Stealth Pun/Video Games

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Examples of Stealth Puns in Video Games include:

• In Half-Life 2, Dr. Kleiner's pet headcrab is named Lamarr, and later confirms the pun when he can't find it.

Alyx: We'll get you a new headcrab. Dr. Kleiner: There's only one Heddy!

• • That's Hedley!
  • The exact same gag was used in Camp Lazlo.
  • There's another one, maybe. "It's spawning season for the antlions!" And they do indeed spawn. And spawn, and spawn... They're the only enemies in the game that do, in fact.
• In case 2 of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials & Tribulations, a valuable jewel is called the "Tear of Emanon". If you don't get it, read it backwards.
  • In the third case, the murder victim was a computer programmer working for a company called Blue Screens. The phrase "blue screen of death" is never used.
    • Maya comments that it "sounds like a really stable company".
  • The final case features two characters using false names with the surname "Deauxnim". Considering the series' love of Punny Names, it's quite surprising that neither is called "Sue".
  • The character's name in Japanese is also a Stealth Pun: her pseudonym is "Elise", but her real name is "Maiko" (one translation of which is "dancer").
  • The Ace Attorney series is famous for giving the characters incredibly punny names. Like Shelly de Killer, the assassin who leaves cards with the images of shells at the scene of the crime to draw suspicion from his clients. The killer with the conches.
  • One potentially obscure pun can be found in the name of Max Galactica, the magician Phoenix defends in the third case of Justice For All. Max is particularly fond of milk, and needs it to calm his nerves before a performance. How many players realize that the word "galactic" is defined as pertaining to milk in the first place?
  • In Ace Attorney Investigations, it's eventually revealed that the Yatagarasu's Key has a handle that opens up to reveal a concealed knife blade. They key part has a bit shaped like a butterfly, and the way the handle opens makes it a literal butterfly knife.
  • The second game's third case introduces us to Acro's pet monkey Money, who has a tendency to steal and stockpile shiny objects. While this causes Phoenix some early grief, the other members of the circus seem to be used to it and regard it as a harmless prank... or monkeyshines.
• No points for guessing which animal is featured on the coat of arms of Aswan in Crusader Kings by Paradox Interactive. A lion.
  • Not a swan?
    • It's a Stealth Pun that's subverted by a deeper Stealth Pun. Whoa.
• At the beginning of the second episode of Tales of Monkey Island, Morgan tells Guybrush how much she admires him, and says she even learned how to hold her breath for five minutes. Guybrush informs her he can hold it for ten. "You mean that's true? I thought the stories were exaggerated! Impressive!" So in her opinion, reports of his breath...
• In Kingdom Hearts II, Namine tells Kairi at one point to "Believe in yourself", whilst trying to convince her to step through a dark portal. If you don't get it, remember that Namine is Kairi's Nobody.
• Almost certainly unintentional, but a large element of the plot of the 2006 Sonic the Hedgehog is Princess Elise's budding romantic feelings for the titular anthropomorphic hero. Thus making her a fur Elise.
• The head of Pokémon's mafia-esque Team Rocket is named Giovanni, making him Don Giovanni.
  • Also, Spoink and Grumpig are pig-like creatures adorned with pearls. Pearls Before Swine?
  • Pokémon Black and White introduces the ability Big Pecks, found on seven Unova birds and four pre-existing Dream World birds, which makes them immune to defense loss. The "pecks" bird reference is immediately apparent, but you may not know that the original Japanese name for the ability translated to "Pigeon Breast". So it really means they have big pecs. Groan.
  • Speaking of Unova, Zekrom, the Legendary Mascot of White, not only has a domain over electricity and lightning, but also has large thighs. It has thunder thighs, get it?
• The most powerful axe in most modern Castlevania games is the Golden Axe. In Dawn of Sorrow, Yoko is able to make said weapon even more powerful by combining it with a boss's soul. Specifically, she adds Death.
  • There's also the enemy in Order of Ecclesia known as the "Chosen Une."
• A particularly dark one in Empire: Total War, in which you get different trade resources from different trade ports- sugar from South America, spices from the East Indies, and ivory from Africa. However, that sure is a lot of ivory, considering the profit to be made... and then you realize it's a reference to Black Ivory.
• In Thief: Deadly Shadows, one mission requires you to break into a clock tower operated by the Hammerites (colloquially, the Hammers) and sabotage the mechanism, causing the clock to stop. In other words, you have to Stop Hammer Time.
