Gaming's greatest unexplained super powers
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They're totally super powers
Why can Mario bash blocks forever without hurting his hand? Why does Megaman have unlimited ammo? Who can Nico Bellic survive a 50 foot drop without breaking a sweat? Gaming is full of plot holes and exaggerations of reality that are never actually explained, with characters being capable of superhuman acts that are never truly justified.
And today, we pay homage to these abilities - the super powers of gaming that represent the sacrifice we make every time we boot up a Call of Duty game: the sacrifice of realism for the sake of gameplay.
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Slow motion
Power: Slowing time itself
Examples: Max Payne, Dead to Rights, Need for Speed: Most Wanted, Sleeping Dogs
Being able to slow down time randomly has been given several names. Sometimes it's called "Adrenaline," other times it's "Shoot Dodging," but no matter what name it's assigned, we all know what it is: that thing everyone decided was awesome after The Matrix came out.
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Never needing to eat, sleep, pee, or fulfill any other mortal necessities
Powers: Never getting tired or needing sustenance
Examples: Everything except The Sims and The Ship.
Link doesn't poop once during his entire journey to save Hyrule from Gannon. Not once. Altair? He doesn't, either. Though some games give the option to eat, drink, sleep, or use the facilities, it's hardly ever actually needed, acting as a proxy to heal lost life or save instead of doing what it actually does: keep humans alive.
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Swinging on a pole indefinitely
Power: Limitless upper-body strength
Examples: Prince of Persia, Enslaved, Tomb Raider
Acrobatic platformers were all the rage last-generation, with characters like The Prince and Lara Croft jumping from pole to platform to explore ancient crypts. Both games also allow their heroes to swing on poles... indefinitely. Just spinning and spinning and spinning...
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Regenerating health
Power: Passively healing wounds.
Examples: Nearly every game after 1999
This one sort of makes sense, at its core. If you're beat up, you can take a deep breath, relax for a few seconds, and head back into the battle. But when this concept is found in a shooter, where your character regularly gets shot in the face, our suspension of disbelief is tested - especially when the bullet-holes are shown (Max Payne, we're looking at you).
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Indestructible, immovable costumes and hair
Power: Invulnerable characters
Examples: Most adventure games, Nathan Drake's half-tucked shirt
Some games show the character's outfits changing throughout the game. Others, though, treat the character models as untouchable effigies, with perfect hair and costumes that won't budge no matter how many bullets they soak, punches they take, or leaps they make.
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Double jumping
Power: Essentially flying
Examples: Team Fortress 2, Devil May Cry, Super Smash Bros.
Seriously, this is one you can go outside and try. Jump, and then without touching the ground or anything at all, jump again. You can't do it. It's not a thing. And yet, despite that, a huge amount of retro platformers included the ability to jump and then to also jump again. Modern games do this less, and usually explain it, but sometimes they'll still throw it in without any justification out of what we assume is development habit, giving random characters the super human ability to jump whilst jumping.
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Seeing around corners without looking
Power: Psychic vision
Examples: All cover shooters, most stealth games that don't give the character secret agent tools
Nearly every third-person game gives the player the ability to see stuff that the in-game character's can't. Once cover is added in, this feature usefulness is improved tenfold, as the character is able to act on what the player can see. In stealth games the character can react to an oncoming guard that they couldn't possibly see, and in shooters it allows the player to blind-fire at enemies, taking them down without looking around the corner.
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Respawning after death
Power: Immortality
Examples: Nearly every game ever
Essentially any game that doesn't have perma-death or explain why characters are able to come back to life after dying has granted their characters with one of the most powerful superpowers of all: immortality. Dying and coming back to life - with the knowledge of what killed you - is absurdly powerful, and nearly every game ever made does it.
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The ability to revive dying friends by tapping their shoulder
Power: Ability to resurrect allies on touch
Examples: Gears of War, Left 4 Dead
Besides being able to come back to life over and over again, the ability to resurrect allies in squad-based games is another feat of super heroism that has been appearing in more and more games. We'll give magical syringes a pass, since we can assume that there's some sort of medical voodoo that allows a needle to heal bullet wounds, but when all it takes is "being helped up" or a slap on the shoulder, to bring someone back from the brink of death it's a little much.
