r/TopCharacterTropes • u/mp3help • 18d ago

miscellaneous [Interesting Trope] Attempts at fanservice/virality that failed not because they were hated, but because nobody noticed them or cared at all.

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1) Hoopy the Hoop, Portal (2007) When you defeat GLaDOS and her room is destroyed at the end of the game, debris rains down in the final cutscene, including a big metal hoop that bounces around a bit. Developer Erik Wolpaw said the team dubbed it "Hoopy the Hoop" and expected it to become the big meme of Portal. Of course, none of the fans paid much attention to the hoop since "The Cake is a Lie" became the biggest meme of the game, and overall one of the biggest video game memes of all time.

2) Burgh, Pokemon Black and White (2010) When designing Burgh, developer Yusuke Ohmura said Gamefreak had many of their female employees give input on his design to create their ideal handsome man. However, as someone who's been in the Pokemon fandom for almost 3 decades, in the 15+ years since Pokemon Black and White released, I have personally never seen any fans swoon over Burgh, or even mention him in general. If anything, characters like N and Colress are far more well-known within the fandom as the most handsome and beloved male characters of Pokemon Gen 5.

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935

u/First-Shallot947 18d ago

Baxcalibur - pokemon scarlet and violet

They gave this thing everything, its a godzilla reference with its signature attack being the godzilla slide meme. It got an excellent signature ability, its a competitive beast, and, its a pseudo legendary, and it even got a mega

No one talks about baxcalibur outside of competitive viability, when it comes to gen 9 popular pokemon, it got utterly mogged by tinkaton

541

u/VeritateDuceProgredi 18d ago

Rule number one of basically any rpg.
Give your players a gremlin and they will inevitably adopt it, and tink is the ultimate gremlin

219

u/Comprehensive_Top267 18d ago

it quite literally is a gremlin tho not even as in a "quirky lol random gremlin girl" kinda thing more as in "give me your fucking engine so i can sell it for more bong ammo" like literally the very idea of Gremlins back in their debut

129

u/Mrpgal14 18d ago

“I need a bigger hammer”

“Why?”

“Cuz a bird looked at me funny”

26

u/Ladies_Pls_DM_nudes 18d ago

If you can't solve your problem with a hammer, you just haven't made a big enough hammer yet.

18

u/MortuusSet 18d ago

Tbf those Corviknight are right assholes.

8

u/Karekter_Nem 18d ago

It’s honestly a miracle Corviknight got the taxi job considering Tinkaton is intentionally aiming for them.

7

u/SPyd3r_bYt3z 18d ago

I mean the tinkaton explicitly drove paldean corviknights to unemployment. Arceus help galar corviknights should my beloved hammer daughters decide to migrate.

2

u/Karekter_Nem 18d ago

Oh. I see what happened. I’m old and my memory is failing me.

2

u/Gangbang8008 18d ago

And they got some good metal on em

2

u/Always_Paddy_Last 14d ago

"Need a bigger metal hammer!"

"Why?"

"Kill a bigger metal bird"

"Why?"

"To make a bigger metal hammer!!"

17

u/Gizogin 18d ago

And then Pokopia did the impossible and improved on perfection.

She turns her hammer into a Swiss Army hammer.

13

u/tylerjehenna 18d ago

Honestly, this is pretty much exactly why I love tinkaton lol

4

u/TimYoungJik 18d ago

Tinkaton’s lore and design just hits that perfect combination of cute, funny and cool that makes her appealing to almost anyone in some way.

2

u/AFalconNamedBob 17d ago

Grafaiai my beloved gremlin pokemon

104

u/Frustrella 18d ago

The "Looks like Godzilla" attention already got it Tyranitar so maybe people weren't too excited for a second one, even if Baxcalibur looks more like Godzilla than Tyranitar does

46

u/Reborn1Girl 18d ago

Tyranitar conveys the feel of Godzilla much better. Baxcalibur looks too derpy, especially with his hands in that pose.

16

u/StePK 18d ago

Tyranitar conveys the feel of Godzilla much better.

I mean, T-Tar is probably the most successful competitive Pokemon on average, being a load-bearing pillar of the singles competitive scene every generation since it was introduced in Gen II. Definitely worthy of the Godzilla comparisons.

