Headscratchers / Wreck-It Ralph — Cameos

• Sonic and Bowser. Neither have appeared in an arcade game in decades. So either the arcade still has Sonic the Fighters/an imported copy of SegaSonic the Hedgehog and Vs. Super Mario Bros. or ???
  • Fanservice.
  • Sonic's game is seen as being Sonic the Fighters in shots of the arcade. Bowser could also belong to a Mario Kart GP cabinet.
    • But that doesn't make sense. In Sonic Fighters, Sonic and Robotnik/Eggman appear in their Classic incarnations, and the Sonic and Eggman we see in this movie are the Modern ones (save for the Sonic 2 scene in the credits). Generations confirms that in the 1991-1997 games, they really did look like how they do in them. Or maaaaaaaybeeeeee, the whole "Classic and Modern" thing was a lie that the devs lead the gamers to believe, and that the Sonic characters always looked like how they do now.
  • Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing actually came out for the arcade in 2011, a year after it was released. This featured the "Modern" incarnations of both Sonic and Eggman/Robotnik. As far as I know they did not show the arcade cabinet in the movie.
    • Because we don't see the entire arcade, after all.
  • From what little was shown of Mr. Litwak, he seems to like owning an arcade. He's not stingy (giving Moppet Girl a refund right off the bat), is quite happy to see the kids and the old man when he opens it up, and was very joyful to see Fix-It Felix Jr. fix itself. So it's not hard to think he might enjoy playing some of the games himself, and has kept some of his favorites/old popular games to play or just have. Because otherwise, no modern-day arcade would keep an old 80's arcade game and an old '97 arcade game around, unless it was insanely popular (like Sugar Rush seem to be; the two boys were gonna play it all day).
    • The Grand Hotel arcade here (in 2014) has Frogger, the Jurassic Park game from 1997 and a bunch of other oldies, so some modern arcades do keep elderly games.
    • There could also be a modern Sonic game in the arcade; we just can't see it.
    • Sonic and Sega All-Stars Racing, perhaps? (it got an arcade port) This could mean that Beat, Ulala, Aiai, Samba de Amigo, and others hang out around Game Central Station too. Plus, Ralph is going to be in All-Stars Racing Transformed, so...
  • Alternately, maybe the Arcade has wi-fi, allowing characters in handheld games or something to drop in. Since it's probable that the arcade has regulars, this means that Bowser and Sonic could show up relatively regularly if the arcade's patrons come in with DSes or 3DSes that have Mario or Sonic games in them, or even a good smartphone that has games on it.
    • The sequel centers around Ralph and Vanellope venturing into the Internet after a modem is installed in the arcade, and it's set around six years after the original film. It would seem unlikely they had Wi Fi before then.
  • This troper fondly remembers the Nintendo Super System of the '90s, which was basically a SNES in an arcade cabinet, and you had your choice of one of three SNES games when you put in a quarter. Usually, Super Mario World was one of the three games, so it's not impossible that Mr. Litwak still has a Super System in his arcade, and that's where Bowser came from.
    • There was a Sega equivalent of this, the Mega-Tech, Which did indeed have a pair of Sonic games, so this would explain Sonic & Eggman's presence perfectly.
  • The answer is actually simple. Litwak's Arcade has games in it at least thirty years old like Pac-Man and the in-universe Fix-It Felix Jr. It's not a big stretch that he's got older Arcade games featuring Bowser and Sonic. And to those who'll question Bowser's look, remember that Ralph's look outside the 8-bit style is different as well.
• In the arcade, we only see a Street Fighter II: The World Warrior machine, so what's Cammy doing walking around?
  • In Real Life, some versions of SF2 had their software updated to Super Street Fighter II while the cabinet remained the same. Not hard to believe that at some point Litwak either upgraded his SF2 box or bought one that had been upgraded.
  • But the footage clearly shows World Warrior. Specifically, Ryu's orange-hued stage. It's nighttime in Championship Ed and Turbo and twilight during Super and Super Turbo.
• How would aVideoGame/Metal Gear "!" symbol be in an arcade? There is a Metal Gear Arcade, but it was never released outside of Japan.
  • Fanservice.
