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Techno Babble: Difference between revisions
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{{quote|'''Sid Phillips:''' No one has ever attempted a double bypass brain transplant before!
'''Buzz Lightyear:''' [[Captain Obvious|I don't believe that man's ever been to medical school.]]|''[[Toy Story (franchise)|Toy Story]]''}}
[[Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness|Any impressive- and scientific-sounding]], but ultimately nonsensical utterance.
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'''Aoba:''' Destrudo reaction in old area! Pattern sepia!
'''Hyuga:''' A change is confirmed on the core pulse too! + 0.3 confirmed!
'''Ritsuko:''' [[Status Quo Is God|Maintenance of the status quo is top priority]], prevent backflow!
'''Maya:''' + 0.5... 0.8... It's odd, I can't stop it! }}
** Fuyutsuki and Gendo Ikari were experts in "metaphysical biology" (You got philosophy in my science! You got science in my philosophy!) before going military. In other words, the Eva universe had a field of science devoted to things like the Angels even ''before'' the Second Impact.
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* The ''[[Firefly]]'' Tabletop [[RPG]] featured a table that allowed the GM to randomly generate damage to the players' ship. It had two columns, one for technobabble, and one for what this actually meant. They were rolled separately, and therefore one had no correlation to each other whatsoever.
** The technobabble column itself came in three parts: the part prefix (Primary/Hydraulic/etc), the part (Stabilizer/Vent/Feed/etc) and what happened to it (Cracked/Jammed/Exploded/etc) requiring three rolls to describe what went wrong when all anyone wants to know is the fourth, which is what it means.
* The Adeptus Mechanicus of ''[[Warhammer
* ''[[Genius: The Transgression]]'': Actually represented in the rules, and known as Jabir. A [[Mad Scientist|Genius]] who tries to talk about any kind of science will find that they have suddenly stopped making sense.
** [[Deconstructed Trope]]/PlayedForDrama in this case; Jabir is described as a disturbing thing to witness and suffer from.
* ''[[Spirit of the Century]]'' allows players to make declarations about scientific facts their characters know which can help in whatever situation they find themselves in. Since ''[[Spirit of the Century]]'' runs on the rules of [[Two-Fisted Tales|pulp narrative]], both players and [[Game Master]]s are encouraged to make such situations less about "realistic science" and more about "impressive sounding technobabble."
* ''[[Paranoia]]'' has a recommendation for the GM about this trope: talk fast. If any of the players ask for clarification, tell them that said information is beyond their security clearance. The ''Paranoia XP'' rulebook also had a table at the back to randomly generate technobabble-esque medication names
* Many RPGs have their own set of jargon phrases. Try asking a new ''[[Dungeons
** This is jargon and not technobabble: the words make sense to players who are familiar with the game. Also, the vast majority of people who started playing D&D after about the year 2000 won't have a clue what THAC0 is, as it was only a feature of the second edition of AD&D that was "retired" in that year.
* The Fudge Factor Article Building A Better Space Ship states "Unless your players are more scientifically adept then usual, don't be afraid to simply take some cool sounding word and putting it in" on names. Their example is a Phased Ion Rifle.
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* ''[[Unreal Tournament]]'' mixes technobabble with a generous measure of [[Gun Porn]] in most weapon and item descriptions, so even if bits of it go over your head, you can still be confident of the power it's packing.
* ''[[Xenogears]]'' and ''[[Xenosaga]]'' are madly, passionately in love with their technobabble.
* ''[[Terminal Velocity]]'' and its [[Spiritual Successor|spiritual successors]] ''[[Fury
* [[Ratchet and Clank]] lampshades this in the first game, in Metropolis, when the duo enter Big Al's Roboshack. Al babbles for some time, then we get this gem:
{{quote|'''Ratchet:''' Um, Clank, you speak Nerd...}}
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* The writers at ''[[Orion's Arm]]'' put a lot of work into producing plausible technobabble, the effect of this is that determining what parts they made up is pretty hard.
* ''[[Sailor Moon Abridged]]'', episode 31:
{{quote|'''[[The Unfavorite|Amy]]''': These readings are all weird, because we seem to be stuck in the time-space Nerf Gun continuum, and the only way out is if we make a pyramid out of-
'''Artemis''': I think this bitch is just making shit up now.
'''Amy:''': You guys never listen to me anyway! }}
* ''[[Sci Fi Debris]]'' repeatedly calls these out in his ''[[Star Trek]]'' reviews. He goes one step further in his review of the ''[[Voyager]]'' episode "Prototype", where he explains the method by which Technobabble is created: take two unrelated, scientific-sounding terms, and stick them together. He proceeds to demonstrate it by creating some examples, with captions giving a possible explanation of what the complete term would mean, including:
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'''Zap Brannigan:''' Spare me your space-age techno-babble, Attila the Hun! }}
** Really, they use (and [[Parody]]) this all the time, in a variety of different ways.
{{quote|'''[[The Professor|Professor Farnsworth]]:''' [[As You Know|I'm sure I don't need to explain]] that all dark matter in the universe is linked in the form of a single non-local meta-particle.
'''[[Genius Ditz|Amy]]:''' ''[[Future Slang|Guh]]!'' Stop patronizing us. }}
* ''[[Code Lyoko]]'' is also chock full of it. Suffice to say it's never a good idea to let Jérémie explain how his newest program works. Or let Aelita answer questions about simple mathematic concepts.
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* In the first episode of the Thanagarian invasion ''[[Justice League Unlimited]]'', one of the Thanagarian's suggests to the Martian Manhunter that he wouldn't understand the technology they are using. He replies with a burst of technobabble indicating a deeper understanding of what's going on that she obviously expected.
* In ''[[Dave the Barbarian]]'', this is parodied in an episode in which Dave suggests solving the problem with convenient technobabble. Candy responds that convenient technobabble levels are dangerously low.
* In ''[[Justice League: Crisis
* ''[[Jimmy Two-Shoes]]'' makes a [[Running Gag]] of this. [[Mad Scientist|Heloise]] will often give these explanations for her inventions to [[Dumb Blonde|Jimmy]] and [[Fat Idiot|Beezy]], receiving blank stares. She then deadpans an explanation you'd give a child.
* Also seen in one opening of ''[[Family Guy]]'' where [[Fat Idiot|Peter]] is watching TV and a stand up comedian (Dennis Miller) comes on and delivers this line: "I don't want to go on a rant here, but America's foreign policy makes about as much sense as [[Beowulf]] having sex with Robert Fulton at [[American Civil War|the first Battle of Antietam]]. I mean, when a neo-conservative defenestrates, it's like Raskolnikov filibustered deoxymonohydroxinate." Which in turn leaves Peter with the amazing comment "What the hell does "rant" mean?"
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[[Category:Tropes of Legend]]
[[Category:Applied Phlebotinum]]
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