Way keep so low level Pokemon right next to Victory Road?

The things that could be taken from this theory are nearly endless, but I'm going to stop here, so that this post isn't ridiculously long. See you all next week!

Iron Man 2 - Tony Stark's Impossible Element

Iron Man 2 Spoilers ahead! Consider yourself warned!

So, there was that subplot in Iron Man 2, where Tony Stark was slowly dying from the polonium inside his arc reactor. In order to save his life, he invents a new element to make the reactor out of, which just happens to be more powerful by making a particle accelerator in his lab, which is actually more reasonable than you might think.

Part of the reason explained that it was killing him was because it was highly toxic, and the main reason that polonium is so toxic is because of its radioactivity. Because polonium is such a heavy element, it is highly radioactive, particularly emitting a lot of alpha radiation: not very penetrating but if it can get into your body, highly ionising. So... not exactly the best thing to stick into your body.

However, the new element that Tony makes should really be even worse. The only elements undiscovered at the time (since we've actually discovered a bunch of new ones since the movie's come out. Science is awesome.) were the ones with electron numbers above 118, which is Ununoctium.

These are even more radioactive than polonium, since as the atoms get heavier, they decay faster. Which means that yes, it would have more power, just as the movie stated, but it'd also be killing Tony a heck of a lot faster.

It also wouldn't last long enough to be used as a heart battery. Even Ununoctium only has a half life of about a millisecond. That's barely enough time for a laser blast, let alone to keep a man for a normal lifespan.

However, there is still hope.

He could be using antimatter, and could have created antilithium.

Now, this seems like a bit of a cop-out. "Oh, he didn't create an element, he created an anti-element!", but it's reasonable.

One of the things we know he used to create the element is a particle accelerator. How is antimatter made? Particle accelerator. One tick for antilithium.

Toxic? Not at all, you just have to keep it in an electric field so it doesn't blow everything up. Two ticks for antilithium.

More energy than polonium? Well, you could say that, considering just one particle of antimatter is more powerful than an atomic bomb. That's more than enough power.

And of course Tony Stark seems to have mad science and mad engineering as a superpower. If anyone could construct something to make antilithium, it'd be him.

Now the problem with this.

The desk.

Or table. Or game of blocks that went WAY too far. Your choice

Even when Tony Stark removes all of the stuff that was on the table just to make it look like an actual park and not a secret message, there are loads more than three pavilions, which is the number of positrons that would be around antilithium. However, we could just pass this aside using story.

Howard might have been wrong.

He's stated to be an extremely good scientist, but limited by his times.He died in 1998, and the first antimatter particles produced, positrons were only done so in 2008. So it's possible that he never learnt about antimatter or knew about it in any way, and Tony came onto it whilst trying to make his father's plan.

It's also possible he did know about it, but didn't know how hard it would be to create anti-elements. He might have just assumed that by Tony's time, they'd have done a lot of the elements already, and he'd need a new anti-element to complete the arc reactor, rather than just use one that's the anti-element of the otherwise basic lithium.

The arc reactor would be incredibly dangerous, and if the electric field broke, Tony would explode. He doesn't really seem the type to care though.

Winx Club-What happened to Tune and Digit?

SPOILER WARNING FOR WINX CLUB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Tis the age old question.(Age old= Since 2013)
What happened to Tune and Digit?
These two pixies were supporting characters in the Italian cartoon Winx Club from their first appearance in the first episode of season 2. After the pixies disappeared from the series for the majority of seasons 4 and 5, most of the pixies returned for the rest of the series. Tune, Pixie of Etiquette and Digit, Pixie of Nanotechnology were missing.
And in their place were imposters!

These are those imposters.

Cherie and Caramel appeared alongside the main group of pixies in season 6. They are presented as the bonded pixies of Musa and Tecna respectively and all the main characters act as if they had been there all along. The viewer however knows something is wrong.
Where did these two imposters come from?
What have they done with Tune and Digit?

Okay, So in all seriousness let's talk about why Rainbow (or Nick) may have chosen to switch the Pixies before we get into all the conspiracy theories I've made up on the topic.
Cherie and Cara first appeared as main characters of the Winx Club spinoff series PopPixie. Tune and Digit were characters in this series too (although they changed Digit's gender and Tune is now the Pixie of vocal power for some reason for some reason). The only logical reason I can think of for switching Tune and Digit for Cherie and Cara is to promote PopPixie. Of course they could have included Cara and Cherie as bonded Pixies for the two fairies predominantly  featured in the series that don't have Pixies yet; I'm talking of Daphne and Roxy. Fans have been speculating about Roxy's Pixie literally before she even appeared in the show so it would make loads more sense to introduce one of these two as her's instead of replacing two exsisting Pixies for no reason.