  • Mr. Litwak could have had it imported. Given that he still has an old school 1982 game, he might very well try to appeal to the hardcore gamer crowd.
  • One of the arcade games was probably plugged in to the same circuit as a console or PC at some point. Lots of possibilities for objects to wind up in weird places when they can be transferred over power cables. For all we know, Mr. Litwak hosts LAN parties every weekend.
  • There was a deleted sequence where Ralph would venture into a The Sims-type game on Litwak's laptop, so console/PC games can probably canonically be connected.
• Is the dark elf-esque girl in the Bad Anon meeting a Shout-Out or just a generic villian character?
  • She's probably a placeholder. The concept art hints that she was originally intended to be Morrigan but they couldn't get the licensing to use her, so they swapped her out for a generic 'bad girl' sprite.
  • She's Neifirst. Dark, shiny blue hair, pale skin, elf ears, red bustier, floats? Yeah, she's not an arcade character. Rule of Funny.
    • She's not Neifirst. Neifirst wears a blue leotard and her skin is a darker shade of blue.
• Considering Clyde's nickname (Pokey) and how he acts in the original Pac Man game, should he come off as... slower?
  • Perhaps it's another case of the villain only acting for the role? It would explain why he's running the Bad Guys Anon meeting and none of the other ghosts are there.
• What game is Satan...er, Satine from?
  • The game of thrones?
  • Probably Ghosts N Goblins. It DID have an arcade version.
    • Unlikely, considering the main villains of the franchise were almost always either naked or possessing a Belly Mouth. I'm fine with calling this guy an expy of that style of demonic antagonist, though.
  • He could just be from a game that only exists in the Ralph universe.
    • Satan's Hollow.
• Why did they use Pac-Man's Fanon designs instead of his actual one◊? Was it too hard to figure out what to do since Namco is redesigning him?
  • Because Pac-Man the character does not have arms, legs, or anything else. That image of Pac-Man is promotional art. Characters may look more detailed from within their own world, but their overall design doesn't change.
  • It's possible they (film makers) thought that his actual appearance which has eyes, arms, legs, etc would be so radically different for those who didn't know the difference that said people wouldn't recognize Pac-Man as Pac-Man. That is, his game appearance is far more iconic than his promotional one.
  • But they also could have used his appearance from Pac-Land which was directly based on the Hanna-Barbera cartoons. However, who remembers the Pac-Land arcade?
• King Candy using the Konami Code I have no problem with, but within the arcade world, why is there an NES controller?
  • Fanservice.
    • It also raises the bigger question of just where in the game King Candy goes to access the Code! We're never shown the route he takes to get to this back room, apparently not made of sweets, to get to it. I suppose there's this dependence on the characters' knowledge that we're shown later (he reveals that he found a way to alter the codes of other games through years of hiding undercover) and I GET that, but why allow characters to take control of their own games to begin with?
    • The descriptive video track mentions King Candy boarding an elevator to get to the code room.
• As a BurgerTime fan this troper wonders something, if the Nicelanders hate bad guys (especially Ralph) then why is the Egg from BurgerTime present at Fix-It Felix Jr.'s 30th anniversary party? Along with hotdogs and pickles the eggs are also bad guys as well.
  • They're only regular enemies. Far as I can tell, regular enemies get more of a pass than the Big Bad. Or perhaps Felix invited them, and the Nicelanders didn't have a say in it. Though if he did invite them, it's a wonder he didn't invite Ralph as well.
    • He didn't know how Ralph felt about being treated like crap until later on.
    • Perhaps it was Gene that sent the invitations.
  • Furthermore, the Egg is frequently seen in the company of a giant walking strip of bacon. Bacon isn't one of the BurgerTime baddies. Who is it?
    • Probably just a generic character.
• Why is it that Clyde was capable of speaking perfect English, yet Pac-Man was only talking in beeps?
  • He's playing a character that doesn't speak.
    • But he was at a party in another game. Why was he in-character?
    • He takes as much pride in his role as Mr. Pricklepants.
  • Rule of Funny.
  • Maybe Clyde is just bilingual to better run Bad-Anon, and Pac-Man isn't.
• We see that the Bad-Anon meeting at the start of the movie is held in the middle of the Pac-Man maze and led by Clyde. Where are Inky, Pinky and Blinky?
