But the big reason is that, for most of them, there’s just no reason to. Most of the stuff we do in video games because it’s just too ridiculous to try in the real world, they do every day. Stuff like…
6. Sonic the Hedgehog’s Speed Roll
Sonic the Hedgehog is a blue hedgehog who runs really fast and collects gold rings to fight robots and wow, we’d never actually said that out loud before.
Sonic may not be the most… sane flagship character (Mario isn’t much better, but at least “guy jumps on monsters” takes less explanation) but he made up for it with his play-by-my-own-rules ethos and a healthy dose of 90’s ‘tude.
Wha-? Upside down? What will that crazy fool do next?
And he’s definitely not realistic — after all, hedgehogs can’t run,
and they certainly don’t gain speed by tucking themselves into a ball
and somersaulting and supersonic speeds.But you know who does? The Wheel Spider.
By wrapping his legs around his body, the Wheel spider can spin at roughly 20 rotations per second, and travel at speeds the equivalent of a car going almost 200 MPH. That’s not quite a match for Sonic, who canonically can reach 770 MPH, but it’s pretty good considering it’s a somersaulting spider.
Watch it on video here.
5. Solid Snake’s Camouflage
Solid Snake is the inappropriately named spy from the Metal Gear series of games known for his ability to camouflage in pretty much any situation. While early games simply had Snake carry around a cardboard box (in his… pocket?) which he could leap under at a moment’s notice, the sequels upped the ante — MGS3 allowed Snake to switch between 27 different kinds of camouflage at a moment’s notice.
Look, this isn’t exactly fair…
It worked great in the game, but there’s no way anything could be
that adaptable in the real world. That is, except for the Ocean,
apparently. Check out this sly little dude, the Mimic Octopus, as a
flounder:
Or a seasnake:
Or… um, Ninja, we guess:
Same Octopus – it can change color at will, too. You can watch it in action — all those images are from this video.
There are even reports of it mimicking divers that were trying to photograph it – they can become anything they want, whenever they want, and it’s awesome.
4. Rocket Jumping
Rocket Jumping is a strategy unique to “shooter” video games where the player jumps into the air and fires a rocket-launcher directly at the place where they used to be standing, using the momentum from the blast to launch themselves into the air. Rocket jumping is patently insane — that’s the entire point. It’s most known from a game called Team Fortress, that was mainly about being as ridiculous as possible.
But there is an animal that does the same thing, and it also seems to exist with the sole purpose of being as ridiculous as possible.The Trap-Jaw ant can use its jaws (the fastest predatory appendages in the animal kingdom, capable of closing at 140 miles per hour.) so fast that it actually launches itself into the air. Just like in team fortress, it usually uses this ability to impress (irritate) its friends.
You can watch it happen here, or just consult our helpful diagram:
This is the only one that’s actually more badass than the video game version, because the ant doesn’t actually need a rocket launcher. It just uses its mouth.
3. Camping the Spawn Point
One of the most reviled strategies in online First Person Shooter games is the so called “camping” strategy, where players figure out exactly where new players are going to enter the game and “camp” there, blasting them with an assault rifle right when they start and before they have the chance to orient themselves. It makes the game impossible to play, and when you’re a victim of this particularly strategy your only choice is to quit and walk away.
Unfortunately, this option isn’t available to the real world victim of camping: baby turtles. They can’t walk away because this isn’t a game, this is their life and they just got born. Furthermore, their enemies are among the most merciless, brutal, and downright annoying in the animal kingdom. They may not have rail guns or infinite ammo, but they do have wings and beaks and cold, dead eyes as black as the hellish pit from whence they spawned.
Behold the steely gaze of He-Who-Eats-Infants.
Despite the fact that a turtle can lay as many as 200 eggs, most
species have remained extinct not only due to illegal poaching (which is
also a thing),
but because the babies never make it to the water. Baby turtles haven’t
earned their armor upgrade yet (it takes a couple weeks of grinding) so
crabs and, again, those dirty seagulls will just chow down before the
poor little guys have any hope of defense or recourse.
Run, you poor son of a bitch!
This is the saddest example on this list.
2. Regenerating Health Bars
Unless you are a very special kind of idiot, you know that in real war if you get shot you can’t actually just take cover and wait for your injuries to heal up. Otherwise, come on — war would be silly.
Ha! That’s hilarious!
But, tragic as it is, mortality adds to the beauty of life: if we
could live forever, time and accomplishment would have no meaning.
Motivating yourself to get stuff done would be next to impossible: Why
do something right now when you can do it at literally any point in the
future lifetime of the universe?
The dishes? Are you kidding?
This is an existential burden that some animals have to deal with
every day. Most species of starfish have the ability to re-grow a leg
that gets ripped off — what some people may not realize is that that leg
(the one that got ripped off) also has the ability to grow a whole new Starfish. It’s called “Reproduction Through Fragmentation” and it is the most metal way to have kids.
The difference between “grisly carnage” and “babies” is frequently a matter of how well you know biology.
1. Reaching Max Level
But while Starfish are still gonna die eventually, hundreds of other animals have figured out a way to stop having that problem. Some creatures, once they reach a certain age, decide to stop aging. Just because they can. It’s called “negligible senescence,” and it’s basically reaching max level in age.
Some examples: Quahog Clams have been found to be as old as 400. Some scientists claim that lobsters can live forever, barring disease or injury or being boiled alive and eaten. An Aldabra Tortoise named “Adwaita” was brought to India in 1750 by Robert Clive of the British East India Company. And it lived until 2006, only dying because his shell was cracked in an accident. There’s even evidence to suggest that at a certain point, the human body stops aging too – the only problem is that “certain point” is usually after we’ve developed cancer, our organs have given up or we’re pretty much vegetables — but still! Guys! Immortality!
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