First let's talk about Pop Pixie. The spinoff takes place in Pixie villiage and features various Pixie characters from Winx club. However none of the Fairy characters are ever mentioned in the series so it is safe to assume PopPixie at least takes place before Winx Club season 2 (when the Pixies first appeared). This would also explain the changes to certain character's personalities, especially Tune.

So what happened?
Well for one thing this show is not very good with continuity. There are several instances in the series where events are retconned or simply ignored for the sake of continuity. This is especially true in the series co-produced with Nick since they are...Let's be honest, pretty sh!t at writing a coherant story. Now you could just say that Cara and Cherie are just relics of a time when Nick had a say in the story of Winx Club and a lasting reminder to never let the people at Nick tell you how to write your series, however that's not why you clicked on this blog post is it?

Time for some Crack Pot Conspiracy theories!
Pixies want to bond with fairies. When they learn the last fairy of earth is coming to althea, they are all super excited. Perhaps Cara and Cherie grew jealous of Tune and Digit and decided to take their place. But how?
Time Travel!
So it's not like Tune and Digit disapear completly after Cherie and Cara's indroduction; they can be seen in the background in some episodes so they definately still exist. So something must have happened between season 4 and 6 to create the switcheroo. As mentioned earlier from season 4 onwards the show's canon gets rather... confused.
For one thing the Nabu dies in season 4 and then appears in the second movie which is supposed to take place after. In the same movie the Winx use their believix powers despite the events of season 4 implying they could only be used on earth. The circumstances of Daphne's "death" are changed completely in season 5 for the conveniance of the story.  So here's my theory, all the messed up canon from season 4 is caused my Cara and Cherie travelling back and forth in time trying to create a world where they are able to take Tune and Digit's places.

Attempt 1 
So they went back in time for the first time at the end of season 4. They did it on a whim so they ended up making several random, haphazard changes, creating a world where Nabu never died, Roxy never goes to Alfea, Love&Pet never happened, Helia never cut his hair, the Trix either never got captured after the end of season 3 or escaped very soon after and the Winx continue using believix after leaving earth. Unfortunately (for Cara and Cherie) even after all these changes, Tune and Digit still found their way to their destined fairies. C and C decide to change everything back to normal and try again...
Attempt 2
Next C and C decided to go back and prevent the pixies from ever meeting the winx by stopping them from being captured by Lord Darkar in season 2. This created the world season 5 takes place in, where the Pixies are never seen or mentioned once. Lord Darkar had an important role in the destruction of domino and Daphne's "death" so the changes C and C make are what caused the changes to the canon in season 5.
Attempt 3
This time C and C need to find a way to get close to their targets. With Tune and Digit out of the way, C and C are free to bond with Musa and Tecna. The other Pixies end up meeting with their destined fairies without any problems and know one except C and C know how hard they worked to create a universe where they can be the lucky Pixies to get a bonded fairy.

So yeah it's a bit of a long shot and this theory is really just for fun but... I don't trust Cara and Cherie, they are clearly up to something.
Feel free to share your own crack pot theories in the comments!

Mario Universe... Or Universes?

Hi guys! This is going to be our first videogame theory! Yay? Spoiler alert for Galaxy 2, even though I haven't actually played the game.

So you've probably wondered what's up with the relationships in the Mario Universe. One minute Bowser's kidnapping Peach, the next she's inviting him to parties and to golf tournaments. You'd think that after the 10th time she'd learn to stop inviting him to these sorts of do's.

Unless... they're not the same Peach and Bowser.

It would also explain the way that Bowser Jr and the Koopalings disappear and reappear at will, so in some games they own their own pads, and the others they seemingly don't even exist. Because they're not in the same universe each time.

Wait. What?

Remember the end of Galaxy 2, when Rosalina did the magic doodads and turned it into a new universe where everyone shared one planet. This shows one thing. There's more than one universe, and each can be different. Wait. That's two things. Eh.

So it's not a leap to say that there might be some universes where Bowser just gets far too into the Peach kidnapping thing and does it over and over and over... seriously Bowser needs to get a hobby that isn't princess kidnapping.

Would probably be better for his health.

And one where they're just pals from neighbouring kingdoms that get invitations for Mario's parties or for go karting or golf or football... is there a universe where Mario actually does plumbing? Maybe. Probably not, being as he seems to do any other thing but actual plumbing.

This could also be used to explain easter eggs, such as Link deciding to just casually take a nap in Mario RPG. It's just an alternate universe.

We could even take it a step further...

Every single copy of a single game is its own universe.

Not every copy of every game gets completed, whilst some get done in hours. These can't exist in the same universe, so there must be separate ones for every copy of the game, heck every save file to make everyone's game experience the 'real' one.

And somewhere out there there's a load of universe where Peach is still waiting for her Mario...

Aww...