Shout Out / Scott Pilgrim

Listing all of the references in the Scott Pilgrim series/game and movie was starting to eat up their pages, so let's list them all here! Considering the sheer number of references, it's gonna be one hell of a chore to keep track of them.

For references from the film, see ShoutOut.Scott Pilgrim Vs The World.

For references from the anime series, Scott Pilgrim Takes Off, see here.

Scott Pilgrim — Graphic Novels

Multiple volumes

• The band The Clash at Demonhead gets its name from combining the band The Clash and the obscure NES game Clash at Demonhead.
  • Their drummer, Lynette Guycott, is named after Tom Guycot from that game.
• Gideon the Cat's name is a blatant shout out to Gideon the cat from Pinocchio.
  • The whole subplot with the cat is an Homage to Breakfast at Tiffany's, a classic Manic Pixie Dream Girl movie.
• The high school flashback was one big River City Ransom ref.
  • At least one person has said "Barf" when getting beaten up.
  • Also, when Scott is trying to remember the name of the Katayanagi Twins, he suggests "Randy and Andy Katamari". Randy and Andy are bosses in River City High.
  • The rumors that Simon would be Gideon (given their identical appearance) is likely a reference to RCR, in which the final boss, Slick, is a nobody from the main character's past who was previously named Simon.
• Scott also wears MOTHER 2 and Astro Boy t-shirts at some points.
• Several of the books' first page title logos are shout-outs to videogame title screens. The logo to Book 2◊ was done in the style of Bonk's Adventure◊, Book 4 had a full-color take◊ on the title screen◊ of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, and Book 5's spoofed◊ the cover◊ of Double Dragon III.
• The names of Stephen Stills and (Young) Neil are a shout out to the folk legends, er, Stephen Stills and Neil Young, who played together in Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young.
• Ramona's nickname is Rammy. Despite admittedly being a fan of the game, O'Malley says this is an unconscious homage.
• A particularly obscure one: a magazine article in Volume 2 and 6 called "Bam! Kapow! Comics aren't just for kids anymore!". And on the same magazine cover: "Are video games art? Source says no."
• The back of the books features a parody of the "STOP! You're reading the wrong way" page◊ that publishers such as Tokyopop and Viz often put at the back end of American manga translations.
• Potential Utena references spanning the series:
  • There's the fact that neither Scott or Ramona are as pure or good as they believed themselves to be, or as we were led to believe, just like with Utena and Anthy when their flaws became more apparent.
  • Like Anthy, Ramona is seen as a prize to be won and Scott, like Utena, must frequently defeat unwanted opponents in order to keep her. Like the Student Council, the League of Evil Exes all have various reasons for wanting Ramona back, some still like her and others absolutely hate her, all the while relating to Scott that's she not so innocent. Scott, like Utena, is too naive to understand what they are trying to tell him.
  • The Power of Love and The Power of Understanding are swords that emerge from Scott's chest, just like many swords in Utena.
  • The cryogenics chamber Gideon unveils in the Chaos Theater, revealing all of his exes frozen in slumber, bears more than a passing resemblance to the Castle Where Eternity Dwells. Especially considering Scott and Ramona fight Gideon underneath it. The chambers where Gideon's ex-girlfriends are sleeping also resemble the glass coffins the Student Council members were trapped in during the climax of the manga.
• The official colors of the scarf Knives wears (shown in the sprite of her on book six's back cover and on the cover of Volume 2's color edition) are blue and silver. Similar to the house colors for Ravenclaw. The house of an asian girl who kisses the main character but is emotionally troubled and doesn't turn out to be the ending romantic lead. That doesn't sound familiar at all. Word of God confirmed all this.
• Scott's 4½ shirt is a Fantastic Four reference—a shirt like that was notably worn by Franklin Richards.◊

Volume 1

• Volume 1, at the Rockit, 2nd panel features the drum set of The Archies.
• When Scott tries to draw Ramona's shoes, Wallace points out they look like the shoes from Mr. Men.
• Though there are several AKIRA references in Volume 3 (see below), there is also an illustration of Ramona Flowers on the back of Volume 1, which looks very similar to some art on the back of the AKIRA volumes..
• A bus displays the Trapnest logo from Nana.
• A magazine cover says, "Make Headlines Believe Them Come Back," the chorus of The New Pornographers' "The Fake Headlines."
• Scott directly references Metroid: "I wish I could turn into a morphing ball and roll to the bathroom".
• Matthew Pattel can shoot fireballs from his hands.