(Other GOAT Pokemon are Doubles Satan Incineroar, for absolutely warping the official competitive format forever, and Gen II Snorlax, who has a winrate a rounding error away from 50% - because 100% of teams use him).

8

u/SavageNorth 18d ago

T-Tar is a fundamentally cooler design, it just looks powerful

It's a lot simpler, it doesn't have a stupid fin on its back or whatever is going on with the mask thing, I appreciate the fin is a reference to Godzilla but it looks completely ridiculous here

Kids like using Pokémon that look cool, Baxcalibur just looks a bit silly which is the antithesis of cool

7

u/wazeltov 18d ago

I think T-Tar instantly becomes mid design-wise if you remove the thigh plates/holes and the chest plates/holes and have the body be flat textured instead of jagged, which exactly describes Baxcalibur.

Bax is literally just an ice dinosaur with a sword on its back. I feel like they're afraid of doing anything too complex with the vector graphics that they made for 3D, and everything suffers for it. Lots of old Pokémon got visually downgraded because of it too.

4

u/Independent-Size1028 18d ago

Well, when you look at the older Godzilla…

1

u/Sadcelerystick 17d ago

This looks just like Old Godzilla though…

1

u/Downtown_Injury_3415 18d ago

I thought Baxcalibur was supposed to be a mecha-godzilla type to rival tyranytar

7

u/Mr-Christie 18d ago

Nah that's Iron Thorns.

1

u/Own_Philosophy8190 18d ago

Isn't that the description for Duraludon? The fact people don't talk nearly as much about their supposed beef, as opposed to Tinkaton robbing Pawniard and trying to punt Corvinknight out of the sky, says a lot about how well that went (not really big deal, but still...)

1

u/Mysterious_Month4792 18d ago

I think looking more like Godzilla may actually count against it.

177

u/gamarun 18d ago

Its just so bald man

63

u/First-Shallot947 18d ago

Barber done fucked his shit up

15

u/JBR_4025 18d ago

They had to give him a mega to make him have some aura and they still managed to fuck that up by forcing you to play online to unlock it

31

u/chalkdusted 18d ago

Huh. Something about a lot of gen 9 designs never quite clicked with me, and I could never explain why, but I think you cracked the case: they’re all just… so fucking bald. Not always as literally as Baxcalibur, but a good chunk of the dex feels like they’re supposed to have another design element that got photoshopped out at the last minute, like that post of peeled pokemon. I went into SV mostly blind, and I kept being surprised that so many of the new mons didn’t have another evolution stage because they just felt unfinished to me.

Oh my god, I had another revelation while typing this— I bet it’s for the fucking crown they get when they terastallize. They’re bald so they can show off their cool hats better. Man, that was my theory for why so many of them are monotype, too… no wonder it’s my least favorite gimmick.

11

u/ShatnersChestHair 18d ago

All the hair went to Quaxly and his evolution line. More seriously, I feel like a lot of the mons in this generation either have no features on their head (other than ears) or specifically hair (a tuft, a coif, etc.) whereas previous gens had more horns, spikes, antennae, leaves, stuff like that.

6

u/Water_Attunement 18d ago

It makes me SO SAD. I love ice types but never gravitate to any dragon types in any of the games ever. I just don’t care for their dragon psuedo push.

This guy SHOULD have been the one to turn that around for me, but once I saw how fucked up he looked, especially in 3D where the artistry of spritework isn’t present, I realized he wasn’t the one.

115

u/MemeDealer2999 18d ago

Honestly it just looks really goofy. For me I think its because of how mushy half of its blue body looks, looking almost just as malleable as like regular human skin. Godzilla is a giant hulking beast of impenetrable scales, whilst this thing looks like it could be taken down by a wooden pike.

Maybe I'm biased cuz Haxorus is my favorite regional dragon line but I feel like he does it way better. Also just the difference between pixel art with loads of personality versus 3d modeling which... has never been my favorite.

12

u/Sum1nne 18d ago edited 18d ago

Honestly I'm kind of just over Dragon psuedo-legendaries too. There's only so many ways that archetype repeated over and over can be done, and they're played out.

It's not even a real tradition, Tyranitar & Metagross were Gens 2 & 3, and the Dragon type hasn't been legendary coded since Gen 6 when they got hard countered and booted from best typing by Fairy and started showing up more commonly as regular pokemon. That was 13 years ago and despite the fact that people are now pretty deep into Fairy fatigue from their own prominence feeling overdone, even they haven't had a psuedo-legendary for some reason. It's just all dragons and its kinda ridiculous.