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Being completely invisible to enemies more than X feet away
Power: Invisibility
Examples: Every MMORPG
The idea of "aggro" in MMORPGs sort of makes sense once the battle starts - of course enemies will focus on specific players over others. But the act of getting aggro has always meant walking SUPER close to enemies, meaning there are two options: every enemy has terrible vision, or the players are invisible, and don't become visible until they're right up next to the enemy. Neither makes that much sense, but we think the second is more likely.
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Dual-wielding shotguns without breaking arms
Power: Super-powered forearm and hand strength
Examples: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Marathon 2, Call of Juarez, Timesplitters
Firing a shotgun without holding it correctly could shatter your arms, or cause enough recoil to break your hand or nose. In case you're wondering, holding a shotgun with one hand isn't correct. Despite this, characters often hold two powerful guns and can not only fire them accurately without breaking their bones, but somehow reload them. Maybe they're holding the shells in their belly buttons.
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Not shattering knuckles when using melee on objects/people
Power: Indestructible hands
Examples: Super Mario Bros., most games with melee
Ever punch someone? It hurts. Bad. And yet in many games, characters punch out dozens of people without breaking a sweat (or a finger). What's more, Mario can punch stone blocks all day long without wounding himself. Talk about a super power - he's essentially Hellboy with that fist.
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Super finger strength
Power: Absurd finger strength
Examples: Assassin's Creed, Prince of Persia, Infamous, most games involving climbing
Holding on to a pull-up bar for a long time is really, really difficult. It takes massive upper-body strength, and is quite a workout in and of itself. Holding onto something by just your fingertips? Well, it's essentially impossible to do it like they do in video games, meaning they must have some sort of superhuman finger powers.
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It's a bird! It's a plane!
There are plenty of other game mechanics that are essentially super powers, but these are the ones we like the most. Others either aren't as powerful, or are simple enough that our suspension of disbelief is able to wrap around them.
What about you? What are your favorite super powers in gaming?
And if you're interested in more super-powered lists, check out our list of the best super hero games of all time and the top 7 games that deserve comic book spin-offs.
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tyler_14_420 - July 19, 2012 9:55 a.m.
Firing a shotgun one-handed wouldn't break your bones, especially if you're a well-trained and very fit soldier. My friend's dad fired his double-barrel with both barrels at once single-handed (Which shredded his knuckles though), and my friend's cousin fires his S&W 500 (.50 Handgun) single-handed all the time. Yes, it's still incredibly unrealistic, but it's by no means impossible. -
iluspook - July 17, 2012 1:46 p.m.
I'm surprised the perfect full-clip reloading has yet to be mentioned. Not one game, no matter how realistic they claim to be, has done reloads correctly (I want to be wrong about this...please list a game that actually does it correctly if you know of one). Of course, we don't mind a bit, because it sure makes things easy and gets us right back in action, super reloading powers activated! :) -
DrFunFrock - July 14, 2012 2 p.m.
I've thought the whole thing about double jumping before, but just to be slightly pedantic - in DMC1 and 3 you actually have to buy a special ability in order to be able to go which provides you with a kind of platform for your second jump. Make of that what you will, but it does explain the mechanic at least. Not the case for DMC2 but the less said about that the better... ;D -
Clayr - July 12, 2012 8:58 p.m.
The fact that characters like Cloud and Sephiroth can carry those giant fucking swords without their arms being ripped off. And swords in general, really. Not having to clean off blood, not needing a sheath or any sharpening. And the fact that Batman's cloak gets ripped in the Arkham games and yet it still keeps him aloft perfectly. -
510BrotherPanda - July 21, 2012 11:16 a.m.
Re-sharpening swords is an important melee weapon mechanic in the Monster Hunter series. I'm more concerned with how Cloud, Kratos, and most other characters with visible weapons slung over their shoulders stick them to their back without belts or scabbards. Must be magnets. -
robotdickens - July 12, 2012 12:11 a.m.
