The 'Shroom:Issue 221/Pipe Plaza

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Director's Notes

Written by: Zange (talk)

Shroom2019 Zange.png

Hello and Happy August!! It feels INCREDIBLY bizarre having an issue of The 'Shroom release this late into the month, but part of that is because of fabulous AWARDS that were last week! I think that's the latest I remember Awards being in the month too, funny how the ways of the calendar work... Anyways, if you haven't already you SHOULD check out all the awards presentations on the forum!! The way I like to see it is everyone pours a little bit of themselves into their presentations and that's pretty amazing ^^

I have just had what is possibly one of the WILDEST weeks of my life in a long time, but I'm capping it out by seeing a Japanese punk rock band (TsuShiMaMiRe) at a live music bar in my town the day this issue goes up!! Unless it's either an act in a specific niche (we get lots of country music artists...) or a stadium-worthy artist, music tours almost NEVER come to Iowa, let alone foreign music!! So I KNEW I had to go see this band. Honestly, this month has kind of turned me into a live music junkie. I saw The Velveteers live at the beginning of the month, and near the middle I saw a band called Monsoon perform at the same bar I'm going to tonight. I definitely bought T-shirts and CDs from both bands... No regrets though!!!

As always, we have some cool and awesome things here for you in Pipe Plaza! You, too, can become part of the cool and awesome things we have going on here in Pipe Plaza by just going to the sign up page to learn more!

That's all I have for you this time, enjoy your month ^^

Section of the Month

Congratulations to this month's winners! In first place, we have Shoey (talk) with What's in a Campaign?! Taking second is Sparks (talk) with Poll Committee Discussion, and rounding us out at third is Trig Jegman (talk) with NIWA News! Thank you to everyone who votes for their favorite sections as well.

PIPE PLAZA SECTION OF THE MONTH
Place Section Votes % Writer
1st What's in a Campaign? 6 35.29% Shoey (talk)
2nd Poll Committee Discussion 4 23.53% Sparks (talk)
3rd NIWA News 3 17.65% Trig Jegman (talk)
News and information
Mario Calendar
GPM1000 (talk)
Find out all about this month's Super Mario releases.
read more
To-Do Tracker
Camwoodstock (talk)
No clue what to do? Join the fun and see what's been done!
read more
Anniversary Announcements
Lakituthequick (talk)
The ongoings of the Mario Awards.
read more
The 'Shroom Report
Waluigi Time (talk)
All the latest writers and all the milestones of the current ones.
read more
What's in a Campaign?
Shoey (talk)
Find me where the Wild Thing is.
read more

Mario Calendar

Written by: GPM1000 (talk)

Hello everyone! I hope you guys have all had a fantastic August, and I have just the news… I have the perfect way to end it with a bang! Another issue of Mario Calendar, of course. I'm sure you're all used to it by now, but it's been a while since I've properly introduced this segment! I'm GPM, and this is Mario Calendar. Here, I tell you every single game that came out in any given month! It's August, so let's get into every Mario game that has ever come out in the month of August!

Region Abbreviations

Abb. Region
ALL All Regions (JP/NA/EU/AU)
JP Japan
NA North America
EU Europe
AU Oceania/Australia
SK South Korea
CHN China
UK United Kingdom

Console Abbreviations

Abb. Console
NES Nintendo Entertainment System
Famicom Family Computer Disk System
SNES Super Nintendo Entertainment System
N64 Nintendo 64
GC Nintendo GameCube
GB Game Boy
GBC Game Boy Color
GBA Game Boy Advance
DS Nintendo DS
3DS Nintendo 3DS
Switch Nintendo Switch
Wii VC Nintendo Wii Virtual Console
3DS VC Nintendo 3DS Virtual Console
Wii U VC Nintendo Wii U Virtual Console
VB Virtual Boy
G&W Game and Watch
64DD Nintendo 64 Disk Drive
MS-DOS Microsoft Disk Operating System
CD-i Philips CD-i
IQ iQue Player
NVS Nvidia Shield
ACPC Amstrad CPC
ZX ZX Spectrum
Coleco Colecovision
TI-99 Texas Instruments TI-99/4A


I said this exact thing last year, but I feel like I NEED to say it again. How on Earth does it go from August 11 to August 17?? Every month, there are obviously spots where there aren't a lot of exciting releases. But usually there's SOMETHING. For the better part of a week, there's literally nothing. That kind of just shows how rough this month is for Mario releases overall.

