Inside jokes and obscure references
By
Aghast,
Posted on: 2005-02-04 17:31 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Bosses/Villains:
Maestro: The "deaf composer" is clearly a reference to Beethoven. Except he's an evil, vampiric, Beethoven.
[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah...Beehtoven wasn't vampiric at all.
[/ QUOTE ]
Should i take that statement to mean that he *was* evil? 
"Men strunt �r strunt och snus �r snus
om ock i gyllne dosor.
Och rosor i ett sprucket krus
�r st�ndigt alltid rosor."
I laughed for ten minutes the first time I saw the technology single origins. IIRC, they are called either "Portacio Industries" or "WetWare, Inc."
These are references to Wetworks, an old (and good) Image Comics title. Whilce Portacio was the creator, writer, and I believe he did some of the artwork also.
Someone at Cryptic is a Wetworks fan! 
I have a strong feeling that's where Portacio came from, but "wetware" has long been programmer slang for the human mind, as opposed to hardware or software. Dictionary.com even has a listing for it.
Up and Away burger - In and Out burger
The Badguys - The Goodguys
Prisoner "Redd" Maybe from The Shawshank Redemption
I once encountered a pair of Rikti who were commenting on recent events in the story arc - Rozen and Stren.
Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)
[ QUOTE ]
The Serpent's Teeth - ok, this one is a long one. Zeus steals Europa, sister of Cadmus. Cadmus is charged by his father to seek her out. Athena helps him out. He has to slay a serpent, and when he does, Athena instructs him to plant the teeth in the ground. He does, they turn into warriors and fight each other. When 5 remain, they build Cadmus the City of Thebes and install him as king. Teiresias is a descendent of one of these men who sprang from the Serpent's Teeth. His relevance to the Odyssey is that Circe instructed Odysseus to journey to the land of the dead to speak with Tiersais, the only woman (apparently, s/he changed sexes several times in his/her tale) in the underworld allowed to retain her intellect and sanity by Prosepine, and consult her about a way to make it home. Told you it was long.
[/ QUOTE ]
In Greek mythology, another "serpent's teeth" were given to Jason (ex: Argonauts) to sow; they sprung into living warriors. Ray Harryhausen made them skeletal warriors in the Jason and the Argonauts movie.
<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison
I first encountered the term wetware in Shadowrun. It refers to bioware, cloned-type additions to the body, as opposed to cyberware, the typical hardware-type stuff.
Comrade Smersh, KGB Special Section 8 50 Inv/Fire, Fire/Rad, BS/WP, SD/SS, AR/EM
Other 50s: Plant/Thorn, Bots/Traps, DB/SR, MA/Regen, Rad/Dark - All on Virtue.
-Don't just rebel, build a better world, comrade!
[ QUOTE ]
How about we also go the other way with references.
Watched "Sky Captain..." the other day. There was a large sign for Kings Row and the symbol on the robots is nearly identical to the 5th Column insignia (at least in my memory, can't actually check anymore).
Edit: Oh and Franky's Skyraider jetpack.
[/ QUOTE ]
Kings Row.
Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)
[ QUOTE ]
STRIGA Isle
Striga - a pretty pink plant that's parasitic. Home to the Vampyrs...
[/ QUOTE ]
Striga < Latin strix, originally a kind of owl. Now striga in Italian means a flying witch or various sorts of night-faring spooks.
<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison
FWIW, Nectanebo, Li Tieh Kuai, and Crowley are the names in the Magic/Natural DOs. They are all names of semi-historical figures.
Crowley = Aleister Crowley, a magician who was involved in the Golden Dawn in turn of the century England, and led a rather scandalous life.
Nectanebo was one of several pharaohs of the last native Egyptian dynasty, before Egypt was conquered, first by the Persian Empire, and then by Alexander the Great, and then by the Romans.
Li Tieh Kuai is "Iron Crutch Li", one of the eight immortals of Taoism. He was apparently fond of out of body experiences, and one of his students found him apparently dead, and cremated his body. When he returned, he had to take over the body of a crippled beggar, while of course keeping his magical kung-fu powers; thus the Iron Crutch.
<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison
I'm surprised that no one's picked this one out yet:
The Science/Tech DO for Intangibility Duration is the Oscillator Overthruster. The OscillatION Overthruster was used in the movie and novel THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKAROO BANZAI to allow for passage through solid objects, by accessing the "8th Dimension", made up of all the empty space in matter.
