Litwak's Family Fun Center and Arcade on Route 83 was a location in Disney's 2012 animated feature film, Wreck-It Ralph. A majority of the film takes place in the digital worlds inhabiting various game consoles of the arcade. The establishment itself was owned and operated by Stan Litwak.
By the time of the 2018 sequel, the arcade has a Wi-Fi router installed, which allows the video game characters to enter the digital world of the Internet.
Background[]
Human world[]
On the outside, the arcade functions as any other of its kind. Litwak appears to be the sole proprietor and employee of the establishment, and typically monitors the area during operating hours to ensure that the machines are functional and that customers are satisfied with their visit. Should a game malfunction, Litwak would repay the player and place an "out of order" sign on the screen. The arcade also holds events for special occasions such as birthdays.
Game world[]
As mentioned above, the arcade consoles house a unique and often vibrant world of its own, and is inhabited by anthropomorphic avatars that make up the characters of their games. These worlds, and the characters that inhabit them, are made up of codes. Although such an act is forbidden, codes can be altered and manipulated by the video game characters themselves.
Video game characters function much like humans, having their own unique personalities and social lives outside of their games; their roles in said games are treated as mere jobs. They typically gather in the arcade's central hub, Game Central Station, which acts as the bridge between each world. The video game characters are free to leave their respective cabinets/worlds whenever they please, though they are strongly advised to only do so when the arcade is closed, as a missing character during a gameplay session could lead players into believing the game is broken, which could then lead to a console's unplugging. While the programs can seemingly live forever and never age, they are not immortal. When a character dies within their game, they re-spawn immediately. Should they die outside of their game, however, they would be killed permanently and never return. Public Service Announcements regarding the matter are repeatedly played within Game Central Station as a reminder.
Another manner of permanent death for game characters is the unplugging of their respective cabinets. When a cabinet is unplugged, the world inside is destroyed. Should a character be inside the cabinet during this destruction, they will die as well. To avoid termination in the event of a console's unplugging, characters typically seek refuge in Game Central Station, where they will continue their lives homeless and out-of-work. They can, however, be invited to live in another console.
Although each character is programmed with a specific role, they are not beholden to these factory settings, and can act outside of their assigned functions. For example, Wreck-It Ralph is the "bad-guy" of Fix-It Felix Jr.. Outside of game sessions, however, he is a humble and selfless figure. Another example is the character Turbo. Despite being programmed as the hero — or "good-guy" — of his game, Turbo is villainous and corrupt, going as far as to sabotage other games to preserve his position as the most popular racer in the arcade. Programs who act in the destructive manner as Turbo are known as "viruses", rogue characters who violate the arcade's laws for their own selfish agendas. Some viruses are corrupt due to programming/code errors, such as the Cy-Bugs that plague Hero's Duty, while others, such as Turbo, are malevolent on their own accord.
Other examples of a damaged code are "glitches". A glitch is a program with a fractured code, which causes their model to spasm randomly. They are unique in that they lack the ability to leave their game and, due to their fragile states, can also die permanently within their own game.
Internet[]
- Main article: Internet
Games[]
In service[]
- Fix-It Felix Jr.
- Hero's Duty
- Sugar Rush
- Agent X
- Altered Beast
- Angel Kids
- Battlezone
- BurgerTime
- Crystal Castles
- Cyborg Justice
- Dance Central 3
- Dance Dance Revolution X2
- Dig Dug
- District 51
- Dragon's Lair
- Eye of the Cycloptopus
- Fatal Assault
- Final Fantasy VII
- Finish Line
- Food Fight
- Frogger
- H2Overdrive
- Hoop Jamz
- JetPac
- Joust
- Jr. Pac-Man
- Madden
- Metal Gear
- Mortal Kombat
- Ms. Pac-Man
- Pac-Man
- Paperboy
- Pitfall!
- Pong
- Red Scare
- Road Burners
- Roger Radcliffe's Fetch!
- Satan's Hollow
- Sonic The Fighters/Sonic Championship
- Space Invaders (Though the game is implied have been unplugged prior to the events of Ralph Breaks The Internet)
- Spike the Aunts
- Stitch Invaders
- Street Fighter II
- Super Mario Bros. or PlayChoice 10
- Tapper
- Target Bravo
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
- The House of the Dead
- The Simpsons
- Time Hunter 4
- Tron
- Undead Apocalypse 3
- Virtua Cop
- Whac-A-Mole
Unplugged/Defunct Games[]
The following are a few of the games that are either shown or mentioned to have formerly been in:
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- "Quarter alert" is a term used when a player starts a game.
- "Going Turbo" is a recurring term in the film, referencing the disastrous actions of Turbo during his attempt to take over RoadBlasters. Claiming that a character has "gone Turbo" implies that either he or she has abandoned their game to sabotage and/or take over another.
- "Stick to the program" is a term used when a character (be it unintentional or otherwise) risks exposing their sentience to a player. It reinforces the law that video game characters are not to reveal themselves to the human world.
References[]
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