But, it's not without its few bright spots! In Japan, we saw the release of the original Super Mario Kart, which obviously began what shaped into one of the greatest video game series of all time. And in North America, we got the release of Super Mario World, which is just one of the best 2D Mario games of all time. But other than that, there's not a lot.

But it's okay! As we build up to the end of the year, we'll get more consistent awesome releases. So I guess we'll have to see if we have much better to work with next month! But, until then, I hope you have a great rest of your day :)

To-Do Tracker

Written by: Cam / Tori / Cecil / Claire / Macy (talk)

Welcome back, there! Awards season has come-and-gone (...mostly, there's a few community events still ongoing), and one of you actually chose to vote for the shroomtable rightline CSS class. We've never been prouder.

...Okay, but actually, the awards ceremonies this year were super cool. If you somehow missed 'em, and needed us to tell you to check them out, we're glad we told you to do that! We've truly never been more proud to be a part of the strange little corner of the internet that is the Mario Wiki, and that's saying something. It's truly something else, having gone from a lurker all the way back when we were a kid, and seeing this place grow into what it is today, that's all we're sayin'.

But, enough about something that's passed! What about what's currently going-on? As usual, we're here to illuminate the shiny deets and give a peel behind the curtain for what's been done, and what still has to be done.

Note: All dates here, unless otherwise denoted, were taken fairly late at night in EST; around 1-3 AM EST. In this case, August 27, 2025 was taken at 8:22 PM EST.

July & August To-Do Items
To-Do Item Jul 16, 2025 Jul 23, 2025 Jul 30, 2025 Aug 6, 2025 Aug 13, 2025 Aug 20, 2025 Aug 27, 2025
Spotlight focuses 2 10 8 8 7 6 6
Ongoing TPPs 6 5 13 13 13 14 6
Unimplemented Proposals 30+ 30+ 30+ 30+ 30+ 30+ 30+
Unresolved Discussions 277 276 275 276 277 279 283
Construction Projects 105 117 119 122 124 126 125
Rewrites Needed 135 136 137 136 138 139 139
Sourcing Issues 19,845 19,745 19,736 19,743 19,633 19,600 19,606
Stub Articles 735 737 739 736 746 752 758
Wanted Articles 1000+ 1000+ 1000+ 1000+ 1000+ 1000+ 1000+
Requested Deletions N/A N/A N/A 1 3 2 3
Suggested Moves 65 62 65 63 62 60 61
Suggested Merges 57 58 58 59 59 59 61
Suggested Splits 47 51 53 57 58 58 62
Deprecated Parameters 143 N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A
Disambigs Needed N/A N/A N/A 1 N/A N/A N/A
Broken File Links N/A N/A 1 N/A N/A N/A N/A
Unknown Meanings N/A 2 6 N/A N/A 3 N/A
Upload Issues N/A N/A 1 N/A N/A N/A N/A
Image Quality 3,877 3,881 3,899 3,890 3,874 3,892 3,887
Images Needed 693 700 714 718 720 723 735
Media Needed 342 358 378 394 399 404 412
Media Quality 5 6 5 5 5 3 3
Post-trim Updates N/A 1 N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A
Unused Files 100+ 100+ 100+ 100+ 100+ 100+ 100+
Files To Be Used 16 15 16 16 16 16 16

For some observations for how the numbers have progressed, and some potential targets:

  • We've had an influx of construction projects and stub articles, no doubt because of how dense a game like the newly-released Donkey Kong Bananza is. It's nothing to worry about yet, but if they stick around for too long, we might need a clean-up crew. Definitely keep your eyes peeled!
  • Sourcing has continued its steady descent, losing well over 100 entries. Any progress is good progress, but if you're willing to help take on the 17,200+ foreign names that still need citing, now's as good a time as any!
  • Out of the trio of moves, merges, and splits, they all sit comfortably neck-and-neck... But, that's not necessarily a good thing; while moves and merges have held rather steady, splits has gained quite a few entries.
  • Media Needed continues its rise, and the grim reality of 400+ entries in it has been achieved. It may very well reach over 500 by year's end. If there's something we'd suggest honing in on, it'd be this one!
  • Media Quality has definitely seen the most impressive shift in terms of percentage--a whole 40% of its entries have been taken care of! 'Course, that's because it went from 5 entries to 3, but that's still nothing to scoff at. Just a trio of files remain for it. If you own the 2023 Super Mario Bros. Movie, The Super Mario Bros. Super Show!, or know how to fix audio de-sync in a video, this could be your shining moment!