Peace,
ZQA (who bought one despite not having Phase Shift, just because)
[ QUOTE ]
KILL SKULS!
[/ QUOTE ]
I think I missed something.
Where did this joke come from. I see it all over the boards now.
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Something else about Tempest Quay:
In relation to Aquaman, as seen above...Tempest was also the name the young adult Aqualad chose to use durring his later Teen Titan stint. Statesman seems fond of the Titans. George Perez (Perez Park) designed the new costume he used, as well...
[/ QUOTE ]
Another possible Curry reference is the actor Tim Curry, who played a number of nautical roles (and chewiing scenery with the best of them) including.... (wait for it): Hunt for RED OCTOBER and Pirates of Penzance! 
[/ QUOTE ]
if the nautical works of Tim Curry is the link, he also voiced Captain Hook for Fox's Peter Pan and the Pirates (very late 80 when fox was still trying to get off the ground). Moderately okay cartoon, but Curry was as amazing as he ever is.. almost as good as in Clue!
[/ QUOTE ]
McHales Navy too
[ QUOTE ]
I once encountered a pair of Rikti who were commenting on recent events in the story arc - Rozen and Stren.
[/ QUOTE ]
I stumbled across these two last night. It's a good thing I was stealthed, because I was laughing too hard to fight for a bit.
By the way...Rozen and Stren are dead.
The Way of the Corruptor (Arc ID 49834): Hey villains! Do something for yourself for a change--like twisting the elements to your will. All that's standing in your way are a few secret societies...and Champions of the four elements.
Brickstown:
Dark Waters- a reference to "Pirates of Drak Water" an old cartoon
The Abyss Towers- C'mon people, this a a refence to James Cameron (as well as an oxymoron) He made a film called the Abyss in 1989, & Ghosts of the Abyss in 2003. As well as 1 or 2 other deep sea exploration documentaries.
Dark Astoria:
Moth Cemetary & Barca Plaza- Could these be refernces to silence of the lambs? Barca is Hannibals last name, think Hannibal & you associate the name with Hannibal Lechter. The other serial killer in the film, Buffalo Bill, would stuff moths in his victems throats. Death's Head moths I beleve.
----------------------------------------------------------------
"Thank you for encouraging my behavior."
~Bobcat Golthwaite
[ QUOTE ]
At my workplace, all the servers are named after various gods of mythology. I conside one of my finer moments convincing networking that 'Enki' was a good name for our new server.
[/ QUOTE ]
Ours were Harpo, Groucho, Chico, and Karl.
LOL remember searching things in IM? looked like you were taking a leak in the trash cans ..
ArchRex Dojhrom x ?
* Sidus Loricatus: B-NRG2, S-BS/Reg, T-Fire/Ice, MM-Bots/FF, St-NRG2, Dom-Psi/NRG, Cor-Son/Traps, Cor-Ice/Kin, Ctrl-Fire/Kin, PB-LB/LA
* Arachnos Loricatus: Soldier, Widow
* Praetoria Loricatus: B-DP/Dev, Cor-Elec/Elec
Oh,, there's also the obvious, "You wouldn't want to see me mad!" Hulk allusion from the Hellions you se mugging people on the street.
What about Major Flanders fried chicken? that ones so over the top its one of my COH favorites! 
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Bosses/Villains:
Maestro: The "deaf composer" is clearly a reference to Beethoven. Except he's an evil, vampiric, Beethoven.
[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah...Beehtoven wasn't vampiric at all.
[/ QUOTE ]
Ssshhh... That's just what -THEY- want us to think...
Heroes on Freedom Server
Chord - lvl 30 Rock 'n Roll Muse
Mr. Payback - lvl 12 Natural Tank
Caryatid - lvl 14 Magical Stone Tank
Chronobot - lvl 11 Tech Scrapper
Independence Port has way too much in common with Three Mile Island. A nuclear power plant accident. It's apporximately 3 miles long, and it has alot of steel industry like Pittsburgh where Three Mile Island is located.
Ooh, just remembered another one.
The Supergroup Registration form is Form 27B/6.
Form 27B/6 is the Ministry of Public Works' "Authorization for Repairs of Domestic Living Quarters by Licensed Repair Technicians" form in Brazil (the film not the country ).