  • When Ralph leaves the meeting and goes into Game Central Station, the other 3 ghosts can be seen floating around the concourse.
  • Moreover, and this is a little known fact, only Clyde actually had any sort of AI in Pac-Man. He was the only one programmed to chase the player. All the rest had pre-programmed behaviors they stuck to — turning randomly or trying to stay a certain distance away from the player. Thus one could interpret this as Clyde being the only actual villain while the others more NPC-ish.
    • Not so. All four ghosts have specific AI routines: Blinky's AI is to target Pac-Man (chasing him); Pinky's AI is to target a spot a few spaces in front of Pac-Man (trying to get ahead of Pac-Man and cut him off); Inky's AI involves drawing a line between Blinky and Pac-Man and targeting a point on the other side of Pac-Man at the same distance and angle (it's complicated, and gives Inky a very erratic movement pattern); Clyde's AI is to target Pac-Man just like Blinky until he got within a certain distance of Pac-Man, at which point his target changes to the lower-left corner of the maze (so he loses the trail). It's all in the Pac-Man Dossier, Chapter 4.
  • They also simply might have no problem with their job, and so no reason to join the group.
• This is more meta than anything, but there was a disturbing lack of Simpsons. They had an arcade game once, would it have killed for a cameo?
  • They might have not been able to get the rights to it. Also, the average person probably doesn't know the Simpsons even had an arcade game (I certainly didn't) so why would they put that in there when there are plenty of better-known video game characters to give cameos?
  • Because when you think of the Simpsons, you're not thinking of video games. You're thinking of a TV show. They wanted characters that were primarily from and associated with video games.
  • Turbo erased them. What else would he have done to a game that might steal his thunder?
  • Well, what about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Turtles in Time was originally an arcade game before it was ported to the Super NES.
    • The machine we see in the movie is the original TMNT arcade game.
• How is Q*bert supposed to eat that cherry? I didn't see any teeth in that snout of his, and that cherry was way too big to suck up...
  • Maybe his snout works like a vacuum and he gets Coily to chew it into smaller pieces for him?
• How does the Kingdom Hearts series fit in to this? Is it a game world that Ralph and company would be able to access if they wanted to, or is Wreck-It Ralph a Disney world that Sora and company would be able to access?
  • Ralph and the others could enter Kingdom Hearts as a game world in the movie universe where they are from several video games. In Real Life, however, they would be considered a Disney world within Kingdom Hearts.
    • Ralph can enter Kingdom Hearts. Inside Kingdom Hearts, there is a Wreck-it Ralph world. The Wreck-It Ralph world contains a Kingdom Hearts section. Inside Kingdom Hearts, there is a Wreck-it Ralph world. The Wreck-It Ralph world contains...
  • It would probably be a Disney world like any other. In Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance], Sora and Riku go to another world created by technology.
• At the beginning of the movie, when the arcade closes and the various characters get off of work, Ryu suggests to Ken that they both get drinks at Tapper's, and they both speak English with American accents, even though they are both supposed to be Japanese characters, but, a little later, at the Bad-Anon meeting, Zangief, from the same game, speaks with a Russian accent. Why don't Ken and Ryu have Japanese accents?
  • Did Kyle and Reuben give them accents when voicing them in the games? If not, then it was for consistency. Zangief in this film is voiced by the director so he was bound to have a different voice anyway.
    • What difference does it make who voiced which character? Why did they decide to give one Street Fighter an appropriate accent, but not two other characters from the same game?
    • Because one has a major speaking role in an important scene, and the other two have a grand total of one offhand line each.
    • More to the point, Ken is American. Ryu and Ken are friendly rivals, and probably know each other's languages well enough to not sound like they have an accent, at least with each other.
    • It may have also been because giving them Japanese accents would have not sat well.
    • Simply put, that's how it works in the games as well. Ken is an American, and Ryu, despite being Japanese, speaks with an American accent in the English versions of the games. Zangief, on the other hand, has a Russian accent in the games.
• How do Clyde and Surge (and voiceless characters by the player's point of view) have voices in the first place? I thought characters' voices came from people who recorded them.