Anniversary Announcements

Written by: Lakituthequick (talk)

“Anyway, I just submitted my presentation. Look forward to seeing it as part of the 2023 Mario Awards.”
—GBA (talk · Boards)

Good day, dear readers! Welcome to a new edition of Anniversary Announcements, the one directly after the big event! Let us talk about that.

The ceremony

Indeed, the 19th Mario Awards ceremony took place last week on Friday, the 22nd of August! Thank you to all presenters and all those attending for another unforgettable year!

All presentations in the Community, Fail, and of course the Mario Awards, can be viewed in their respective threads.
Logs of the chat party that took place on Discord are also archived and will be published at a later time, but can be read through on Discord itself in the meantime.

Tournaments

In this section of AA, I shall update you on all things tournaments, including new ones and progress in ongoing ones.

Of course, presentations and the ceremony shadowed the scene, but there are a few activities nonetheless.

The Mega Brawl Mines
A new, experimental game which has a small group of players divided into two teams, engaging in freeform exploration and battles on a defined map over semi-live sessions.
The game has advanced to the second map of the first level, but has been paused until Sunday due to player and host availability.
The Scribble Circuit 2025
A new entry in the Scribble series of games, hosted by last year's winner as per tradition. This game is about making a drawing to a prompt in a timeframe of three hours, on a small square canvas with only white, black, and a single colour personal to each player.
New this year is the addition of an additional challenge prompt that players can optionally take, which has additional rules that make it differ from the regular versus prompts. Also new, carried over as a positively received experiment from Scribble Labs 2 hosted earlier this year, is the Inktoplasm feature, in which random players from a dedicated pool are also matched up (originally to fill out odd numbers of players), as well as filling in when a regular player is unable to submit. Inktoplasm players don't need to participate in the regular tournament.
The third round of this tournament is currently ongoing, with the submission window closing on Wednesdays.

The events and games thread can be used to discuss and gauge interest for future activities.

We're in the post-ceremony now, but let's bring the season home without a hurry, shall we? Thanks again for reading, and until next month, have a good one. Ciao!

The 'Shroom Report

Written by: Waluigi Time (talk)

Hello there, 'Shroom readers! I have the neat data from Issue 220, but what I don't have is anything interesting to say in the opener, so I'm just going to move on now. Thanks as always to Meta Knight, the keeper of the spreadsheets!

As a slight change from last time, I'm updating first sections written in a team to only count for established writers (i.e. someone who's already written at least one section), otherwise it's just rehashing all the information in First-Time Writers and I decided that's redundant.

For new readers or anyone needing a refresher, please open the box below.

​
  • First-Time Writers lists everyone who wrote their first section for The 'Shroom in the previous issue.
  • New Sections lists recurring sections that started their run in the previous issue. This includes returning sections that previously went inactive.
  • Guest Sections lists one-off submissions from the previous issue.
  • Milestones covers certain section numbers reached in the previous issue. Writers are mentioned for every 10 sections written in a team and every 50 sections written overall, teams are mentioned for every 100 sections, and The 'Shroom itself is mentioned for every 500 sections. Additionally, established writers are mentioned the first time they contribute to a particular team.
  • Most Sections Written lists the current all-time record holders.
First-Time Writers
Writer Section
DrkLrdHmGree3856 (talk) Poems from the Other Side
Hint Toad (talk) Mushroom Kingdom Comics!
Trig Jegman (talk) NIWA News
New Sections
Section Writer
Police Blotter Shoey (talk)
Mushroom Kingdom Comics! Hint Toad (talk)
Paper Mario: The Door Ash
Poems from the Other Side DrkLrdHmGree3856 (talk)
NIWA News Trig Jegman (talk)
Guest Sections
Section Writer
News Flush Shoey (talk)
Weather Forecast ClawgripFan9001
Die WAH With A Vengeance ClawgripFan9001
Random Image of the Month Shoey (talk)
Shoey's Shoetacular Reviews Shoey (talk)
Welcome To Cosmo Kart TheBlueCatMenace
Milestones
Writer Milestone
ClawgripFan9001 50 Fake News sections
FunkyK38 (talk) 210 Palette Swap sections
Roserade (talk) 90 Fun Stuff sections
10 Strategy Wing sections
Shoey (talk) 160 Fun Stuff sections
30 Palette Swap sections
60 Pipe Plaza sections
Sparks (talk) 10 Main/Staff sections
20 Strategy Wing sections
Waluigi Time (talk) 40 Fun Stuff sections
Most Sections Written
Team Writer Number of Sections
Main/Staff Henry Tucayo Clay (talk) 142
Fake News Waluigi Time (talk) 167
Fun Stuff Shoey (talk) 161
Palette Swap FunkyK38 (talk) 210
Pipe Plaza Yoshi876 (talk) 128
Critic Corner Hypnotoad (talk) 212
Strategy Wing Hooded Pitohui (talk) 158
Overall Yoshi876 (talk) 747
'Shroom Trivia
Of the currently running 'Shroom sections, Anton's Half-Baked Reviews and Anniversary Announcements were the first to receive a top 3 placement in the Community Awards (Shroom Awards at the time). In 2017, Half-Baked Reviews tied with two other sections for first place on Favorite Written 'Shroom Section of the Past Year, and Anniversary Announcements took second place on Best 'Shroom Section Design.