4

u/4GRJ 18d ago

Dragapult was peak and it went downhill from there

7

u/ArkaneArtificer 18d ago

A lot of the gen 9 designs are just kinda… flat? Squishy? Idk how to explain it, they look very sterile in a way, like they designed marketable plushies first and foremost and then made an intern turn them into 3d models or something, I don’t know how to explain it better than that tbh

0

u/Powerful-Possible131 17d ago

An easy way to explain it is that you don't like Gen 9 designs. Trying to justify it with trying to use generic criticisms that can be attributed to any other generation makes a weaker argument.

3

u/ArkaneArtificer 17d ago

Except you can’t really attribute it to other regions designs, yes there are SOME fantastic gen 9 designs, but they seem to be the exception to the rule, Pokemon like tinkaton, and gimmeghoul are actually pretty good designs, but that can’t be said for the majority of others, most of the designs really don’t feel inspired at all, either way too derivative or mundane, looking like either basic animals with not much else, rehashes of older Pokemon, or otherwise

1

u/IeRoyaume 17d ago

Tyranitar is kinda Godzilla / dragonish themed, though.

4

u/VorpalHerring 18d ago

It looks like someone's Spore creation: a goofy potato with some armor plates stapled on.

1

u/Dull_Fix5199 15d ago

I think its meant to look like the OG godzilla.

Which looks and moves like a guy in a really uncomfortable rubber fursuit.

1

u/motoxim 15d ago

Yeah Baxcalibur looks ugly for me. I would take Goodra over it any day.

28

u/Gaias_Minion 18d ago

It just needed to be hunched over really, that'd make it live up to its inspiration more and make it stand out more compared to just the many other pokemon that stand upright when fully evolved.

5

u/IndigoFenix 18d ago

The real problem was basing its official artwork off of its Idle 3D Standing Pose. The design is fine, but people heavily associate a Pokémon with its standard artwork and its standard artwork was trash. Imagine if it was presented like this instead:

13

u/an_agreeing_dothraki 18d ago

expectation: "ice godzilla will have all the attention"
reality: "this is my baby he is big and made of mud"

38

u/sociocat101 18d ago

This literally could be a graggle simpson situation where you made up a pokemon that sounds realistic and I genuinely wouldve fallen for it, because ive never seen that thing before in my life. It looks so dumb

12

u/blackjackgabbiani 18d ago

It's the signature mon of the elite four dragon trainer

Well...that and his teaching assistant Professor Gible.

8

u/Nerdorama10 18d ago

I love Baxcalibur entirely because it's got a stupid meme wombo-combo to get around its supposed weakness. Its signature move massively debuffs its defenses until the next time it attacks, so to get around that you make sure it goes last in the turn, then use a priority move (usually Ice Shard) next turn to make it so the opponent doesn't get a move in while it's vulnerable.

Then it dies in one hit to Rock Slide/Iron Head anyway because it's part Ice-type and you deliberately made it slower than your opponent to pull off the meme combo. Still an alright sweeper but there's way easier ones to use.

2

u/LuminothWarrior 18d ago

Or you just set up a dragon dance or swap into a fire move with Thermal Exchange, and sweep with Loaded Dice + Icicle Spear. It was actually really busted in Singles. Never even heard of anyone using the setup you mentioned at all

1

u/KillYourUsernames 18d ago

I was hardcore into pokemon as a kid but fell off around gen 5. Every new pokemon I see feels like that meme about "curtains for zoosha?".

1

u/SagaSolejma 17d ago

I started catching up around a year or two ago and the amount of times I've asked my friend "okay surely THIS ONE isn't an actual pokemon, right?" is too much to count. Fucking monkidori.

6

u/2006pontiacvibe 18d ago

We already had a pokemon with almost all of this (pseudo with mega, good ability, kaiju design, competitive viability) and it was iconic. They didn't need to make another Tyranitar, and that's my problem with Baxcalibur.

1

u/ForteEXE_ 18d ago

Thank you, that's what I've been saying this whole time. 

They were too obvious when it came to the references. 

1

u/Charliefoxkit 17d ago edited 17d ago

And it even has a Mega...but that's still aping Tyranitar.  Duraladon's evolution in Gen IX might outshine it.

