Pikmin

Aren't they adorable? Now go order them to die in the name of your capitalist society.

Let's make a game based entirely around micromanagement.
Let's make a game where every moment must be spent efficiently or else it can't be completed at all; any wasted time means a growing anxiety of being able to finish. All your units must be fragile enough that a literal stray wind will severely debilitate them, and every enemy must be powerful enough to steamroll through and obliterate your entire squad in an instant if left unchecked. Let's make a game that forces you to spend several hours and superfluous effort to reach a goal that, if not reached correctly, will cease to exist.
Hell, while we're at it, let's put a time limit on the whole thing.
BUT WHY DO I LOVE IT SO MUCH

—Katie Tiedrich, Awkward Zombie #102

Real Time Strategy at its quirkiest, the Pikmin series came about from a mix of the Super Mario 128 project, Shigeru Miyamoto's childhood observations of insects at work, and general RTS gameplay. The Pikmin games lead players into a world where they must use the different kinds of plantlike creatures called "Pikmin" to defeat enemies, produce other Pikmin, collect treasures, and survive in a strange world with even stranger creatures.

The first game's basic storyline follows Captain Olimar as he crash-lands on a mysterious planet, destroying much of his ship in the process. The parts are scattered all over the region, leaving Olimar to command armies of Pikmin to get them back.

The twist? He has 30 days to do it, or he dies from the dangerous oxygen in the air! Sounds fun already, doesn't it? Enough people seemed to think so, and the game became a hit in the Nintendo community.

A sequel was soon created, Pikmin 2, in which Olimar and his partner Louie went back to the planet in search of the rare treasures it held, in an attempt to bring their company back out of debt. Pikmin 2 soon became even more critically acclaimed than its predecessor, gaining rave reviews for its improved timespan, reliability, clever challenges, and unique style.

Pikmin 3, released in 2013 for the Wii U, introduces a system where the tablet can be used to have a quick look-around of the map. If you play with the tablet alone, the game controls and looks more like a Real Time Strategy game. Interestingly enough, the player will not step into the shoes of Captain Olimar this time around, but rather four new pilots that can be used in tandem to solve puzzles and manage Pikmin.

The first two games have been ported to Wii as well, with enhanced Wii-mote controls and a higher price. Olimar also is a playable character in Super Smash Bros. Brawl.

It has a wiki, of course.. Compare to Overlord with a similar gameplay but darker premise.

Tropes used in Pikmin include:

• Action Bomb: Volatile Dweevil
• After the End: It's implied the Pikmin planet is Earth. (You can even see Africa and Europe clearly in the opening to Pikmin 2.) Whether or not there's any humans left is up for debate.
  • According to Miyamoto, humans went extinct at some point.
• Alliterative Name The Hole of Heroes, the Dream Den, and the Cavern of Chaos of Pikmin 2.
  • All three of these caves are in the area Wistful Wild. Notice a pattern?
  • One treasure, the Eternal Emerald Eye.
• Anticlimax Boss: Let's review the Raging Long Legs. On one hand, it has the most HP of any boss in the game. On the other hand it is horribly slow, and unlike it's "lesser" version, the Beady Long Legs, it can be attacked at any time due to its massive size, which also makes it nearly impossible to miss. At worst, you may lose Pikmin if you don't clear out during one of its retaliatory rampages, which are very telegraphed and easy to get away from. Now consider that this is the second to last boss in the game, and boss of what is probably the hardest dungeon.
  • The Waterwraith battle may also count. This thing has been following you through the entire dungeon, but once you've got a few purples it's basically powerless to harm you. The second phase the fight is actually just a big joke.
    • It's hardly fair to call the Waterwraith an Anticlimax Boss though, given getting to the point of having purples is so difficult many consider this to be a combination of That One Boss and in the end a Curb Stomp Battle played for the laughs.
• Arbitrary Headcount Limit: You can only have up to 100 Pikmin outside at any one time.
  • In the second game, the ship speculates that this may be an evolutionary strategy developed by the onions: no matter what happens on the ground, only 100 Pikmin can be lost, so the species will never die out.
• Baby Factory: Empress Bulblax.
• Badass Normal: Olimar can fight and kill a lot of the enemies by punching them to death, despite the fact that many of them are bigger than him. Granted, without the proper punching upgrade, it's probably going to take a while...
  • It's still a lot easier than resetting the game dozens of times while trying for a No Casualties Run.
• Bee People: In the sequel, it was revealed that Bulborbs have a social structure like this, though quite interestingly, it was also revealed that they are viviparous (give birth to live young).
• Big Eater: Louie. For every biological study entry that Olimar has for the Piklopedia, Louie has a recipe or cooking tip for each and every plant and animal you encounter. Olimar notes Louie's appetite in one of his logs and the hidden cutscene reveals that LOUIE was the one who ate the entire shipment of golden pikpik carrots.
• Bonus Boss: The Smoky Progg, technically. It's optional, drops a 100-Pikmin sprouting pellet, and the poisonous trail it makes alone can kill Pikmin.
• Book Ends: Most of the areas in Pikmin 2 are the areas from Pikmin 1, but after time has changed them. The Wistful Wild is what's become of the Impact Site and Final Trial. The entrance to the final dungeon is located where Olimar found his first ship piece, the engine, in the first game.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: The Beady Long Legs and Emperor Bulblax are the only "true" bosses in the first, but the three Burrowing Snagrets, Puffstool, Armored Cannon Beetles, and aforementioned Smoky Progg qualify for this. The Snagret got promoted to full boss in the second game.
• Boss Rush: There are a lot of "mini rushes" in later dungeons that have you fight a few earlier bosses in succession. Or at the same time. Of particular note is the Hole of Heroes, which has you facing off against just about every previous boss in the game. Oddly, this isn't the final dungeon, and the Very Definitely Final Dungeon itself has no bosses other than the final one.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: Mushroom Pikmin.
• Button Mashing: Throwing multiple Pikmin onto an enemy very fast needs a good jamming of the A button.
• Call a Rabbit a Smeerp: While the treasures you find in the second game may be the most mundane of objects for us players, they have the most convoluted names in-game. Only averted with The Key, which is Exactly What It Says on the Tin.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Goolix, Armored Cannon Beetle, Pearly Clamclamp, Smoky Progg, and Puffstool were the only enemies not carried over between games. The Armored Cannon Beetle did get two different larva based enemies to carry on its name, however.
• Clipped-Wing Angel: Pikmin 2 has two bosses that do this:
  • The Waterwraith is completely invincible until you reach the final floor of its dungeon, where you acquire the type of Pikmin needed to defeat it. Once you deplete its health enough, you hear the "boss victory" music start up..until it gets back up off the ground and runs around panicking, completely vulnerable and incapable of hurting you or your Pikmin. At this point, you hear a very freaky version of the boss music that resembles Psycho Strings, and you have to chase after it and kill it to beat the dungeon properly.
