Chibi-Robo vs Captain Olimar VS Prediction Blog
“The field of consciousness is tiny. It accepts only one problem at a time.” - Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Chibi-Robo, the household helper robot from Citrusoft Robotics
Captain Olimar, explorer from Hocotate and commander of the Pikmin
Heroes can come in all shapes and sizes, but these two lesser known alumni of the Gamecube serve as living reminders that size matters not. These two have explored many environments that are massive from their perspectives, solving many problems even under tight time limits. But despite this they’ve been shown to have a lot of support, from both those they meet and the families that they act as helpers for. But what if these two were to happen upon each other on their journeys? Will Chibi-Robo end this explorer’s voyage, or will Olimar take him to the scrapyard?
Before We Begin
For Chibi-Robo, this will be factoring in all the main games in their series. While the various games do star different versions of the titular robot, as they’re all part of the same mass produced robot line made by the same company and the differences between them functionally are rather minor, it should be fair to assume their capabilities are comparable, so this will be compositing details from all of them into one robot.
Media List:
Chibi-Robo!
Chibi-Robo! Park Patrol
Chibi-Robo! Clean Sweep (English Translation by Cjubb)
Chibi-Robo! Photo Finder
Chibi-Robo! Zip Lash
As for Olimar, this is covering everything in the Pikmin series, including the games, the comic, the shorts, and anything else of note. It is worth noting that Pikmin 4 is in an odd spot canon-wise at the moment, as some minor story elements could imply it’s meant to be a new continuity compared to the other games. However, the series already has a fairly loose canon, the game's canonicity has been directly left up to the players to decide, and nothing from it is completely incompatible with the original timeline in the first place, so this will be including details from it. A source this won’t be looking into Pikmin Bloom, as that game is a lot more hard to treat as consistent with the other titles and it’s been more directly confirmed as being treated as a separate universe to the main games. Finally, of course there is the usual exception of crossover scaling, so nothing from Super Smash Brothers, Nintendo Land, or any other sources he’s only briefly met with will be brought up here.
Media List:
Pikmin
Pikmin 2
Pikmin 3
Pikmin 4
Hey! Pikmin
Pikmin Short Movies
Pikmin Comics by Kino Takahashi
Background
Chibi-Robo
“Ahem! Get ready, Chibi-Robo! It’s almost showtime!”
The Sandersons were a simple suburban family, though they had been doing a bit poorly financially due to the husband, George, being unemployed and constantly spending money on toys. This put a lot of pressure on his wife Helen and their daughter Jenny, which led to her becoming a bit of a social recluse. But on her eighth birthday, they’d give her a present that would change their lives forever. That being the latest in a line of household helper robots, Chibi-Robo! He’d help around the house, managing to make friends with a lot of sentient toys, but also helping the family grow together before the parents tried to separate with a divorce.
Though that was hardly the only Chibi-Robo unit that’s been sold. People all over the world have used them to help solve problems, whether that be revitalizing a park that had been polluted, helping an old curator fill his museum, or saving the world from aliens that had stolen the world’s resources. But they’ve been designed primarily to help people, as Jenny found out when she got older. As an adult, she had been living in destitution with her son after the death of her husband. But thanks to the effort of a Chibi-Robo she got to remind her of her youth, she’d end up in better living both financially and mentally. So, if you need a helping hand, be sure to get your own Chibi-Robo unit! This message has been paid for by Citrusoft Robotics.
Olimar
Captain Olimar was a quiet family man who had a job at Hocotate Freight, and he never imagined he’d amount to much. But one day, while on an interstellar trip, catastrophe struck, as a meteor hitting his ship led to him crashing on a planet known as PNF-404. He’d be stranded on this strange alien world full of creatures far larger than him, and with his ship’s part scattered across the area. But he was not alone, as he’d also discover a group of strange plant-like beings which he’d dub the Pikmin. With their aid, Olimar was able to fight back against the creatures and recover his ships’ parts, ultimately managing to make his escape from the planet in a month’s time.
This was of course hardly the last time he ended up on this planet needing their aid. Whether that be recovering various artifacts to resolve his company’s debt, helping the inhabitants of another planet resolve their hunger crisis, or helping other castaways learn to survive, Olimar has become well acquainted with their capabilities. But through it all, he’s been shown to be an understanding commander to the Pikmin. Before his fateful crash landing, the Pikmin were a species on the brink of extinction. But under the leadership of Olimar, they’d become a far more competent race, and they’ve shown that they can take down any creature that could threaten them or their commanders. All thanks to the stalwart adventurer Captain Olimar.
Intelligence & Skill
Chibi-Robo
The various Chibi-Robo units have shown themselves to have a variety of skills. Their main goal is as household helpers, able to clean up all manner of messes and solve problems, often going on odd and circuitous methods of accomplishing these tasks. But if the house is to be threatened by a particularly nasty pest, they also show a good amount of skill in combat. They’ve helped defend against a variety of enemies, ranging from the spider robots known as Spydorz, the pollution spreading Smoglings, and the Gyorians, an alien race that managed to steal all the natural resources of the world. Rather impressive, given the size of the model is only 10 centimeters tall.
Olimar
Olimar has shown himself to be a very intelligent researcher, as seen in his various writings on the creatures of the planet he found himself stranded on. And while he didn’t seem to have any prior experience in battle, he quickly showed himself to be a competent leader to the Pikmin. He’s lead them on a variety of missions, and has taken on a wide variety of creatures also native to the world, many of which tower over him. Quite impressive for a guy who’s canonically only 1.9 centimeters tall.
Equipment
Chibi-Robo
Wire Plug Tail
A Chibi-Robo’s most used bit of equipment is their plug tails. These can be used to recharge their batteries by going to outlets, as well as activate certain bits of technology. He can also use it to stun enemies and even use it as a rope to climb up or swing from if it’s properly extended. In most games it’s relatively simple, but in Zip Lash it gets a bit of an upgrade, as it now acts as Chibi’s primary weapon. He can swing it at objects and enemies like a whip, spin it around to briefly hover in the air, open boxes, and use it to grapple up ledges. And with aid of the titular Zip Lash Chip, they can charge up the whip to increase it’s power and range even further, and can also rebound off objects. The furthest range we’ve seen the plug extend is 500 centimeters.