• In Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story, there is a character named Broque Monsieur who speaks with a heavy French accent and is made out of blocks. If you try saying his name with a fake French accent, it sounds like you're saying "block monster".
  • Or, of course, Mr. Block.
  • That's also a normal Punny Name; it refers to a grilled ham and cheese sandwich. If you add a fried egg to the top, you get a Croque-madame. Hee...
    • Of course there's also a Madame Broque, his ex.
    • Also in that game, the villain Fawful, who is from the Beanbean Kingdom, has a pig henchman named Midbus, making them pork and beans.
    • Midbus also has spikes down his spine so he's also a razorback and when he gets ice powers he can give Bowser a cold. A little coincidence with a recent^[when?] panic.
• In Mass Effect, when accessing a computer system in a trashed laboratory, the computers personality asks you: "It looks like you are trying to restore this facility. Would you like help?"
  • One response option is labeled "Crap. A pop-up"
  • If you buy the Collectors' Edition of Mass Effect 2, you get some extra content: namely suit of armour and a rifle modelled after those of the Collectors, the chief enemy in the game. Note the apostrophe.
  • Quarians bear the name of their home ship in their names preceded by the preposition 'vas', which can be somewhat embarrassing if the ship name is ridiculous, as is the case with Admiral Zaal'Koris vas Qwib Qwib. If you ignore Tali's advice and ask him about the name, he'll mention that he's considered transferring to the Defrahnz or Iktomi.
• In Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, one of your last tasks is to explore the derelict vessel Valhalla to obtain a "pirate code" that will grant access to one of the enemy's leviathans. But the only reason you need it is so that the leviathan can plot a course for you and the Federation fleet to follow to Phaaze, the living Phazon planet. So when you think about it, the pirate code is really more like a guideline...
  • Samus manages to kill a B.O.X. security robot infected by the X parasites in Metroid Fusion. If you've been paying attention to the naming scheme for X victims, this makes it an "X-B.O.X."
    • Not really, since X is always used after the name; Core-X, Serris-X, Yakuza-X, SA-X... It would make the infected robot B.O.X-X.
• Guilty Gear XX has two characters with connections to each other named Eddie and Venom. Would you believe that one of them is a black shape-changing symbiote who combined with a human and went on to control his body?
  • That's subtle?
    • Considering that the symbiote is the one named Eddie...
      • It's still not the least bit subtle.
    • That Zato-1 is the name shown on the character selection screen for the first games with Eddie in, and that he appears to be more a batwinged demonic figure and Venom is a pool cue wielding Egyptian assassin with long purple hair over his eyes, kinda obfuscates the pun a bit too and makes it more stealthy.
      • Also, the number "1" in Japan is pronounced "Ichi", thus making him Zato-Ichi
• Brütal Legend features a demon named Fletus who's obsessed with cars and racing. No-one mentions that this makes him a speed demon.
  • Or that if he ever got more than one, he'd have a fleet of cars.
  • Ditto for Glottis from Grim Fandango.
• In Katawa Shoujo, the protagonist Hisao is hospitalized after a confession of love provokes his arrhythmia and gives him a heart attack. The girl in question eventually breaks ties with Hisao, which is one of the many reasons he's depressed at the start of the game. In other words, Hisao's got a broken heart.
  • Lilly Satou, who is blind, says "I don't see why it matters" when asked to make a name for her team in the fishing competition. Keep in mind that people often say things such as "I see" around her, only to sheepishly apologize, and she is amused by their apologies.
• In Team Fortress 2, one of the Demoman's unlockable weapons is the Eyelander, a big Scottish BFS. Since it's a Scottish BFS, that makes it a claymore. However, there's more than one type of weapon called a claymore. The aforementioned type of sword, and a kind of bomb.
  • He's a black Scotsman. Black Angus.
  • Do not forget the line "DON'T RUN! IS JUST HAM!" when eating the Sandvich (a ham and/or baloney sandwich) as the Heavy, a character who is extremely boisterous and over the top.
  • And the Sniper's camper van. A "camper" in FPS terminology is a guy who rarely moves from one particular spot to kill people. Which is something snipers usually do.
  • The bobble head in "Meet the Sniper" that he pretended to headshot was originally of an old man holding a bottle of apricot jelly, a reference to the part of the brain often called "the apricot" by snipers, but they decided against it because it was so obscure.
    • That didn't stop them from giving him apricot air freshener
  • The Sniper's parents apparently live on "Adelaide St." which is in itself a reasonable name for a street, but Australians joke that the city of Adelaide only has one street anyway.
  • Similarly, the "Meet the Engineer" video has him sitting at a campfire. Guess what one of the main Engineer strategies is.
