Sims VS Animal Crossing - ERBP
When I first heard the idea for two ambiguously depicted video game characters going up against eachother I was very skeptical.
When I heard it was going to be live action, I was even more skeptical.
However, it was pulled off with aplomb and I'm proud to have contributed the lyrical aspect of its success.
EPIC RAP BATTLE PARODIES
THE SIMS
VS
ANIMAL CROSSING
BEGIN
The Sims:
Angry Sim:
What are these? hugging trees, trying to rustle our leaves
The angry sim is confused as to what these Villagers are: they look like humans but
are too short and compact to be of the same kind as the Sims.
Not only do Villagers hug or shake trees to receive items, coins, or bees nests, but the Sim is also accusing them of being "tree-huggers", or overly-environmentaly concerned.
The angry sim cannot believe that these people are now trying to rustle THEIR leaves,
rustling leaves being an idiom for starting a commotion or sparking a fight between two parties.
Energetic Sim:
Shh!
Angry Sim:
No need to speak! We’ll use Simlish to *simlish word* you upstream!
The energetic and angry sim poke fun at the mute nature of Villagers, as they are not seen speaking in any form, not even making grunts or other noises in Smash Brothers.
So, the angry sim says there is no need for them to try to rap against them, as the Sims will use their complex and developed language to dominate over the Villagers' otherwise non existent language.
A simlish word of the producer's or recorder's choice would've been a mockery of
the phrase to "F" or to screw someone upsideways, except the Villagers would get screwed up the stream that runs through their village.
-Explain the simlish word complex-
Energetic Sim:
Let me query these queers, arrange your face towards how we feel to ya!
Corrupt you like your towns with an ordinance for zoophilia!
In Animal Crossing, the player character takes a personality survey to determine what kind of facial structure their Villager will have.
The energetic sim is threatening to take the role of the surveyer, querying the queers to arrange their faces. However, he wants to arrange their faces towards how he feels towards them - which is another way of saying he's going to beat them up so bad, their faces will be rearranged according to how bad he beats them up.
Being a video game, corruption of a cartridge or of software is an infamous possibility.
The double meaning for the word "corrupt" comes with how a governmental system can be politically corrupt, either dictating the constituents based on personal bias or by a failure to economically prosper.
The sim is saying he will corrupt the Villagers like their towns are corrupted - corrupted in this case with an ordinance for zoophilia.
In Animal Crossing New Leaf, the player character is the mayor and can enforce one of a few ordinances in the town.
this ordinance will set a general theme for the town and produce results accordingly.
for example, one can opt to have the Bell Boom ordinance, where everything costs but sells for more money.
The sim says that the ordinance he is witnessing is one for Zoophilia, because the player Villager is the only human native to the towns.
All other Villagers are iterations of different animals, and it is inferred that if the Villager were to spark a relationship with any other villagers, they would be participating in Zoophilia: sexual fixation on animals.
Lazy Sim:
I would do this later, procrastinating to beat ‘em
But I could be a better mayor just sleeping in your museum
The lazy sim participates in a "self observed line", where a line is used in effect to portray the characteristics of a certain character. It's like a surfer saying "duuude", the lazy sim says something that he would say - but also in a clever way.
He says that even if he were to procrastinate, that itself would be his method of beating the Villagers, accusing their raps of being more effortless than he is.
The lazy sim acknowledges that, with how lazy he is, he could be a better mayor than the Villager by sleeping in the museum.
In animal crossing, a nocturnal owl named Blathers is the museum's curator, and can be found sleeping most hours of the day.
The comparison here is that there is a character who effectively sleeps all day in Animal Crossing, similar in characteristics to the Lazy Sim.
He belittles the Villager's authority to govern the town by saying he could do it better asleep.
Artistic Sim:
We can onomatopoeia’em,
Following "to beat'em", and "museum", the artistic sim gets artsy with another rhyme for this tricky rhyme scheme.
By onomatopoeia, he means words that express sounds - buzz, sizzle, etc.
