Fighting Scientists?

[KerfuffleMach2]

Okay, so I'm slowly working on an idea for a game. It was inspired by a t-shirt I saw on Think Geek. It will be a fighting game. Most likely done in Flash. I would like different ideas for characters. When thinking of characters, I recommend going by this question:

If you could see any two scientists or inventors, real or fictional, dead or alive, duke it out, who would you want to see?

So far, I got the following:

Tesla
Edison
Ford
Curie
Goodall
Carver
Nobel
Wright Brothers
Brown (a secret character)
Nye (a secret character)
Da Vinci
Galileo
Einstein
Franklin
Hawking
Newton
Darwin

[GungHo]

Neil DeGrasse Tyson. Problem is he could actually win a fight.

Michio Kaku

[Icedaemon]

It's awfully post-renaissance west biased. Maybe add a few Chinese and Indian inventors. Which Nye and Brown do you mean, I can't recall any great minds with those surnames, but wikipedia suggests a large list of Nyes?

For secret characters and/or bosses, Archimedes, Heron and/or Ktesibios (or Ctesibius, however it is spelled in N America) would serve far better, methinks.

[KerfuffleMach2]

It's awfully post-renaissance west biased. Maybe add a few Chinese and Indian inventors. Which Nye and Brown do you mean, I can't recall any great minds with those surnames, but wikipedia suggests a large list of Nyes?

For secret characters and/or bosses, Archimedes, Heron and/or Ktesibios (or Ctesibius, however it is spelled in N America) would serve far better, methinks.

Well, since I was thinking of including a few fictional scientists...

Brown is Doctor Emmett Brown, from Back to the Future. And Nye is Bill Nye the Science Guy.

I was planning on having the main boss being GLaDOS.

[Weezer]

How could you forget the premiere fighting scientist of them all, the illustrious Gordon Freeman!

[Icedaemon]

If you go with the 'fictional characters are secret' route, I would advise Brown and Freeman over Nye - I've never heard of him and doubt many other Europeans have either. GlaDOS could thus be the secret bonus boss, who would require fulfilling some hidden bonus objectives to activate. The real-world listed scientists are all famous enough for most people to know of them.

Of the chinese, Ma Jun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ma_Jun) and Jiao Yu (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiao_Yu) are good examples, though despite both considerably advancing a field of science or technology, they are rather unknown in the western world.

[SlyGuyMcFly]

I'd like to see (Sir) Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman. Dude had an awesome name, after all.

[Cogwheel]

Nicholas Flamel? Please?

Also, maybe Paracelsus and I wish I knew more non-European scientists. They shouldn't be hard to find: Between them, ancient China/Egypt practically invented half the world.



How could you forget the premiere fighting scientist of them all, the illustrious Gordon Freeman!

The technical term is fightingest scientist.

[KerfuffleMach2]

The main reason I stuck Bill Nye in there is to have a character that copied others' fighting styles.

[Science Officer]

Surely you're joking that Dr. Feynman isn't on that list!

Dr. Oppenheimer would seem like a choice, but even though he was become death, destroyer of worlds, he was kind of a wussy hippy, IIRC.

Archimedes, Sir Francis Bacon, Sir Isaac Newton, Lavoisier, Wernher Von Braun (but only if he could throw busts of Wernher Von Braun at people)

[OracleofWuffing]

How about Schrodinger (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schrodinger)? He could have an attack where he throws a cat at his enemy half the time.

[Mistral]

Dr. Oppenheimer would seem like a choice, but even though he was become death, destroyer of worlds, he was kind of a wussy hippy, IIRC.

In that case, look no further than Edward Teller, Mister "Let's build a harbor with nukes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Plowshare)" himself. In addition to giving us that, boosted fission, and the hydrogen bomb, he also decided that shooting down ICBMs with normal lasers mounted on killsats still wasn't Science! enough, so he convinced Reagan to let him design lasers that would be fueled by blowing up nuclear bombs inside of them (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Excalibur). He really loved his nukes. His taunt can even be using his IgNobel Peace Prize, awarded for "his lifelong efforts to change the meaning of peace as we know it."

[Geno9999]

How about Schrodinger (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schrodinger)? He could have an attack where he throws a cat at his enemy half the time.

No no no, he throws a box, which has a 50/50 chance of spewing poison, or a cat that scratches the opponent's face.

[TheSummoner]

No, no, no.

Schrodinger throws a box. The box deals very little damage, but it isn't entirely harmless. 50% of the time a cat comes out and starts scratching away at his opponent. 50% of the time, the box is empty (or a dead cat falls out) and it just leaves him open to attack.

To compensate, when it DOES work, the attack is fairly effective, but when it fails, he's open for long enough to make the move risky.

[Siosilvar]

fictional

Mordin Solus.

Of course, his moves would consist only of "shoot in face", "ice grenade", "fire grenade", "poison/paralyse things" and "sing", so I'm not sure how well he'd fit into a fighting game.

[OracleofWuffing]

Archimedes, Sir Francis Bacon, Sir Isaac Newton, Lavoisier, Wernher Von Braun (but only if he could throw busts of Wernher Von Braun at people)
Glanced over that one the first time through the topic. Does he get to make some 12-15 punches/kicks after he's been beaten?

[Science Officer]

Glanced over that one the first time through the topic. Does he get to make some 12-15 punches/kicks after he's been beaten?

That, or phlogiston hadoken.

I hadn't really thought about what any of them would do, just scientists that I liked that were less modern and american.
Silly fighting games are silly. I could suggest more abilities for mathematicians/philosophers.