  • In order to beat the final boss, the Titan Dweevil, you have to knock four weapons/treasures off of it. After knocking off all four, its exoskeleton crumbles, and you're left to beat on the defenseless, fleshy, squirming monster as the music builds towards a climax until it melts and frees Louie.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Louie, who on a planet of giant, man-eating beasts, spends most of his time thinking of ways to cook them.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: The different Pikmin species each have a different color.
  • Dweevils in the second game are also color coded based on which elemental power they have.
• Convection, Schmonvection
  • To be fair, all playable characters are wearing space suits, and Red Pikmin can withstand fire.
  • It should be noted that before upgrading the space suits, the captains still take damage from being hit directly with flames. Presumably it's not enough to burn through the suit, but the heat is still dangerous.
• Cool Starship: Olimar's old starship, the S.S. Dolphin, is one of these. On the other hand, the Hocotate Ship in Pikmin 2 is a piece of junk.
  • Of course, after you collect enough Pokos to pay off the company's debt, the Hocotate ship gets quite the spiffy upgrade.
• Crutch Character: The Red Pikmin in the second game are pretty useful until you get the Purple Pikmin. They get even less useful once you got the other Pikmin types. And most fire hazards they can take out are easily avoided/destroyed with the other Pikmin types. That said they aren't completely useless though.
  • If it weren't for the Purple Pikmin being Game Breaker material, the Red ones would still have their place with the strongest attack. The problem is that the Purples can both stun and dish out top damage at the same time.
    • Purples do suffer from a major lack of speed, even with flowers. In many situations, this can be fatal. Reds, on the other hand, are much more swift than their bulky cousins.
• Cutscene Incompetence: Olimar has a weapon on his ship called the Nova Blaster, which is described as being able to destroy anything, even stars. In the cutscene in the beginning of the first game, this could have been used to prevent the impact with the asteroid that damaged his ship. What makes this even worse is that this item isn't required for the normal ending to the game, implying that Olimar is likely to make the same mistake again.
  • According to Olimar's journal on the New Play Control! Pikmin website, he switched the ship to auto-pilot to get himself tea when the asteroid hit his ship.
    • This was also in the game manual of the original for the Gamecube.
• Deadpan Snarker: The Hocotate Ship's AI. Some of the Olimar's treasure hoard journal entries even talk about trying to shut it up or at least convince it to lighten up.
• Degraded Boss: The Snagret in Pikmin 2. In the first game, it was a very large, tough and scary enemy, but in the sequel it's much smaller and weaker. One is used as the boss of an early dungeon. You'll fight multiples of them later on, including several at once! They still get "boss encounter" music, though.
  • To say nothing of the Emperor Bulblax. In the first game it was the final boss. It returns Pikmin 2, though, like the Snagret, it's much smaller and weaker, and can be killed in one shot with Purple Pikmin. Later on you even encounter three Emperor Bulblaxes at once!
• The Dev Team Thinks of Everything: Holding down X lets your captain lie down on the ground, and be picked up by Pikmin. Dweevils can pick up anything Pikmin can to use as disguises/shields. Combine these two mechanics with the chance that a Dweevil may walk over the low walls and fall off the side of the stage, and you get a falling captain... who then gets sent back onto the stage. The Dweevil isn't so lucky, though.
  • The Submerged Castle was programmed so that only Blue Pikmin can enter. Even if you somehow get other colored Pikmin into your group, only the blue ones will enter. Even if you hack and make it possible for other Pikmin to safely traverse water, the game will actually tell you that only Blue Pikmin can enter.
• Disney Death: When you call some Pikmin right before sunset, said Pikmin will pull it off. Happened to Chuggaaconroy.
• Down the Drain: Almost literally in Pikmin 2 -- a few dungeon sublevels (not to mention one entire dungeon, appropriately named "Shower Room") look like a partially flooded bathroom.
  • The 2-Player level Tile Lands and the Giant's Bath in Challenge Mode are of the same design.
• Easter Egg: A few. One of which is in Pikmin 2. If you get twenty of each Pikmin type into a group, they'll hum Ai No Uta instead of their basic marching song.
  • Their "basic marching song" sounds like the title screen music.
  • In Pikmin 2, wait a while on the treasure collected screen after getting treasure from a cave and Totaka's song will play.
  • Pressing the Z button while viewing the Piklopedia will petrify whatever enemy you're looking at.
  • Also, having 100 Red Pikmin following you will make them hum the Luigi's Mansion theme. This also happens if you are in a dungeon sublevel and have collected all the treasure on that sublevel.
• Elemental Powers: Inverted by the Pikmin, which have resistances to certain elements but not control of them (The exception being White Pikmin). Dweevils play this straight, however.