    • This is actually a double stealth pun. Take a closer look at his 'campfire.' It's the burning corpse of the Sniper. So the camper is using a camper as a campfire.
  • The "Mann-Conomy" update was announced with a letter from Saxton Hale explaining how he discovered the Internet, in which he also notes that "the perverts at AnagramYourName.com should be ASHAMED OF THEMSELVES." ("Saxton Hale" is an anagram of "hot anal sex".)
    • So...is that the reason his products are known to spontaneously combust at random, and his top customers happen to be ill-tempered assholes that really like big guns?
• Probably unintentional, but in old Irem arcade game Ninja Spirit you control a ninja named Moonlight. He can create up to three shadow clones which follow his every move. Moonlight Shadow!
• Either that or He's being followed by a Moonshadow.
• Nezumi Man has Milky Nezumi, who doesn't attack with dairy products (like Butter Nezumi), but stars. In case you're wondering, he named himself after our resident galaxy.
• Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door has two in the gameplay mechanics. The first is Ms. Mowz's standard attack, a slap that ignores enemy defenses, and the second is the fact that machine type enemies are easy to freeze with ice attacks, (one of the hints old Wonkey tells you).
  • When tattling one of the harder enemies in the X-Naut base, the X-Yux, Goombella informs you that its name is properly pronounced "Cross-Yux". This in itself doesn't reveal a pun, but instead results in two when you combine this logic with the rest of the base's denizens. First, the X-Nauts, who would be properly pronounced "Cross-Nauts". Noughts and Crosses. And second, their computer TEC, which is a shortened form of its proper name TEC-XX. Double Cross.
    • Said computer is found in a base on the moon. Considering what game this is, would make it a paper moon.
• The text-based game Scapeghost has you as detective Alan Chance killed during an undercover drugs operation and coming back from the dead to take revenge. You are literally the Ghost of A. Chance.
• Backyard Sports: Duksana Pond.
• The newest Touhou game, Double Spoiler, is another camera-based Gaiden Game starring the reporter Aya Shameimaru. Given how much fans love Aya, one has to wonder why? Well, it's been joked that Aya is ZUN's girlfriend. And ZUN is apparently aware of this, because he's releasing Double Spoiler on White Day, i.e. the day that boys give gifts back to their girlfriends to thank them for the Valentine's Day chocolate.
• From Viewtiful Joe 2: The Black Film.
• Sheep Man from Mega Man 10. He's an electric-themed robot master.
  • Some fans, not content with this explanation of Sheep Man's name, have noticed that his stage is set inside a computer, and computers of course have RAM.
  • In the same vein, Mareep, Flaaffy, and Ampharos are Electric-type sheep Pokémon.
• From Metal Gear Solid:

Meryl: I'm not green! Snake: Oh yes you are.

• • The joke is, this conversation takes place over codec. Meryl is, in fact, green. Just like everyone else.
  • Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater brings us several stealth puns on the subtitle "Snake Eater". "Operation Snake Eater" is the codename of Snake's mission, and codenames tend, by their natures, to be stealth puns on the mission's objective. In this case, it is either that Snake was going to have to eat the native wildlife to survive or that he was sent to assassinate the leader of the Cobra Unit.
    • Snake was also a Green Beret before joining FOX, and "snake eater" is a military slang term for Green Berets.
    • If Snake eats a snake and then calls Para-Medic, she won't call him a "snake eater" but instead a "cannibal".
    • In a later cutscene, Snake cooks a snake over a fire and then eats it.
    • Then there's the stealthiest use of the pun - Ocelot's favorite animal according to the database is a Markhor, which in Persian means "snake eater".
• The American release date of BlazBlue: Continuum Shift is July 20, roughly 19 days after the Japanese release. 7/20. As in the 720 degree motion required for Iron Tager's Genesic Emerald Tager Buster distortion drive. REAL SOVIET RELEASE DATE!
• The main characters of Mega Man ZX start out delivering packages. Consider the pronunciation of the game's name in British English, and think of a famous company name that rhymes with it.
• While he was reverse-engineering the Wii's architecture, Segher discovered that the Hollywood processor (officially the graphics processor) contains a tiny ARM core in addition to its normal ATI core. Since it wasn't documented anywhere (not even in the developer's guide!) it didn't have a name, so he nicknamed it "Starlet." Because it's a little piece of Hollywood.
• In the seventh Fire Emblem game, three Pegasus Knight sisters share similar names. The first two, Florina and Fiora, are Latin words for "flower," while third sister Farina's name means "flour."
