The bushes and clouds in Super Mario Bros. are the same thing, just different colors. ( Source )

DMA Designs is a company best known for Lemmings – or at least, they were. After creating Body Harvest for the Nintendo 64, DMA became Rockstar North and produced Grand Theft Auto III. (Source)

If you look hard enough, you can spot Pac-Man in the Disney movie Tron. 659_full.jpg While made popular by Contra, the Konami code’s first appearance is actually in Gradius. (Source)

Pac-Man creator Toru Iwatani revealed that the character was designed to appeal to women. (Source)

Sony’s PlayStation was originally planned as a CD-ROM add-on for the Super Nintendo. (Source)

Chromosome 7, responsible for ensuring human limbs and organs grow where they are supposed to, is called SHH - Sonic Hedgehog. (Source)

Sonic the Hedgehog originally had a human girlfriend named Madonna.

We’ve all heard horror stories about how awful E.T. - The Extra Terrestrial for Atari 2600 was. Guess what? It actually sold more than Space Invaders. E.T. moved 1.5 million units, while Space Invaders only moved 1 million. (Source)

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Don’t think Mario and Halo are related? Think again. Jen Taylor, who has voiced Princess Peach and Toad in several Mario games is also Halo’s female lead, Cortana. (Source)

Ryo Hazuki, Shenmue’s protagonist, had a bicycle in early development to quickly traverse town.

Remember visiting the Goldenrod City gym in Pokemon Gold/Silver? The design is actually a Clefairy!

Nintendo of America is the majority owner of the Seattle Mariners. (Source)

Ever notice the drop shadow in Super Mario 3's title screen?

After Nintendo of America believed Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels was too hard for American audiences, Nintendo went back and changed Yume Kojo: Doki Doki Panic (created from the remains of the scrapped prototype Super Mario Bros. sequel) into Super Mario Bros. 2. (Source)

Before Leon fought for his life in the European villages of Resident Evil 4, Capcom created four different versions of the title. One of the scrapped versions eventually found life as another popular Capcom franchise – Devil May Cry. (Source)

Gordon Freeman wasn’t always the hero of Half-Life. Early versions of the game had players assuming the role of “Ivan the Space Biker”. Thankfully, Valve came to their senses. (Source)

In Deus Ex, players can run around Liberty Island and check out the view. The World Trade Center towers are missing from the skyline, causing a lot of complaints. Designer Harvey Smith has an interesting explanation:

“When people complained, we just explained that it had been destroyed by terrorist attacks. We start the game with the Liberty Island statue having been destroyed by terrorists a few years before. We just said that the towers had been destroyed too. And this was way before 9-11. Years. That’s kind of freaky. There are correlations. We’re using the WTO in this game and there are WTO riots in Seattle every few years.”

Deus Ex hit store shelves over a year before the real world attacks. (Source)

In Metal Gear Solid 3, players can save their game at the beginning of their fight with The End, change the PS2’s clock to a week later, resume the battle, and The End will be dead from old age.

In Super Mario 64, Boo’s laugh is actually a sped up version of Bowser’s laugh. (Listen here)

Early Dreamcast prototypes show the console’s controller looking an awful lot like a television remote. (Source)

Final Fight was originally a sequel to Street Fighter called “Street Fighter ‘89”.

GunValkyrie was originally developed as a Dreamcast game, and was supposed to be played with a controller and light gun at the same time.

After completing Donkey Kong Country 2, there’s a screen that compares the player to Mario, Yoshi, and Link based on how many DK coins that have been collected. At the bottom of the screen, Sonic the Hedgehog’s shoes and Earthworm Jim’s gun are next to a trash can with a sign that reads “No Hopers”.

The Legend of Zelda’s beta version gives players the choice between a sword and a boomerang at the beginning. (Source)

Street Fighter 2 names didn’t fully translate from Japan to North America. In the states, M. Bison is Balrog, Vega is M. Bison, and Balrog is Vega. Capcom wanted Balrog to be M. Bison (their version of Mike Tyson) but changed the names to avoid any legal issues. (Source)

Look closely at Ryu's fireball in Street Fighter 2 and YOU CAN SEE HIS HANDS.

Metal Gear Solid 2’s Raiden originally shared similarities with Spider-Man. Raiden would mimic webhead’s movements and crawl around on all fours. Additionally, Raiden was given a creepy personality, and even licked bird droppings. Thankfully, Kojima rejected Shinkawa Yoji’s bizarre idea. (Source)

Dr. Michael Kaufmann (from the Silent Hill series) is a combination of the names Lloyd Kaufman and Michael Hertz. Kaufman and Hertz are known for creating cult classics, like “The Toxic Avenger”. (Source)

Silent Hill features several hints that suggest the game is related to Kindergarten Cop. Several posters can be seen in both the film and the game. (Source)

Tingle from the Zelda series looks suspiciously like series composer Koji Kondo.

In Pokemon Red & Blue, the three legendary birds Arcticuno, Zapdos and Moltres actually mean "One Two Three" in Spanish! Artic-UNO, Zap-DOS, Mol-TRES.

Look closely and you'll see Bowser appears in Zelda: Ocarina of Time!

Remember the PlayStation 2’s startup screen? The one with the uneven white towers? Those towers actually represent games – the PS2 reads the memory cards and based on the save data, populates the screen accordingly. (Source)



Super Mario Sunshine features a man dressed in a Pianta suit that wants to race Mario for shines. If the mask is removed, he closely resembles a character from a different universe. Look familiar? (Source)



The pillars in the last Bowser level of Super Mario 64 have some interesting art on them, reminding gamers of the good ‘ole days. (Source)



The music from Super Mario Bros. 3’s water world is the same as the fairy music from Ocarina of Time. (Source)



Hecatoncheir, Vanille’s Eidolon originally appeared in Final Fantasy III, along with Fang’s crystal. (Source)



If gamers need to take a nap in Super Mario RPG, rent a room at the hotel in the Mushroom Kingdom. You’ll wake up next to a famous elf! (Source)



Remember Sonic Unleashed? Yeah, we’d rather not, either. However, during one of the cutscenes, players can catch a glimpse of what Robotnik does in his spare time. Once you see it… (Source)



NES title Snake Rattle ‘n’ Roll gives a shout-out to another platform by spelling out “GAMEBOY” in the ground’s tiles. (Source)



Sonic the Hedgehog’s debug mode reveals an unused item – air goggles. These goggles would allow Sonic to breathe underwater. (Source)



A fortune teller in Morrowind tells gamers about Oblivion’s plot. Visit Sothelstiem and talk with Odfrid White-Lip: “When the dragon dies, the Empire dies. Where is the lost dragon’s blood, the Empire’s sire? And from the womb of the void, who shall stem the blood tide?.” (Source)



To the untrained eye, the Perfect Dark logo looks like the text “Perfect Dark” in front of an “N”, symbolizing the platform the game is on. A closer look reveals that “N” to actually be “PD”. (Source)



Ooccoo, the dungeon-warping bird in Twilight Princess, has a strange connection with Link. “00CC00” is the hexadecimal code for the green in Link’s tunic in The Legend of Zelda. (Source)



Link was originally planned to be in the Wii version of Marvel Ultimate Alliance. (Source)