What's in a Campaign?

Written By: Shoey (talk)

Hello and welcome back to What's in a Campaign? a section where I look at various competitors from the hit show Robot Wars. Last month, we looked at a childhood Shoey favorite in the Series 4 run of The Morgue. This month, we're going to look at both an adult Shoey and What's in a Campaign? general favorite by focusing in on the Series 6 run of Wild Thing.

When plastic surgery goes wrong!

The last iteration of the ever-present Thing series of robots built by one of Robot Wars' best drivers Nick Addams and his daughter Isabelle Adams, Wild Thing 2, as it's officially known (which is odd because this this the 3rd version of Wild Thing) is completely different from any of its predecessors. Gone is its signature two-wheel wedge shape with lifter arm weapon/self-righter. Also gone is the aesthetically-pleasing-if-not-somewhat-useless 12kg spinning disc it sported for Series 5 (that looks so good in both pictures and on the Robot Wars toy I have. Instead, Wild Thing 2 is now a compact, flat, invertible, and two-wheeled robot with a cutting disc as a weapon… Boring!

What a great design!

So what happened? Well, Wild Thing had always suffered from one major problem - its inability to do damage. You have to remember that damage was easily worth the most amount of points in the classic Robot Wars format. So what would usually happen is, Wild Thing, which was one of the most reliable and steady robots in the field, would spend most of its fights against the upper echelon of Robot Wars getting bodied in the first half of the fight before coming alive in the second half as its opponents naturally slowed down from wear and tear. Good examples of this are its fights against Hypno-Disc in Series 4 and Chaos 2 in Series 5. But since Wild Thing couldn't really do damage, it often wasn't able to overcome the point deficit against those heavy hitters and would lose via judges' decision.

They had tried to fix that in Series 5 with the 12kg disc, but it didn't really work. The disc rarely caused damage to robots that weren't Napalm, and it oftentimes would stop upon hitting its opponents. This also made its signature wedge significantly less useful because robots like Tornado could simply tank the weak disc's blows and position themselves under the disc, allowing them to push Wild Thing around. In addition, the two-wheel design left the wheels completely exposed, meaning that robots with big powerful discs like Hypno-Disc could shred them. Finally, and while this only happened once, the self-righting arm (that was originally a mediocre-to-bad lifting arm) once proved to be an Achilles heel against Firestorm, with the extended arm getting stuck in the arena. Plus, you know, with flippers getting so much better year-to-year, you probably want a more reliable and faster self-righting system.

All that taken into consideration, I can see the logic of deciding to try something new, but this I just don't like, and it's all because of the blade. It's a thin cutting disc that only spins at 1500rpm. Your 12kg disc from the last series spun four times faster and did nothing! What do you think this puny disc is gonna do??? I don't like tiny discs because, other than Pussycat who was sporting a custom-built sawblade, they never work. They don't have enough oomph to cut through your opponent. And now you don't even have the lip of the wedge you used to have, so you've got no pushing power. I just think this design is a total downgrade from Series 5 Wild Thing. Also, your wheels are still technically exposed! I know all of Series 6 has about three axe bots you should be afraid of, but I'm just throwing that out there!