• In Red Dead Redemption, a high-stakes poker game in Mexico results in several people pointing their guns at each other. Someone notes that "There must be a name for this."
• Banjo-Tooie has one that can spawn two stealth puns: One move Banjo learns, Snooze Pack, has him fall asleep inside his backpack to recover health. Thus literally making his pack a Nap Sack or a Sleeping Bag.
• The general of the Cornerian forces in Star FOX is named Pepper. Which means he had to have been a sergeant at some point in the past.
  • Not really as enlisted men and officers are on separate pay grades, but that just ruins it doesn't it?
  • Long before the N64 version, the Nintendo Power comics (which promoted the then-recently released Super NES game) actually incorporated this pun into one chapter.
• In EV Nova, there is a ship called the Cambrian. Some historically-inclined gamers like to call it the Prince of Wales.
• In Mega Man Zero, Zero can divide enemies if you deal the final blow with a bladed weapon.
• The Fable series has monsters called Hobbes. They're nasty, brutish, and short.
• Very near the end of Professor Layton and the Unwound Future, you discover that the London of the future is actually the London underground. Not phrased like that, so...
• Ratchet from Ratchet and Clank is a mechanic. Ratchet is also the name of a socket wrench. Furthermore, Ratchet's ears are shaped like the head of a standard wrench.
• The final level of Mario Zone (where the levels are inside a giant mechanical Mario) in Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins has a lot of (suspiciously Lego-like) bricks. The level apparently takes place in the Mario-bot's head. So the Mario-bot is a blockhead.
  • Another level has a lot of what seem to be rubber balls - and considering this level is set in Mario-bot's crotch...
• In Left 4 Dead 2, Whitaker's gun shop from the first campaign is running a 2-for-1 special for 9mm pistols.
  • In the second campaign, you visit a theme park with a nut theme. The character on the hammer-bell game is named Mustachio. The game never mentions what kind of nut he is. He's a pistachio.
• In Lunar Knights, Perrault is an antagonist who keeps confronting Aaron and Lucian with her mobile ship Schrodinger. It is only later that the player finds out that Perrault is a cat.
• In Fallout: New Vegas, you can recruit the cyberdog belonging to The King, leader of the gang, The Kings. The dog's name is Rex. Rex's personal quest involves replacing his aging brain. One of the candidates for the transplant? A dog named Rey. Rex is Latin for "king". Rey is Spanish for . . . you guessed it! "King".
  • Though possibly unintentional, Fallout: New Vegas is often abbreviated as "NV." Much of the game takes place in Nevada. What's the US Postal Code for Nevada? NV.
  • A nice Stealth Pun gives the town of Novac its name. The town is built up around a prominent hotel (of which we are unaware of the real name) and a large, partly working neon sign outside the hotel entrance tells us the hotel has "No Vac ancy"
• In Minecraft, all monsters of a particular type share the same behavior patterns, often leading to the player being ambushed or chased by several enemies at a time. The common term for an NPC among the Minecraft community is a shortening of "mobile entity": mob.
  • Mobs are actually a generic term for mobile entities for any MMORPG. Sure enough, it's rather easy to get mobbed by mobs in most of them.
  • Creepers have an irritating habit of hiding behind corners, under ledges, and outside doorways to ambush the player.
  • Creepers have a mottled green texture that, at a distance, can cause one to mistake them for cacti or the tops of trees. The word "creeper" can also refer to various plants.
• Chibi-Robo! features a beautiful princess doll by the name of Princess Pitts. This seems like a curious name for a princess, but consider that this is a Nintendo-published game. What do you find in a Peach but a Pit?
• Guilty Party has a level set inside of a train. If you play a co-op game in that level, the all-play mini-game involves you catching a bunch of snakes that were released in the luggage compartment. Snakes on a Train, anyone?
• In Japan Street Fighter II: Champion Edition is known as Street Fighter II Dash, while Street Fighter II: Hyper Fighting is known as Street Fighter II Dash Turbo. The word "dash" is not written on the logo of either game, but represented by a prime mark (′) used to indicate derivatives in math, which is sometimes called a "dash". Both games were derivatives of the original Street Fighter II.
• A bit into the second half of Portal 2: "You're good at murder. Could you murder this bird for me?" Judging by the sound it makes as it flies away, the bird is a crow. A murder of crows?
  • At the very end of the game. Wheatley is stranded in space with another personality core orbiting him. For it to orbit another object of equal volume means that Wheatley must be incredibly dense.