7

u/Tangy_Toucan 18d ago

It’s just “cold tyranitar” from the same generation we got ROBOT TYRANITAR and no one really even cares about that guy either

7

u/DuelaDent52 18d ago

Isn’t Tyranitar already a Godzilla reference? And then Gen V had Hydrigon and the moth Pokémon.

3

u/Relative-Tonight3083 18d ago

I thought it was Tyranitar to, lol

When I played through black n white I made a Toho team out of Tyranitar(Goji), Sandslash(Anguirus), Butterfree(Mothra), Aggron(Mecha G) and Hydreigon(Ghidorah)

3

u/oath2order 18d ago

when it comes to gen 9 popular pokemon, it got utterly mogged by tinkaton

Clodsire as well.

7

u/MilkMaiden_22 18d ago

It's cause the design is super half baked. If the default was basically the mega (i.e., finished) and the mega was even crazier, it'd have been much better recieved

11

u/jbwarner86 18d ago

Speak for yourself. I put Baxcalibur on my Violet team and it wrecked house 😁

5

u/omegon_da_dalek13 18d ago edited 18d ago

Incorrect

I have never not used it in sv

3

u/East-Efficiency-6701 18d ago

It’s seriously just me that really likes him outside of comp?

3

u/SlothsAreFuckinRad 18d ago

Maybe it’d be more popular if it didn’t look like someone stripped it naked and tied a plastic bag over its head. Give it more scale detail over the rest of its body, give it some head spikes to draw attention away from that shiny bald dome, and you’re good to go.

And I say that as someone who actually really likes Baxcaliber. But I like Arctibax much, much more.

3

u/Saphl 18d ago

It also looks really awkward in battle, which I suppose does kinda fit the Godzilla theme, but if they made it more dynamic, or based it on the Monsterverse Godzilla, I think it might have seen more success

3

u/Foostini 18d ago

It just looks fuckin stupid and its mega is even worse. You could have given him like 3-4 swords as spines, you could have put it on his tail, there's a million things you could have done other than have the most plain looking dino with ONE spike. This is a middle aged bald man in a Bud Light can cosplay.

3

u/Inversedraft 18d ago

I personally just didn't like Baxcalibur because it looks like one of those videoes where people peel pokemon, like taking away Bulbasaur's bulb. It should be able to use solar beam since if the sun hits its dome at the wrong angle it'll reflect into your eyes. I also think part of the problem is that I can't think of a way for it to make use of its back-sword without looking really dumb. It's so impractical as a sword that it feels pointless.

2

u/featherw0lf 18d ago

Personally, I would have given this thing a try if its shiny wasn't god awful. They gave it pink hands and called it a day like this thing wouldn't look sick with a blue/silver or black/orange alternate color scheme.

2

u/Massive-Exercise4474 18d ago

The design isn't great other than a reference.

2

u/A_Monster_Clown 18d ago

I have a particular soft spot for Baxcalibur, I was an ice trainer in Scarlett so I went up to the mountain and kidna- caught a breeding pair of it's first form the had the lvl 1 baby as my "Starter" before I did anything else... And Bax still doesn't even kinda make it into my potential list of favorite pokemon

2

u/Gmknewday1 18d ago

It's base design is just missing something 

3

u/Sea-Writer-6961 18d ago

More like everything 😭

2

u/HairiestHobo 18d ago

He really needed just a little bit more texture down his Spine.

Just the one big fin and then perfectly smooth otherwise irks me.

2

u/HeirofZeon 18d ago

I was so excited when the weird little Dragon Gremlin evolved in to a little Spinosaurus, so I was pumped to keep going. The disappointment when he turned into *another* Godzilla was BITTER.

3

u/Adaphion 18d ago

I have hardly kept up with pokemon in over a decade and a half and this is literally the first time I've ever heard about this guy, so yeah, great example.

2

u/SirVixofthePooSea 18d ago

It is really under-designed and just looks like a half-finished monster that somehow made it into the game. Like what is the point of the random red claws over top the normal hands? They don't link into any bigger pattern, they're just glued on.

3

u/JadeTheCatYT 18d ago

Man, I didn't know he was unpopular.

Me and my friend group really like this guy.

3

u/gourdgirl2013 18d ago

tinkaton my beloved 🎀 why have a bald lizard on my team when i can instead have an adorable hammer goblin?

