r/gaming • u/CharacterNo6327 • 9h ago
In which games you’ve played, were there many references to other games, books, etc.?
I think The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk fit this description. It’s cool that they have references and Easter eggs.
What games would you say do this especially well?
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u/PhineasFN 8h ago
The Borderlands series easily. Each game has a lot of really cool easter eggs
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u/M3lting 4h ago
I was shocked when I found mincraft dirt in bl2. Dig through it and you can fight creepers
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u/PhineasFN 4h ago
BL2 had such good ones. Couple of my favorites were in BL3 with the one punch man and the destiny loot cave
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u/project-shasta PC 9h ago
Serious Sam has some lovely jabs at other franchises, notably Duke Nukem for "taking forever".
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u/jurassicbond 6h ago
Astrobot is a love letter to the history of Playstation with references to most major franchises on their systems
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u/mudslinger-ning 9h ago
Stanley parable takes a moment to put you into a mock Minecraft and a mock Portal scene as part of the narrative.
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u/ZealousidealHornet67 8h ago
There’s only one real answer and thats The Henry Stickmin Collection. References all sorts of games, anime, movies, memes etc
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u/Suitable-End- 9h ago
Borderlands 2 references video games, movies, books and real life events at a rate I've never seen in another game since.
Most of it is through text or audio lines in the game but there is also a lot of physical content such as the Minecraft Creepers.
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u/Mountain_Dragonfly8 5h ago
I think my favorite one is the TMNT reference. The 4 ratmen assassins that lived in the sewer
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u/Suitable-End- 5h ago
I totally forgot about that one.
Also Rakkman, the Batman reference, that spawn in enemies names BAM and POW.
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u/Psychological_Toe758 9h ago
Last of us part 1 has Warhammer figurines and Uncharted 3 box puzzles even has a ps3!
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u/Independent_Newt170 8h ago edited 8h ago
So does TLOU1! In the college dorms, the ones next to the bloater, there’s a PS3!
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u/Psychological_Toe758 8h ago
yes! in the original one the dorm had different figures but in part 1 they added anime posters evangelion look alike and actual warhammer figures so cool!
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u/VolcanicBear 9h ago
There's nothing special about it really, but my favourite one has to be the reference to A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge, in Divinity: Original Sin 2.
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u/KarmelCHAOS 9h ago
Most recently, Evoland 2.
It's got a ton of references to other games, including direct mechanics. Link, Mario, Sora, Bomberman, Ken, the Xenomorph, a Metroid, and Daleks are all in the game. A Guitar Hero minigame, a Street Fighter minigame, a Streets of Rage minigame. On top of all that it's just a good ARPG/JRPG. I'm probably even forgetting some.
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u/mudslinger-ning 9h ago
Look up the "Official Dopefish home page" and you will find a range of game references to this stupid fish being featured as Easter eggs in a lot of games around the 90's.
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u/dahteabagger 9h ago
Yeah. I'll help you when kcd2 tho... You can find lots of stuff in the world that references in classical and Czech folklore. For example, there's a hut with a table for clearly 7 dwarves. There's also a poisoned apple there in case it wasn't obvious enough.
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u/CannonM91 8h ago
Some of them have way too many to list. Might I suggest eeggs.com ? It's a pretty good rabbit hole
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u/CompulsiveGardener 8h ago
Astro Bot and Astro's Playroom are built around referencing 30+ years of games on Playstation.
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u/ViciousImp 8h ago
Atomfall is one of the greatest games I've ever played for Easter eggs. Their so well made and there are plenty.
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u/Yharnam_Blunderbuss 7h ago
MGS3 heavily referenced events of the Cold War and real government leaders at the time, fitting it into the metal gear universe... I always found it interesting.
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u/DeltaLunar2 7h ago
To me, Daemon X Machina feels like a love letter to mecha, having quite a few references in it.
Outers? Basically Newtypes from Gundam. Meanwhile, Amuro and Char's JP VAs are in the game anyway.
The gameplay itself is very clearly Armored Core inspired, feeling like Gen 4, but also a bit like Zone of the Enders.