Chibi-Gear
Citrus Robotics has created various tools to assist their robots in completion of their tasks, which they can equip at any point. The robots are also clever enough to use random tools they find throughout their journeys, which are also listed here.
Chibi-Rides
When Chibi-Robo doesn’t feel like just walking around, he’s able to use various vehicles to transport himself between areas.
Chibi-Suits
Chibi-Robo is also able to equip various suits, which offer a few different abilities on top of his standard moveset and which he can quickly swap between. There’s many cases of these, but later games make this purely cosmetic, so this will just be covering the ones that have some sort of gameplay benefit.
Chibi-House
All Chibi-Robo units are based out of one of these, which are equipped with some useful gadgets. Generally they come equipped with a charging station and a Chibi-PC, which allows Chibi-Robo to access the internet and to purchase various upgrades. Other gadgets that have been included as part of them are the Recyclotron, which can be used to break down trash into more useful material, and the Wonder Timer, which is able to decrease the rate of time in a day, though that’s likely just a gameplay mechanic. But perhaps the most notable upgrade it received was in Zip Lash, as not only did it become a spaceship able to quickly fly from orbit and transport him between levels, it’s also able to be upgraded to form a massive Giant Chibi Robo for dealing with giant threats. (See Before the Verdict for the implications of this)
Olimar
Spacesuit
No space explorer is complete without their spacesuit. Not only does it have a life support function which lets him stay alive for up to a month unimpeded, it also protects him from various environments, such as going underwater.
Whistle
A built-in function of his suit is his whistle, which he uses to help command his Pikmin to do various tasks. This can also oddly be used to heal the Pikmin of status effects like fires.
Jetpack
In Hey! Pikmin, Olimar is able to use this to hover and fly through the air.
Bomb Rocks
To blast apart walls and enemies, Olimar has used these, which are on a slight timer before exploding. Though he has to stay careful, as they can damage him and his Pikmin if they’re misused.
Ice Blast
Another throwable object which is able to freeze enemies and water on contact much like the Ice Pikmin for 8 seconds.
Onions
To help create the Pikmin, you need these, which act as nests for the Pikmin and can convert dead enemies and other objects into nutrients that will grow into more Pikmin. In the comic it was shown they could directly eat attacking wildlife as a defense mechanism. They can also fly at comparable speeds to spaceships by spraying bioethanol as a form of propulsion. While the Pikmin they spawn do depend on the color of the onion, in Pikmin 3 it was shown they could merge together, allowing one onion to spawn multiple types.
Nectar
This is a substance which can be used to increase the maturity of a Pikmin, bringing them to the flower stage, which doubles their speed. One nectar can upgrade up to 10 Pikmin at a time. They can also be used to help Pikmin recover from injuries like being flattened.
Sprays
Concocted from berries native to PNF-404, these sprays can be used for special effects during battle. The Ultra Spicy Spray can instantly upgrade all Pikmin to flower level when sprayed with it, along with doubling their movement speed and increasing their strength for 30 seconds. The Ultra Bitter Spray, meanwhile, can be used to temporarily petrify foes for 9 seconds, leaving them immobilized while taking 50% more damage from attacks.
Gear
Olimar has also been able to upgrade his own capabilities with several artifacts that are found throughout his journey.
Mystery Capsule Items
During the Dandori battles of Pikmin 4, Olimar is able to use these to get several items to use in battle with other captains, and several of which he was also able to use as bonuses during his Shipwreck Tale. They include:
SS Dolphins
Olimar has had access to several different ships used to transport himself across the stars, though his most commonly used one is the SS Dolphin, which he’s had from the start and most recently in the 4th game. It’s equipped with repair systems which can repair his suit, a blaster can blast stars apart, a reactor that can warp the space-time continuum and turn it into pure energy, jets that let it hit escape velocity in an instant, and jumpers which can accelerate it to light speed. (See Before the Verdict in regards to the implications of these).
In Hey Pikmin, he was shown to have access to a second version of the ship, known as the SS Dolphin 2. It’s equipped with an AI helper who can help him and follow along by detaching the cone of the rocket, which can also act as a way to transport him distances. The ship itself is powered by a substance known as Sparklium, and it also seems to have an onboard storage system which can open portals to store larger objects.
While he likely should have access to only one of them, they should be comparable enough VS wise that it’s not terribly relevant which one you give him access to for a debate.
Blender
Surely this will be the key to victory.
Abilities
Chibi-Robo
Robo Physiology
Chibi-Robo being a robot does come with some perks. For starters, he doesn’t have any biological needs, such as eating or breathing, and he never seems to feel fatigue. He also is able to do things like unhinge his head or shift his arms for use with his various tools.
Chibi Lenses
Chibi’s eyes are special lenses, allowing him to zoom in, scan details, and even detect normally invisible doorways.
Hammerspace
Chibi Robo also has an internal storage system within his noggin. This can fit a variety of objects, even if they’re far larger than he is. It’s also been shown that this can be used to seal away stunned enemies. Though the space is still somewhat limited.
Recharger Heart
In Park Patrol, Chibi is able to summon a heart which he can use to recharge other toys that have run low on power.
Resistances
Technology Manipulation - Was immune to Smoggolor’s Zapow attack, which was able to leave other toys completely drained of their power
Cosmic Radiation - Has been fine functioning in the vacuum of space
Heat - Survived being inside an oven as it turned on, and was able to run through a volcanic area just fine
Olimar
(none notable)
Resistances
Fire - See section on Scorch Guard
Electricity - See section on Anti-Electrifier
Toxic Environments / Cosmic Radiation - His spacesuit is, well, a space suit
Poison / Acid - Comparable to Dalmo, who survived eating part of a White Pikmin
Mind / Memory - See section on the Leafling form
Forms
Chibi-Robo
Fire Chibi Robo
By plugging into special Fire plugs, Chibi can light himself on fire for the next 15 seconds. While in this form, not only can he melt metal obstacles instantly, he’s also immune to all enemies, instantly defeating them upon touch.
Ice Chibi Robo
By plugging into special Ice plugs, Chibi can become covered in ice for the next 15 seconds. While in this state, he can freeze water as he walks on it and defeat enemies on touch.
Super Chibi Robo
By coughing up money for a Chibi-Robo amiibo, you can upgrade into this form. It’s golden and seems to have the plug length at full length all the time, but it’s otherwise functionally identical. Incredible.
