Gold Makes Everything Shiny, right? Yeah, pretty much, but what if you want to go further? Then you go for platinum. Maybe a platinum medal that's worth more than gold, or a platinum enemy stronger than a gold enemy, the point is, platinum is better than gold. Why? Because it's more rare, and is less mined. But curiously enough, it has a lower atomic number than gold!
This standard isn't too new, but never quite took off before the Turn of the Millennium. Europeans thought that platinum worthless before the late 1700s, as they couldn't quite figure out how to refine it properly. Some tribes in Central America were able to refine the metal and use it in jewellery, but they weren't exactly willing to share their secrets with the Spanish Empire when it swept through the area and enslaved everyone it could get its hands on to work in the gold and silver mines. In fact, Platinum was considered so worthless by the Spanish, not knowing its actual value, that they simply threw it out whenever it was found alongside the other precious metals they had come to mine.
Subtrope of Metallic Motifs. In fictional media that has a Gold–Silver–Copper Standard, platinum may occasionally be seen acting as the fourth 'rung' in the fiction's economy.
Examples:
open/close all folders
Anime & Manga
- JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stardust Crusaders: Unlike other Stands, Jotaro's "Star Platinum" doesn't have any special powers of note, but it has amazing raw stats in all areas and is considered the best qualified to defeat DIO's golden Stand "The World". During the Final Battle, Jotaro discovers that The World and Star Platinum actually have the same powers, and that his Stand is theoretically capable of surpassing DIO's.
Literature
- Implied in The Bone Maker regarding magical bone talismans, which can be improved with a precious metal inlay. When a master bone wizard gives Kreya a charm inlaid in a matte-white metal that she doesn't recognize, she assumes it's a step above gold in power.
Live-Action TV
- On How I Met Your Mother, Barney comes up with a Platinum Rule to go with The Golden Rule, which he mistakes for "Love thy neighbor". It goes "You may love thy neighbor, but under no circumstances should you love thy neighbor."
- Kamen Rider:
- Kamen Rider Wizard's Super Mode, Infinity Style, gives him armor of platinum and diamond. Strangely, the movies give him a more powerful version of this form which is gold.
- Kamen Rider Gotchard's Mid-Season Upgrade, Platina Gotchard, is an upgrade of his Iron Gotchard form that allows him to use multiple Chemies at once without any restriction.
- In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, numerous subplots involve the desire of the Ferengi (and some other races) to obtain "Gold-pressed Latinum" (the gold is there to be shiny and suspend the minuscule amount of insanely valuable Latinum — one of the few remaining non-replicable materials, and therefore precious due to its scarcity). In reality, there is no such thing as "Latinum", which is an obvious one-letter-off rhyming stand-in for Platinum.
Tabletop Games
- Dungeons & Dragons:
- For currency, the game follows an extended version of the Gold–Silver–Copper Standard: copper pieces are the least valuable form of currency, followed in worth by silver pieces, sometimes electrum pieces and then gold pieces. Above gold pieces are platinum pieces, the most uncommon and most valuable denomination available.
- This same pattern holds true for the Always Lawful Good metallic dragons: copper, brass and bronze dragons aren't as powerful or majestic as silver dragons, while gold dragons are the mightiest kind of mortal dragons. Above gold dragons in size, majesty and power are only the platinum dragons. Depending on the exact edition and setting, these are either vanishingly rare, with less than a handful in the whole universe, or outright unique. In the latter case, the only platinum dragon around is Bahamut, the god and ruler of all metallic dragons.
Video Games
- The ranking system in Bayonetta measures the halos you collect, the speed in which you finish the stage, combo scores, damage taken and ultimately awards you with a character trophy based on the outcome. The highest ranking trophy you win is a Platinum Award of Bayonetta, followed by a Gold Award of Rodin, a Silver Award of Luka, Copper Award of Cereza and finally a Stone Award of Enzo.
- This is in fact a trait that PlatinumGames have in their games, such as the aforementioned Bayonetta. Each game's Rank Inflation of their chapter rankings run in the order of Stone, Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Pure Platinum.
- Castle of the Winds also uses platinum coin as the top currency above the usual gold, silver and copper, each denomination being worth ten of the one below it.
- From Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped onwards, the best Relic you can win in Time Trialnote is the Platinum one, before Gold and Sapphire. Aside from keeping up your top speed, breaking all time crates in the level is almost necessary to get it.
- Dark Age of Camelot has platinum coins worth 1,000 gold coins, which are in turn worth 100 silver coins and 10,000 copper coins. They are not, however, the highest denomination — that's the mythril coins, worth 1,000 platinums each.
- EverQuest has platinum coins above gold, silver and copper, each denomination trading up at a 10:1 ratio. EverQuest II increases the exchange ratio to 100:1.
- The top medals achievable in Iggle Pop! are the Platinum ones, which are awarded only with a perfect score for a given level.
- Kirby: Starting from Kirby's Return to Dream Land, the many minigames involve scoring enough points to get medals, with platinum being the highest achievement.
- PlayStation:
- Starting with the PlayStation 3, Platinum Trophies can be earned by getting all the other Trophies in a game (which are Bronze, Silver and Gold rank).
- There was also the PlayStation Platinum label in Europe (known as Greatest Hits in the Americas), which sold for a slightly reduced price compared to the normal "Black Label" copies. It was given to games that exceeded a certain sales threshold, like Final Fantasy VII, VIII, IX, X and XII. The label was retired after the PlayStation 3.
- Pokémon Platinum. It's a third version to Diamond And Pearl, and was released not far behind HeartGold and SoulSilver.
- Runescape: In Old School Runescape, in order to circumvent the "max cash" limit (which prevented players from having cash stacks larger than 2,147,483,647 GP— the maximum integer allowed in a 32-bit system), Platinum tokens were introduced in 2015, which are worth 1000 GP each, and can be converted between the two freely at any bank or bank chest.
- In Terraria, platinum is one of the alternative metals introduced in 1.2 that can replace gold when a world is generated. It is statistically better than gold and a full set of Platinum Armor provides one of the biggest pre-Hardmode defense bonuses second to Molten Armor, making it a viable choice for Melee players.
- There's also platinum coins for the game's Gold–Silver–Copper Standard when you collect 100 gold coins. Very few items are bought for platinum coins and they deal the most damage when fired from the Coin Gun.
- The Platinum medals are the highest-ranked medals that can be awarded to the player for each minigame in Wii Play and its sequel.
Web Original
- In Neopets, the bank account types with "gold" in the name are ranked below those with "platinum".
Western Animation
- In The Legend of Korra, metalbending has become a more commonplace skill than the incredible skill unique to its inventor. To counteract the large number of benders who can destroy metal, mechs made out of platinum began cropping up, which contained metal that had been refined purely enough to purge the traces of earth from their composition.
Real Life
- In credit card plans, platinum cards offer more exclusive and elite privileges and reward programs to their holders than gold cards do, and require a higher income and/or credit score to obtain, too.
- Among the awards that the Recording Industry Association of America offers to singers whose songs or albums have been successful, platinum awards for 1,000,000 units sold are the second highest tier, above gold awards (500,000 units) and below only diamond (10,000,000 units).
- A couple whose marriage has endured for fifty years celebrates their golden anniversary. If they reach their seventieth anniversary still together, then that is referred to as their platinum anniversary.