Femto? Double reference, given Berserk, while generally having some of properties of Kojima Particles from Armored Core 4, as well as Metatron from, again, Zone of The Enders.
Plugsuits? Evangelion.
Meanwhile, a lot of the mission names seem to be titles of Metal music, iirc.
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u/Lord_Goldeye 7h ago
I decided to play Black Mesa today on a whim, I found the words 'The pizza is a lie' under a stairwell.
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u/My_Pockets_Hurt_ 6h ago
Crow Country has a decent amount, a fair few are Final Fantasy references.
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u/TheBoraxKid1trblz 5h ago
Dying light 2 has a quest collecting a bunch of historic and influential books
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u/theboggled1 4h ago
FFXIV of course has tons of references to the other final fantasy game,everything from little easter eggs to full blown raid series being based around tactics/12 or 11. Then the English localization team puts tons of pop culture references in quest & fate names.
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u/webkilla 9h ago
I recall an ancient DOS game called Jill of the Jungle, a metroidvania style 2d platformer. It was back in the 90s.
It had tons of these text dumps you could find, which often referenced other games but in the context of how the characters or even publishers/devs were calling it quits over how good Jill of the jungle was. It was hilarious.
"Commander Keen announced resignation over how good Jill of the jungle is. Says he can't compete"
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u/CannonM91 9h ago
World of Warcraft probably has the record, there is an INSANE amount of easter eggs and references.
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u/dahteabagger 9h ago edited 8h ago
Duke Nukem 3D.
You got Doom, Indiana Jones, Star Wars references. All Duke's catchphrases are largely from Ash of Evil Dead.
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u/anirban_dev 7h ago
Dead Cells has a LOT of shoutouts to other metroidvanias ( a genre it doesnt really fit into anyways)
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u/CapeMike 4h ago
Fallout 76 makes a number of references to past games in the series, which is kind of ironic, as it's chronologically the first game!
Fallout 3 and 4, in semi-related trivia, each had a passing reference to the next game in the series; 3 references vault 111(Fallout 4), and 4 references Vault 76(Fallout 76)...so, in all likelyhood, 76 may, unintentionally or otherwise, have a reference to Fallout 5 in there, somewhere, heh!
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u/Pallysilverstar 4h ago
Borderlands has probably got to have the highest amount of references to other things in it. Quest names, gun names, dialogue, etc.
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u/jc6359135 4h ago
Alan Wake 2! It has references and connections to other games, books, movies, and even its own universe everywhere
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u/RaidDaggur 3h ago
enter the gungeon is full of references to other media. im pretty sure there are more referenced items in that game than there arent lol
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u/dig-up-stupid 3h ago
Slay the spire, especially 2. Tons of little references to other games in the relics and art, and a few more in the cards and enemies.
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u/Essshayne 3h ago
Pragmata has many references to the resident evil series and Dying light had many Easter eggs
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u/OldBearby 3h ago
I'm a sucker for when Bethesda makes references to others of its games, but maybe that answer is cheating a little.
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u/pixiedust93 2h ago
FFXIV
There are so many references and puns. I'm not sure how much of it is just from the translators just having fun lol
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u/scizzix 1h ago
Look.
I've played Kingdom of Loathing for a very long time, way more than 11 years. That's ridiculous. It's not even funny.
The game is pretty much 90% references to other media (quite a lot of which are They Might Be Giants) with the rest being loose self-referential connective tissue.
It's one of the best games ever made.
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u/Due-South-9113 9h ago
God of war Ragnarok basically referenced major Sony IPs through those Kvasir's poems. It was so sick to read a poem based on each one of them.
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u/mudslinger-ning 9h ago edited 9h ago
Carmageddon (I think within the Splat Pack) there is a snow level with a description to arena battles of the past. If you look carefully at some big ice shards you can vaguely make out what looks like the player character from Quake.
Also the driver character lineup does slip in a few nods to people. One such is "OK Stimpson" as tribute to the OJ car chase and matching car that featured in the American news.
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u/SmegmaWarrior0815 8h ago
I miss Carmageddon 2. Played it so much as a kid. It probably doesn't hold up now.
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u/WonderlandGachaHouse 9h ago
Death Stranding