Plot-Sensitive Button: Difference between revisions
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== 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 another ad, office supplies randomly fall from the air—until a family discovers their one-year-old happily playing with a new toy. Current commercials have people [[Magic A Is Magic A|trying (and failing) to use said EASY button for things other than office supplies]]. Staples has actually [[Defictionalization|manufactured these buttons]], which simply state "that was easy" when pressed.
== Anime ==
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** In ''[[Star Trek: Insurrection]]'', Captain Picard pushes a button on his control console labeled "Calibrate", which is enough to call up the lyrics of [[H.M.S. Pinafore|"A British Tar"]] and engage it in karaoke mode (complete with bobbing ball).
** More generally, 24th century Starfleet control panels are reconfigurable, thus allowing actors to push the same spot and achieve different effects. So says series graphic designer Mike Okuda in the ''Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual.'' In other words, everything works like [[Everything Is an iPod In The Future|big iPhones]].
** ''[[Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country]]'' - A modified torpedo is launched by someone pressing a
*** To be fair to the movie, they had just finished jerry-rigging the torpedo, so maybe they just wired it into a handy nearby button.
* ''[[Galaxy Quest]]'' plays with this. The pilot knew just what buttons on the control panel did what, because when he was working on the fake ship, he personally assigned 'X Task To Y Button', being a child star (enjoying his work!) when he was initially on the [[Show Within a Show|TV show]]. In [[Real Life]] [[Wil Wheaton]] did this when working on ''Star Trek: The Next Generation'', inventing imaginary things he had to push to send the commands he'd logically need to send, like 'propulsion', 'impulse', 'to 50%'. This is probably the basis of the scene in ''Galaxy Quest''.
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* In the ''[[Red Dwarf]]'' episode "Parallel Universe", Holly invents the "Holly-Hop Drive", a device intended to move the ship instantly to any point in space (although it actually instead moves the ship into an [[Alternate Universe]]). Much to the crew's scorn, the drive is just a red box with two buttons: "Start" and "Stop". In the words of Holly: "If you want to start it, press Start, and you can work out the rest of the controls for yourself."
* ''[[Doctor Who]]''
** The sonic screwdriver seems able to perform any and all tasks required, just by pointing and buzzing. It has cut, welded, unlocked locks both electronic and mechanical, detonated marsh gas, disabled androids, changed channels on a military communications screen, manipulated multiple computer systems and, of course, unfastened screws. No explanation for its versatility-sans-external-controls has ever been advanced onscreen, but when Amy Pond had to use the screwdriver in "Let's Kill Hitler", Rory commented that it (at least that incarnation of it anyway) had a psychic interface
Specific settings have been referenced. in The Empty Child, he tells Rose which one reattaches barbed wire. We don't know how settings are selected. In ''The Keeper of Traken'', however, the Doctor explicitly states that it can't do anything against purely mechanical locks. Also, since it can only manipulate one device at a time, it can't open deadlocks.
*** On occasion, the Doctor gives the screwdriver to a companion to use. His instructions (except for the barbed wire case above) are never more complicated than "point and click", though.
** Oddly, in the TARDIS we have the inverse: the same function is sometimes activated by different controls. The Doctor and Adric use different controls to open the TARDIS doors in ''Logopolis'', the 9th Doctor dematerialised the TARDIS by twisting a dial whereas the 10th Doctor does it by throwing a particular lever, and so on. One companion had a control that only worked when she took two paces to the right and tried again.
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* ''[[Portal (series)|Portal]]'' and ''[[Half-Life]]'' have the "Use" key (default: E) which will do various things based on context. In ''Portal'', it normally picks things up, but will also push the small red buttons on pedestals and open unlocked doors.
** 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
Additionally, pressing C when no icons are highlighted will make the Tamagotchi do an animation (on the newer toys), for example, coming up close to the screen and waving.
* 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.
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* ''[[Inspector Gadget]]'' - Penny's watch could do a lot, from firing a laser, to remote controlling things, to being used as a phone. It only had three buttons.
* 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:
Other labels were "Five Minutes left in the Episode" (because he'd always push it right then), "The Right Choice", and the one time the button was missing it was labeled "Save the World". Which was part of a selection which included "Smite the world", "Destroy the world", and "Destroy the world worse".
** 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!".
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