In a newsletter I got in my inbox this evening I received a link to 100 Things You Didn't Know About Videogames by the staff at GamesRadar and since I'm unsure if you get the newsletter or not, I thought I'd share.
1. The play area of GTA: San Andreas is roughly 17 square miles. Thats about five times the size of Liberty City and four times the size of Vice City.
2. Cancelled Megadrive 32X game Ratchet & Bolt boasted a boss character that was 30 screens tall, and packed some 33 weapons.
3. God Hands Chihuahua races feature a dog called Mikamis Head, a reference to the Resi creators claim that hed rather lose his head than see Resident Evil 4 converted to PS2.
4. The maximum achievable score possible in a game of Pac-Man is 3,333,360 points.
5. Unreleased titles in the Oddworld series include The Hand of Odd, Squeeks Oddysee and SligStorm.
6. Segas Space Channel 5 had a lawsuit brought against it by Lady Miss Kier, once a member of Deee-Lite, over similarities between her and lead character Ulala. She lost.
7. The first ever product released by Sony was a rice cooker.
8. PS2 robot action game Armored Core Nine Breaker has a training mode that features some 150 lessons.
9. The strangest videogame cameo? That would have to be Alien Hominid in an episode of The Sopranos.
10. Bizarre PS2 RPG Metal Saga (unreleased in Europe) features an ending sequence you can access from the introductory cut-scene.
11. In the original arcade Donkey Kong game, Mario was called Jumpman and he was a carpenter, not a plumber.
12. A six-digit number can be found on the Scorpion tanks in Halo, which refers to the birth date of the games art director, Marcus R. Lehto. His initials also appear on Master Chiefs boots.
13. The first ever videogame Easter egg is considered to be that found in Adventure for Atari 2600, where the player could access a room displaying the name of the games creator.
14. First-person shooter Doom 3 contains a reference, found on an in-game PDA, to Brit sitcom The Office.
15. Guy Cihi, who played James Sunderland in Silent Hill 2, is a high-powered venture capitalist who was unexpectedly cast while taking his daughter to audition for a different game.
16. There are 504 pieces of character equipment in Final Fantasy X on PS2.
17. Michael Jackson, in some form or other, has appeared in Sonic the Hedgehog 3, Ready 2 Rumble Round 2, Space Channel 5 1 & 2, GTA: Vice City and, obviously, Moonwalker.
18. Back in 1995, Nintendo claimed that over 100 third-party titles were in the works for its subsequently stillborn Virtual Boy system.
19. Everybody Loves Katamari features a bonus level that involves collecting one million roses. It doesnt have to be completed in one go, thankfully.
20. FIFA 2001 is the first and only game to date to use a "scratch and sniff" CD. The disc smelt of turf.
21. Fable: The Lost Chapters features Peter Molyneuxs gravestone.
22. Red Dead Revolver was originally being made by Capcom, before it sold the rights off to Rockstar.
23. US-only PS2 and Xbox boobfest The Guy Game (seriously, a DVD-style quiz based on ladies flashing their breasts) was banned when it transpired that one of the contestants was underage.
24. Halo 2 is the bestselling Xbox title ever, selling some eight million copies. Its closely followed by five million for the original Halo.
25. Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind contains a secret talking crab tucked away on a small island, whos also a trader.
26. The title of PS2 game ICO is a pun on the Japanese word for lets go.
27. In the original Animal Crossing for Nintendo 64, unreleased outside of Japan, you have to input the time and date every time you boot up the game.
28. Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime used to be the senior director of national marketing at Pizza Hut. While there he launched the Bigfoot Pizza and The Big New Yorker.
29. Squat braniac Raz wasnt always intended to be the lead character of Psychonauts. It had initially been an ostrich.
30. Before going on to create classic games like Outrun, Shenmue and Virtua Fighter for Sega, Yu Suzuki had considered becoming a dentist.
31. Tomb Raider's Lara Croft was originally called Laura Cruz.
32. Nintendo has never given Mario an official surname, even though Mario Bros. suggests that its Mario Mario.
33. PS2 game Asterix & Oberix XXL 2 features over 100 parodies of videogame characters/titles, including Pac-Man, Tetris, Tomb Raider, Street Fighter and Super Mario Sunshine.