Volume 2

• Scott, Lisa, and Kim had a band in high school called Sonic & Knuckles.
• "I totally grazed you!" "How appropriate, You Fight Like a Cow."
• In the first chapter of Volume 2, Kim asks Scott to "Draw me a sheep!"
• Scott's rescue of Kim in the first chapter is a straight-up parody of River City Ransom, right down to the name of the final boss.
• On page 34 of volume 2, Scott and Kim's sex in the car is identical to a scene in Say Anything....
• On page 117 of volume 2, the name of Lucas Lee's movie, You Just Don't Exist, is also the name of a Plumtree song.
• While talking on the phone with Stephen Stills, Scott is playing Parodius Da!.

Volume 3

• The name of the third book, ''Scott Pilgrim and the Infinite Sadness", is a reference to the similarly-named album by The Smashing Pumpkins.
  • Chapter 16 is titled "Frail and Bedazzled" after a The Smashing Pumpkins song. Scott can also be seen wearing a Zero shirt at one point as well as his classic SP tee shirt.
• In Book 3, Scott has the internal dialogue, "Yeah! I know! I gotta believe!!" before leaping to Ramona's aid against Envy.
• There are a few to AKIRA, mostly involving Todd's parallels to Tetsuo.
  • In the title of Chapter 14: About to e-x-p-l-o-d-e◊
  • Todd uses his psychic vegan powers to severely damage the moon. When asked what happened next, Ramona says "About thirty pages of explosions and tidal waves."
  • When Todd loses control of his powers in Honest Ed's, he quotes a line from the 1989 dub word-for-word, screaming "It's my brain!!! What have you done!?!"
  • Ramona recalls Todd's "origin" in which he was taken to a lab for testing, and is shown returning with bandages wrapped around his head.
• There is a flashback sequence called They Were Eleven
• Acccording to O'Malley, Wallace's super-sad eyes in the "dipping sauce bitch" panel is a shout-out to Clone High.
• There are Utena and Porco Rosso posters on Envy's college dorm room walls.
• A direct reference to the opening of Chrono Trigger in how Wallace wakes Scott up after he finds him sleeping in the rain. "Scott... Scott! Good morning, Scott! Wake up, sleepyhead!"
• In the color version, Envy Adams strongly resembles Razor, the punk rock girl from Maniac Mansion.
• The deer's head in Volume 3.
• Scott mistakenly refers to Todd Ingram as Todd Rundgren.

Volume 4

• Book 4's title is a potential reference the song "Get It Together" by The Go Team.
• Book 4 contains a shot-for-shot parody of the iconic battle from the introduction to Ninja Gaiden.
• In a bonus page of volume 4 Comeau shouts "It's time to kick out the Jams, motherfuckers!" in reference to "Kick Out the Jams" by MC5.
• In volume four when Roxanne and Scott first meet, Roxanne teleports the way of every Japanese depiction of ninjas, ever, which is having her fingers locked in a certain way like the usual Ninjutsu abilities.
• Roxy's defeat involves her splitting apart much like Mecha Frieza, and then a much of small animals pop out like a Prison Egg capsule from the Sonic the Hedgehog games.
• In Volume 4, Scott finds himself in a dream where he's basically Link, getting pestered by a forest elf that acts as a N'avi.
• The Gilded Palace of Flying Burritos is named after the album The Gilded Palace of Sin by The Flying Burrito Brothers.
• Scott pulls a sword out of himself, much like in Revolutionary Girl Utena with the sword of Dios.
• Scott wears a shirt with Mr. Happy on it.
• Young Neil has a shirt with the Deathly Hallows symbol.
• After Roxanne and Ramona's fight, Roxanne tells Ramona that she hopes she's "happy with her children."
• Lynette's teleportation looks similar to how Chaos Control is portrayed in Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics).

Volume 5

• If you think about it, Kyle and Ken Katayanagi are twin brothers with a dragon motif.
• Knives' dad has hair like Vegeta, and Tamara looks like Osaka.
• Chapter 27 is entitled "Can't Face Up", after a Sloan song. In addition, one of Gideon's exes is named Sloane.
• Scott quotes the chorus to Backstreet Boys' "As Long As You Love Me" word-for-word just before Ramona leaves.
• The last chapter of volume 5 is called World of Ruin
• Two chapters in Volume 5 are named "The Glow" and "The Glow, Pt. 2" in reference, respectively, to the song and album by The Microphones.
• Word of God confirms that one onomatopoeia is misspelled "tumbl" in reference to a certain popular blogging website.
• At the top of the back cover of Volume 5, in 8-bit text, is the phrase "THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH".