Olimar
Leafling
If Olimar is to end up in critical condition, it’s been shown that the Pikmin can save his life by bringing him to his Onions, which can fuse his DNA with that of a Pikmin to turn him into a Leafling. This is helpful as it helps him survive without their life support systems, but while in the state he becomes obsessed with Dandori and try to kidnap others to turn them into Leaflings. Other people turned to Leaflings were typically shown to be simple minded and lose their memories after the fact, but Olimar was less affected by this, as he was more eloquent, kept a sense of self and was later able to remember what he did while transformed. This state also was one which needed to be reversed with a cure developed by Shepard which used glow sap from the Luminknolls of the Glow Pikmin, so it’s likely this state would be treated as a last resort.
Support
Chibi-Robo
Telly Vision
The Chibi-Robos have all been assisted by a personal manager robot known as Telly Vision, which has come in a more varied set of appearances. Generally, they act as a guide for Chibi-Robo, letting them know information on their surroundings and guiding them between objectives, along with contacting Citrusoft if needed. They can also talk, allowing them to communicate for Chibi-Robo, and they’re very supportive of their friend. As for more individual abilities, the Telly from Clean Sweep is able to help Chibi-Robo by floating while carrying him to let him fly, and the one from Zip Lash can act as a fortune teller, giving daily fortunes on the levels and providing special cards with bonus items.
Utilibots
In the original game, Chibi Robo is able to deploy these robots to let him traverse the house easier, which are stationary and can be pushed around to move to the proper location. They come in a few types, including the Ladder Utilibots, who can extend up and down, Bridge Utilibots, which can extend over gaps, and Warp Utilibots, which can directly teleport him between locations.
Olimar
Pikmin
Naturally, the big point to talk about with Olimar is his Pikmin, which are a species of sentient plant life. While they are relatively simple, they have shown the intelligence to be capable of problem solving, talking, singing, marching in formations, building, imparting lessons, and understanding the concept of games. Olimar even believed they deliberately were drawn to him due to him being a good leader that they needed. They can also glue objects together with their bodily fluids. All Pikmin can also reach maturity when growing flowers on their head, which makes them faster than average and also lets them glide. And while in the main games Olimar can only have up to a 100 Pikmin at a time, other games and animated shorts have shown him leading far more than this, indicating that’s likely just a gameplay limitation.
The Pikmin also come in several different colors with differing abilities, and to go over that:
Red Pikmin - They have a higher attack power than average and are immune to fire based attacks
Blue Pikmin - They are the only ones who can swim underwater due to possessing gills.
Yellow Pikmin- They are lighter than average, letting them be thrown further distances, and are immune to electricity, even being able to carry electric currents through themselves with no ill effect
Purple Pikmin - They are 10 times heavier and stronger than average, making them powerhouses. They can also create paralyzing shockwaves and can make intangible beings physical
White Pikmin - They are immune to poisonous toxins and can spit corrosive acid strong enough to instantly melt metal, which also makes them poisonous if ingested
Winged Pikmin - They aren’t as effective in combat, but their wings allow them to do useful utilities other can’t, like carrying Olimar and lift up objects without destroying them
Ice Pikmin - These parasitic creatures are masters of the cold, not only being unaffected by low temperatures, but being able to freeze enemies and bodies of water, which they can also float in easily
Rock Pikmin - These guys can smash through objects when thrown, and have better defenses, able to survive being crushed when it normally kills other Pikmin
Glow Pikmin
Worth their own section are these guys, who are rather odd even by Pikmin standards. These are unique pikmin that seem to be undead, which Olimar has theorized may be the souls of Pikmin. They act similarly to standard Pikmin, but rather than being spawned with Onions, they get spawned from Lumiknolls, which show up at night wherever an onion was in the day. They share all the environmental immunities the other types of Pikmin have individually, and don’t die in the same way as Pikmin, as they instead will return to their Lumiknolls. They can also be launched as a ball of light which will explode, stunning nearby enemies. However, they do have a catch in that they’re only active at night or while underground, and revert to seeds to rest if exposed to sunlight.
Moss
A dog-like creature that Olimar met while shipwrecked, and who he quickly formed a bond with. She can be used as a mount to quickly traverse the environment and can act as a second captain to command Pikmin. She also has access to a few abilities to use beyond this:
Big Chomp - She directly bites enemies to damage them
Rush - She charges, dealing damage to opponents and breaking through objects
Super Buff - She pulls along an object, having a strength equivalent to 100 Pikmin
Swallow - She can swallow objects to carry them, which has been shown to have a pretty big capacity
Doggy Paddle - Allows her to swim
Dig - Lets her dip up hidden objects
Heal - Allows for healing over time
Olimar also was able to find gear for Moss with her own versions of Tuff Stuff, giving her 50% more health, and Air Armor, which reduces damage she takes by 50%.
Pebble Pitcher
In Pikmin 4, you have the opportunity to play in co-op, with the second player being able to help by throwing rocks at enemies. And as seen above, it has been acknowledged in the comic so it is canon.