Simlish is similar to onomatopoeia with a mix of interjections, as the words they say are nothing but strange sounds provoked out of a reaction to something. The energetic Sim gives some examples.
Energetic Sim:
Switz Zorg! Ooh! Dabee!
Artistic Sim:
Make their red noses bleed!
All:
Turning over a New Leaf!
The artsy sim would opt to paint their noses red, but since the Villagers have red noses, he will resort to beating them up and making them bleed instead. In doing so, the Sims will turn over a new leaf, meaning 3 things:
1. a reference to the game, "New Leaf"
2. the Sims will overturn the game, mocking the amount of sales the game has worldwide: around 7 million. The sims, across all their platforms, have a higher sell rate.
3. the sims will resort to utter violence, something they have never tried before.
To turn over a new leaf is to start fresh, start anew. the sims will be starting this new life of destroying anything that comes in their way with rap.
Animal Crossing:
Villager 1:
Welcome to our Wild World, Sims, here we gooooo!
Don't need to pocket your pool ladder to drown you with our flow
The happy go lucky nature of the Villager kicks off the verse with a reference to the gamecube game, Animal Crossing Wild World.
A common joke in the Sims community, as evident here and with the ending announcer, is that one can drown a sim by removing the ladder from the pool they're swimming in.
Villagers have a special trait especially emphasized in smash brothers to pocket items and keep them for later.
The villager is saying that he won't have to pocket the pool ladder to drown them, as their flow is so liquified and impeccable that it will be what drowns them.
Flow is always compared to water, as the term is interchangeable with both the current stream of water and the quality of a rap's syllabic meter .
Villager 2:
Town tuning out your shitty simulated committees
If you can’t dig it, we got treaties that’ll keep you in your city
In Animal Crossing, one can create a town tune that plays in different sound fonts and pitches everytime another villager is interacted with. To tune out is another way of saying to not listen to, and this is what the Villagers intend to do. they will tune out, not listen to, or shut down the terrible simulated committees and communities that are created through, you guessed it, the "sims".
If the sims can't dig it, or like what the Villagers are going to do, the Villagers have another option. They are offering a peace treaty that will declare their dominance and allow the Sims to run away before they destroy them, banishing them to stay in their city.
The ongoing theme of this line is that the Villager's Town is better than the Sim's City. It's all about drawing comparisons.
Villager 3:
We’ve got similar roots, but we can rip raw weeds!
Watch us trip you up with disses like a pitfall seed!
Ok hold on for this one.
The games have similar roots - meaning the ideas behind each are similar:
to create a community of your liking through complete customization and interaction with artificial intelligence.
Acknowledging this, the Villager says that they do have similar roots, but makes the pun that roots can be referred to as plant roots - something they rip out of the ground.
The pitfall seed is a famous item in Animal Crossing, even making an appearance in Smash. The item takes the appearance of a buried item, and, if walked over, the player falls into a pitfall. Not only will the Villagers spit rhymes like pitfall seeds to make the Sims fall, but "tripping" is also a mechanic in Animal Crossing.
If the villager keeps tripping as they walk or run, it means they have bad luck that day. something regarding feng shui and furniture arrangement and town clarity and such. The villager says the sims have bad luck going against them, as they will trip them up.
Villager 4:
Smashing Simcity spinoffs till they’re blue and noir
Now I suggest you take a seat, before we move it to the door
This is an extended reference, so pay attention.
SimCity is a spinoff game for the sims where you can build your own city.
The villagers call the Sims spinoffs of Animal Crossing by also referencing their own spinoff games.
This is also a jab at how SimCity sounds like and may have been inspired by Sin City, a movie that utlizes noir style lighting.
Noir style involves very dark shadows and black textures, almost cartoonish in a sense. The villagers will smash (smash brothers) the Sims until they are blue and noir, noir like the movie they copied off of, or blue and black. black and blue.