Volume 6

• At the end, Shatterband is seen (badly) playing "I'm a Believer".
• In the beginning, Wallace is wearing a Gryffindor scarf.
• Ramona and Scott use the X Slash move from Chrono Trigger against Gideon.
• For the majority of the beginning of the volume, Scott can be seen playing a game similar to Monster Hunter on a PSP Go. Lampshaded by one of the behind-the-scenes pages in the color edition, where one of O'Malley's notes to himself is to stop playing Monster Hunter and start drawing a comic about a guy who won't stop playing Monster Hunter.
• The shirts that are being given away in Chaos Theater Toronto are suspiciously similar to an inverted Triforce from The Legend of Zelda, and the pyramid-shaped stage might be a reference to the one used by Daft Punk, and although it's hard to see, one of the background characters is wearing a Team Fortress 2 shirt when Scott gets stabbed by Gideon. Also, Chapter 34 is titled "A Link to the Past".
  • The stage could also be the pyramid at the center of the dark world in A Link To The Past that the final battle takes place on/in.
  • Also, three Gs...
• Scott is shown sporting a shirt with a Slime from Dragon Quest for a good portion of the book.
• Travis Touchdown can be seen in the audience when Envy resumes her show in volume 6, after Scott and Ramona defeat Gideon.
• For a change of pace, in volume 6, there's a short shout out to the internet in the "Memory Cam" of Ramona and Gideon, with Ramona saying "Babby" in place of "baby."
• The climactic chapter of Volume 6 is entitled Music Sounds Better With You, a dance song by Stardust. It's very fitting, given the contents of said chapter.
• Gideon's Girlfriend plot is basically a cross between A Link to the Past and Revolutionary Girl Utena
  • Not to mention the People Jars resemblance to the Castle Where Eternity Dwells...
• When Envy walks into Sarah's party, there is a painting on the wall depicting a certain pirate ship.
• Chapter 37 is titled "Not the End of the World", possibly another Utena reference.
• The Power of Understanding take the form of what appears to be Zangetsu. Either that or a Buster Sword.
• "Scott Pilgrim is coming home... and this time, it's personal!"
• Also in Volume 6, at one point someone's playing a Hokuto no Ken game in an arcade. The machine next to that one has the characters for Touhou Project (東方) on it.
• The Chaos Theatre Toronto's basement level features a big, shiny pyramid.
• The final scene of the series is highly reminiscent of scenes from the Future and Resurrection chapters of Osamu Tezuka's Phoenix.
• When Gideon realizes that Ramona left Scott too, he makes this offer to Scott; "Join me, Scott, and I will complete your training! Together we can rule Ramona's future love life!"
• In Chapter 37, when Ramona breaks free of her cuffs and confronts Gideon, there's a visual reference to the final fight between Tron and giant Sark in Tron (though the roles are reversed)
• In the final battle when Scott enters Ramona's mind, it is very reminiscent of the scene in Final Fantasy VII where Cloud enters the life stream to finish off Sephiroth. Compare this to this.
• Scott's pre-asskicking line about how he's gonna punish Gideon is one to Sailor Moon.
• In Volume 6, there is an arcade machine called the "Murder Simulator". This could be referencing Doom as this is what it was accused of being by haters. Then again, it could just be a joke about the FPS genre...
• Gideon shoots the Glow as though it were a Kamehameha.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game

