Shout Out / Neopets

Items

• The Rotting Wormburger bears more than a passing resemblance to "the Nasty Patty".
• The flavor text on the Lupe Patchwork Chia Doll is pretty much taken straight from a boss in World of Warcraft, Patchwerk.
• The description of the Pink Poogle Toy is a Take That!/Shout-Out to a fansite of the same name.
• One of the backgrounds is the "Double Rainbow Background", with the item description "But what does it mean!?".
• The description for the Undead Cheese Wedge reads "In Haunted Woods, cheese wedge eats you!"
• The description for the Miniature Wheel of Monotony: "We heard you liked spinning the Wheel of Monotony... Now you can spin the Wheel of Monotony while spinning the Wheel of Monotony!"
• The Altador Cup prizes for Y14:
  • "Yo Lupe, we heard you like slushies, so we put a slushie in your slushie so you can slurp while you slurp."
    • "Celebrate ALL the teams!"
• The description for the Shrubbery is "For that layered effect, place beside another shrubbery, only slightly higher!"
• The Rotting Skeleton Stamp seems to be a familiar character...
• The Altador Cup Yard Statue, a prize item in Altador Cup V has this as its description: ''All hail the Yooyu!''
• This item, a drill-shaped fruit, is called a Gurrandrillge. Doesn't sound like a coincidence to me!
• The description for the Pink Doughnut. "A doughnut with pink icing. Mmmm, Homers favourite."
  • Relatedly, the description of the Hiding from Clowns Blanket: "Cant be seen in broad daylight, clowns will eat me..."
• The description for the Grarrl Ocean Warrior Spear: "Stick them with the pointy end!"
• The book "Cybunny Down".
• The description of the Apple Apple◊: "Its like an apple within an apple! *BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHM*"
• The Sour Blue Slushie's description says, "It is sour, and blue, da da dee, da da da..." and at least one other item has the same description (minus the "sour" part), as a reference to "Blue (Da Ba Dee)" by Eiffel 65.
• The description for the Jelly Tambourine:

  We all live in a jelly tambourine...

  • While most paint brushes are simply named for the color they paint, the one that paints pets Strawberry is called the "Strawberry Fields Forever Paint Brush."
• A gift from the 2014 Advent Calendar is a book called "Your Coal Is Now Diamonds".
• The Ice Palace background bears a strong resemblance to Elsa's ice palace in Frozen, with the same kind of fountain surrounded by stairs.
  • And now that it has morphed, it is definitely a reference to Frozen.
• When the site was passed down from Viacom to Jump Start, they introduce two new plushies that seem oddly familiar...
  • The Cheerful Sponge Kiko Plushie◊ is basically Spongebob. Its description is "This plushie will feel at home anywhere, even if you decide to put it in fruit under the ocean for some reason."
  • The Friendly Brown Gelert Plushie◊ is Frankie, the mascot of JumpStart. Its description is "This is one friend who will love to jump around with you wherever you go! Even to maths class."
• One of the Pteri outfits is a cosplay of Chihiro from Spirited Away.
• The Meerca Maid set features the same hairstyle as Sakuya Izayoi.
• The Funky Rainbow Wig and Trendy Highlights Wig are meant to look like the manes of Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle respectively, moreso the former.
• The Charming Wonderland Wig resembles the one on Disney's Alice.
• The description for the Can of Pickled Spinach: "Some sailors in Neopia claim that this spinach possesses the power to make you super strong!"
• Film buffs will recognize the Bow Tie wearable as Roger Rabbit's, yellow polka dots and all.
• May not be totally intentional, but Lupes have a wearable item that's a plain bright red neckerchief.
• The Amulet of Inevitable Betrayal. Its laugh is an evil laugh.
• The Jetsam is a pet that resembles a shark. There exists a species-specific wearable item for them called the Jetsam Head Laser. You too can have sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads!
• The Thermal Explosive Device looks like the thermal detonator from Star Wars.
• The description for "The Long Winter: An Epic" says: "Cant keep calm, winter is coming."
• The description of a Sand Sled is "Snow? Where we are going, we do not need snow!"
• The description of the Weapon Formerly Known As Desert Axe Weapon notes that the person responsible for naming it has been sacked and that they "now present a weapon completely different."
• The book The Old Mynci and the Sea is a reference to The Old Man and the Sea.
• The description of the Long Silver Wig is "WHERE ARE MY CYODRAKES?!"