Feats
Chibi-Robo
Saved the Sandersons from the Spydorz and divorce
Revitalized a city park after defeating the Smoglings
Saved Jenny’s family from crippling debt
Helped the Curator make a museum of NostalJunk
Saved the world from the Gyorian stealing natural resources
Power
Chibi-Blaster can blast holes in objects, including:
Could blast off metal objects the Queen Spydor used as armor
Can shatter massive blocks of ice (34.822 - 290.144 Kilojoules)
Ice Form was able to freeze it beforehand (26.213 Megajoules) (Inapplicable, See Before the Verdict)
Speed
Threw his plug across a section of water quickly while parting it (5.85 m/s)
Chibi-Blaster fires sonic blasts (Mach 1)
With Drake Redcrest, created an ice meteor that quickly fell from the cloudline (Mach 7.411)
Can move in tandem with King Kabombra’s lasers (0.03 c) (Debatable, See Before the Verdict)
Chibi House was able to quickly fly from orbit down to Earth (Mach 8308.63) (Debatable, See Before the Verdict)
Durability
Olimar
Overall
Survived crash landing and being stranded on PNF-404 at least 4 times
Led the Pikmin into being an effective army
Successfully paid off Hocotate Freight’s debt
Defeated many of the creatures of PNF-404
Has a wife and 2 kids
Power
Bomb Rocks can blow up rocks (25.332 - 71.491 Joules)
Pikmin as a group can harm and take down the various creatures of PNF-404
Purple Pikmin are able to make small earthquakes (1.995 Megajoules)
Since Purple Pikmin are 10 times stronger than normal Pikmin, this means normal Pikmin can each dish out impacts of 199.5 Kilojoules
Purple Pikmin can make gravitational waves that warp space-time (See Before the Verdict)
Ice Pikmin can freeze lakes (578.054 Megajoules) (Inapplicable, See Before the Verdict)
With the SS Dolphin (See Before the Verdict)
Speed
With Rush Boots, this is upped to 0.2925 m/s
Can move in tandem with the Man-at-Legs’ projectiles, which are stated to be machine guns (Mach 0.879) (Debatable, See Before the Verdict)
Able to pilot various Hocotate Ships
Was seen quickly flying between planets in Pikmin 2's intro (Mach 1064.599) (Debatable, See Before the Verdict)
Some of the SS Dolphin’s parts are stated to be capable of doing the following
Glow Pikmin turn into photons when defeated (Debatable, See Before The Verdict)
A Purple Pikmin was able to block sunlight from blinding him (Inapplicable, See Before The Verdict)
Durability
Survived his ship crashing, which involved a fall from orbit (60.043 Joules - 38.316 Kilojoules)
In the Pikmin 2 intro, this crash caused an explosion visible from orbit (577.562 Teratons) (Inapplicable, See Before the Verdict)
It also depicted the ship as crashing into the Earth very rapidly (2.073 Kilotons) (Inapplicable, See Before the Verdict)
Can take hits from the various creatures of PNF-404
Pikmin can survive:
Being in a bottle that was blown up into the air by a bomb rock (0.000187 Joules)
Being at the very edge of a Gatling Gronk’s pellet explosion (0.0202 joules)
Getting squished by snowballs (0.0274 - 0.0403 joules)
Rock Pikmin can survive getting squished by rocks (1.029 joules)
The SS Dolphin survived getting hit by a meteor, though it did end up crashing from the impact (52.298 Megajoules - 0.512 Tons)
Alternate depiction from the manual (5.297 - 216.983 Megajoules)
Alternate depiction from the Pikmin 2 intro (807.123 Megajoules - 7.901 Tons) (Inapplicable, See Before the Verdict)
Scaling
Chibi-Robo
Toys and Other Robots
The various Chibi-Robo units have crossed paths with a variety of strange folk, whether that be other robots made by Citrusoft or various living toys met throughout their adventures. Chibi has been shown to
Telly survived getting launched high by a Utilibot into the camera (0.0103 Joules)
Giga-Robo’s battery requires 1000 times more energy than Chibi-Robo’s, indicating Chibi is 1000 times weaker than Giga (See Before the Verdict)
Giga-Robo can shake the house with his footsteps (0.477 Tons of TNT for Giga, 1.996 Megajoules for Chibi)
Giga-Robo caught the aliens’ spaceship crashing from orbit (4.739 Tons of TNT for Giga, 19.827 Megajoules for Chibi)
The aliens survived getting crushed under Drake Redcrest’s ice meteor (22.715 Megajoules)
Captain Plankbeard’s ship was able to fly to space (Mach 8.311)
Drake Redcrest can spontaneously make explosions (322.2 Joules)
Various Enemies
The various Chibi-Robos have also had to deal with a variety of enemies throughout their various adventures, and in a lot of these cases he’s shown to be able to pretty easily defeat them. So it should be logical to scale him to those he’s defeated.
10 Spydorz were able to shake a room (6.311 Megajoules each)
The Queen Spydor was able to attract multiple metal objects and tank their impact to use them as armor, which included a fridge (1.464 Kilojoules)
Gyorian UFOs were able to quickly fly down to Earth (Mach 2578.89) (Debatable, See Before the Verdict)
Count Umbrahla was able to make a dark cloud (23.618 Megajoules)
The Gyorian Mothership survived a volcanic eruption (15.534 Tons of TNT) (Debatable, See Before The Verdict)
Mega Gyoros’ eye cockpit thing survived the explosion that blew up the Gyorian Mothership (469.985 Kilojoules)
Mega Gyoros made a big explosion on death (378.652 Megajoules) (Inapplicable, See Before The Verdict)
Olimar
The Other Captains
Olimar is far from the only tiny alien who’s ended up stranded on PNF-404. As he’s typically treated as equals to them and they all end up fighting the same creatures, it should be fair to assume he can compare to what they’ve done.
The Pikmin 3 Captains survived falling from orbit (60.043 Joules - 38.316 Kilojoules)
The Pikmin 3 Captains were able to fly to PNF-404 from Kopai, which is 279,000 light years away (Inapplicable, See Before the Verdict)
Newbie was able to reverse time? (Inapplicable, See Before the Verdict)
Newbie can punch fast enough to make afterimages (1.245 m/s)
PNF-404 Fauna
Throughout his time on this alien planet, Olimar has shown he and the Pikmin are more than a match for the many creatures they encounter, able to harm and take them down on many occasions. Olimar himself is also able to take hits from them himself, though this is typically enough to kill the Pikmin. So it should be fair to assume they can downscale these creatures.
Dweevil was able to carry a gold bar that weighs 1000 pikmin
Arctic Cannon Beetle can shatter icicles (161.749 - 228.727 Joules)
Segmented Crawbster can roll into walls hard enough to send down fragments (178.409 Joules)
Bulborb was able to send a tire rim flying (5.346 - 8.218 Kilojoules)
Armored Cannon Beetle can send big rocks rolling (5.714 Kilojoules)
Ancient Siren Hound can shatter stalactites (41.05 - 136.443 Kilojoules)
It can ground pound hard enough to break up to 4 at once (164.2 - 545.772 Kilojoules)
Quaggled Mireclops was able to significantly damage a Hocotate ship beyond repair (Debatable, See Before the Verdict)
Weaknesses
Chibi-Robo
A Chibi-Robo’s most notable limitation is its battery life. It can only operate for a limited time, needing to recharge on outlets when low on juice, and a lot of his gadgets and vehicles also require this battery, meaning if he runs low in an inconvenient time he’ll be left helpless. While some of them have gotten infinite battery lives, this was only with the help of others and therefore wouldn’t be on the table here. They’re also primarily designed as a household helper, with a lot of their tools and experiences being more suited for problem solving and chores rather than more direct combat.