Also, OP, have you heard of M.U.G.E.N. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.U.G.E.N)? I have not ever used, and have no idea how practical that would be, but it's a cool idea.

[Icedaemon]

The main reason I stuck Bill Nye in there is to have a character that copied others' fighting styles.

Couldn't Edison do that? His major special skill was stealing others inventions, so copying moves makes sense.

Also, looking over the list, adding Hawking might be slightly poor taste.

Additionally, Ford did not really invent all that much - he was the patron of mass production whose business practices led to an increase in industrialization, but that's it.

On the other hand, Brunel actually was a great engineer, architect and designer.

[KerfuffleMach2]

Also, OP, have you heard of M.U.G.E.N. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.U.G.E.N)? I have not ever used, and have no idea how practical that would be, but it's a cool idea.

I have, but I was looking to make this myself. At least the coding part. I'll probably find somebody to do the art.


Couldn't Edison do that? His major special skill was stealing others inventions, so copying moves makes sense.

Also, looking over the list, adding Hawking might be slightly poor taste.

Additionally, Ford did not really invent all that much - he was the patron of mass production whose business practices led to an increase in industrialization, but that's it.

On the other hand, Brunel actually was a great engineer, architect and designer.

Edison did enough by himself to count. Plus, I'm sure Tesla vs. Edison would be popular.

Eh, I wasn't too sure about Hawking. I could have him as the guy who runs the tutorial/training mode.

Ford did invent the assembly line, and helped invent charcoal. I was thinking of making him a speed character. Since assembly lines make production faster.


Well, I'm getting quite a few names I didn't even think of, and ones I never knew. Guess I got some more research to do.

[GungHo]

Well, since I was thinking of including a few fictional scientists...

Brown is Doctor Emmett Brown, from Back to the Future. And Nye is Bill Nye the Science Guy.
I could be reading this wrong, but Bill Nye isn't a fictional scientist. He's a real one... aeronautics & ME. Doesn't have a doctorate (well, honorary), but he engineered functional equipment for Boeing and NASA.

[nooblade]

Going from a more scholarly than popular angle, to be honest, I can't see any of these people in a real fight.

Euler
Gauss
Maxwell
Hertz
Fourier
Laplace
Paul Dirac
Oliver Heavyside
Aleksandr Lyapunov

From my own limited experience. Games that are about scientists usually don't even scratch the surface. :smalltongue: Mention one popular guy and everyone is like, "OMG! It's about SCIENCE!" It's a handful of buzzwords. It's like Jersey Shore with big wigs.

[Forbiddenwar]

Ford did invent the assembly line

Actually the division of labor in a moving process was first developed by Adam Smith (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assembly_line), Mr. Wealth of Nations himself, regarding the manufacture of pins. Ford just applied the concept to vehicle manufacturing, (it had long been applied to textiles, printing and other trades)

So How about Gutenberg and Adam Smith?
Samantha Carter is an idea for a fictional scientist.

[FoeHammer]

How OTT is this planned on being? Is this just going to be smart people punching each other, or some cartoony explosion fest fueled by ridiculous moves? To be honest, the second would definitely be more fun, so don't feel to constricted by what these people actually did.

[OracleofWuffing]

I could be reading this wrong, but Bill Nye isn't a fictional scientist. He's a real one... aeronautics & ME. Doesn't have a doctorate (well, honorary), but he engineered functional equipment for Boeing and NASA.
Ooh! Oooh! Did stuff for NASA? That means we could have Randall Munroe!

[Pinnacle]

Fictional scientists are okay, and nobody said Agatha Heterodyne (http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php)?

I guess she's not really on the same power level of the others, though.

[Talesin]

Dmitri Mendeleev - Father of the periodic table

I guess it'd be hard to get some of them recognised for what they actually did. If you want engineers too then Isembard Kingdom Brunel would also get my vote.

[Weezer]

I guess it'd be hard to get some of them recognised for what they actually did. If you want engineers too then Isembard Kingdom Brunel would also get my vote.

Never heard of this guy before but he has one of the most epic names I've ever come across and some quick googling seems to indicate that he lived up to that name.

[Talesin]

Never heard of this guy before but he has one of the most epic names I've ever come across and some quick googling seems to indicate that he lived up to that name.

He actually won a poll by the BBC (British Broadcast Company) and was named the greatest briton who ever lived. But I guess outside of at least England he's no as well known as the others on the list.

[Knaight]

I'd add Charles, Boyle, and Guy-Lussac to the western group, as well as Hermann Staudinger.

Hermann Staudinger is the reason we understand polymers. He essentially discovered what they actually are, and almost every modern discovery regarding polymers would have been impossible without him. Take a look around you - do you see plastic anywhere? If so, Staudinger is partially responsible.

Jābir ibn Hayyān is absolutely necessary. He essentially created modern chemistry from alchemy (Boyle often gets the credit for this, which is nonsense), and was a notable polymath who advanced several fields of science.

Ibn Sahl is another important figure. Among other things, he greatly developed mirrors and lenses, and paved the way for another great figure.

Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen) further developed optics. Moreover, he experimentally showed that both of the theories regarding vision present in his life time were wrong, and that eyes neither projected light to see nor was entered by physical objects but instead observed rays of light. He also essentially figured out how the eye actually worked in some detail.

[Surrealistik]

Gordon Freeman obviously; c'mon man.

[Hunter Noventa]

Alton Brown ought to be there. He's a food scientist after all.

[Prime32]

Needs Planck (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Planck).

[Cogwheel]

Needs Planck (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Planck).

With Planck time as some sort of bullet-time mechanic. Mostly because "stop, Planck time" is a bit too silly.

Or he could just hit people with a wooden board I guess.