Other

• One of the major ones is Dr_Death, the operator of the pound.
• Quoth a farmer from the Altador Plot: "WINDMILLS DO NOT WORK THAT WAY!" There's even a book given out from the plot titled "The Way Windmills Work" with the following description: Windmills do, in fact, work that way.
• "The first rule of Punch Club, is that you do not talk about Punch Club."
  In a secluded alley behind the Colosseum are gathered a group of Neopets... This is Punch Club.◊
  "Would you like some punch?"
• One result you can get from spell-casting in the Altador plot is "It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a Grue."
• This avatar◊ references Homestar Runner.
  • This one◊ does too.
  • Not to mention, this◊.
• There are at least a few to Firefly and its sequal movie, Serenity:
  • The avatar released as a prize for the Cyodrake's Gaze plot features a quote◊ by the character of Hoban.
  • The Grundo Engineer outfit is very reminiscent of Kaylee's, and even includes a brown wig.
  • In the Lost Desert section of Neoquest II you find a yellow Skeith named Bledynn, who happens to call his BFS "Vera", the same name as Jayne's favorite gun.
• On the page for the Daily Dare '10 Staff Tournament, hovering over Jimmy James' picture mentions if anyone has seen his Red Stapler.
  • On the same page, several victory quotes reference Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog.
• It is very unlikely that the Pirate Xweetok sporting an horizontal scar under its left eye was a simple coincidence. 2023 also introduced a "Rubber Fruit" that looks awfully familiar. Then there's the Mynci Adventurer Outfit which is just a Luffy cosplay.
• The Editorial of Issue 452 gave us this Shout-Out to The Man Your Man Could Smell Like:

  "Hello, TNT. Look at your artists. Now at me. Artists. Me. Artists. Me. Too bad your artists aren't me, but they can smell like me. I'm on a horse."

  "Look again. Your horse is now diamonds!"