Olimar
While Olimar is a crafty captain, he still has his weak spots. First off, oxygen is toxic to him to breathe in, so him running out of air or having his helmet broken would be very bad news. He also just has the worst luck, as he’s somehow crash landed on the same planet on 4 different occasions. As for the Pikmin, while they are formidable as a unit, individually they’re fairly weak, being easily killed by all manner of obstacles if misplaced. Which isn’t helped by them being… a bit stupid, to be frank. While the species has gained more of a survival instinct thanks to Olimar’s guidance, they still have a tendency to be shortsighted, get stuck on stuff, and run directly into death without proper guidance.
Before the Verdict
Chibi-Robo
Giga-Robo and the Aliens
In the original game, a major part of the story involves resurrecting a larger robot known as Giga-Robo. I’ve seen some people discuss that he could be treated as part of the assistance for Chibi-Robo, but I wouldn’t really say that would be fair to include. Not only is he specifically only owned by the original game’s family, meaning any other Chibi-Robo unit would not have access to him, he’s also not really an entity that can just be freely summoned to any point. If the debate was for the first game’s Chibi-Robo specifically where you’re saying the fight would take place in his house then maybe you could argue he’d be a factor, but for a composite Chibi on neutral ground it doesn't make sense to include him. This also means Chibi’s infinite battery life would not be considered, as that was explicitly only possible with the aid of Giga, who was the one that got the infinite battery from the aliens. However, that’s not to say Giga’s completely irrelevant here, as he also has a few notable feats, such as shaking the house with his footsteps and catching the alien’s spaceship crashing from orbit. And as they are both made by the same creator, with Chibi being specifically designed as a more energy efficient version of Giga, it makes sense to assume their designs are comparable enough that Chibi can downscale Giga’s feats. If you’re wondering by how much specifically, it’s directly noted that Chibi requires 1000 times less power to run than Giga, implying he should be 1000 times weaker than Giga. This brings these feats down to the Megajoule range, which is fairly in line with other feats Chibi should compare to himself, meaning this can add consistency.
Speaking of the aliens, they’re another potential aid, as Chibi-Robo is able to call them directly with his radar. Now for one thing it can be a bit questionable if they would aid just any model of the robot, given the house was one they already had experience with due to Giga-Robo, but it’s never specifically indicated that the signal was a specific one that no other unit would be able to access, and this radar is standard issue Citrusoft equipment, so you could argue they could come in. The bigger issue is that the aid they could provide is not really as useful as it might sound on paper. For one thing, they are able to grant wishes, as they brought the toys in the first game to life and were responsible for the aforementioned infinite battery. However, not only have we never seen these wishes be used offensively, but to grant them they need balls of light, a specific energy source from their home planet which they can only carry a small amount of. They also have a time machine, but they were explicit on not letting anyone use it, and Chibi only got access to it due to them getting an earth sickness that incapacitated them. So even if you were to treat them as a valid source of support, the aid they could give is too circumstantial and limited to really be of much practical use.
Giant Chibi Robo
Now to finally talk about the big elephant in the room. If you didn’t know, the final boss of Zip Lash involves Chibi-Robo activating a giant Chibi-Robo to fight another giant robot called Mega Gyoros. There’s a lot people have said on this thing and how it might affect this match, but eagle eyed viewers might recognise I have yet to discuss anything specifically for it, so let’s get into it.
First off, some statistics to establish the scale it’s working at. The robot is definitely pretty short by mecha robot standards, only being 6.247 meters tall, which makes it about as tall as a 2 story house, and makes it smaller than even your average Gundam. But it can scale to some pretty tough guys, thanks to being able to go blow for blow with the similarly imposing Mega Gyoros. Not only can he punch it hard enough to send it flying, but he also was able to survive the massive explosion caused by it on its defeat, which clocks in at 378.652 Megajoules. Another notable feat is that the robot’s eye, which seems to act as it’s cockpit, previously survived the Gyorian Mothership exploding, which would be worth 469.985 Kilojoules. Of course, the biggest feat you could give this line of scaling is from an attack the Mothership survived, that being the volcanic eruption that happens during the boss’s intro, which clocks in at 15.534 Tons of TNT. Very impressive, and while Chibi scaling to this normally is a bit questionable, given the boss fight requires you to deal chip damage to the ship’s weak spots, Giant Robo scaling to it is a bit more solid. Mega Gyoros is likely meant to be more powerful than the mothership narratively, given Telly did not try to bust out the Giant Robo before this and it being the true final boss who comes out after the mothership was wrecked implies it’s the Gyorian’s ultimate trump card, so Giant Robo beating it up means it should be superior to the Mothership. And yeah, barring debatable feats of his own which will be discussed shortly, this definitely would be more than enough to crush Olimar with no real chance of him winning. <insert the less overused Ben vs Hal meme here>
However, the big issue is that Chibi actually busting it out in this fight is fairly questionable. For one thing, even for the Chibi of this game it’s not a standard part of his arsenal, as the robot was only able to be built due to Telly specifically requisitioning the parts for it from Citrusoft, and after the boss fight is over they end up abandoning it during the credits. And even if you wanted to just give it to him, or say that any Chibi unit could get their hands on if they really needed it by requesting it on their own PC, the other issue is that there’s not much reason to assume Chibi would even end up resorting to it in the first place for this kind of battle. The fact they were dealing with an international threat and yet only ended up bringing the robot in after another giant robot was on the attack shows that this definitely wouldn’t be their first response to a threat, so it’s very doubtful that they’d think of using it in a battle with someone who is a fifth of their size under any context. As such, there’s not much reason to factor it into this debate.
Relativistic - Hypersonic Chibi-Robo
Speaking of buffs from bad games, there are a couple higher tier arguments for Chibi’s speed from Zip-Lash. The biggest one would be Chibi being able to dodge and move in tandem with lasers from one of the bosses. First off, much like other laser dodging feats, there is a pretty big question mark in terms of validity. While it doesn’t have any contradictory factors, the issue is that it doesn't really have any supporting evidence in favor of it being a light speed laser either. It is from a technological source and seems to be fired by refracting through a gemstone, but it’s also never noted directly as being a laser or moving at the speed of light by any source. And there’s not really any other case of Chibi having relativistic speeds, as the only other times he’s interacted with energy beams are either with stationary traps that are constantly firing their beams or beams that travel their whole distance in one frame, so there’s also not a lot of consistency to the idea of him being quite this fast in the first place.