As a robot that had never failed to make the semi-finals, Wild Thing was naturally given a seed. This time, much like Series 5, Wild Thing was given the 9th seed and placed into Heat E. Its first-round fight has it go up against a pretty solid lineup, facing off against the mastodon of Robot Wars Vader, UFO, and aw man another of my favorites, The Stag! The fight (1:30) starts with Wild Thing driving with into the claws of The Stag as Vader and UFO tussle. The Stag and Wild Thing 2 push each other around as the claws of The Stag prevent Wild Thing 2's disc from "cutting" into them.

Oh no, my two great loves are fighting? Who do I choose???

UFO and Vader then arrive to break up this party as The Stag and Wild Thing 2 split apart from each other. Vader then turns into The Stag and shows Wild Thing 2 what a real blade is by cutting off part of The Stag's wheels. The two spinning disc machines team up, with Vader attacking The Stag's claws while Wild Thing 2 attacks The Stag's shell. Wild Thing 2 continues to attack the backside of The Stag, who is now sporting a messed-up wheel and a bent claw, sending them into the clutches of Sir Killalot. Despite having messed-up claws and being harassed by Sir Killalot, The Stag still manages to get a grip on Wild Thing 2 as UFO rams Wild Thing 2 from the backside. Vader gives chase to Wild Thing 2 as Sir Killalot picks up The Stag and spins it around and around, even slamming it into the arena wall before nearly falling on its face from the force of its own spins! Wild Thing 2 rams Vader head-on, stopping Vader's blade in its tracks, which is pretty impressive.

Carnage!

UFO is then knocked out. They don't show the killing blow, but I'm pretty sure as Wild Thing 2 was running away after making contact with Vader, UFO went in for an attack and got clobbered to death by Vader's disc! Oh, also, The Stag is dead! Probably from being thrown by Sir Killalot! As The Stag is being counted out, suddenly UFO comes back to life! Meanwhile, Wild Thing 2 and Vader tussle! In the process of that tussle, Wild Thing 2 somehow disables Vader's disc! The fight then goes to a judges' decision, but not before UFO decides to pit The Stag… which, like, mates, I don't think you get points for attacking a counted-out robot! The judges rule that Wild Thing 2 and Vader move onto the second round!

Wild Thing 2's second fight (7:00) is probably one of the most famous fights in the entirety of Series 6, if not all of Robot Wars. It's a fight we've covered before, a long, long time ago. Wild Thing 2 faces off against the horrifying 259. Wild Thing 2 starts the fight desperately trying to get away from 259 and trying to find some sort of avenue for an attack. But finally 259 has them corned and, for about thirty seconds, oh man guys, it sucks to be Wild Thing 2. Over and over again, 259 hits Wild Thing 2 with its blade. flipping them in the air and sending bits flying. Wild Thing 2 can't do anything in the face of this assault. But while I may not like Wild Thing 2 as a design, it's still a Wild Thing robot, which means it basically can't be killed. And Wild Thing 2 manages to survive this assault and manages to get to the side of 259. Safe from 259's blade, it begins pushing it around a little, including into the arena wall in a desperate counterattack.

YOU FOOL, 259! YOU'VE ACTIVATED WILD THING 2'S TRAP CARD!

Unfortunately for Wild Thing 2, that reprieve doesn't last long, as 259 escapes the wall and again just clobbers Wild Thing 2 with its disc. But this kind of works out for Wild Thing 2, because, in the process of kicking Wild Thing 2's ass, one of the weapon chains on 259's disc breaks off, rendering it incapable of spinning. This also might technically be counted as damage points for Wild Thing 2? Or maybe points against 259? Idk, release the scorecards, you cowards!

Now you'd think this would be the time for Wild Thing 2 to strike, right? NOPE! Instead, 259 manages to get to the side of Wild Thing 2's tiny disc and push Wild Thing 2 around. That's right! Wild Thing 2 is getting bodied by a giant disc machine with no disc! But still discless and scared, 259 runs away from Wild Thing 2 before pushing the pit button (the move of every coward). Wild Thing 2 attempts to push 259 around, but they keep getting stuck on the smooth body of 259 and being pushed around instead. I'm gonna level with you guys; the rest of the fight is a whole lot of nothing! 259 attempts to bait Wild Thing 2 into the pit. Wild Thing 2 pushes 259 over the flame pit. But it's mostly ineffective pushing from two robots who can't really do anything to each other. And then 259 just sort of breaks down???