  • Except in Super Smash Bros Brawl, but the blue and purple still have no element.
    • This is due to the Purple Pikmin actually having no element associated with it in the games (its power is that it is heavy but strong), whereas Blue Pikmin is associated with water, which, while in Brawl, is only used for pushback effects.
  • The new Rock Pikmin that will be in Pikmin 3 are an odd case. As their name implies, they are rocks. Anything else about them, including if they are immune to earth attacks, is unknown.
• Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: While there are elements, there are only a few direct examples of this. For instance, leading a Fiery Bulblax into water will cool it off for Blue Pikmin to attack.
• Eldritch Abomination: The Smoky Progg and Waterwraith.
  • At least we know a Smoky Progg is a developing Mamuta. The Waterwraith came out of nowhere, and we have no clue whatsoever what it is.
• Everything Fades: Averted. The bodies of dead enemies lay around until taken away, and only disappear if you leave the region. (In fact, you're supposed to recycle their corpses for Pikmin food...)
  • Some enemies do not leave no corpses. Some examples would be the Puffy and Billowing Blowhogs, who deflate like a balloon and then poof into oblivion, or the Beady Longlegs, who actually disintegrates before your eyes.
  • Your Pikmin, however, die and turn into little Pikmin ghosties with the most mournful sound ever.
• Everything Trying to Kill You: Pikmin seem to be on the very bottom of the food chain.
  • They are, however, part plant, so it's more or less justified.
• Extended Gameplay: The second game ends when you get 10,000 Pokos, but you can return to the planet to find Louie and the rest of the treasure, which includes exploring a new level and eventually getting a One Hundred Percent Completion ending.
• Extreme Omnivore: Breadbugs drag any treasure, edible or not, to their hole to eat. The Giant Breadbug even ate an eraser. Of course, most enemies that hold a treasure would qualify as well. Louie is also known for eating things he shouldn't.
• Final Exam Boss: The Titan Dweevil in Pikmin 2.
  • It's possible to fight the Titan Dweevil with one-hundred Yellow Pikmin. Electricity is the only attack that kills Pikmin instantly, the other ones make your Pikmin suffer for a while before dying. If you can call your Pikmin back, they'll live.
    • Though as a bit of a Scrappy Mechanic, the Dweevil's attacks can't hurt Olimar, but can stun him... over and over again in quick succession, so while he's immobilized the suffering yellows can die all at once.
      • Since the Titan Dweevil can't hurt you, it's possible to beat it without any Pikmin at all. It'll take a long time, but it's doable.
• Flawless Victory: 2's Challenge Mode awards you for completing the level without losing any Pikmin. Getting this on all 30 Challenge levels unlocks a hidden cutscene.
• Flunky Boss / Explosive Breeder: Empress Bulblax, excluding the one in the Hole of Beasts.
• Food Porn: Louie's intensely detailed descriptions of how to cook the various enemies and plants in the Piklopedia in Pikmin 2.
• Friendly Fireproof: Also averted. Woe is he who misuses his Yellow Pikmin's Bomb Rocks.
  • This is one reason why there was much rejoicing when it was removed for the sequel. The controls were fairly inaccurate, so accidentally having a Pikmin drop a bomb rock at the wrong time was frustratingly common.
  • Enemies also avert this. As such, Decorated Cannon Beetles can be more of a blessing than a hazard in densely populated enemy areas.
• Game Breaking Bug: In the original, it was possible to drop the Libra down a bottomless pit, rendering it Lost Forever and the game Unwinnable. The second game fixed this by having fallen treasures respawn near where they fell. It also featured more bottomless pits, making this necessary.
• Gasshole: The Doodlebug.
• Gateless Ghetto
• Genre Busting
• Gentle Giant: The enormous Mamuta creatures, with their weird, asymmetrical bodies and strange, loping gaits, are actually benevolent. They purposefully cultivate Pikmin, and will turn all of your Pikmin into flower Pikmin for you, even if you don't exactly want them to. You can attack them, but... You're not that mean, are you?
  • Approach one without Pikmin, and he'll attack you without provocation. Gentle, my arse.
    • Well, Olimar and Louie COULD be mistaken for a Pikmin when you have a brain the size of a mosquito.
• Ghibli Hills: The outdoor stages are serene, almost pristine wooded areas, with soft sunlight and fitting ambient music.
• Glass Cannon: Anode Dweevils have the smallest health of the Dweevil family, but it has the one element that instantly kills any Pikmin that aren't yellow, or Bulbmin.
  • The Bulborb Larva are infamous for this. They're very small and have so little health that one punch from a captain will kill them immediately, but their bite is insanely deadly. It will hurt the captains pretty bad, and will instantly kill any Pikmin. Made worse by the fact that they always come in large swarms.
• Goomba Stomp: Purple Pikmin.
  • Or any Pikmin if you have good aim, but only on small Bulborbs (mimics included).