I figured it would be easier if I just compiled everybody's contributions to date and posted them. I tried to give credit where credit is due, but don't shoot me if you mentioned something before the person I gave credit for it. I did my best. Also, I tended to leave out the more, shall we say, stretches of the imagination in favor of explanations that seemed dead on. For instance, as entertaining as the Tim Curry as a nautical method actor was, I'm pretty sure the devs probably named Curry Cove after Aquaman's real name, Arthur Curry, since two other PI locations are named after his wife and Aqualad. That being said, here's the results:
Slovalia
Warriors quoting Bruce Lee - "Move like water."
Charles_Langly
Freak boss named Stone Cold (as in "Steve Austin")
StrayLight
boss Mass Def (tribute to Mos Def, no doubt)
Zloth
Shadow Shard TF bosses named Humperdink and Vezeni (from
Princess Bride)
TheCatFanatic
contact in FBZ is General Hammond (from Stargate)
The Supergroup Registration form is Form 27B/6.
Form 27B/6 is the Ministry of Public Works' "Authorization for Repairs of Domestic Living Quarters by Licensed Repair Technicians" form in "Brazil"
MadScientist
Around the Bendis badge (referring to comic artist Brian
Michael Bendis)
Challenger Tech = Challengers of the Unknown
Raysun = (the opposite of) The Shadow
Astoria was a town in The Goonies
Technophile
Babbage, after Charles Babbage, the "father of
computing".
Tesla Princes/Knights/etc after Nicola Tesla, inventor
of, among many things, an alternating current motor.
Oscillators are devices for producing alternating
current.
Ironik
Toffet Terrace may be an alternate spelling of tophet,
which is an unpleasant place, or another name for hell.
Hutchison Park probably named after Thomas Hutchison,
who was the governor of Massachusetts in the period
leading up to the Revolutionaru War.
Nytrus_Oxyde
Nemesis Automaton office workers quoting the movie
Office Space.
Exelion
Roland, a Malta gunslinger boss, after Stephen King's
Roland, from The Gunslinger series.
LiquidX
Warriors missions dealing with Platonic Solids and
Pythagoreans, both mathematics references.
Coffeeninja
King's Row areas named after streets near Cryptic's HQ.
Atomic_Knight
Tempest is the alias of Aqualad during his time with the
Teen Titans.
Bountytaker
Louis Forest named after Louis XVI, who gave aid to
American revolutionaries.
Dennis_Heffernan
For numerous corrections about my vaguely-remembered
Greek mythology and its relation to Talos Island names.
Drewcifer
Fake Nemesis quoting Epyx, an old C-64 video game.
Knight_of_Argh
Crate# 9906769 referring to crate the ark of the
covenant was sealed in at the end of Raiders of the Lost
Ark?
Zhanate
Freak boss named Kerner, self-identified as a graphic
artist. Kern refers to the spacing between letters in
type.
Xanador
Benedict Tech, tech store that specializes in
prosthetics, after Benedict, a character from Roger
Zelazny's Amber novels, who lost an arm and had it
replaced with an artificial one.
Shiphty
The generic "If you want to fight, fight me" kung fu
movie dialogue of the Tsoo.
Inkblaster
Red Beast Energy Drink - Red Bull
Infront Steakhouse - Outback Steakhouse
Procella
Clockworks building Paladin saying "If we build it, he
will come", a quote derived from Field of Dreams.
Fushico
Hide Park refers to Hyde Park in Austin. And the "Guns
Ammo" store sign in KR actually exists in Austin on
South Congress.
The Conjuntion Junction badge in TV, which comes form
the Schoolhouse mini-cartoon "Conjunction Junction
(What's your Function?)"
Interdictor and Khaighle
Hide Park -> Hyde park -> Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde -> guy
who drank potion that turned him into monster, which is
what is happening to The Lost and the Trolls.
Khaighle
Ernesto Hess, the Council guy who wants to work with
heroes, could be a reference to Rudolph Hess, a Nazi
agent who parachuted into Britain in the 40's and
attempted to negotiate a separate peace with Germany.
Lady_Jade
Prisoner boss named J.P. Mason after John Patrick Mason,
Sean Connery's escape artist character from The Rock.
WingedKagouti
Hide Park - An old English measure of land, usually the
amount held adequate for one free family and its
dependents.
Another Hide Park can be found in Terry Pratchett's
Discworld novels. That park is named so because it is
actually the size of a hide.