34. The development code name for Half-Life was Quiver, after the Arrowhead military base in Stephen King's novella The Mist.
35. The very first Dynasty Warriors game was actually a one-on-one beat em up.
36. Gran Turismo 2 featured some 650 cars, a total that Gran Turismo 3 couldnt pip.
37. According to the Entertainment Software Association, the average US game player is 33 years old, and has been gaming for 12 years. Not in one session, were hoping.
38. Former Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi owns a majority share of the Seattle Marines baseball team, which is now managed by former Nintendo of America head, Howard Lincoln.
39. Keita Takahashi, director of the PS2 Katamari Damacy games, cites both Picasso and Little Shop of Horrors as part of their inspiration.
40. In the early stages of Final Fantasy XIIs development, there were plans to let a second player join in the game.
41. In 2001, a pair of art students created a version of Pong known as the PainStation, where losers could be inflicted with genuine whip, heat or electrical damage.
42. David Hayter, the voice of Solid Snake in the Metal Gear Solid games, wrote the screenplay for the movie X-Men.
43. Nearly half the disc space on Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is taken up with dialogue.
44. When GTA first appeared (at E3 in 1997), attendees were told that to drive from one side of the game's city to the other would take players around three minutes.
45. In Halo 2s Metropolis level of its single-player campaign, a giant football can be found tucked away on a rooftop.
46. Before settling on its nonsensical Simlish dialogue for The Sims, the games creators experimented with languages such as Ukrainian, Navajo and Tagalog.
47. A total of 57 games have been released for Nokias N-Gage phone/handheld gaming hybrid.
48. The sprouting, titular Pikmin from the GameCube games were named after Shigeru Miyamotos dog.
49. Segas classic sunshine racer Outrun has appeared on 19 different formats.
50. A game of Animal Crossing on GameCube can last up to 29 real-time years, potentially.
51. The inflated breast size of Lara Croft was the result of designer Toby Gard accidentally adjusting the model's chest to 150% its intended size and being persuaded by other designers working on the game that the ballooned boobs should stay.
52. In Japan, the PS2 release of Viewtiful Joe was subititled A New Hope, thanks to Episode IV of Star Wars.
53. A certain soldier in God of War emits the Wilhelm scream, a stock sound effect thats been used in TV and movie productions for over 50 years. Youll also hear it in Metal Slug, Lost Planet, Scarface and LEGO Star Wars.
54. The most powerful weapon in American McGees subversive but not-very-good action game, Bad Day L.A.? The nailclippers.
55. In Japan, four Dreamcast titles have been released in 2007.
56. Steve Downes, the man who provides the voice for Halos Master Chief, is a DJ for a radio station in Chicago.
57. Capcoms gladiatorial combat epic Shadow of Rome gives you a point bonus known as Urine Trouble for attacking someone whos just lost control of their bladder.
58. There really is a game called Communist Mutants from Space, yknow. Its a Space Invaders clone released for the Atari 2600 in 1982.
59. Doom-programming genius John Carmack is a voluntary employee of Armadillo Aerospace, a Texas-based company dedicated to orbital spaceflight.
60. The development team responsible for porting Resident Evil 2 to the N64 went on to become Rockstars San Diego studio (that made Red Dead Revolver, Midnight Club, Table Tennis).
61. Nintendo translates as Leave luck to heaven.
62. Final Fantasy got its name from the fact that its creator, Square co-founder Hironobu Sakaguchi, intended it to be his last video game, using up the remainder of Squares money after a number of unsuccessful projects.
63. Terry Butcher, current manager of Brentford FC, provided commentary for the inaugural Pro Evolution Soccer back in 2001.
64. Alongside Pandemics Full Spectrum Warrior, a more advanced, strategy-led version known as Full Spectrum Command was developed for army use, and never released to the public.