Shout Outs

• The game's opening text is similar to Street Fighter Alpha 3, and just like the movie, the announcer yelling "KO" is taken from that game, as well.
• In the background of the Frying Tengu, you can see karaoke which the only lyrics are "Da Di Da Dooo~!"
• The Map screen is done in the same style as Super Mario Bros. 3.
• Wallace's Mystery Shop, in the car tunnel, is a very clear homage to Merlin's Mystery Shop from River City Ransom.
  • Another direct ref is the Flat Irons bookstore. (To list the others would take up the rest of the page.)
  • The Flat Irons bookshop actually sells "Lost at Sea", another of Bryan Lee O'Malley's graphic novels.
  • The music shop sells Kupek, the name that Bryan Lee O'Malley makes music under.
  • Wallace's Mystery Shop sells "Never-ending Fantasy" and "Speedy the Porcupine" video games for stats. We can see a blue turtle shell and the dwarf's axe from Golden Axe in the background.
• On the subject of River City Ransom, the "Grand Slam" move is lifted directly from RCR, and it is indeed still a Game Breaker.
• There are banners on the streets for "The Wright Stuff", referring to a series of double bills in Toronto that director Edgar Wright screened while the Scott Pilgrim film was in production.
• Speaking of Edgar Wright, he is actually in the game. During the second stage, he's the director in a stocking cap shouting directions in a megaphone. ...this probably explains why you can't hit him.
  • Apparently, his body can be seen in the stack of bodies in the cutscene after that stage.
• The Subspace Warp Zones are filled with Bricks and $Blocks that release coins.
  • Some of the Subspace levels themselves bare a more than passing resemblance to Rainbow Road.
• Breaking the car in Stage 2 is exactly like the breaking the car mini-game in Street Fighter II.
• The band Clash At Demonhead arrives in a stretch limo version of K.I.T.T.. (Probably K.A.R.R.)
• Many of Todd's physical attacks◊ are lifted from AKIRA and his "move item storm" is from Slick from River City Ransom.
  • Additionally, his Super attack is identical to K9999's SDM from The King of Fighters, down to even the initial pose and animation. Which makes sense since K9999 was a Tetsuo ripoff himself.
  • There's also a Spider-Man (Well, Venom, but Spider-Man as the series) reference when Todd uses his super attack. His creepy transformation as he shoots the vegetables from his arm morphs his body into a near exact copy of Venom's outfit.
• One liftable item/weapon is a vegetable with a face.
• At the Halloween party, there's someone in the background dressed up as Bang from the Nes Game Clash at Demonhead. In addition, one of the enemies is wearing the skull of Tom Guycott, a boss from that game.
• The sequence on the bus is reminiscent of the first boss battle in The Punisher (Capcom), that was fought on a bus.
• Triforce symbol on the recycling buckets.
• Mobile's house in the park is styled much like the houses in Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, much like that game; he's in the basement and gives (well, he sells it) you a special move.
• The park is filled with Invincible Minor Minion elves who look like Link and act like the Golden Axe gnomes.
• The key in the park is in a pedestal like the Master Sword.
• The design and game mechanic of the keys is reminiscent of the keys from Super Mario World.
• Gideon literally sprouts one angel wing during one of his attacks. His Battle in the Center of the Mind form brings to mind Kefka's final form.
• Gideon's underground base is some mix between the Technodrome and Dr. Wily's castle.
• Whereas comic Roxy uses a regular sword and movie Roxy uses a chain blade, game Roxy's sword works as both, similar to Renji' from Bleach or Ivy's from Soulcalibur
• When Scott finishes a stage, he blinks out ala Mega Man, Kim leaves via Warp Star. Stephen Stills leaves via a Green Pipe that appears from the ground. Finally, Ramona exits via her own bag.
• Stephen Still's clear-out move is a localized Power Geyser, taken straight from Terry Bogard of Fatal Fury fame. In a similar vein, Scott uses a Tatsumaki Sempuukyaku, Kim does a Spinning Lariat WITH DRUMSTICKS, and Ramona appears to have stolen a trick from May's playbook (spinning around wildly with an odd weapon outstretched, in this case a bag).
• The little wolverines in stage 6 attack using Wolverine's standing Fierce Punch animation from the Marvel vs. Capcom games. In reference to the same character's healing ability, the end credits of the game rate the wolverines as "having to regain HP."
• The "paparazzi" enemies from stage two appear to have covered wars, you know...
• The Twin's Humongous Mecha description states that it's a prototype to the Kazinger K.
  • It also features detachable arms, a mono-eye, head-mounted beam weapon and a head that becomes an escape vessel, not unlike Mobile Suit Gundam's Zeong.
  • When you fight the robot; the city in the background is on fire, you're fighting it on a rooftop, and it sometimes retreats to the background, just like the third boss in the first stage of Contra: Hard Corps.
• The Subspace in Gideon's Mind has Bloody Tears and Medusa Heads.
• Roxy's belt looks a lot like the whip-sword from Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonance.
• The rolling balls in the Dojo stage and Dragons Den and the Chaos Theater Elevator are straight from the TMNT arcade games.
• The character select screen for the Scott Pilgrim video game is nearly identical to the selection screen for Super Mario Bros. 2.
• The Subspace? stage features Red Drops of Doom from the last stage in Mega Man 2 and crystal platform blocks that look like lifted straight from Mega Man Battle Network.
  • When you beat the final form of the last boss you find Gideon behind a console just like Dr. Wily in Mega Man 2.
  • He even whimpers just like Dr. Wily does at the end of the games.
• The Ubisoft logo video at the game start has MPEG artifacts, just like video sequences from early CD-generation games.
• Winners don't eat meat. A veganized reference to the ad that showed on later arcade machines stating that "Winners don't use drugs."