Never get into a land war in Asia and never get into a battle of attrition with Wild Thing.

I'm not sure if it's because Wild Thing 2 was on top of it as it was driving around and the weight caused something to break or if it's just a random breakdown? Either way, it's here where things get controversial. So, 259 breaks down, right? Now normally that's an automatic loss, but technically it shouldn't be the case here. See, 259 was immobilized for 26 seconds before the fight ended, but the rule is that a robot has to be immobilized for 30 seconds in order to be considered immobilized. So technically, the fight should have gone to a judges' decision where 259 should have been declared the winner on the basis that it scored lots of points and, by my count, Wild Thing 2 scored none! But the judges instead ruled in favor of Wild Thing 2 on the basis of 259's immobilization. Now some people don't like that because, again, 259 wasn't immobilized long enough to be considered immobilized by the rules. I, on the other hand, am in favor of the judges' position because, like, you shouldn't be saved by the bell when you're clearly immobile, especially when the difference is a measly 4 seconds. Regardless, Wild Thing 2 is sent into the heat final in a rematch against Vader.


Wild Thing 2 would start the heat final (13:25) hot, immediately charging at Vader and meeting Vader disc-to-disc before getting at the back of Vader and sending Vader running. With Wild Thing 2 giving chase, Vader would take advantage, turning its blade onto Wild Thing 2 and scoring a shot to the side of Wild Thing 2. But Wild Thing 2 refused to back down, again slamming blade-to-blade into Vader, with the blade of Vader having seemingly no effect.

You'd think the blade of Vader would be superior to Wild Thing 2's.

Wild Thing 2 continues the pressure by meeting Vader's blade with its body, jamming it before pushing Vader into Shunt, lands an axe blow to the top of Vader. Wild Thing 2 and Vader begin a shoving match, with Wild Thing 2 getting the advantage and pushing Vader around the arena. Jonathan Pierce then begins talking about Wild Thing 2 flipping Vader over and how Vader doesn't have a self-righter. Which, yeah, I'm sure Wild Thing 2's 1500rpm blade is gonna have enough force to flip Vader over! Finally, the house robots get bored of this shoving match and break it up, sending Vader fleeing and Wild Thing 2 pursuing. Wild Thing 2 hits the back of Vader, sending sparks flying. Wild Thing 2 continues its aggression, again meeting Vader blade against blade and again backing Vader down as it pushes Vader into the wall. The two battle it out on the flame pit, spinning around and trying to hit each other. Vader then briefly stops and during this time Wild Thing 2 drives its blade through Vader's armor. Wild Thing 2 pushes Vader into the CPZ and Shunt puts its axe right between the blade of Vader. It's pretty cool.

TINY BLADE > BIG BLADE?????

Wild Thing 2 and Vader are stuck together, with Wild Thing 2's disc stuck into the side armor of Vader. The house robots and Refbot attempt to get them unstuck (unsuccessfully for a while) before finally Shunt lifting Vader manages to get the blade of Wild Thing 2 out of Vader. Again the two robots meet in the middle and again Wild Thing 2 pushes Vader back. Knowing that they're losing the fight, Vader decides to hit the pit release button. But it's too late; there are only ten seconds left in the fight when they do and they have no time to actually pit Wild Thing 2. The fight goes to the judges, where Wild Thing 2 scores an easy victory sending them through to their 4th consecutive series semi-final!

Unfortunately, they score an all-time poor draw as they go up against reigning champion Razer. Which, flat robot, tiny disc, Razer??? I'm sure this is a recipe for success!!! The fight (20:02) goes about as you'd expect! Wild Thing 2 darts around for a little bit, probably trying to get to the side of Razer, but, spoiler, it doesn't work! Instead, they end up on the wedge of Razer, who uses the crushing claw to basically explode Wild Thing 2's right side armor! Then, don't worry guys, Razer manages to reposition as it spins Wild Thing 2 around, now getting its claw right into the meat of Wild Thing 2's right side!!! Razer has to let go of Wild Thing 2 because I think legally they're only able to hold them for one minute.

It was a strategic error to be flat against Razer

But don't worry! Razer immediately gets Wild Thing 2 back on the wedge! Only this time, they get to start working on destroying the part of Wild Thing 2 just past the blade! This is pretty much the entire fight. Wild Thing 2 would briefly escape, only to get caught immediately. Wild Thing 2 would attempt to push Razer around as the claw of Razer goes through various parts of Wild Thing 2 like butter. Eventually, Razer gets tired of toying with Wild Thing 2 and picks them up and drops them in the pit. So, yeah, not much of a fight, but if you like a classic Razer squash match, this is as good as any!

