Plot-Sensitive Button: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

[[File:ContextSensitiveButton5 1317.jpg|link=Megas XLR|frame| [[Slices, Dices, and Makes Julienne Fries|It slices! It dices!]] [[Lampshade Hanging|It lampshades itself!]]]]

 

{{quote|''"Wow! Just what I needed! In fact, it would seem to me that these give me just what I need at that moment in time! Oh, I see! Context sensitive! Clever!"''|'''[[Conker's Bad Fur Day]]'''}}

 

 

It's a decades-old geek joke that the perfect computer would only have one instruction: Do What I Want. In [[The Future]], this will be achieved, so that a character can push the same button over and over and have it do something different each time. (Often a [[Big Red Button]], but not always)

 

These are often used to control the [[Do-Anything Robot]]. Compare [[Action Commands]], [[Green Lantern Ring]], [[Magic Tool]], [[Damn You, Muscle Memory!]].

{{examples|suf=s}}

== Advertising ==

* The Staples chain of office supply stores ran a series of TV commercials in which someone is out of a certain office supply, then presses a big red button labeled "EASY" which caused a large quantity of the missing office supply to appear. A later commercial parodied earlier ones by having an EASY button accidentally held down, causing massive quantities of various office supplies to materialize around an office building.

 

* In ''[[Code Geass]]'' Lelouch has a switch shaped vaguely like a chess piece that serves multiple functions, ranging from remote controlling guns of a freshly hijacked mecha, detonating planted explosives, causing his [[Humongous Mecha]] to eject a container full of mini-mirrors which let him reflect his [[Evil Eye]] at improbable angles, and causing Mount Fuji to erupt. As one might expect from this example, [[Memetic Mutation]] has turned the switch into the anime equivalent of [[Batman]]'s utility belt.

* In ''[[Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann]]'', the Ganmen's controls don't have a clear connection to the operation. When asked how to operate one, Simon says you just move the levers back and forth and it does what you want.

 

== Film ==

* ''[[Star Wars]]''

** In ''[[Attack of the Clones]]'', Padmé Amidala pressed a red button on her ship control panel to transmit Obi-Wan's message to the Jedi Council, and later pressed the same button to show Anakin the holographic map of Geonosis.

 

== Literature ==

 

* ''[[Torchwood]]'' - Captain Jack Harkness' vortex manipulator seems to control just about everything in [[Elaborate Underground Base|the Hub]] not to mention being a teleporter and time travel device when working properly. Similarly, opponent Capt. John Hart has a device which appears to be exactly the same (including the limitation of ''not'' actually doing what it's meant to do, despite it never being stated that his VM is anything other than perfectly functional) with the added bonus of his being able to manipulate the rift, which Torchwood requires a massive machine draining huge amounts of power to do...

* In ''[[Firefly]]'' there are three switches that the pilot, Wash, always flips whenever he starts doing something. This is remarked on by the actor in one of the commentaries.

 

== Newspaper Comics ==

* The transmogrifier in ''[[Calvin and Hobbes]]'' has an indicator that points to whatever animal Calvin wants to turn into. If he wants to turn into something that is not listed, he just writes it on the side. The Transmogrifier ''gun'', on the other hand, takes a much simpler approach: telepathy! The box that the transmogrifier itself is constructed from is context-sensitive: crawl underneath it and it's a transmogrifier, go into it from the side and it's a duplicator, and climb in the top and it's a time machine.

{{quote|'''Hobbes''': Oh no, I'm not getting into that box. I don't want to be transmogrified or duplicated or whatever.

** Actually weaponized when Calvin gets rid of his clones by tricking them into running into the duplicator, then flipping it over to turn it into a transmogrifier.

 

* The former [[Trope Namer]], ''[[Conkers Bad Fur Day]]'' featured the Context Sensitive Buttons, which were big, B-labelled buttons on the ground that did ''whatever the plot called for''.

* Many games have a context-sensitive button for the player to use in an effort to simplify the control scheme. With exceptions like Conker above, they don't actually appear in the game world.

** Portal 2 uses the same all-purpose use/grab key, but the tutorial has a subversion: when asked to speak and prompted to try the Jump button, all Chell does in this context is jump.

* A [[Tamagotchi]] is a very sophisticated virtual pet that's controlled by only three context-sensitive buttons. In general, A is used to navigate menus or selections, B to make choices, and C to cancel. If none of the menu icons are highlighted, B brings up the current time, holding A and pressing B pauses, and pressing A and C together turns the sound on/off.

* Both ''[[Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories]]'' and ''[[Kingdom Hearts II]]'' do this with the triangle button.

* ''Every bloody thing'' in the ''[[Assassin's Creed]]'' series. Though it gives you an unprecedented level of control.

 

== Web Original ==

* Parodied in [[The Onion]]'s report on the [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BnLbv6QYcA MacBook Wheel], which uses a single iPod-style click wheel for all input.