• The scene during the end credits where they are in Ramona's back yard and a wave of zombies approaches is just like Plants Vs Zombies.
• The very first stage features a store named Mecha-Fetus Toys, which would be the most wonderful toy store ever. There must be more references to Mecha-Fetus...
• Right before the battle with Todd Ingram, you engage in a bass battle with note highways similar to Rock Band and Guitar Hero. After a while, Scott decides to cut the crap and hits Todd with his guitar. The actual boss battle then commences.
• The Twins' Humongous Mecha is named "Super Fighting Robot", a Shout-Out to the opening theme of the Mega Man (Ruby-Spears) cartoon.
• You can find subspace highways in secret doors, like the ones that Ramona uses. The subspace highways sometimes act all glitchy and surreal with rainbows, but mostly like Glitch City.
• Scott does the Awesome Face as a victory pose.
• In level 4, the blue tang just keeps swimming while most of the other fish are staying in one place.
• The graphic for the "Energy Tank" food item you can buy in the last level looks almost exactly like energy tanks from earlier Mega Man games. The in-game description even states "It has a letter E on it".
• Ken Katayanagi, of the Katayanagi twins, had his name changed to Kevin for the game. This is a reference to Street Fighter 2010, where the character Kevin had his name changed to Ken for the American release.
• Compare the pause theme to that of Battletoads'.
  • In fact, the music is FULL of Shout Outs in the names of the music. Lucas Lee's boss theme is called Skate Or Live, the twins' boss theme is called Twin Dragons, the final stage music is called Techno Man. In addition, some of the songs feature concepts from the comics. The music for stage six, for example, is called Leave The Past Behind which is exactly what Scott wants to do, but exactly what he shouldn't do.
• The enemy bats do two shout outs in one: they usually appear near bottomless pits - just like the early Castlevania games - and are called G.D.Bats - Goddamned Bats!
• At one point, Knives' mother will be summoned and call your enemies a grass mud horse.
• When Super Fighting Robot shoots his missiles at you, it resembles a lot like another Background Boss.
• During Todd's Massive arm attack, reactor symbols flash onscreen, a la Utsuho from Touhou.
• One of the logos in the background of the Mini-Mart looks like the Angry Sun. There's also a red bull
• There are multiple throwbacks and Mythology Gags to the original graphic novel that are too easy to miss, for example...
  • On the window of the Video store, there are two posters depicting the covers of the second, third, fifth, and first volume of the graphic novels.
  • In level 4, why are there constantly girls attacking you on roller skates? They're the Winifred Haileys that Roxanne conjured from the short comic that came after the second book.
  • Why does Mobile teach you a special attack in his secret basement? Because there was a Red Herring in the third volume about him teaching Scott how to use psychic powers against Todd. Speaking of which, what are Wallace, Jimmy, Other Scott, and Joseph doing outside of his basement? The only correlation between them and Mobile is that they're all gay secondary characters.
  • You see the symbol on the Katayanagis' organ? It's the same symbol used on their keyboard/synthesizer in the movie.
  • In stage 3, while you make your way through the club, you can see at least two "The Clash at Demonhead"-poster that are recreations of the ones used in the movie. Notably it shows Envy with blond hair rather then red hair.
  • One of the trophies/achievements you can get ("Twin Dragons") is unlocked by defeating both of the Katayanagis simultaneously. In the comic, Scott gets an achievment for doing the same thing.
  • In order to unlock the secret shop, the player has to pay $504.25 for Scott's late fees at No Account Video, an obvious reference to the comic. ^note Granted, the actual fee is $504.28, but it's most likely to prevent annoyance at constantly having a cash total not ending in 5 or 0 (as the lowest coin is 5 cents)
• Posters in Julie's party reflects the albums of Metric and the island that Anamanaguchi's Dawn Metropolis was placed in.
• Several of the games cheats (At least on the 360 version) Are shout-outs to famous codes from other games.
  • The blood code is ripped from the Genesis version of Mortal Kombat. ABAXABB being as close as you can get to ABACABB on the 360 pad.
  • The "Change coins into animals" code is not only a shoutout to Sonic games, but the code Up, Up, Down, Down, Up, Up, Up, Up is the same as Sonic The Hedgehog 3's insanely hard level select and sound test code.
    • The Konami Code makes an appearance (With LT and RT needing to be held) as a code that spawns money when you commit suicide.
    • The select the same character code (Down, RB, Up, LB, B) is identical to the SNES version of the Vanilla Street Fighter II Code that enables Mirror Matches.
• Ramona's secret technique (the one you have to purchase) is a front-flip-landing-in-straddle-split move, used by Kim Kap Hwan and Chun-Li.
• A few of Super Gideon's attacks are taken from Gill's standing normals.
• Mr. Chau is fought on an open field in the middle of a storm; it looks a lot like the place where you fight Shin Akuma in Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold. There is some sort of castle in the background, though.
• The elves on Nega-Scot's level that can be beaten for coins resemble those on Golden Axe.
• One of Gideon's attacks is a pixelated Demon Fang.
• On the cover of the Complete Edition Limited Run packaging, Scott is doing the same pose that Sonic does on the cover of Sonic Adventure.
• The trophy/achievement you gain in the Complete Edition by achieving 100% Completion? The Completionist.
  • Sadly, it turned out to be a complete coincidence.
• Possibly unintentional, but Scott's blue color swap (blue shirt, brown hair, grey pants, yellow wristbands) brings to mind Takato without his goggles.
• The instruction booklet included with the physical release of Complete Edition acknowledges the fact that Knives and Wallace are Moveset Clones by referring to them as "Echo Fighters"