  • If that was true, then Wreck-It Ralph would only be able to say three things throughout the whole movie: "Hey! You moved my stump!", "I'M GONNA WRECK IT!", and his "thrown from the building" yell. Would kind of make the thread of the story hard to follow. A better probability is that all video game characters can speak naturally, but they just don't when they're on the screen if they're not "supposed to". As in, if they're supposed to be playing characters who don't talk, they don't when they're on the screen and when players are there to see them.
    • It could be possible that characters designated by their developers as, say, human, automatically come with a suite of human traits - speech, complex emotions, a desire to eat and drink - that don't have to be specifically programmed into them, for instance.
    • Also, listen closely when Moppet Girl tries to play Fix-It Felix Jr. Felix gasps, chuckles nervously, and says "Ralph!" repeatedly.
• How the heck did Skrillex get in the Fix-It Felix Jr. arcade game? Is there a machine that allows people to go inside video games? Or is that not the real Skrillex? If it is the real Skrillex, does that mean he took the time out of all his other things to go to this random arcade cabinet to have a party? If it isn't, why is there a digitized Skrillex in the arcade?
  • Maybe one of the arcade denizens dressed as Skrillex?
    • He looks like Surge Protector...
    • Skrillex could also be visiting from a Licensed Rhythm Game that exists only in the movie.
  • Maybe he performs the music for Hero's Duty live.
• Why is Zangief^note who, in the Street Fighter canon, is NOT particularly villainous at the villain support group? He's not a bad guy; he just plays one sometimes.
  • So is the title character.
  • He was in the movie and the cartoon. The mix-up could've been there.
    • Going off of that, he might be a version of Zangief from the arcade game based on the movie, where he was evil.
  • Before and for a few years after the Cold War, ANY Russian character in American Media was depicted as a villain. Zangief's in the support group as a victim of cultural dissonance.
  • A psychological issue: Statistically speaking, how many Street Fighter players actually play Zangief (and other Mighty Glacier grappler types like him), compared to Ryu and Ken, Chun-Li, and other more balanced (or even attractive) characters? Technically speaking, Zangief isn't a Bad Guy. But if you spend 95% of the time as an obstacle to the player rather than the Player Character himself, you might start to feel like one.
    • There's also the fact that, sometimes depending on the iteration but almost always in the right hands (another player or high-level A.I.), Zangief is notorious for giving players an extraordinarily hard time. So, it could be less a case of Zangief being erroneously labelled as villain because he's morally evil (unlike, say, M. Bison) and more the fact that he's seen as a barricade by players on the other side of the screen, as said above.
    • This one's pretty much confirmed. When asked about this over Reddit, Rich Moore responded "he was bad to me."
  • Also, remember what Zangief actually says to Ralph. "You are 'Bad Guy', but that does not mean you are bad guy." Who better to explain that concept than a guy who, despite not being particularly villainous in most of his incarnations, is nonetheless filed under 'villain'?
  • Zangief isn't there because he's a villain, he's there because he's the group leader helping them through their issues. It's why he gets all the deep and insightful lines. He's not a member, he's the therapist.
    • According to the director, he had trouble defeating Zangief as a child, so he considers him "evil".
    • I thought Clyde was the leader? They meet at his place, he leads the discussion it seems...
  • I thought Zangief was just there for the free donuts.
    • They only do that on Thursdays.
  • It's because the director, Rich Moore, always got his ass kicked by Zangief when he was playing single-player in Street Fighter II, so Zangief became a "bad guy" for him.
  • Anyone else think that is a decidedly dodgy reason regardless?
    • Nope. If lots of players (like the director) hating Zangief for being a strong opponent is enough for Bad-Anon to include him in the therapy group, that's their prerogative. It's not like we see any rules about who is and who isn't allowed in.
• The bartender from the game Tapper was seen in the new trailer, instead of the soda jerk character from Root Beer Tapper. Does this mean that Disney will have to use the Budweiser logo?
  • Not necessarily. If you look in the background of the scene, where the Budweiser logo would normally be is in fact the logo from Root Beer Tapper. The Bartender is definitely from Tapper though. I assume they simply mixed the two games, but if that were the case, why they didn't just use the bartender from Root Beer Tapper remains a mystery.