• Gotta Catch Them All: The first game had 30 ship parts, of which you only needed the 25 critical parts and could get 5 optional ones for the best ending. The second game had 200 treasures; to beat the game you only needed however many were necessary to raise 10,000 Pokos, but could return to get the rest and a second ending.
• The Great Repair
• Guide Dang It: The Ujadani, tiny mite-like creatures that release gigantic amounts of nectar and sprays when attacked. They aren't even mentioned in the official strategy guide, and the game doesn't acknowledge them in its encyclopedia. In fact, the name is only known from a Japan only E-Reader card. They only appear every 30 days starting from Day 31 in the final area around the entrance of The Hole of Heroes, the Boss Rush dungeon. The only way to ever see them is to happen to be at that specific place by chance.
• Hammerspace: How do Careening Dirigibugs keep so many bombs in their body, anyway?
  • After a Careening Dirigibug throws a bomb at you, it usually kinda floats there for a minute before bringing it's arms to its mouth and apparently spitting out a new bomb rock. It's possible they use their saliva to create them, like a clam making pearls.
• Helpful Mook: The Mamuta- see above for details.
  • Cannon beetle larva can be this unintentionally. You can very easily have their cannonball boulders kill off enemies you don't want to risk losing Pikmin against.
• Heroic Mime: Captain Olimar (and Louie) in Pikmin 2 only, as the Ship's AI takes over the exposition duties.
• He Was Right There All Along: The beady long legs and Raging long legs drop from above. The Titan Dweevil, Snagret, and Emperor Bulblax all come up from underground.
• Holler Button: Just Whistle to summon your Pikmin back to you.
• Implacable Man: The Waterwraith, combined with Stalked by the Bell. Its one weakness is Purple Pikmin, which aren't obtained until the last floor of its dungeon.
• In-Universe Game Clock: 20 minute days, anyone?
  • 13 in the first game.
• Infinity+1 Element: Bulbmin, only found in a few dungeons, are "extra Pikmin" with Mario-esque attack and speed... but resistance to every element. You can only use them in the dungeon they appear in though.
  • On the enemy's side, explosions serve as a sort of "fifth element"; no Pikmin, not even Bulbmin, can survive it, and only the most dangerous enemies have access to it. Bomb rocks also destroy the other elemental hazard generators.
• It Can't Be Helped: Song of Love has this as its premise. It's all about how the Pikmin go through Hell for their leader, Olimar, yet despite the fact that it's very likely they'll die ignobly, "We don't ask that you love us". The song's single actually outsold the game itself because of how it resonated with the Salaryman public.
• Jerkass: The Hocotate Ship. It forcibly ejects people from the cabin, whines about storing specimens, lies about treasures (both to Olimar and potential customers), and constantly chastises Olimar.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: One of the treasure in Pikmin 2 is a console controller D-Pad. The treasure log says that the Pikmin carrying it looked a little dazzled.
  • There are quite a few instances of this in Pikmin 2. Another example if for Aquatic Mine, another treasure. Olimar mentions in his notes that he feels the presence of a guiding hand.
• Let's Get Dangerous: Louie. He's sort of an idiot who tries to eat EVERYTHING. However after he gets left behind he survives ON HIS OWN and gets to the BOTTOM of the Dream Den with FOUR pieces of treasure. The ship even remarks that the desire of man is something to be feared.
• Lilliputians- If one wants to get specific, the game manual pegs Olimar to be around the size of a quarter, and a Pikmin to be slightly shorter.
• Loan Shark: The All-Devouring Black Hole Loan Sharks are the main reason you head back to the Pikmin Planet in Pikmin 2, and the former Trope Namer.
• Macro Zone: The setting.
• Married to the Job: Olimar is clearly very devoted to his family back on Hocotate. Though it's clear that he's also very devoted to the company he works for, and some emails he receives from his wife and children show that the amount of time he's spending away from home are taking a bit of a toll on them.
• Mighty Glacier: Purple Pikmin, oh so much.
• A Million Is a Statistic: The night after you let your first Pikmin die, Olimar's journal entry will be depressed and frightened of his mistake. Later on, when Pikmins might start dying in droves, Olimar won't even comment on the matter.
• Misguided Missile: The rocks that the Decorated Cannon Beetle shoots are highly magnetic, causing them to home in on your captain. Run around to the other side of a beetle after it launches a rock. We'll wait.
• Mix-and-Match Critters:
  • The Snagrets.
  • The upcoming Rock Pikmin take this Up to Eleven. Plant, animal, and mineral?
• Monster Compendium: The Piklopedia. Comes with view of the enemy in its habitat, scientific notes/names, and eventually cooking recipes.
• More Predators Than Prey: Most enemies on the Pikmin planet seem to be carnivorous, and the only thing any of them ever seem to eat are, of course, Pikmin.