Misc

All of the Above

• Note that this article claims to list every video game reference in the series, which is at least 58.
• Gideon's theater is called the Chaos Theater
  • Fun fact: the building actually exists, though it's currently a homeless shelter.
• Every band name is a video game reference of some sort.
  • Sex Bob-Omb
  • Crash and the Boys
  • The Clash at Demonhead
    • The bass drum of the Clash at Demonhead featured the "No" sprite used by friendly characters in the game.
  • Sonic and Knuckles
  • Kid Chameleon
  • Shatterband
• Scott uses Makoto's Fukiage attack against Roxanne Richter in both the comic and the movie. It's also one of his special moves in the game.
• Scott himself was named for (and the series inspired by) a Plumtree song of the same name. Then there's also Stephen Stills and Young Neil.
  • The Plumtree song even appears in the soundtrack of the film.
  • It gets better, according to one of the Omakes, the song is based on a guy who's real name was Scott Ingram, who became the basis for Todd's name.
• Young Neil's nickname is a reference to Neil Young via a Sdrawkcab Name.
• The SP on Scott's shirt in Vol. 4 is all Pumpkins. In an interview that was on an older version of SP's site (now sadly gone), O'Malley stated that Scott had bought it not because of an affection for the band, but simply because it had his initials on it.
• Ramona looks like Tank Girl sometimes, especially when she's shown in roller skates and goggles wielding a baseball bat.
• Lucas Lee is at least partially inspired by Jason Lee (a pro-skateboarder turned actor with the last name Lee)
• Lynette Guycott is probably a reference to Tom Guycot from the game. Her arm is a reference to Bionic Commando.
• Nega-Scott is a shout out to Shadow Link from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.
  • In the game, he has Double Dragon II's Hyper Knee.
  • Super Dodge Ball, a game which was related to the River City Ransom universe, also has you play against the evil version of your team after you've beaten the final team without losing a match. They have a similar palette to Nega-Scott.
  • In the game, he also pays homage to the Double Illusion boss from Double Dragon II (i.e., He's the same as Scott, but purple and with the added ability to throw fireballs).
    • Nega-Scott not only throw fireballs in the same stance as Ryu, as his fireballs are purple, just like Akuma and Evil Ryu from Street Fighter.
• When people die, they turn into coins.
• "Okay, let's start with Launchpad McQuack."
• The drawing of swords from the chest and Ramona's subservience in the final fight is very reminiscent of Revolutionary Girl Utena.
• Thirst bars, pee bars, and money bars, á la The Sims.
• In Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, in the original cut of the Roxy vs. Ramona fight, we get this exchange:
  Roxy: You unbelievable bitch!
  Ramona: Believe it.
• Subspace appears to be based on the dream world of Subcon.