me: i love video games
brain: let’s play video games
me: hjjjjjjjjjjjjjjrrrgHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH maybe later
It’s often been remarked that video game characters who wield very large weapons - for example, Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy VII - must be wearing very heavy shoes in order to get away fighting as they do. Intuitively, this makes sense: if you try to swing around something that substantially outweighs you, you’ll just end up swinging yourself around instead. It doesn’t matter how strong you are if you don’t have the mass to balance it out!
What’s less intuitively obvious is that it’s not just a matter of mass: it’s also a matter of surface area. In order to push or strike a target, you need to generate enough friction with the ground to counteract the equal and opposite force that your target exerts upon you. If you don’t, you’ll simply be pushed away. While mass is a contributing factor here, an equally important one is contact area with the ground. Even a very heavy object can be displaced with relative ease if its ground contact is minimal.
In short, if you wish to avoid being sent skittering along the ground every time you hit something with your cartoonishly large sword, beyond a certain point it’s not sufficient to wear very heavy shoes: you must also have very large feet.
And that’s why Sora from Kingdom Hearts is the most realistic Final Fantasy protagonist.
verumrex