 

* Humorously inverted in ''[[Bob and George]]'': George's time suit [http://bobandgeorge.com/archives/index.php?date=030923 only has one button], but its operation turns out to be [http://bobandgeorge.com/archives/index.php?date=030924 anything but simple.] Later, George screws with Dr. Light's mind by [http://bobandgeorge.com/archives/index.php?date=050419 taking the same approach to a completely normal button].

* The Rod of Versatility in ''[[The Way of the Metagamer]]'' ''specifically'' works this way.

 

== Western Animation ==

* [[Ren and Stimpy]]: when Ren and Stimpy are in the "House of Next Tuesday", they find a machine that will make beef jerky (unfortunately for Ren, the user must provide their own meat). they press one button to cycle through the available seasonings, and then press the same button rapidly to make their selection.

* ''[[Space Ghost]]'' - Space Ghost's wristbands have three buttons on head arm. How many powers could he use with those again? Here's a hint, more than six. It didn't help that he usually pressed the same one or two buttons every time.

* Parodied in ''[[Megas XLR]]''

** Coop activated a weapon with one button labeled "That Cool Giant Energy Sword Thing". He later activates a different weapon with the same button, and when he does the button is labeled "[[media:Same Button.jpg|Exactly the Same Button Coop Just Used Like Five Minutes Ago]]". This was a running gag in the show, where this same button would have different labels like "Do Something Stupid Coop", "Rip Arms Out of Sockets" and after Coop said, "Maybe you'd like ''this'' better, then!", it said "This Better Then". After announcing he was about to use Super Destructor Mode it said "You heard the man kids, Super Destructor Mode"

** In another episode, Megas is trapped in a giant cocoon by a moth-like alien, and his teammates argue which button he should press: "Destroy Giant Cocoon" or "Attack Moth-Like Bug". Unable to decide, he mashes both, encasing Megas in a [[Science Ninja Team Gatchaman|giant firebird]].

** On at least one occasion he used the stick shift to go from 'drive' past 'neutral' and 'reverse' all the way to 'Save Jamie'. Coop's Speedometer usually reads as a normal speedometer, but once it measured from "Slow", "Fast", "Faster", and "GOOD CRIPES!".

** Coop's Oil Gauge reads from "Empty", "Needs a Little", "Almost There", "Good Enough", "No really, I'm fine", and "PLEASE STOP!"

** Don't forget the slide-knob heater. "Warm" "Hot" "DANG!"

* ''[[Kim Possible]]'' - [[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshaded]] with a [[Weather Control Machine]]: Dr. Drakken keeps hitting the same button because, as he says, "These controls are supposed to work intuitively!"

* The ''[[Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy]]'' episode "Robbin' Ed" featured "The Thingamajig", which provides exactly what the character needs when they push the button, [[Hyperspace Arsenal|even if the object is bigger than the Thingamajig]]. It's used at the end of the episode to resolve the plot.

* In ''[[The Magic School Bus]]'' there was a context-sensitive lever that Ms. Frizzle would pull to get the bus to turn into whatever the episode called for. Mind you, that may be justified by the fact that the bus was sentient.

* In ''[[Batman Beyond]]'', [[Mad Bomber|Mad Stan]] had a detonator with only one button on it, yet pressing it only set off the bombs he wanted it to.

* Rico in ''[[The Penguins of Madagascar]]'' has an extreme [[Stomach of Holding]] and is capable of vomiting up whatever is most useful at the time.

* In [[The Simpsons]] episode ''I, D'oh-Bot'', Homer 'builds' a robot for Bart with one all-purpose button on the control, although the robot is actually Homer in disguise. As it turns out, the button gives him a mild electric shock when pushed.

 

== Real Life ==

* BMW developed a system which gave you a single knob/button to control the entire center console with, be it audio, air conditioning, GPS or something else entirely. They called it the "[[wikipedia:IDrive|iDrive]]," which is a [[Non-Indicative Name]] as far as most people are concerned.

* Cellular telephones often have keys below the screen with just a dot or line on them, and they do whatever it says on the screen directly above them. These are literally called "context keys".

* Also the [[Nintendo DS]]. Or any other device with a tactile-sensitive screen. That was the driving principle behind inventing them, after all.

* The mythical "Do What I Want, Not What I Tell You" button compu-forensic specialists have been seeking since the damn things were invented.

* The right mouse button for computers is something like this. Granted, it takes two presses to do what one wants it to do because the first click creates a context sensitive ''menu''.

* Ipod Touches verge on this, especially the smaller ones which are only a little bit bigger than large buttons. The regular sized ones have exactly one button below the touchscreen which may be redundant (although convenient). The vast majority of the Ipod's features are accessible using only one finger.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Applied Phlebotinum]]