The other big feat would be from the Chibi House being able to fly down from orbit. While this is a pretty fast feat on the face of it, the issue is that there’s not a lot of reason to scale Chibi to this speed in terms of his own reactions. The ship is never really put in a position where it has to maneuver around obstacles or dogfight enemies, and this journey specifically is directly shown to be in a straight line, so the one flying it does not need to react as fast as it to successfully bring it down. Similar issues lie in the Gyorian UFOs doing the same. While it is a bit slower due to the Earth’s size being fairly inconsistent throughout the intro, there’s similarly not anything really indicating these aliens could react at the flight speeds of their ships. As for Chibi scaling, these ships specifically don’t reappear until the penultimate boss fight with the mothership, which has them pop up as enemies. But they’re clearly not traveling as fast as they were during the trip from orbit, so there’s not much reason to assume Chibi scales to their full flight speeds from this fight.
Olimar
Hocotate Ship Scaling
Probably the most contentious topic with scaling Olimar is how to handle his ships, which have quite a few statements implying they’re capable of feats well above what he can do himself. Now first off, these statements are all coming from Olimar himself, but they should be fine to use. The games generally treat him as a reliable source, he tends to be fairly technical when describing things, and he has no reason to lie in his own personal logs, so it should be fair to treat these statements as accurate.
Though there is one statement I feel is completely invalid, that being the Nova Blaster being able to bust stars. As funny as the idea of a guy the size of a coin being able to pull a Sephiroth would be, the effectiveness of the lasers has never been shown to have anywhere close to that level of power, so it’s fairly questionable to assume that’s true. Especially given Olimar directly says this statement was from a promotional brochure that he’s unsure of the accuracy of, meaning it’s far more likely this statement is just meant to be a marketing tagline hyping it up rather than a literal description of the cannon’s power. There’s also the statement of the Chronos reactor being able to warp the space-time continuum and turn it into pure energy, but this is a fairly vague statement that isn’t supported by much else. And even if you did use this as evidence for the ship being universal, since it’s specifically describing how the ship gets power to it’s boosters and not it’s weapons, this means that it wouldn’t be universal in a way that Olimar could actively weaponize, and therefore it’s pretty irrelevant for VS.
The more complicated question is in terms of speed. The ships Olimar has flown have been shown to be able to travel between various star systems relatively quickly, and it has even been stated to be able to go at faster than light speeds. But this is only during jumps, which show the ship accelerating in a manner similar to Hyperspace in Star Wars. There haven’t been any cases of a pilot in Pikmin reacting to objects moving at these speeds during these jumps, so there isn’t much reason to assume anyone can scale to this speed for reactions. There’s especially this with the Pikmin 3 journey, as not only is their journey mostly offscreen meaning there’s not a lot to infer it’s time frame from, but we also explicitly see the journey was mostly done with a jump, so there’s no reason to assume they scale to this whole journey personally.
But in terms of the ship’s more standard flight speeds, that’s more fair to scale him to. It has been shown that Olimar has the reactions to maneuver around obstacles at these speeds, such as being able to duck under an incoming branch during Pikmin 2’s intro and in the intro of Hey Pikmin where he briefly dodges through an asteroid belt. And while the ship does have autopilot, there’s actually bits which imply Olimar has better reactions than it thanks to the fact that he attributes leaving the ship on autopilot to being why it ended up crashing in the original game. So scaling Olimar’s reactions to his ship’s standard flight speed should be fine.
Finally, there are a few cases of the ships taking pretty big hits, most notably with the asteroid that caused the first game’s crash, which has two main depictions that are reasonable and can range from 5.297 Megajoules at a minimum to 0.512 Tons of TNT at the highest. While Olimar can’t scale to the whole impact personally, as the ship was relatively undamaged by the initial impact and only fell apart during the resulting orbital reentry, it should be fair to assume the ship can take comparable hits. And there is a case of a creature directly damaging a Hocotate ship in the Quaggled Mireclops during the events of Pikmin 3, so that does give Olimar and the Pikmin an arguable method of downscaling the impact by way of defeating the creature. Though this is a bit questionable given said defeat was done mainly by attacking it’s weak points.
Purple Pikmin are how strong?
Speaking of questionable statements which could imply massive power, the Pikmin 4 Piklopedia has an entry where it’s established that Purple Pikmin’s stomps are actually gravitational waves that can warp space-time. As you could imagine, if you take this literally it can seem pretty game changing, but I feel like that would be a bit disingenuous. This passage is likely meant to be in reference to the Water Wraith, whose ability to phase through attacks was noted to specifically be the result of it anchoring its physical form in another dimension, and which the Purple Pikmin were able to counteract. So what does this mean versus wise? Practically speaking, not much. They do have the ability to counter a very specific form of spatial manipulation / avatar creation, but this statement is way too vaguely defined to assume it means they could use it to do much else. It also definitely does not mean they have universal power, as the wraith’s real body being in a separate dimension just means said separate dimension exists. There’s nothing implying the Wraith created this dimension or that the Purples are destroying it to bring it back to the main one. And even under the interpretation it was, like come on there’s also no conceivable reality where this is not a humongous outlier, get real.
Light Speed Pikmin?
There are also surprisingly two different instances which could imply Pikmin have speeds comparable to the speed of light. Though on closer scrutiny, both feats do have issues. The less debatable of the two from the comic where a Purple Pikmin blocks sunlight. The issue here is pretty simple: He’s clearly not blocking the light before it can hit him, given the fact that his face was already lit up, it’s just him doing it in response to the sun being too bright. While tandem movement is a fairly common argument for getting characters to relativistic ranges, the intent here is clearly not that he’s moving at comparable speeds to the light, so using it to argue he’s moving as fast as light is simply absurd.
The more solid case here is with Glow Pikmin, who have been directly described as turning into photons when defeated. Photons move at the speed of light, so does that mean the Glow Pikmin can travel at that speed? Potentially, but there are still issues. First off, while both statements are from in-universe scientists that are meant to be reliable, the Glow Pikmin are also treated as biological oddities, and both statements are worded in a way that imply these are simply theories that they have, not definite facts they’re certain of. Beyond that, even if you were to treat it literally, it’s a bit hard to justify them actually being able to react at the speed they travel at, due to the fact their forms after being defeated are intangible, and therefore they don’t need to worry about dodging things on the return trip. And there’s also not really a good argument that any of the other Pikmin can compare to their speed here, given this is a process explicitly unique to the Glowing Ones. So while you could argue it, I feel it’s not substantiated enough to work, and even if you did, it’s for a minority of the Pikmin that are already situational in being deployed in the first place.