- Explain why I don't understand the what are you talking about line-
If the purpose was to have the Angry sim interrupt the Villager, first it shouldve been taken up with the writer and producer, second it should've been choreographed into the battle.
For example, the Villager could have had a shorter line that delivers the message its supposed to and allows the Sim to cut off the Villager without overlap and losing the meaning of the line.
In these bars, it takes all the available space to get to the punchline. The sim interrupting the Villager on top of that clouds the punchline and doesn't give the battle a fair chance of exemplifying one of the 4 powerful ending lines.
What I'm saying is that an interruption could have been worked in without making an injustice to the line it overlapped.
Also, I don't understand why the phrase "what are you talking about" took priorty over the Villager's last line. "what are you talking about" has no weight to either side, it's a generic phrase that drowned out the emphasis of the Villager's line. Correct me if I'm wrong but if an interruption like that is going to be made, it needs to pertain heavily to the subject matter.
I understand the concession that the Angry Sim is just being angry and spewing out generic phrases that he might say, but again, there's a choreographed approach that should be taken in situations like this to avoid doing an injustice to the lyrics.
I only did this rant as a lesson to all, because I see things like this a lot and I hope that understanding this kind of approach will improve the choreography of battles as a whole.
The Sims:
Angry Sim:
Our mods are iconic
The angry sim says that their mods, or bodily composition is static and well recognized by the gaming world. Meanwhile, the villagers have an awkward body shape, as followed up with the next line:
Lazy Sim
Ironic, Your failure’s hand-held
Not only is he poking at the AC series migrating to handheld device and accusing it of a failure, but he uses the word ironic because Villagers have spoons for hands, and it would be ironic for them to have anything held in their hands without apposable thumbs.
Artistic Sim:
Lookin through nooks and crannies just tryna’ ring a bell
Quadruple entendre alert!
1. nook and crannies is the name of one of Tom Nook's stores
2. to look through nooks and crannies is to search every last corner of an area in search of something. what they are searching for is:
3. a bell to ring, or money to cash in. the currency in AC is called "bells" but the biggest meaning is:
4. the accusation is that the Villagers are looking everywhere and pulling out the stupidest connections and punchlines in an effort to "ring a bell", meaning to make sense or have someone understand a line. He's saying they're failing at making the Sims feel inferior and all their disses are unorthodox and don't ring a bell to him.
Energetic Sim:
Let’s take it to the streets, we’ll see who’s talking
Another mute villager joke is accompanied by an idiom to start a fight.
To take it to the streets is to fight in an uncivilized and uncontrolled environment with no rules or limits. To see who's talking is to say that the Sims will beat them up so bad, that the Villagers will have to reconsider their will to say mean things to them. The double meaning with "take it to the streets" is this:
All:
you’re more less of a threat than an actual animal crossing
They parody the name "animal crossing" and compare it to an actual animal crossing sign, something like "watch for ducks" or "turtles are nearby". this is barely a threat to drivers on the road as it just means "be cautious as animals may or may not appear". they are easily brushed off just like the Villagers.
Animal Crossing:
Villager 1:
Agh! We’re axe assassins, knap-sacking the win!
Rhyme scheme accompanied by another pocket reference. In Smash, the villager was often joked to be a murderous axe-assasin character with a constant smile on his face.
Villager 2:
If you wanna be like us then I’ll make you MySim!
The MySims spinoff series saw customizable Sim characters that strongly resemble the cartoonish characteristics of Villagers. Now that you know this, the meaning for the line is obvious, but there's also a secondary meaning. If I were to make someone "my bitch" they would be my slave, forever beneath me, and succumbing to my orders. it's a common insult that takes the form of "My Sim", the name of this similar spinoff series.
Villager 3:
It’s PC verse 3D, you’re stuck in ‘04!
Villager 4:
and Sims 4, was a bore,
All:
even slower than Spore…..
Props to Zander for writing the ending line, its one of the only lines I kept word for word. It's a simple self explanatory yet harsh line that accuses the Sims franchise as a one hit wodner by demolishing the Spore franchise.