• Multiple Endings: In the first Pikmin, the bad ending involves attempting to fly away without at least 25 ship parts, which results in the Dolphin crashing, Olimar being knocked unconscious, his Pikmin carrying him to their Onion and turning him into a freakish Pikmin/Olimar hybrid (known as "Olimin" or "Pikmar" in Fanon, and no evidence that he is ever picked. In the good ending (received through 100% Completion), Olimar bids the Pikmin farewell before hopping on to his ship, and the Onions follow him into low orbit as a show of gratitude (as they are now able to handle enemies on their own, as shown in a scene shortly before that). In the neutral ending, Olimar makes a hasty jump into his ship before his life support dies, and the Pikmin are left to fend for themselves.
• Never Say "Die": In the second game: "Are your life functions fading?"
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: The Smoky Progg supposedly is the direct result of a Pikmin attack breaking a normally peaceful Mamuta's egg before it's time for it to hatch.
• No Biological Sex: The Pikmin. Like many plants in Real Life, they seem to be asexual creatures; the only way they reproduce is by providing organic nutrients to their respective "Onions".
• No Casualties Run: (See Video Game Caring Potential)
• Noob Cave: The Impact Site in Pikmin 1. Also an abundant source of Pikmin pellets for mass reproduction to come back to later in the game.
• Noodle Incident: When you find the Broken Food Master(NTSC)/Divine Cooking Tool(PAL) in the PAL version of Pikmin 2, part of Olimar's description is "I did try and be creative at cooking once before.. but there are some things that are better left forgotten."
• Only Mostly Dead: If one of the leaders in the second game runs out of health, you'll see them lying on the ground in front of the ship, unmoving for the rest of the day until you leave, in which they get back up and board the ship.
  • The Gatling Groink and Spotty Bulbear enemies will die, but slowly regain health as their bodies lay there. If you let their health get back to full before you take them to get turned into Pikmin food or money, they'll get back up and attack your team again.
• Old Save Bonus: Having a Pikmin save file will let you unlock a Captain Olimar trophy in Super Smash Bros. Melee.
• Poison Mushroom: A living example: the Doodlebug. Looks similar to the Iridescent Glint Beetle, but actually leaves small clouds of poison lying around as you follow it, instead. Bonus points for literally being poison.
• Poisonous Pikmin: The White Pikmin, who are resistant to poison and will poison enemies that eat them.
• Product Placement: The second game is full of it, with many of the "treasures" being things like Duracell batteries and Vlasic pickle jar lids (this also helps reinforce the theory that the Pikmin's home planet is Earth.)
• Puzzle Boss: All of them... More or less.
• Ragnarok Proofing: With the various "treasures" in the second game. Some (but not all) electrical devices are still functional, metal objects may be rusted but are all still in pretty good shape, and all the food items still look perfectly fresh (and are still totally edible and tasty, according to Olimar's notes), despite having sat in a cave or out in the open for who knows how long.
• Randomly Generated Levels: The holes are mostly this, though there are a few floors that have specific layouts that can't change. They always contain the same monsters and treasure, but rearranged.
• Real Time Strategy
• Reviving Enemy: Spotty Bulbears and Gattling Groinks will slowly recover health and get back up after being defeated if they aren't taken back to the ship first.
• Riddle for the Ages: Just what is the Waterwraith? Where did it come from, and what does it want?
• Ruins of the Modern Age: There was some of this in the first game, but it especially stands out in the second - many areas explored on the Pikmin planet have recognizable remains of human constructions, such as metal pipes and ceramic tiles.
• Salaryman: Concerning Captain Olimar's perpetual struggle to balance out his long hours spent on the job, alongside spending time with his family.
• Scunthorpe Problem: Wistful Wild.
• Self-Imposed Challenge: "ARRRG! It killed a measly one of my Pikmin! Now I have to reset and do it all over again!"
  • Also, trying to collect all your ship parts in fewer days than you did before.
• Shout-Out: In Japanese, Olimar is Sdrawkcab Name of Mario. Louie = Luigi is not as clever, but seems thematically appropriate for Olimar's second fiddle.
  • Also, in the second game, several items are shout outs to other games, like a tube of paint with Mario's name on it, R.O.B.'s head, the key from Super Mario World, and even a deck of Nintendo brand playing cards from before Nintendo started doing electronics.
  • Many players noticed that the Poko symbol looks a lot like the coins from Super Mario Bros..
  • The Mario games later returned the favor in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, where Chapter 2 has Mario leading a swarm of tiny creatures around to aid him. Sound familiar?
  • However, this is semi-justified by the fact of having 101 members in TTYD, when the max you can have in Pikmin is 100. Still, it's there.
• Slippy-Slidey Ice World: The Valley of Repose and several dungeons within.