Man-at-Legs Bullet Timing?
On the topic of weird speed feats, there’s the Man-at-Legs, a cyborg spider who can fire energy projectiles. These projectiles have typically been described fairly vaguely, but the Nintendo Power guide for Pikmin 2 directly states these are meant to be machine guns (based on context the “laser” part of this statement is likely referring to the targeting reticule that shows up before it fires not the actual projectiles, as this statement is worded in a way where these are two different things). While some have argued this could count as bullet timing, it’s still a relatively vague feat, and the fact sources made later stick with the idea of these just being energy blasts could indicate this statement is outdated.
Time Reversal?
In this comic, the Pikmin 4 Captain was able to rewind time. Somehow. There’s not really any elaboration on how they did it, they just kind of do it, so it is pretty blatant as just a thing they can do. But there’s sadly no reason to scale Olimar to it. While the comic is pretty gag focused, it’s not one where toon force is commonly used, especially not by Olimar during his few appearances, so there’s not much reason to assume that because he’s on similar standing to them he is therefore capable of this. I just wanted to bring it up because it’s funny.
Pikmin 2 Intro Feats
So the intro of Pikmin 2 is kind of weird when put under a VS lens, thanks to it opening with the Dolphin flying quickly between planets, and of course it's depiction of the spaceship crash. Both feats are, if taken at face value, a good deal higher than most of the other feats you could scale Olimar to. But there are a few issues in doing that. First off, a thing that applies to both feats is that this sequence is clearly meant to be a snappily animated recap rather than being a literal depiction of the events it portrays, so hinging anything on this version of the events is a bit suspect. For the ship crash’s depiction, there really isn’t any defending it under a serious context. The explosion visible from orbit thing, beyond being a clear and obvious outlier due to being quintillions of times stronger than anything reasonable you could scale Olimar to, is kind of a blink and you miss it effect that’s not really backed up by any other display of this event or similar ones, so it’s very easy to simply disregard this feat. Similar issues lie in the Kinetic Energy of Olimar crashing at rapid speeds and the larger asteroid that caused the crash, as both feats are also far too big a gap to be reasonable and are fairly blatantly just the result of the event being truncated in this manner.
As for the ship flight speed, if you take the scene at face value then the trip would clock in at 1.73 times the speed of light, which is pretty damn fast. But there is the issue in assuming that, as it is kind of contradicting the lore to say his ship can just casually breach light speeds when his jumping system is meant to be what accelerates the Dolphin to that sort of speed. And there’s no reason to assume the ship was at jumping speed during this moment, given it’s shown that it’s only used for cosmic distances, not going into planet's atmospheres. However, there is a way to bring this speed down to being somewhat more reasonable, as the planets rotating fairly fast implies this shot was sped up. By extrapolating how far the big planet rotated to get the actual speed of this moment, that would bring the feat down to Mach 1064.599. While it is still somewhat questionable due to the aforementioned issues on whether or not it’s meant to be literal, it being far less of a jump in numbers in comparison to other values that Olimar should scale to the piloting of means that I feel it’s reasonable to consider iit as a high end.
Both
Freezing Feats
Both of these two do have access to methods of freezing decently large amounts of water, at least in comparison to their size, thanks to the Ice Chibi Robo form and the Ice Pikmin respectively. However, in neither case is there much reason to really scale them to their effects. For Chibi’s, this is only done by way of a specific form that requires finding a specific environmental factor, so in a neutral ground fight there’s not much reason to scale him to it, along with the Fire Form’s ability to melt blocks. As for Olimar, while the Ice Pikmin freezing things is impressive, this process has nothing to really do with their own natural power, as it’s instead thanks to the specific ice they act as a parasite for. This means that their actual physical strength shouldn’t scale to the freezing, as it’s more akin to a weapon they use. And while you could argue they could use it to freeze Chibi, the robot being able to survive in the vacuum of space means he can survive at temperatures of -270 degrees Celsius, as opposed to water which freezes at only 0 degrees Celsius, which was unlikely to be effective.
Bonus Art
Verdict
Stats
When it came to strength and durability, both of these two definitely had more power than you might expect considering their size, as both could solidly place themselves in the wall level. But there wasn’t much question that Chibi had the edge in power. The best feat that the Pikmin were capable of was Purple Pikmin being able to make small earthquakes, which could clock in at 1.995 Megajoules. Very impressive, but this is a value that only the strongest among the Pikmin could scale to. As a contrast, Chibi could scale to multiple Megajoule level feats himself, including Spydorz shaking a room at 6.311 Megajoules, downscaling from Giga Robo catching the UFO at 19.827 Megajoules, the aliens surviving the ice meteor at 22.715 Megajoules, and Count Umbrahla making a cloud at 23.618 Megajoules. This would make Chibi about 3 - 12 times stronger than the Purple Pikmin, and which would also make him 30 - 120 times stronger than the other individual Pikmin.
You could arguably scale the Pikmin even higher by way of saying they downscale the Quaggled Mireclops, whose ability to damage a Hocotate ship meant it could scale to 0.512 Tons of TNT. Though this is a bit dubious, given the Pikmin can only damage it en masse and by targeting its weak point, so arguing they fully scale wasn’t really on the table. And even you did, under similar standards you could downscale Chibi to the Gyorian Mothership, as he similarly only is able to slightly damage it by targeting its weak point, and means he would be downscaling it’s volcanic eruption survival at 15.534 Tons of TNT, which would be about 30 times stronger. This meant Chibi would still have a sizable edge in power, as not only is he working down from a higher value at the start, any value you could downscale him from is one he’d just get himself, as opposed to the Pikmin, who also have to deal with dividing it between them. So no matter how you look at it, Chibi-Robo has a significant edge in power.