  • Wheatley is a spherical robot who was built to make GLaDOS dumber. Or, in layman's terms, an Idiot Ball.
  • The most obvious one in the game: Throughout the game you get drops that the turrets sing opera and a capella. Some Easter Eggs let you see a very fat turret that stays silent until the ending sequence where it leads an entire symphony of 'singing' turrets in a female Italian's voice. It ain't over 'till the fat lady (turret) sings.
• Tons of them abound in the platform game Bug!. Many of the enemies are based off real-life animals, with the names taken literally.
  • The ants in Reptilia wear soldier hats, drop via parachutes, and fire grenades out of their tails. They're Army Ants.
  • Splot has flying insects that fire out a stream of electricity from their rear. They're Lightning Bugs.
  • Quaria has fishes that have the head of a bulldog. They're Dogfishes.
  • Also in Quaria, there are swimming beetles which sport scuba equipment. Diving beetles.
  • The Burr-ubs had annoying white fleas that jumped out of the snow and threw (or rolled) snowballs at Bug. Snow fleas.
  • Arachnia had ants with flamethrower packs and fire breath. Fire Ants. Then again, the manual calls them that.
• In Mortal Kombat 9, Mileena's second Fatality is called "Rip Off". She tosses her sais at the victim's feet then rips their torso off. More dedicated Mortal Kombat fans will recognize it as a rip-off, in the imitation sense, of one of Kira's Fatalities in Mortal Kombat: Deception.
• Elite Beat Agents has the "September" level, where the target uses fans, planes, and an animal-controlled bonfire to make the sun shine. In other words, she's using Earth, Wind and Fire.
• Shin Megami Tensei‍'‍s Mara isn't exactly subtle, being a giant penis demon and all, but Persona 3 has a couple of subtle jokes in his stats: All of his physical attacks are pierce-type (including Primal Force, the strongest single-target pierce attack in the game,) and he's weak against ice.
• Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves has a chapter set in Blood Bath Bay, inhabited by "throwbacks" who live as pirates. Since the Sly universe is populated by funny animals, all the Mooks in the entire chapter are canines. Meaning the pirates who inhabit this town are... sea dogs.
• In Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, you have a pistol from the start of the game. Early on, you're introduced to Borgia messengers, who you can tackle to steal all of their money. However, if you kill one, you instantly become notorious, and the guards will attack you on sight. The game is basically telling you "don't shoot the messenger".
• In Alice: Madness Returns, one enemy you encounter is called an Eyepot. the reference to a certain portable audio player is right out in the open, but what you might not realize at first is that, as an Eyepot, it must contain Eye Tea.
  • Also, you defeat them by first stunning them with blasts of pepper... making them pepperpots, perhaps?
  • In one area, you pass through a castle made of playing cards. Well, a man's home is his castle, so this one is a house of cards.
  • In addition, it's a Castle in The Sky or Air.
  • This castle has crenelations, obviously having been made by cutting the cards.
• Angry Birds is all about flipping birds at evil pigs.
  • The white egg-shaped birds in Angry Birds drop egg bombs at their targets, making them "egg-layers" (a slang term for bomber planes).
  • Angry Birds in Space featured a Super Mario Bros-themed bonus level. Just think about it.
• In Kirby's Dream Land 3, Kirby can fling his bird buddy Pitch about by swinging a parasol like a golf club. The parasol is a pitching wedge.
• In the Super Mario Bros series, all of the background scenery have eyes.
• In Where's My Water?, if all of the water were to flow off-screen, then the alligator you're supposed to have the water go into his bathtub will start crying.
• Super Smash Bros. Brawl not only removed all clone characters (Young Link, Dr. Mario, Roy, and Pichu) from Melee, but also Mewtwo (who isn't a clone) as well.
• The final boss theme of Contra: Hard Corps is called "Last Springsteen." Bruce Springsteen's nickname is "The Boss."
• In the original Mega Man, Cut Man is weak against Guts Man's Super Arm, which allows you to pick up and throw boulders. That is to say, rock beats scissors.
  • In addition, Cut Man takes more damage from Mega Man's Mega Buster than any of the other original six Robot Masters. Again, Rock beats scissors (Rockman being the Japanese title of the Mega Man series).
• Matt's incarnation in Epic Battle Fantasy 5 is called a hobo (including by himself) for his reclusive and slobbish lifestyle, his standard approach to solve problems is finding monsters to kill to take their stuff and gain XP and he often threatens NPCs with violence when they rub him the wrong way. He is a literal murderhobo.
• The character Trowzer in Yooka-Laylee. He is a snake. A Trouser Snake.

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