• Stalked by the Bell: The Submerged Castle. On each of the first four floors, you have a random, invisible timer that, when it runs out, the Waterwraith drops down and pursues you. Mercifully, you can exploit a weakness in its AI that prevents it from reaching you in certain corners, though it may get you if you're not careful.
• Stone Wall: Similar to how Anode Dweevils are Glass Cannons, Munge Dweevils have the most health but the least dangerous attack (it's the only Dweevil that is always harmless to captains; the breathing filters in their space suits make them immune to poison, so they can be punched to death with no problems).
• Super Drowning Skills: Only Blue Pikmin can swim. Reds and yellows do flounder around for a while before drowning. If you call them, they can possibly flounder on over to the bank and survive.
  • Or you can disband your Blues, who will then act as lifeguards and throw any drowning Pikmin onto dry land.
• Surprise Creepy: Of the more subtle variety; once you've had a chance to sit down and reflect on what you're doing to the Pikmin...
• Taken for Granite: Ultra-Bitter Spray does this to your enemies. Killing them while they are like this leaves no corpse to retrieve, but may drop nectars or sprays (Even more Bitter Spray!).
• Technicolor Toxin: Poison gas in the second game is purple, as are Munge Dweevils, so you can tell them apart from the other 3 species.
• This Loser Is You: Olimar's journal entry for the Bumbling Snitchbug, an enemy that swoops down, grabs you (not your Pikmin) and slams you into the ground, implies that only leaders (that's you) that are in some way dumb or incompetent can possibly be caught by it.
• Too Dumb to Live: All Pikmin will follow you wherever you go, even if it's not exactly a good idea for them to do so. Only blue Pikmin can swim, but all of your Pikmin will follow you into the water, for instance.
  • Certain enemies can be tricked into marching off the side of the level in the rusty metal levels. This is a good way to dispose of Bulbears and Fiery Bulblaxes, especially since any treasure that they may have had respawns near where they fell.
• Updated Rerelease: the "New Play Control!" Wii versions of the first two games.
  • No Export for You: The Wii version of the 2nd game is out in Japan and even Europe but it's suspiciously absent from North America.
    • Uncancelled: Until it was finally announced three years later.
      • Probably to better prepare more gamers for the soon-to-come (sooner than before, at that) third installment on the Wii U. As for the other regions, good luck getting a re-stock on it, if that even works.
• Underground Monkey: Several, though the differences often range beyond color and ability. Typically you see alternate-elemental forms of certain enemies, or ones that are just plain tougher such as the cave-dwelling Wollywogs.
• Unique Enemy: Several. The first had the Mamuta, Goolix, Pearly Clamclamp, Breadbug, and Smoky Progg. The second had the Toady Bloyster, which shows up less than its boss variant.
  • Note that the Challenge Mode of both games is less sparce about these enemies.
• Variable Mix: Pikmin 2 has a very deep set of this. Themes can vary greatly. The captain's health affects the tempo and the amount of Pikmin lost within a cave will cause the song to lose instruments. In addition, there are variants on the themes when carrying treasures and when fighting enemies. Multiply the level themes by 2 since there's a variation of every song for when you play as Louie/President, and for above-ground themes multiply by 2 again to account for the sunset variations of every song.
• War for Fun and Profit: Many people have this opinion of the second game. Profit yes, not fun though its paying back the Loan Sharks. Then later its saving your lost friend. If you keep playing after that it becomes just for fun, but that's what games are for.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Purple and white Pikmin are kept in the ship's hold because they have no Onion. It isn't explained what happens to them when the Captains leave the planet. Are they taken back to Hocotate? Are they left behind?
• What the Hell, Player?: It is possible to make the Pikmin extinct, but it probably won't happen unless you do it intentionally. If you do manage to kill them all, you get a depressing "Pikmin Extinction" cutscene followed by Olimar beating himself up in his journal for letting it happen. It won't end the game, but you are forced to start over with just a single seed.
  • This is quite the Tear Jerker, too.
• When You Coming Home, Dad?: Olimar's son and daughter ask him this repeatedly, almost word for word, in their emails.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Pikmin will freak out at the sight (Or apparently, scent) of Mitites. Except Purple Pikmin. Which just so happen to be the best tools for crushing Mitites all at once.
• You Bastard: Ai no Uta is a song dedicated to this.

Uprooted, we'll gather and be thrown to our deaths/
But we won't ask you to love us.

• Zerg Rush: The Pikmin's main mode of attack (excepting bomb rocks in the first game); you can even up the efficiency of said Rush by directing the Pikmin swarm.