Luckily for Wild Thing 2, much like in Series 5, Series 6 has a losers' melee, meaning that Wild Thing 2 has one more chance to get back into the tournament! And one more chance of reaching the top eight for the first time Since Series 4! Despite being heavily damaged by Razer, Nick Addams with the help of the other roboteers, manages to repair Wild Thing 2 in time to participate in the three-way losers' melee. Here, they face off against five-time semi-finalists 13 Black and Dantomkia.

The loser's melee (26:00) begins with Wild Thing 2 charging right into the flipper of Dantomkia and getting flipped into an empty CPZ. 13 Black then hits Dantomkia in the side of the flipper, which actually spins Dantomkia back under Wild Thing 2 in a pretty neat visual. Dantomkia then decided to go after 13 Black, taking a few hits from the double-bladed roulette bot as Wild Thing 2 tries to get back into the fight, also taking a hit from 13 Black in the process. 13 Black then slams right into Wild Thing 2, with its blade sending Wild Thing 2 into the wall, spinning from the force of both the blade and the wall.

Dantomkia, seen here kicking the shit out of its competition

Seeing that 13 Black is the stronger of the two, Dantomkia continues to pursue 13 Black, finally getting under and flipping it over. Now 13 Black doesn't have a self-righter (bad form, guys), buttttttt thanks to its twin blades, it can still move in a sort of crab-walk manner, so it's not actually declared immobile. Dantomkia then gets under Wild Thing 2 and flips it into the wall. Sir Killalot drags Wild Thing 2 off of the wall (I don't think you can be declared immobile if you're stuck on the wall). Dantomkia then hits the pit release button, which drops just as Wild Thing 2 drives over it. Wild Thing 2 is just barely unable to get off the pit in time, sending it down below into the pit and out of the competition.

Goodbye, sweet Wild Thing. Thanks for the memories.

Sadly, this would be the last time we'd ever see Wild Thing in Robot Wars. While Series 7 in general represented a real changing of the guard moment in Robot Wars, Wild Thing got a head start on all that by not even appearing in Extreme 2! Perhaps if Robot Wars would have continued past Series 7 then Wild Thing would have returned in a future series. But sadly, it would not. And unfortunately, like most teams, Wild Thing 2 didn't exactly go out on top. While, yes, it did make the Series semi-final, it's by pure luck that 259 broke down. And they didn't exactly have a good showing in the semi-final itself. Like, yeah, sure, you can't really hold getting dominated by Razer against them 'cause that's what all the cool kids were doing at the time. But, like, even in the losers' melee, it was clear they had nothing for either 13 Black or Dantomkia. It's a real shame that in the pursuit of a more competitive model, the team stripped away all the character from Wild Thing and then didn't even succeed in making a more competitive model!

Battered and bruised, but Wild Thing never quits

Every other Thing robot was way more impressive, with Thing 2 taking it to Panic Attack before being overturned by the arena spike. Think of Wild Thing defeating X-Terminator in the Series 4 semi-final's first round to become the only Wild Thing to make a top 8. A robot which then went on losing to Hypno Disc on a tight judges' decision after refusing to go down from a five-star ass kicking from the spinning menace in a fight the judges thought about awarding to Wild Thing for sheer tenacity. And finally, don't forget it nearly pitting two-time defending UK Champion Chaos 2 not once but twice in their epic encounter in the Series 5 semi-final.

I just don't like Wild Thing 2. Much like the also-much-maligned Panic Attack Gold from Series 6, it's just a total downgrade from its predecessors. And it makes me sad that the final appearance from one of my favorite teams is with a robot I don't really like with a run that I don't think is that good! Instead, I choose to remember Wild Thing for what it truly was - an indestructible zippy wedge. That's why I left one more Wild Thing run to cover, that being the epic Series 4 run of the original Wild Thing. That's not what we're covering next, though. Don't get too excited, but just know it's coming in the future!

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The 'Shroom: Issue 221
Staff sections Staff Notes • The 'Shroom Spotlight • Poochy's Picks • Credits
Features Fake News • Fun Stuff • Palette Swap • Pipe Plaza • Critic Corner • Strategy Wing
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