Max_Firepower
Moth Cemetery = Mothman, Unexplained America? Or Moth
Diaries, a book dealing with "obsession and death"
perhaps?
Toffet Terrace - Helsing Letters, seeks The Tophet, a
mysterious organization...
Striga - a pretty pink plant that's parasitic. Home to
the Vampyrs...
Poison
Prisoner boss named Johnny-23, which is Danny Trejo's
character's name in Con Air.
A Carnie boss named "The Artist Formerly Known as
Claire", after Prince's name fiasco.
Sir_Vimes
Just FYI, I asked a developer about who Bettis was. They
said that it was originally suppose to be Bendis, and
wasn't sure why it was changed when it went live.
PBG3814
Hutchison Park referring to Anne Hutchison, a woman who
was chased out of colonial Mass because she was
essentially doing what a woman should not be doing
(thinking, having opinions) in colonial times. She was
exiled to Rhode Island, the same location as Paragon
City.
Smersh
Cooke's Electronics = Fry's Elctronics (store or chain
on west coast?)
Golgamesh
Hide Park - Dido, when she founded Carthage, was given a
space to build her domain no larger than that which
could be bound by an ox (?) hide? So she sliced the hide
into thin strips and laid them around a hilltop, upon
which was built Carthage. not sure if that has any
relevence.
LadyAndreca
Exploration badge in Talos called "Minotaur" after the
Talus/Talos connection.
Paveway
Portacio Industries and Wetware Inc enhancements refer
to Wetworks, an old Image Comics title, created by
Portacio.
Jet_Black
Up and Away burger - In and Out burger
The Badguys - The Goodguys
Prisoner "Redd" Maybe from The Shawshank Redemption
KaliMagdalene
Freaks discussing recent events in story arc named Rosen
and Stern (after Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, two characters from Shakespeare's "Hamlet"...or, possibly, more recently, from the Tom Stoppard film "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead")
Heraclea
Striga < Latin strix, originally a kind of owl. Now striga in Italian means a flying witch or various sorts of night-faring spooks.
Crowley = Aleister Crowley, a magician who was involved in the Golden Dawn in turn of the century England, and led a rather scandalous life.
Nectanebo was one of several pharaohs of the last native Egyptian dynasty, before Egypt was conquered, first by the Persian Empire, and then by Alexander the Great, and then by the Romans.
Li Tieh Kuai is "Iron Crutch Li", one of the eight immortals of Taoism. He was apparently fond of out of body experiences, and one of his students found him apparently dead, and cremated his body. When he returned, he had to take over the body of a crippled beggar, while of course keeping his magical kung-fu powers; thus the Iron Crutch.
Cliff_Hanger
The Science/Tech DO for Intangibility Duration is the Oscillator Overthruster. The OscillatION Overthruster was used in the movie and novel THE ADVENTURES OF BUCKAROO BANZAI to allow for passage through solid objects, by accessing the "8th Dimension", made up of all the empty space in matter.
Wizatch
Dark Waters- a reference to "Pirates of Dark Water" an old cartoon
Moth Cemetary & Barca Plaza- Could these be refernces to silence of the lambs? Barca is Hannibal's last name, think Hannibal & you associate the name with Hannibal Lecter. The other serial killer in the film, Buffalo Bill, would stuff moths in his victims' throats. Death's Head moths I believe.
Ilion
Hellions repreating the "You wouldn't want to see me mad" quote from the original Hulk television series.
WhiteRook
Major Flanders Chicken = Colonel Sanders Chicken = Kentucky Fried Chicken
megamoses
Independence Port has way too much in common with Three Mile Island. A nuclear power plant accident. It's apporximately 3 miles long, and it has alot of steel industry like Pittsburgh where Three Mile Island is located.
and extra special kudos to TheCatFanatic for reminding me of the 27B/6 reference. Believe it or not, that reference was what got me writing this thing in the first place; it just got lost in the mix.
[ QUOTE ]
LiquidX
Warriors missions dealing with Platonic Solids and
Pythagoreans, both mathematics references.
[/ QUOTE ]
Actually, its more then just Mathmatics references, its actual history. The Pythagoreans were an actual group. (Fun bonus. If you've seen Reign: The Conqueror by Peter Chung, then you also know of the Pythagoreans)
Snowcrash is such a great book. I was wondering the same thing...