65. At present, 24% of Americans over the age of 50 play videogames, compared to just 9% back in 1999.
66. In late 2005, Sony hired graffiti artists in seven cities across the US to promote PSP, leading to one mayor issuing a cease and desist order.
67. The song lyrics that feature in cutesy PSP puzzler Loco Roco were deliberately written as gibberish, so that theyd never be localised and sound the same the world over.
68. Capcom is short for Capsule Computers.
69. Although youll rarely see them, Yoshi does have teeth.
70. In the UK, Rayman is the bestselling PlayStation 1 game of all time.
71. Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory was banned in South Korea, thanks to it featuring the destruction of Seoul, its capital city. The ban was lifted at the end of 2006, however.
72. Resident Evil Zero is the only non-spin-off Resi title to remain exclusive to a single format, the GameCube.
73. J Allard is actually J Allards name. It was changed from James Allard.
74. Ace platformer Psychonauts managed to sell fewer than 90,000 copies on PS2, Xbox and PC combined. Boooo.
75. All of the carrier pigeons found in Capcoms Killer 7 are named after female characters from Bond movies.
76. Saints Row on Xbox 360 features over 130 licensed tunes, including some 40 pieces of classical music.
77. Possessing a copy of Manhunt in New Zealand is a criminal offence.
78. Almost 5,000 games were displayed at E3 2004. 1,000 of them were brand new, while 16% of the games on show were classed as educational
79. Each of Gran Turismo 4s 700+ cars took approximately one month for a designer to create.
80. In the US release of Gameboy RPG Final Fantasy Legend II, Nintendos censorship guidelines meant that a band of opium smugglers became banana smugglers instead.
81. The Chain Chomp enemies in Mario games were inspired by a dog, chained to a post that belonged to a neighbour of Miyamoto during his childhood.
82. John Romero put his Ferrari on eBay in 2002. It featured a modification that allowed its engine to be tuned with a laptop.
83. Tom Clancy initially rejected Sam Fishers triple-eyes goggles in Splinter Cell, due to the implausibility of goggles capable of both thermal and night vision.
84. Hectic PS2/Xbox/PC racer Flatout 2 features over 5,000 destructible objects on each of its race tracks.
85. Okamis official soundtrack spans five audio CDs.
86. In Hitman 2: Silent Assassin, one of the levels contains pizza boxes sporting Danish text that translates to Real pizza with shit on it.
87. Only 2000 or so units of Capcoms hulking Steel Battalion, an Xbox game powered by a table-hogging 40-button controller, were released. There was a very limited follow-up run in the US, however.
88. The Xbox was originally due to be called the DirectX-box, after Microsofts programming interface for Windows.
89. A comic book spin-off of Killzone was once in the pipeline, but failed to materialise after its publisher went bankrupt.
90. Remember the Resi 4 Chainsaw controller? A katana controller was also released for Onimusha 3, and was nearly a metre in length.
91. Before working for the company, former Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi ran a taxi firm and even a love hotel which rented rooms by the hour.
92. The speeding up of enemies in the 1978 original Space Invaders was an unintentional feature that stemmed from the way the game was programmed, but was retained.
93. The bestselling GameCube title of all time? Thatll be Super Smash Bros. Melee, with some six million copies under its belt.
94. The Sims managed to spend 82 weeks within the UKs top ten PC games sales chart.
95. Metropolis Street Racer was released a total of three times on Dreamcast, thanks to various game bugs.
96. Throughout the creation of Forza Motorsport 2, the development team racked up a total of 41 speeding tickets. Two licences were also revoked.
97. Free-roaming PS2/Xbox action title Mercenaries features both Han Solo and Indiana Jones as unlockable characters.
98. Max Paynes face is modelled on the face of Sam Lake, who wrote the games story and script.
99. ICO was first intended for release on PlayStation 1. Also, wispy waif girl Yorda was due to have horns, not lead character ICO.
100. Mega Man is blue thanks to the first format he appeared on the NES having a limited, blue-tinted selection of colours to display.
101. By exploiting a series of glitches, its possible to complete Super Mario 64 after collecting just one of the games 120 stars. Normally, youre required to collect 70 of them.