Stepping on med packs and instantly healing themselves, bullet sponges for humans, surviving rocket attacks, buildings and structures not taking a single amount of damage after X amount of damage, regenerating structures being hit by bullets and rockets only to have a simple mark that eventually regenerates over time, "black hole" pockets, blood that washes away over time, disappearing bodies, stepping over ammo crates and gaining ammo, stepping over weapons and gaining ammo, standing on top of a gun and yet still being able to pick it up, throwing a perfectly good gun on the floor yet it has no damage if picked up again, etc. -
Annihilator820 - July 11, 2012 7:04 p.m.
Unintentional article-related hilarity: Go to the double-jumping entry. Look at the Scout. Increase the image size. Look at his impossibly morose face. "Effing intel capping, 9 to 5 job with no benefits. I got kids to feed here, and I got no time for this "teamwork" BS." -
Darkhawk - July 11, 2012 5:52 p.m.
A lot of these apply to movies as well. How many Hollywood films have someone just dangling off the edge of something by their fingertips, and then miraculously pulling themselves up? Or pretty much any action movie in which the character (usually the female one) has perfect hair and nails after being blown up five times. -
mentalityljs - July 11, 2012 5:07 p.m.
Everlasting endurance/running/jumping/swimming, Immunity to infectious diseases after being bit/attacked/exposed several times over, Cold blooded - able to swim in negative temp waters, Natural steel toe - walking barefoot in any environment, International travel with no jet lag, Seeing in the dark, Staring at the sun, defying gravity... -
iHateFatPeople - July 11, 2012 11:23 a.m.
Holy Hell, what a pointless article. Was this supposed to be clever? Next list - Top 7 Ways That Movies Are Different Than Life. -
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Pruman - July 11, 2012 9:59 a.m.
Halo is the first game I remember playing with regenerating health, and there it at least made sense because you were playing as a power-armor clad supersoldier with a built-in deflector shield. The same thing makes absolutely no sense in any game without those things. -
NeutralFan - July 11, 2012 9:26 a.m.
Storing a massive amount of gear in apparently infinitely deep pockets... MGS and GTA, amongst others. I laughed when Kojima parodied this in MGS3 by having Snake pull an RPG out of literally nowhere while riding shotgun in a motorbike car. -
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Insanetwig - July 11, 2012 5:54 a.m.
I hate getting a pipe to the back of the head while peeing in The Ship. Damn you real life issues! -
Asloveszuko - July 11, 2012 5:03 a.m.
Great article! Double jumping has always been the bomb. So often I play a video game and think about them not having to do basic human needs, bathroom breaks, eating, sleeping...just cool to think about. -
KA87 - July 11, 2012 5:01 a.m.
Dude it’s not that time has actually slowed down, it is that when that big adrenaline rush kicks in it allows your brain to process info so fast and crystal clear that it just seems like everything is slowing down. Dude respawning after death is easily explained lol. Kenny from South Park is somehow related to all video game characters. Kenny has the ability to respawn after death each morning and this has been passed on and adapted by his relatives. Dude reviving allies is easy to explain lol. It was just a flesh wound and all they really need is a hand. One really good question is why so many characters can’t swim or float? We are essentially a really big water balloon so floating should not be that hard. Also why do all of these characters that die when they touch water live around so much water? Vice City is a great example, life guards at the beach can’t even swim. -
KidKatana - July 11, 2012 3:16 a.m.
I like 'rendering any item weightless when you're not using it'. Link and his iron boots are a prime example - somehow they only affect his movement when he's wearing them, even though they're clearly in his backpack the rest of the time. Also, Batman and Solid Snake seem to have the ability to safely and non-lethally incapacitate people for an indefinite amount of time using nothing but blunt force trauma/suffication. Those people would definitely be dead. I mean, really dead. Their brains would have haemorraged within minutes.
SA-13576 - July 30, 2012 9:19 p.m.