User talk:Alex the weeb/Fact-checking Tips in Ultimate
A few things[edit]
First off is regarding the "Charizard: In Its Series" tip.
I wanna point out that the info regarding Charizard "never hurting a weaker foe" actually originated from Charizard's Pokédex entry in Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire (at least, that's the earliest I could find on Bulbapedia; I ain't digging through dozens of licensed material just to find the origin of some minor piece of lore). This isn't to say the tip should be removed from this page (I mean, how many times at this point has the Pokédex spouted bullshit that probably isn't true?), but it should at least be noted that this isn't a mistake that Smash "invented" (for lack of a better term).
Second, I have one tip I wanna suggest adding here: "Donkey Kong: In His Series", which states:
Donkey Kong first wore his signature red necktie with the initials DK in Donkey Kong Country.
While the Rare incarnation of DK did first wear a tie in DK Country (which is his debut game, anyway), the idea of the Donkey Kong character in general wearing a necktie actually debuted in the 1994 Donkey Kong game for Game Boy. Since there is technically some truth to this but it still isn't 100% accurate to the history of the character as a whole, "Misleading" might be the best way to label this tip.
Up to you if you wanna add these or not. 🧥The Jacketed Terrapin🐢 16:59, July 19, 2025 (EDT)
- Consider this a bump I guess, but there's one more thing I wanna bring up on the "Hydrophobic Fighters" tip:
"Also, as far as I can tell, these fighters do not have rabies, so aquaphobia would be more fitting."
- Recently, it was brought to my attention that Merriam-Webster not only uses "a morbid dread of water" as a valid meaning for hydrophobia, but they don't even consider "aquaphobia" to be a valid word (note the link for "aquaphobia" I put up leads to a non-existent page).
That being said, several other online dictionaries* that I could find do consider "aquaphobia" a valid term, so either Merriam-Webster isn't even aware of the term or they're just very stubborn about it, for whatever reason. Regarding "hydrophobia", while several sources** I could find do mention it as a symptom of rabies, they never actually explicitly state it is exclusively such (the most I could find is "especially as a symptom of rabies"; the "especially" implies there are cases of non-rabies hydrophobia, they're just nowhere near as prominent). Even when they do, they often have a secondary meaning that describes it as a valid synonym for aquaphobia, anyway.
*Cambridge Dictionary, Dictionary.com, Wiktionary
**Google search, Cambridge Dictionary, Dictionary.com, Wiktionary
- In short, while "aquaphobia" might be less vague in conveying the intended meaning of "fear of water", "hydrophobia", while more often associated with rabies, isn't necessarily an incorrect term either. 🧥The Jacketed Terrapin🐢 17:12, September 21, 2025 (EDT)
So, tracking down the origins of all the mistakes in the tips would probably take a really long time, and ultimately I don't think it's THAT important where the myths first came from, but rather that they made it into Ultimate's tips unchecked. Also regarding the Donkey Kong thing, it's generally accepted that the RareWare incarnation of Donkey Kong is the first appearance of the Donkey Kong we know today, with the Donkey Kongs of the past being ancestors of his (usually his grandfather iirc). So DKC would be the first time that the Donkey Kong playable in Ultimate wore a tie. They likely didn't include references to earlier DKs due to only having a limited amount of space in each tip, and I don't really consider that to be all that misleading.
Regarding the hydrophobia thing, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to take a hard stance on this. While hydrophobia is the technically correct term based on how phobias are typically named, in modern-day English the term "hydrophobia" either refers to a property of some solids where water bounces right off them, or the aversion to water specifically caused by the disease rabies (or in some cases, the disease itself). Since the word is so strongly tied to these meanings which obviously don't fit what we typically consider to be a phobia, I don't really think the technical definition of hydrophobia is an appropriate use of the word anymore. Aquaphobia as a more general term for fear of water seems more appropriate (although in the case of Sonic, thalassophobia might be more fitting, since he's afraid of swimming/drowning, rather than water in general). Also, I don't put much stock in what Webster's dictionary says in general, since they're often quite slow to adapt, and there are many superior online dictionaries out there imo. I'm not really sure why Americans tend to consider them the gold standard. Alex the Weeb 18:21, September 21, 2025 (EDT)
- Time for some responses:
- Origins of tip mistakes: Eh, I was only really concerned with the Charizard tip and not carryover mistakes in general, but I getcha.
- Donkey Kong's tie: For the record, Smash has more often than not considered DK to be more of a legacy character rather than explicitly treat Rare DK as his own distinct character (note his All-Star Mode placement in both Smash 4 and Ultimate grouping him among the other 80s fighters, as well as his appearances in the 80's Classics conquest and Bringing Back the '80s event tourney), so that's why I brought up the "DK actually first wore his tie in the 1994 Game Boy game" point. Overall though, this is something that probably doesn't really matter in the grand scheme of things, so if you still wanna disregard Smash counting the arcade game as DK's debut, then I won't complain.
- Hydrophobia vs. Aquaphobia: Admittedly, I am no expert in the English language, so I don't really have anything to add to this. 🧥The Jacketed Terrapin🐢 10:58, September 22, 2025 (EDT)