Sorry for the long-ass read. But i hope you had some giggles and enjoyed yourself.
1. The play area of GTA: San Andreas is roughly 17 square miles. Thats about five times the size of Liberty City and four times the size of Vice City.
2. Cancelled Megadrive 32X game Ratchet & Bolt boasted a boss character that was 30 screens tall, and packed some 33 weapons.
3. God Hands Chihuahua races feature a dog called Mikamis Head, a reference to the Resi creators claim that hed rather lose his head than see Resident Evil 4 converted to PS2.
4. The maximum achievable score possible in a game of Pac-Man is 3,333,360 points.
5. Unreleased titles in the Oddworld series include The Hand of Odd, Squeeks Oddysee and SligStorm.
6. Segas Space Channel 5 had a lawsuit brought against it by Lady Miss Kier, once a member of Deee-Lite, over similarities between her and lead character Ulala. She lost.
7. The first ever product released by Sony was a rice cooker.
8. PS2 robot action game Armored Core Nine Breaker has a training mode that features some 150 lessons.
9. The strangest videogame cameo? That would have to be Alien Hominid in an episode of The Sopranos.
10. Bizarre PS2 RPG Metal Saga (unreleased in Europe) features an ending sequence you can access from the introductory cut-scene.
11. In the original arcade Donkey Kong game, Mario was called Jumpman and he was a carpenter, not a plumber.
12. A six-digit number can be found on the Scorpion tanks in Halo, which refers to the birth date of the games art director, Marcus R. Lehto. His initials also appear on Master Chiefs boots.
13. The first ever videogame Easter egg is considered to be that found in Adventure for Atari 2600, where the player could access a room displaying the name of the games creator.
14. First-person shooter Doom 3 contains a reference, found on an in-game PDA, to Brit sitcom The Office.
15. Guy Cihi, who played James Sunderland in Silent Hill 2, is a high-powered venture capitalist who was unexpectedly cast while taking his daughter to audition for a different game.
16. There are 504 pieces of character equipment in Final Fantasy X on PS2.
17. Michael Jackson, in some form or other, has appeared in Sonic the Hedgehog 3, Ready 2 Rumble Round 2, Space Channel 5 1 & 2, GTA: Vice City and, obviously, Moonwalker.
18. Back in 1995, Nintendo claimed that over 100 third-party titles were in the works for its subsequently stillborn Virtual Boy system.
19. Everybody Loves Katamari features a bonus level that involves collecting one million roses. It doesnt have to be completed in one go, thankfully.
20. FIFA 2001 is the first and only game to date to use a "scratch and sniff" CD. The disc smelt of turf.
21. Fable: The Lost Chapters features Peter Molyneuxs gravestone.
22. Red Dead Revolver was originally being made by Capcom, before it sold the rights off to Rockstar.
23. US-only PS2 and Xbox boobfest The Guy Game (seriously, a DVD-style quiz based on ladies flashing their breasts) was banned when it transpired that one of the contestants was underage.
24. Halo 2 is the bestselling Xbox title ever, selling some eight million copies. Its closely followed by five million for the original Halo.
25. Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind contains a secret talking crab tucked away on a small island, whos also a trader.
26. The title of PS2 game ICO is a pun on the Japanese word for lets go.
27. In the original Animal Crossing for Nintendo 64, unreleased outside of Japan, you have to input the time and date every time you boot up the game.
28. Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime used to be the senior director of national marketing at Pizza Hut. While there he launched the Bigfoot Pizza and The Big New Yorker.
29. Squat braniac Raz wasnt always intended to be the lead character of Psychonauts. It had initially been an ostrich.
30. Before going on to create classic games like Outrun, Shenmue and Virtua Fighter for Sega, Yu Suzuki had considered becoming a dentist.
31. Tomb Raider's Lara Croft was originally called Laura Cruz.
32. Nintendo has never given Mario an official surname, even though Mario Bros. suggests that its Mario Mario.
33. PS2 game Asterix & Oberix XXL 2 features over 100 parodies of videogame characters/titles, including Pac-Man, Tetris, Tomb Raider, Street Fighter and Super Mario Sunshine.
