55 awesome character cameos

37. LittleBigPlanet

Speaking of Metal Gear, its characters – or, at least, costumes that make your Sackpeople look exactly like its characters – are just a few of many cameos from other games to which LittleBigPlanet has played host.

There’s also Final Fantasy VII’s Sephiroth…

… a few characters from Street Fighter…

… a set of Sackboy-shaped LocoRocos…

… the (non-expanded) cast of the Sonic series…

… a trio of costumes from God of War…

... good and evil versions of Cole from InFamous…

… a set of characters from White Knight Chronicles…

… characters from Killzone 2, Buzz, Patapon, Heavenly Sword, Assassin’s Creed II and Ape Escape…

… oh, and a goddamn Chimera from Resistance.

CRIPES.

38. Hot Shots Golf (series)

LittleBigPlanet aside, Sony’s been a big fan of crossovers and cameos for years, and especially likes using the Hot Shots games as a platform for that. That’s why, in the last few games, we’ve seen tee-offs from Jak and Daxter…

… Ratchet…

… one of the chimps from Ape Escape…

Above: Wow, these bastards sure get around

… and perhaps most ridiculous of all, God of War's Kratos.

39. Soulcalibur: Broken Destiny

Not all of Kratos’s cameo appearances are that inappropriate, though; witness his Nightmare-crushing “cameo” in Soulcalibur: Broken Destiny.

40. SoulCalibur II

Years before Kratos joined its cast, however, SoulCalibur set the bar for what cameos should be, with the GameCube and PS2 versions playing host to Link and Heihachi, respectively (Xbox owners got Spawn, but he doesn’t count).

Above: Now THAT’S how you do a cameo (and also ensure that no Nintendo fan will ever play as any of your other characters)!

Above: Woo, a tough old guy. That's totally better than a comic-book antihero or a Hylian hero who can transcend time

41. Soulcalibur IV

Years later, Soulcalibur IV continued the crossover-happiness with appearances by Darth Vader and Yoda. But while everyone was getting hot and bothered over those, most people failed to care that Starkiller – protagonist of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and the only guest character in SCIV to have actually come from a videogame – was in the mix and kicking armored asses as well.

42. Smash Court Tennis Pro Tournament 2

Like Sony, Namco loves to sneak its characters into its sports games, and the Smash Court series has played host to guest appearances from Tekken characters since the PlayStation days. SCTPT2 was a relatively crowded example, pitting its more realistic tennis pros against the likes of Heihachi Mishima…

… Soulcalibur’s Cassandra Alexandra…

… Tekken’s Ling Xiaoyu…

... and, also from Soulcalibur, Raphael Sorel.

43. Soulcalibur Legends

Even Soulcalibur’s widely derided slash ‘em-up spinoff on the Wii sported a cross-series cameo, in this case Lloyd Irving from Tales of Symphonia.

44. Grand Theft Auto III

While most of the cameos on this list are of the officially sanctioned variety, the shout-out in GTA III harkened back to the jabs 3D Realms took at Doom and Tomb Raider. In two missions, players have to hunt down a “strangely animated” undercover cop named Tanner, who runs like a goof and drives a ‘70s muscle car.

He is, of course, a reference to Driver’s protagonist (also named Tanner), and is specifically a reference to the way he runs in that game.

Above: Look, it was on PSOne, OK? Nobody knew how to animate humans yet 

Driver's developer, Reflections, wasn’t about to take that slam against its main character lying down, so it struck back a couple of years later, when “Timmy Vermicelli” made his debut as a murderable extra in the disastrous Driv3r. An obvious reference to GTA: Vice City’s Tommy Vercetti, Timmy added to the insult by wearing waterwings to make fun of the fact that Tommy couldn’t swim.

Above: Note also the huge hands. It’s like they were copying directly!

45. X-Men Origins: Wolverine

The hack-and-slash tie-in to last year’s Wolverine movie wasn’t just the most gruesome game ever to star the character – it was also filled with Easter eggs, including the hatch from Lost. More interestingly (to World of Warcraft gamers, anyway), it also included the Lich King’s sword, Frostmourne, as a hidden extra.

This wasn’t just a parody or veiled reference, either; look closely, and you’ll find that there’s very little deviation between the in-game sword and the one from official WoW sources:

Above: See?

46. Valkyria Chronicles

There was a lot to like about Sega’s alternate-history World War II strategy-RPG – particularly if you were a fan of the Dreamcast/GameCube RPG Skies of Arcadia. Its three main characters – Vyse, Aika and Fina – were among the characters it was possible to recruit as you made your way through the game.

47. Star Ocean: Till the End of Time

48. Dead or Alive 4

There wasn’t a whole lot to recommend the lackluster 360 continuation of Dead or Alive – unless of course you’re a big Halo fan, in which cast the opportunity to thrash the other, less armored characters as Nicole (a female Spartan created for DOA4 by Halo dev Bungie) was probably irresistible.

Above: It’s not Master Chief, but… ehh, close enough

49. Dynasty Warriors: Strikeforce (PS3)

After last year’s merger between Tecmo and Koei, it was inevitable that a little bit of corporate synergy would creep into their games sooner or later. It finally happened in the PS3 release of Dynasty Warriors Strikeforce, which featured appearances by three characters from Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2: Ryu…

… Ayane…

… and Momiji.

50. Super Swing Golf Season 2

Tecmo’s 2007 golf sequel might have been dragged through the mud by reviewers, but no old-school fan can look at its unlockable costumes – some of which are juuuuust detailed enough to qualify as cameos, and reference past Tecmo games like Mighty Bomb Jack, Solomon’s Key, Ninja Gaiden, Monster Hunter, Tokobot, Tecmo Bowl and (the Wiimake of) Rygar – and not find something to like.

51. Castle Crashers

A game as jam-packed with content as Castle Crashers is obviously going to have some cool bonuses lurking around its edges, and one of them is an appearance by none other than indie superstar Alien Hominid. Actually, it’s an appearance by a whole lot of him, which you’ll have to decapitate as quickly as possible.

52. Super Meat Boy

Alien Hominid’s also appearing in another hotly anticipated indie game, Super Meat Boy, which is reportedly going to feature meat-ified versions of other indie characters as well. Among those confirmed so far are Tim from Braid, Bit Trip Runner’s Commander Video and the always-charming tar-lump Gish.

53. Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing

Another time, another place, this would have been grouped with the Nintendo-character cameos earlier in the list. But as it stands, the turncoat Banjo and Kazooie (who first appeared, interestingly enough, in Diddy Kong Racing on N64), and their Xbox 360-exclusive appearance in Sega’s new kart racer, are out here, way at the end of the list, cold and cut off from their former comrades.

Above: Although they don’t look all that cold

54. Dante’s Inferno

OK, this is another one that’s more of a “costume” than a “cameo.” But so long as you can’t see his face behind that space-engineer armor, who’s to say that it’s Dante and not Dead Space’s Isaac Clarke who’s actually doing all the killing?

55. Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy

This unlockable skin, meanwhile, is unmistakably Scorpion from Mortal Kombat. All arguments of it being a costume aside, who the hell else would leave their house in this ridiculous getup?

Above: Don't answer that

Apr 30, 2010

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