• Several achievements in the Faerie's Ruin plot are Shout Outs: "Son, I am Disappoint" "Never Gonna Shut You Up, Never Gonna Quiet You Down.", "OVER 9000!", and one has the description "How appropriate. You fight like a kau."
  • Another achievement references Questionable Content: "She blinded me with library science."
  • For the plot step where you have to block Xandra's attacks, one of the many things she says is "Tion cep in".
• The Griefer Petpet◊ seems oddly familiar...
  • The Navibot looks familiar, too...
• The "Kougra - Cats" shopkeeper bears a certain resemblance to a certain Zero Wing character...
• There's a game called "The Usul Suspects", although the game has nothing to do with it.
• A fairly blatant one several years back was Wolvercheek (a Kacheek dressed as Wolverine). It was renamed "Kacheek - Superhero" to match the others, and disappeared shortly afterwards.
  • Though the Dark Korbat hero Mask remains - it's the goddamn Batman.
• Trying to use the Qasalan Expellibox more than once a day produces the message "What are you doing?! You can't just dump them in there! It's a series of tubes!" There's also an item called the Series Of Tubes, the description of which is "Thankfully, the tubes are not all clogged."
• One of the NPCs that can donate items to the Meridell Rubbish Dump is named Farmer Ted.
• In the Kadoatery, there are kadoaties named Shinji and Misato, Vash, Mario and Luigi, Sasuke, Kunai and Kakashi, Raphael, Leonardo, and Michaelangelo, Q, Riker and Picard, and Fry, Bender, Leela and Zoidberg.
• On April Fools' Day of 2012, one of the site's pranks would involve the Shop Wizard messing up his search results. The possible results included a reference to Steve Holt.
• In one of the quotes seen just as you enter a battle in the NeoCola Centre sector of the Battledome is, "Would the owner of a white space ship, designation MCP1138, please pick up the white courtesy communicator. You\'re double parked."
• While fighting Tekkitu the Witch Doctor in the Battledome, one of the things he might say between rounds is "Ooo eee, ooo ah ah!!!" This, of course, is the refrain from the song "Witch Doctor," written & performed by Ross Bagdasarian Sr. (better known as David Seville).
• The description for the Lens Flare Faerie Ability "My Eyes, The Goggles Do Nothing".
• The Robot Chia suspiciously looks a bit like R2-D2.
• One of Rasala the Bright's quotes during the War for the Obelisk is "I love the smell of fireballs in the morning..."
• Lanie and Lillie, the leaders of the Awakened, are based on the Grady girls from The Shining.
• This Neopian Times image◊, featuring a Zafara, looks uncannily like Twilight Sparkle.
  • Pastel Unis◊ look a lot like Scootaloo.
• While visiting Coltzan's Shrine, you will sometimes see your Neopet say, "And to think, Malkus Vile would have gotten away with it if it weren't for us pesky Neopets!" This is a pop culture reference to Scooby-Doo.
• A lot more references can be found here.
• Male Elderly Kaus resemble◊ John Hammond from Jurassic Park.
• The Chocolate Factory owner's welcoming spiel: "Nobody ever goes in...nobody ever comes out, but we sell chocolate by the truckload!"
• The boons you can get from the Battleground Of The Obelisk include "Cheaper By The Dozen", "Doctor Who?", and "Right Round Round Round".
• In the "Spooky Food Eating Contest" plot, the monster hunters Kell and Corbin are expys of Sam and Dean of Supernatural, respectively.
  • The Perilous Catacombs step has a few:
    • One of the rooms you can find if you choose the right option when opening a door is a treasure room. The text for it includes, "You're all for taking a swim in the gold coins littering the floor, but Corbin and Kell are remarkably uninterested."
    • Another type of room has a Gelatinous (Non-)Cube.
    • One of the curses you can get is the Curse of Barrel Roll, which causes the map of the floor you're on to spin while the text "BARREL ROLL!!!" is displayed in the middle.
    • Occasionally, one of the options for opening a door is to play the banjo. If you choose it and are successful, you "launch into 'The Pant Devil Went Down to Altador' and play your banjo fiercely." This is a reference to the old song, "The Devil Went Down to Georgia".
    • "We need to go deeper.", which 'you' say when you're ready to go down the next floor, is a Shout-Out to Inception.
    • Corbin cries out Ackbar's "It's a trap!" when barging in on the doppelgangers when you hear banjo music.
• The 404 errors tend to be this.
  • Sarah, go back to your room. Play with your toys. Forget about the 404.
  • The 404 will be with you, always...
  • I see dead pages.
  • I'm sorry, Dave, I can't let you view this...
  • Sir, the possibility of this page being broken is 3,720 to 1!
  • But why is the page gone?!
  • This is an ex-page. It has shuffled off its mortal coil.
  • I find your lack of page disturbing...^note  Someone on TNT really likes Star Wars.
  • My mother said there are no such things as 404s, but there are, aren't there?
  • It's dead, Jim!
  • What you want is irrelevant. What you have chosen is at hand.
  • Alas, the case is hopeless.
  • All your page are belong to us.
  • It's a 404 error. It doesn't have motivation.
  • There are at least a dozen more. Just keep refreshing the page.
• One that was there from near the beginning; the Shoyru needs just two letters swapped around to translate into "Rising Dragon", which is fitting for what it is.^note Disappointingly, the pet registered with the name "Ken" is a Skeith.
• Some of the rock monsters in the game Moon Rock Rampage look like Onix and Metagross.
• The Spectre of Lord Darigan is clearly based on the Balrog from The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring.
• The characters in Ghoul Catchers are pretty obvious homages to Ghostbusters, complete with a PKE Meter and proton packs.
• If you hover over the Gallery of Evil with your cursor, the book opens to reveal that the creature on the cover is chewing on a Pikachu.
• One of the planets visited in the Assignment 53 game is named Gorignak V and has Rock Monsters as enemies.
• The year before the "Curse of Maraqua" plot, a hint was given in the Advent Calendar animation for December 27, 2004 that paid homage to Band Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas?". All the bands that existed at the time played together at the Concert Hall, and the accompanying text read, "Rebuild Maraqua - Let them know Neopia loves them!"
• The answer to the last question in this Neopian Times editorial invokes the CSI: Miami Glasses Pull meme.
• A 2021 Advent Calendar animation shows an apathetic Bruce sitting on a chair at a kitchen table while the room burns around him, referencing the memetic "On Fire" strip from Gunshow. One of the items given out for that day is a Flaming Room background, and its description starts with "This is fine..."
• The Tyrannian Chomby resembles Bumpy the Ankylosaurus from Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous.
• The Battledome ability "Summon Monoceraptor" has the flavor text "That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons even death may die."

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