34. The development code name for Half-Life was Quiver, after the Arrowhead military base in Stephen King's novella The Mist.
35. The very first Dynasty Warriors game was actually a one-on-one beat em up.
36. Gran Turismo 2 featured some 650 cars, a total that Gran Turismo 3 couldnt pip.
37. According to the Entertainment Software Association, the average US game player is 33 years old, and has been gaming for 12 years. Not in one session, were hoping.
38. Former Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi owns a majority share of the Seattle Marines baseball team, which is now managed by former Nintendo of America head, Howard Lincoln.
39. Keita Takahashi, director of the PS2 Katamari Damacy games, cites both Picasso and Little Shop of Horrors as part of their inspiration.
40. In the early stages of Final Fantasy XIIs development, there were plans to let a second player join in the game.
41. In 2001, a pair of art students created a version of Pong known as the PainStation, where losers could be inflicted with genuine whip, heat or electrical damage.
42. David Hayter, the voice of Solid Snake in the Metal Gear Solid games, wrote the screenplay for the movie X-Men.
43. Nearly half the disc space on Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is taken up with dialogue.
44. When GTA first appeared (at E3 in 1997), attendees were told that to drive from one side of the game's city to the other would take players around three minutes.
45. In Halo 2s Metropolis level of its single-player campaign, a giant football can be found tucked away on a rooftop.
46. Before settling on its nonsensical Simlish dialogue for The Sims, the games creators experimented with languages such as Ukrainian, Navajo and Tagalog.
47. A total of 57 games have been released for Nokias N-Gage phone/handheld gaming hybrid.
48. The sprouting, titular Pikmin from the GameCube games were named after Shigeru Miyamotos dog.
49. Segas classic sunshine racer Outrun has appeared on 19 different formats.
50. A game of Animal Crossing on GameCube can last up to 29 real-time years, potentially.
51. The inflated breast size of Lara Croft was the result of designer Toby Gard accidentally adjusting the model's chest to 150% its intended size and being persuaded by other designers working on the game that the ballooned boobs should stay.
52. In Japan, the PS2 release of Viewtiful Joe was subititled A New Hope, thanks to Episode IV of Star Wars.
53. A certain soldier in God of War emits the Wilhelm scream, a stock sound effect thats been used in TV and movie productions for over 50 years. Youll also hear it in Metal Slug, Lost Planet, Scarface and LEGO Star Wars.
54. The most powerful weapon in American McGees subversive but not-very-good action game, Bad Day L.A.? The nailclippers.
55. In Japan, four Dreamcast titles have been released in 2007.
56. Steve Downes, the man who provides the voice for Halos Master Chief, is a DJ for a radio station in Chicago.
57. Capcoms gladiatorial combat epic Shadow of Rome gives you a point bonus known as Urine Trouble for attacking someone whos just lost control of their bladder.
58. There really is a game called Communist Mutants from Space, yknow. Its a Space Invaders clone released for the Atari 2600 in 1982.
59. Doom-programming genius John Carmack is a voluntary employee of Armadillo Aerospace, a Texas-based company dedicated to orbital spaceflight.
60. The development team responsible for porting Resident Evil 2 to the N64 went on to become Rockstars San Diego studio (that made Red Dead Revolver, Midnight Club, Table Tennis).
61. Nintendo translates as Leave luck to heaven.
62. Final Fantasy got its name from the fact that its creator, Square co-founder Hironobu Sakaguchi, intended it to be his last video game, using up the remainder of Squares money after a number of unsuccessful projects.
63. Terry Butcher, current manager of Brentford FC, provided commentary for the inaugural Pro Evolution Soccer back in 2001.
64. Alongside Pandemics Full Spectrum Warrior, a more advanced, strategy-led version known as Full Spectrum Command was developed for army use, and never released to the public.
65. At present, 24% of Americans over the age of 50 play videogames, compared to just 9% back in 1999.
66. In late 2005, Sony hired graffiti artists in seven cities across the US to promote PSP, leading to one mayor issuing a cease and desist order.
