Curated playlist
Super Smash Bros. fighters
- Solid SnakeHideo Kojima once planned for Solid Snake to die in Metal Gear Solid. Disappointed staff led him to change it.
- Princess PeachPrincess Peach has appeared in more video game titles than any other female character. For much of that run, she has spent the story waiting at the end of it. Shigeru Miyamoto created her for Nintendo's Mario franchise, and she debuted in…
- BowserBowser, the fire-breathing king of the Koopas and the great enemy of Nintendo's Mario, once became the subject of a strangely candid admission. In a 2012 interview, his own creator, Shigeru Miyamoto, said: "Our current story is that the…
- Sonic the Hedgehog (character)Sonic the Hedgehog, the blue hero of Sega's video games, was tested on strangers in New York City's Central Park before most of the world had heard of him. The designer Naoto Ohshima carried several of Sega's internal character sketches on…
- Ryu (Street Fighter)A 2019 study found Street Fighter's Ryu would need to move nearly 70 miles per hour to land his spinning kick.
- Ken MastersDaigo Umehara's Street Fighter Ken blocked and countered fourteen straight hits with 26 seconds left.
- Mega Man (character)Mega Man was almost not called Mega Man. A Capcom USA executive called the Japanese name Rockman "horrible".
- Cloud StrifeCloud Strife's heroic identity was built from a dead friend's life.
- PikachuPikachu, the yellow mouse at the center of the Pokémon franchise, finished second in Time magazine's 1999 person of the year ranking. Only the singer Ricky Martin placed higher, and the author J.K. Rowling came in behind it. Time called…
- MarioShigeru Miyamoto once reflected on a name he had considered for Mario and concluded that the character likely would have "disappeared off the face of the Earth." Mario is the mustached Italian plumber who stars in the Mario franchise and…