1

u/blackjackgabbiani 18d ago

Hey my Icebox was a key member of my endgame team and got in the last hit on the end boss's team

1

u/Nehemiah92 18d ago

I instantly saw him as a Godzilla reference, but still thought how could they mess it up that badly?

1

u/TCLG6x6 18d ago

first time i see or hear of this thing

1

u/Straight_History2858 18d ago

Genuinely forgot this Pokemon existed

1

u/Disaster_Wolf44 18d ago

I like it. If I were a trainer I’d have one as my finisher.

1

u/awesomeman07 18d ago

I used it on my team. I always have to have a dragon on the team and I always like to pick a new region dragon.

1

u/pwninobrien 18d ago

He's kinda dumb looking. Look at those claw-shells.

1

u/Murgatroyd314 18d ago

General reaction: “So that’s this generation’s pseudo-legendary. Okay.”

1

u/abloopdadooda 18d ago

I mean he looks like they said "What if we designed a knockoff Aggron?"

1

u/KaliVilNo1 18d ago

Baxcalibur looks like a dude inside a Godzilla suit, which is something only old school Godzilla fans really can grasp and comprehend lol.

It evokes that look from the Godzilla of those Tokusatsu movies perfectly, but it's not for everyone.

1

u/Sea-Writer-6961 18d ago

TIL this thing exists

1

u/DougSpeagle 18d ago

It's mildly interesting but I can't get pass the ass head prevo

1

u/stillnotelf 18d ago

They accidentally buried its hook in the animations, where the stupid fly backward upside down move is somewhere between cool and dumb but at least attention grabbing. As a static image or with idle animations, this guy is boring

1

u/Sairakcaz 17d ago

It's totally valid, of course, and to each their own, but it always confused me cause it's the first Pokémon to break my top 10 favs since like gen 5. But that makes me biased of course.

1

u/SagaSolejma 17d ago

He just looks so underdesigned. Like why does he only have one spine plate? Wheres all the spikes, the scales, the atomic fire. Bro looks like a thumb.

1

u/GitGudWiFi 17d ago

Honestly thought this creature was from Sun Moon

1

u/Perks92 17d ago

It looks ass. Like most Pokemon since gen 6 onwards

1

u/DR035A 17d ago

This isn't even the Pokemon people think of when someone says "Godzilla". That's sad

1

u/comingdownblue 17d ago

I would like baxcalibur sooo so much more if they just gave it horns! I've seen fanmade fixes that literally just add two simple icy horns and it already looks 100x better. I'd like to have a word with the person whose idea it was to make it bald and smooth

1

u/derpy_derp15 17d ago

It's bc it fricking ugly

1

u/Ns-45G 17d ago

Its evolution level is also a godzilla reference. As a massive Godzilla fan I talked about this thing non stop and used one on my team

1

u/PizdunEbun228 15d ago

If they gave it more cool edges and spikes it would be more popular. its design feels unfinished

1

u/Odessey_And_Oracle 18d ago

Literally never once seen or heard of this pokemon before. You could have drawn this yourself and I'd never know

1

u/Trunksshe 18d ago

I thought Bax was dope as heck. But Gen 9 is so loaded with greats, that he's just lumped alongside them. He got a mega though!

Unpopular opinion: Tinkaton sucks and I always forget it's Gen 9. The only reason I even remember it is for it's love of killing the dope taxi bird and I only recall the bird because the first one I encountered was level 50 and huge and I thought it was a legendary.

1

u/MrVioletRose 18d ago

Tinkaton should have been the gen 9 pseudo and I stand by that

1

u/Due_Campaign1432 18d ago

To be fair Bax also got some good cards in the TCG and digital TCG game. 

Burgh notably to date hasn't had a supporter in the official card game or tcg pocket.

-1

u/Head-Sky8372 18d ago

God I fucking hate this guy

-1

u/Cold_Ebb_1448 18d ago

Tinkaton is popular?! I hate that ugly pink turd

0

u/AccountAmbitious2671 18d ago

I feel like it’s as if it’s how late in game ya can get it
Your like almost done all the story lines when ya finally can get one that’s in its first form, just like a few other paldea mons that truly suffer from this

1

u/ElementalNinjas96 18d ago

That's the case with every Powerhouse Pokémon (official term for Psuedo-Legendaries)