67. The song lyrics that feature in cutesy PSP puzzler Loco Roco were deliberately written as gibberish, so that theyd never be localised and sound the same the world over.
68. Capcom is short for Capsule Computers.
69. Although youll rarely see them, Yoshi does have teeth.
70. In the UK, Rayman is the bestselling PlayStation 1 game of all time.
71. Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory was banned in South Korea, thanks to it featuring the destruction of Seoul, its capital city. The ban was lifted at the end of 2006, however.
72. Resident Evil Zero is the only non-spin-off Resi title to remain exclusive to a single format, the GameCube.
73. J Allard is actually J Allards name. It was changed from James Allard.
74. Ace platformer Psychonauts managed to sell fewer than 90,000 copies on PS2, Xbox and PC combined. Boooo.
75. All of the carrier pigeons found in Capcoms Killer 7 are named after female characters from Bond movies.
76. Saints Row on Xbox 360 features over 130 licensed tunes, including some 40 pieces of classical music.
77. Possessing a copy of Manhunt in New Zealand is a criminal offence.
78. Almost 5,000 games were displayed at E3 2004. 1,000 of them were brand new, while 16% of the games on show were classed as educational
79. Each of Gran Turismo 4s 700+ cars took approximately one month for a designer to create.
80. In the US release of Gameboy RPG Final Fantasy Legend II, Nintendos censorship guidelines meant that a band of opium smugglers became banana smugglers instead.
81. The Chain Chomp enemies in Mario games were inspired by a dog, chained to a post that belonged to a neighbour of Miyamoto during his childhood.
82. John Romero put his Ferrari on eBay in 2002. It featured a modification that allowed its engine to be tuned with a laptop.
83. Tom Clancy initially rejected Sam Fishers triple-eyes goggles in Splinter Cell, due to the implausibility of goggles capable of both thermal and night vision.
84. Hectic PS2/Xbox/PC racer Flatout 2 features over 5,000 destructible objects on each of its race tracks.
85. Okamis official soundtrack spans five audio CDs.
86. In Hitman 2: Silent Assassin, one of the levels contains pizza boxes sporting Danish text that translates to Real pizza with shit on it.
87. Only 2000 or so units of Capcoms hulking Steel Battalion, an Xbox game powered by a table-hogging 40-button controller, were released. There was a very limited follow-up run in the US, however.
88. The Xbox was originally due to be called the DirectX-box, after Microsofts programming interface for Windows.
89. A comic book spin-off of Killzone was once in the pipeline, but failed to materialise after its publisher went bankrupt.
90. Remember the Resi 4 Chainsaw controller? A katana controller was also released for Onimusha 3, and was nearly a metre in length.
91. Before working for the company, former Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi ran a taxi firm and even a love hotel which rented rooms by the hour.
92. The speeding up of enemies in the 1978 original Space Invaders was an unintentional feature that stemmed from the way the game was programmed, but was retained.
93. The bestselling GameCube title of all time? Thatll be Super Smash Bros. Melee, with some six million copies under its belt.
94. The Sims managed to spend 82 weeks within the UKs top ten PC games sales chart.
95. Metropolis Street Racer was released a total of three times on Dreamcast, thanks to various game bugs.
96. Throughout the creation of Forza Motorsport 2, the development team racked up a total of 41 speeding tickets. Two licences were also revoked.
97. Free-roaming PS2/Xbox action title Mercenaries features both Han Solo and Indiana Jones as unlockable characters.
98. Max Paynes face is modelled on the face of Sam Lake, who wrote the games story and script.
99. ICO was first intended for release on PlayStation 1. Also, wispy waif girl Yorda was due to have horns, not lead character ICO.
100. Mega Man is blue thanks to the first format he appeared on the NES having a limited, blue-tinted selection of colours to display.
101. By exploiting a series of glitches, its possible to complete Super Mario 64 after collecting just one of the games 120 stars. Normally, youre required to collect 70 of them.
Sorry for the long-ass read. But i hope you had some giggles and enjoyed yourself.
