From Alien vs Predator and Super Smash Bros to Freddy vs Jason and the current obsession with comic book ensemble movies, pop culture is no stranger to crossovers. But while it's nice to see Superman popping up in Tencent's mobile MOBA, Arena of Valor, and of course the famous Yoda/Darth Vader cameo in Soulcalibur IV was pretty rad, there are still some battles you will simply never see. Clearly we have too much time on our hands, because we've come up with a handful of dream face-offs and then spent hours contemplating how they would pan out. Here are our findings. This is a real job.
Cortana vs GLaDOS
Background: Master Chief's AI companion Cortana was a mainstay of the Halo series for a long time. (To be honest she may still be - we just haven't bothered to play Halo 5 to find out.) And her ability to help humanity cling onto existence against seemingly insurmountable odds, generally by telling Master Chief where to go next and what to shoot at, has become legend. GLaDOS, on the other hand, is the psychotic AI responsible for administering Aperture Science experiments involving portals. Both spend their days ordering people from A to B, in other words, albeit for fairly different reasons.
The fight: At first blush this one looks quite tough to call, as both entities are largely incorporeal digital essences. When you start to consider how they are housed, however, it begins to look like a mismatch. Cortana may appear to Master Chief as a translucent sci-fi lady, but in physical terms she is a jumped-up memory card that sits in the back of his helmet. GLaDOS, on the other hand, exists in a mainframe with electronic tendrils dug in across a vast underground science fortress.
Cortana could probably beat the rather more unhinged GLaDOS in a software-based encounter, but without Master Chief to plug her into something, she's a bit stuck. GLaDOS, on the other hand, has all sorts of robot arms with claws and zappers she can call upon, even if you deem her tripod-based talking machineguns inadmissible. Tough times for Cortana, then, as GLaDOS crushes her like a fist on a biscuit.
Winner: GLaDOS
Ornstein vs Smough
Background: Two of Gwyn's loyal lieutenants, Ornstein and Smough are a little-and-large combo of ultra-frustrating Dark Souls bosses. If you can beat these two, you can pretty much do anything in the Dark Souls series. Ornstein is the higher ranking of the two, a lithe and fast-moving dragonslayer with a devastating spear. Smough is the royal executioner, forever denied a place among Gwyn's best knights due to his cruelty and peculiar habit of seasoning his food with the ground bones of his victims. He wields a giant hammer, and despite his girth he too gets around fairly quickly, with an electro butt stomp Mario would kill for.
The fight: Smough beats his smaller adversary on reach, even taking Ornstein's spear into consideration, but anyone who's watched Game of Thrones will tell you size and power aren't always a sure route to victory in single combat. We suspect Ornstein would make the early running, aiming to wear Smough down by evading his hammer blows and charges, nipping in with his spear whenever the larger fighter paused for breath. Seeing where things are going, Smough is likely to break out his famous butt stomp in the hope of sending Ornstein scampering. Alas for poor Smough, however, Ornstein merely plants his spear directly below his comrade's rapidly descending posterior, skewering him in the most painful way imaginable. The old dragonslayer moves on, but he might want to clean his spear.
Winner: Ornstein
Big Daddy vs Big Boss
Background: Call it the work/life balance derby. This showdown would pit BioShock's infamous, groaning, diving suit-clad behemoths against Hideo Kojima's legendary master spy. Big Daddies were built specifically to discourage splicers and other ne'er-do-wells from interfering with Little Sisters as they harvested Adam from the dead former residents of Rapture, and as such they're built like brick outhouses, and stacked with offensive hardware ranging from terrifying, fridge-sized drill-bits to grenade launchers. Big Boss is merely a man, but he's a master of evasion, not to mention every kind of weapon and hand-to-hand combat. This should be a close one.
The fight: For the purposes of science, we begin by throwing a brick at a nearby Little Sister with a signed polaroid of Big Boss tied around it. Rapture's crazed creation then flies into a frenzy, revving his arm drill like there's no tomorrow, while Big Boss cowers behind... Uh oh. Rapture may have plenty of Little Sister vents, but those are too small for Solid Snake's genetic ancestor. There are plenty of walls to peek around, but precious little usable cover. Tranquilizer guns and CQC won't be much use against that diving suit, either. Big Boss whips out his cardboard box in desperation, but Big Daddy is having none of that, and his drill-bit rips through it like tissue paper and appears certain to shred the hero inside.
Just when all appears lost, however, we realize the box was housing a Decoy, and quicker than you can say Tactical Espionage Action, a camouflaged Big Boss melts out of the scenery behind Big Daddy and begins reciting at length the various anti-nuclear subtexts of 1960s Japanese tokusatsu kaiju cinema, at which point the Big Daddy forgets what he was doing in the first place and shuts down.
Winner: Big Boss
Right, our boss is giving us a funny look. We hope you enjoyed these important thought experiments. Let us know who YOU would like to see go head to head in the comments.