As for speed, that had a lot of points for both. Olimar did boast slightly faster movement speeds, being able to run at 0.2925 m/s to Chibi’s 0.199 m/s, making him about 1.5 times faster on foot. Though Chibi had an edge in attacking speed, as while Olimar could scale to the Rookie’s after image punching at 1.245 m/s, Chibi had quite a few faster methods of attacking, including his plugs’ 5.85 m/s water crossing his Chibi Blaster firing sonic blasts at Mach 1, and making an ice meteor at Mach 7.411, which would make Chibi 5 - 2038 times faster with his attacks. Chibi also had access to multiple vehicles which could outpace his own movement speed, therefore more than making up for his speed disadvantage on foot. And even when accounting for Olimar’s ship being able to travel between planets at Mach 463.59 - 1064.599, the Chibi-House was even faster, being able to fly down to earth at Mach 8308.63, making it 8 - 18 times faster. Though this definitely wasn’t going to come down to a dogfight between these ships. Finally, there’s the discussion of reaction speeds, which goes back to favoring Olimar on the low end. Both could likely scale to their own movement and attacking speeds, but Olimar is the only one of the two who had a solid argument for scaling to his ships’ speeds, which was a lot faster than most of Chibi’s other displays. But Chibi did have a potential argument for reacting even faster thanks to his laser tandem movement, which could clock in at 0.03 c, making him arguably 25 - 57 times faster in reactions. Though as mentioned this can be seen as somewhat dubious.
So overall, Chibi definitely had a solid edge in power, and while speed had quite a few categories to discuss, generally Chibi had the edge in more categories that counted. So stats overall go to Chibi-Robo.
Arsenal & Abilities
Right out of the gate, there was really no question that Olimar’s Pikmin gave him a significant edge just in terms of raw numbers. He could bring in hundreds of them, and they had plenty of different abilities for versatility. By comparison, the only help Chibi could bring in was the Utilibots, who are stationary and more useful for traversing environments, and Telly, who might be good as an assistant for strategizing but would definitely not help much when it came to more direct fighting. So even with the stat disadvantage, the sheer numbers that Olimar had on his side meant Chibi actually defeating him was not going to be a simple affair. However, while that was an issue for him, Chibi did have a lot of the tools to ensure it wouldn’t be an easy victory for Olimar either.
For one, Chibi had a fairly good selection of weapons. The sheer length of his plug tail, for instance, would give him a very good amount of AOE to give a lot of breathing room. And the Chibi-Blaster would also be a very effective way of blasting apart a lot of the Pikmin faster than they could hope to keep up with. Both of these would also be very easy as the Pikmin are all fairly weak durability wise. He could use the vacuum to suck up the Glow Pikmin, or the Tomato Suit’s guitar playing to charm some of them to his side. And he could even directly seal away enemies after stunning them and putting them in his hammerspace, which would be a good way of taking away Olimar’s more notable help like the Onions or Moss, and would definitely cripple his gameplan in the long run.
Speaking of his gameplan, Olimar did have his own selection of weapons which could be helpful, but they weren’t going to be enough to net him the win here. First off, a lot of the Pikmin didn’t really have a good way of really doing damage to Chibi without all rushing him at him, which would make them pretty easy pickings for Chibi’s weapons. The White Pikmin did have a potential way to deal significant damage thanks to their acid being able to eat through metals, but this was still something they needed to get close to do. And given Olimar’s typical use of the Whites were feeding them to creatures to feed them, which Chibi wouldn’t be affected by due to his aforementioned sealing hammerspace, this being a specific strategy would likely not be Olimar’s first thought.
And Olimar did have a decent variety of equipment on his own, but a lot of it was stuff that was either more utility based or more focused on buffing his Pikmin. The Dandori capsules did give him a variety of special items, but the more offence based ones were either temporary stunners or weapons that would be too weak to really do much damage. There was also the Ultra Bitter Spray, which could petrify enemies, but not only is it also a temporary effect, but the fact that Chibi is a robot meant that kind of biological weapon could very well not work at all. Even their forms wouldn’t really change this, as while Chibi’s were more context sensitive, Olimar getting turned to a Leafling wouldn’t really give him any options for winning, just let him survive a bit longer. So ultimately, while Olimar had a sizable amount of potential, Chibi had the better options for ending the battle in his favor.
Tertiary Factors
Now onto intelligence, and this could be a bit of a toss up. Olimar was definitely the generally smarter of the two, as he’s been shown to be very knowledgeable in sciences, while Chibi’s more of a generally good problem solver. On paper, Olimar did also seem like he’d be the better of the two in battle intelligence, as he’s generally fought more consistently and has taken on an overall wider variety of creatures. But while he does take on guys stronger than him all the time, Chibi was quite literally built differently, as a lot of the other creatures Olimar’s faced are the equivalent of wild animals intelligence wise. Meanwhile, a lot of the combat a Chibi-Robo unit tend to experience is with groups of weaker enemies, which was a lot more comparable to the Pikmin and meant he’d be able to quickly adapt to dealing with them.
Conclusion
“We hope that you enjoy the Chibi-Robo experience™ for many years to come. Welcome to the family!”
Advantages:
Stronger
Faster attacking speed, vehicles, and reactions at high end
Better selection of weaponry and equipment
More effective options for ending the battle
Better battle intelligence
Certified silly little guy
Underrated games
Disadvantages:
Slower on foot movement and reactions at mid ends
Significantly outnumbered
Could be vulnerable to White Pikmin acid
Forms were more context sensitive
Worse general intelligence
Dead series
Not in Smash
Scott the Woz
Advantages:
Faster movement and reactions at mid ends
Massive edge in numbers
White Pikmin acid could give a good way of taking out Chibi
Form was less context sensitive
Better general intelligence
Not from a dead series
Is in Smash
Disadvantages:
Weaker
Slower attacking speed, vehicles, and reactions at high end
Worse selection of weaponry and equipment
Less effective options for ending the battle
Worse battle intelligence
I sure hope Moss does not have contentious opinions on same sex relationships
This was a fascinating battle to discuss, as despite their size these two were fairly powerful. However, once you break this down, the winner is not a hard conclusion to reach. While Olimar’s allies and intelligence could let him take down most, ultimately the Chibi-Robo’s superior power, capabilities, and street smarts would make him an obstacle that ended this explorer’s journey. Sad end for the captain, but this was one shipwreck he couldn’t come back from.
Sourcelist:
Next Time
Another amazing blog. I've always wanted to see Olimir covered so in depth. Thank you so much!
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