    • Maybe it's to keep the bartender a traditional bartender instead of the soda jerk with the paper hat.
    • There were four versions of Tapper: Root Beer Tapper, (Budweiser) Tapper, a variant of Budweiser Tapper for Japan that used Suntory beer instead, and a generic beer Tapper for the rest of the world. The Tapper from the film is likely a mix of the first and the last, since no licenses to the beer companies would be involved.
    • Turns out, it's the Budweiser Tapper. They were happy to have him in the film.
  • Plus, when Ralph returns to the GCS, you can clearly see the "Tapper" sign. Maybe they won't show the Budweiser logo, but will keep the bartender for the older gamers?
  • Fridge Brilliance: It's not a legit copy of Root Beer Tapper, it's a hack of a (Budweiser) Tapper machine to make it like a Root Beer Tapper machine!
  • Also, Tapper is pixelated, or in other words, the root beers are square. Squared Root Beer. Mathematically, the two cancel each-other out, and you're left with Beer.
    • Wow...
    • Mind = Blown
• What are characters from Mario and Sonic games doing here? They're not arcade games.
  • During the Time-Passes Montage where we see all the games that have been in the arcade over the past 30 years, the mildly obscure game Sonic the Fighters can be seen, so it's safe to assume it's still there. Bowser could potentially be from the Vs. Super Mario Bros. arcade game.
    • There was a Mario Kart arcade game that came out a few years ago, and there are NES arcade machines.
  • Mario originally appears in Donkey Kong (where he was called Jumpman), Donkey Kong Jr. (where he was given the name Mario), Mario Bros. (sans Super), and Vs. Super Mario Bros. He was even in Vs. Wrecking Crew. Mario, not from an arcade game? Hmph.
• Sonic's credits scene has a bit of a oddity: he rolls off a ramp and hits Dr. Eggman's Eggmobile from Angel Island. That machine isn't protected by spikes nor shoots its fireballs, and yet it is Sonic, in rolling mode, who takes damage. Didn't people learn anything from Sonic 2006?
  • Rule of Funny.
• Just a small little nitpicky problem, but if the game Sonic and Eggman come from is Sonic the Fighters... then why is Eggman wearing his Post-Sonic Adventure outfit?
  • They probably decided to depict him that way to make him more recognizable to a newer audience. Sonic's also using his new design and voice actor, rather than the classic style Sonic from that game.
• Why is Smoke at the Bad-Anon meeting? He's Face–Heel Revolving Door in Mortal Kombat, and he's in his good guy form.
  • Maybe he's from ''Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. He's a bad guy in that one but his good guy skin appears as an alternate skin.
    • Sort of the same deal Zangief is in the meeting despite being mostly a good guy. Maybe someone in production had trouble beating him.
• Here's something that has been bugging me: characters can't die in their own games, right? And yet we still see graffitties of "Aerith Lives" around the station, as if she's still dead, when given the universe's rules she should be alive, even if killed as part of the game's plot. So, she's actually programmed to die? Is she alive? Also, wouldn't hurt to see some KH and FF characters in the second movie.
  • Plotline deaths in Roleplaying Games are very different from mook or PC deaths in an arcade game, which by definition are intended to be repeated over and over.
    • But what about Kingdom Hearts Aerith? Is that a different Aerith, then?
  • It's not that characters can't die in their own games. Characters die in their own games all the time. It's just that if you die outside your game, you don't regenerate. Ever. Game over.
• Who was that small yellow sun in the blue swimming trunks seen a couple times in Game Central Station? I recognize him from somewhere, but can't place a name or title.
• Ralph knows the name Lara Croft and Vanellope mispronounces the name GLaDOS. When did GLaDOS and Lara Croft appeared in arcades and how does the characters such as Ralph and Vanellope know about them if only characters that appeared and referenced has an arcade platform appearance?
  Surge Protector: "I'm just a surge protector doing my job, sir. Name?"
  Wreck-It Ralph: "Lara Croft."
  Vanellope Von Schweetz: "Well, it's time to step out of your comfort zone, Gladys (GLaDOS)..."
  • Most likely, he or someone else heard the out-of-arcade references from the people playing their games, and spread it to others throughout Game Central Station.

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