50 Fun Facts About South Park: the Stick of Truth

In South Park: The Stick of Truth, the New Kid's magic spells are powered by which bodily function?

Farting stands in for magic, and each spell has a job: one lures guards away with a noise, another blasts through barricades.

Whatever name the player types in The Stick of Truth, Cartman insists on calling the New Kid what?

Douchebag sticks whatever the player enters, and the title only grows: by the end of the story the hero is hailed as King Douchebag.

Which country appears in South Park: The Stick of Truth as a pixelated, overhead 16-bit role-playing game?

Canada swaps the show's look for a retro overhead map, a gag IGN ranked among its 100 most unforgettable video game moments.

After a UFO crashes into South Park Mall in The Stick of Truth, the government claims which chain is being built?

Taco Bell is the cover story, and it works too well: the villain later mistakes the aliens' green goo for taco sauce.

Which South Park boy plays a princess in The Stick of Truth and then betrays the group as the final boss?

Kenny, as Princess Kenny, seizes the Stick for himself near the end, so the last fight is against one of the New Kid's first allies.

The main menu of The Stick of Truth, home to the inventory and quest journal, imitates which social network?

Facebook is the model, and it doubles as a scoreboard: each townsperson the New Kid adds there brings a permanent perk closer.

Trey Parker first imagined South Park: The Stick of Truth as a South Park version of which 2011 fantasy RPG?

Skyrim was the template, and Parker's first script ran to about 500 pages before the plan was scaled back to something buildable.

Australia's censored version of The Stick of Truth replaces cut scenes with a card showing which animal crying?

A koala in tears sits behind a written description of each missing scene, a card the show's creators added so the cuts could not be hidden.

Which South Park character runs the fast travel service that carries the New Kid between flags in The Stick of Truth?

Timmy ferries the New Kid to any flag already found, and he adds the hero on the in-game social network once every stop is discovered.

Which 2017 sequel to South Park: The Stick of Truth picks up one day after the first game's story ends?

The Fractured but Whole arrived in October 2017 from a new in-house team in San Francisco, with the kids now playing superheroes instead of fighting a fantasy war.

Which California studio, the maker of Fallout: New Vegas, developed South Park: The Stick of Truth?

Obsidian Entertainment got the job because Trey Parker liked its role-playing games, and he and Matt Stone contacted the studio themselves in 2009.

Which publisher bought The Stick of Truth at a bankruptcy auction in 2013 and released the game a year later?

Ubisoft paid about $3.2 million for the rights, then decided within three weeks that the game needed major changes and delayed it again.

Which original publisher of South Park: The Stick of Truth filed for bankruptcy in December 2012, mid-development?

THQ collapsed after a run of failed releases and its games were sold off one by one, a sale South Park's own studio challenged in court.

In The Stick of Truth, what do the humans call their cardboard kingdom in Cartman's backyard?

Kupa Keep is a camp of cardboard boxes, and its full title, the Kingdom of Kupa Keep, shortens to initials that are one of the game's darker jokes.

Which former US vice-president attacks the New Kid with a sleep-inducing slideshow in The Stick of Truth?

Al Gore first recruits the New Kid to plant ManBearPig trackers around town, then decides the hero is the monster and picks a fight.

Which long-dead South Park character is revived as a zombie for a boss fight late in The Stick of Truth?

Chef, killed off in the show's tenth season, is brought back with alien goo by the story's villain and must be beaten before the Stick is recovered.

Which South Park dad helps the New Kid break out of the alien spaceship in The Stick of Truth?

Randy Marsh guides the escape from the ship, and he later teaches the New Kid a stealth spell for sneaking past government agents.

The three South Park episodes that led into The Stick of Truth in 2013 borrowed themes from which TV drama?

Game of Thrones supplied the scheming for the Black Friday trilogy, in which the kids wear their game costumes and go to war over new consoles.

The kids' costumes in The Stick of Truth come from a 2002 South Park episode spoofing which film series?

The Lord of the Rings was the boys' make-believe in that episode, where the quest was returning a rented videotape, and the game reuses its outfits and classes.

Tuong Lu Kim, who can be summoned into battle in The Stick of Truth, owns which South Park restaurant?

City Wok's owner becomes a summon after the New Kid clears Mongolian raiders out of a tower for him in a side quest.

Which boy, banished by Cartman for losing the Stick, becomes the main villain of The Stick of Truth?

Clyde takes revenge for being kicked out by stealing the Stick, building a fortress in his backyard and raising an army with alien goo.

Butters, the New Kid's first ally in The Stick of Truth, plays which fantasy class?

Paladin Butters is the first of six buddies who can fight beside the New Kid, and he can heal the hero as well as swing his hammer.

In The Stick of Truth, Butters can transform mid-battle into which of his alter egos from the TV show?

Professor Chaos is Butters' wildest move: he changes into his supervillain self and unleashes one of five attacks chosen at random.

Which summonable ally in The Stick of Truth arrives with an assault rifle and guns down the enemy party?

Jesus joins the summon list once the side quest Find Jesus is done, though like every summon he cannot be called in against a boss.

Beating which night-time intruders in The Stick of Truth earns the New Kid the ability to shrink?

The Underpants Gnomes come to raid the hero's bedroom, and their defeated warlock hands over the dust that lets the New Kid change size at will.

The New Kid must shrink and climb inside which South Park character to disarm a nuclear bomb in The Stick of Truth?

Mr. Slave is where government agents hid the device, and outside that mission he is one of the four characters the New Kid can summon in battle.

Cartman and Kyle each send the New Kid to recruit which South Park clique in The Stick of Truth?

The Goth kids only listen after the New Kid dresses the part, proves he is a nonconformist and learns to dance the way they do.

In The Stick of Truth, which of the New Kid's four magic spells is used to blast through blockades?

Nagasaki is the fourth and final spell the New Kid learns, taught by Terrance and Phillip, and it needs a completely full mana bar before it can be cast in a fight.

What does the PP that fuels special attacks in South Park: The Stick of Truth stand for?

Power Points is the official name, but the game insists the abbreviation be said aloud as a toilet joke.

At the end of The Stick of Truth, the kids decide the Stick is too powerful and throw it where?

Stark's Pond swallows the Stick in the epilogue, and with the war over the New Kid simply walks home rather than start another game.

Which Nintendo RPG series, with its blend of 2D and 3D visuals, helped inspire the look of The Stick of Truth?

Paper Mario's flat characters moving through a world with depth suited a show whose look is based on paper cutout animation.

The New Kid's silence in The Stick of Truth was modelled on which famously wordless Nintendo hero?

Link is the silent hero of the Legend of Zelda games, and the New Kid stays just as quiet, saying a single line only as the story ends.

Which Super Nintendo role-playing game starring a boy named Ness helped inspire South Park: The Stick of Truth?

EarthBound follows a young boy and his party across the world to stop a cosmic destroyer, and it was cited next to the fantasy epic the creators first pictured.

An early plan for The Stick of Truth let players insult Cartman by voice using which Xbox 360 accessory?

Kinect support would have let players give voice commands, taunt enemies and insult Cartman, who would answer back, but it was gone by the time the game shipped.

Which celebrity was planned as a boss fight in The Stick of Truth but removed before release?

Paris Hilton was cut along with vampire children fought in a cemetery, hippies and a large winged monster as the game was trimmed down.

Trey Parker won Best Performance for The Stick of Truth at the very first edition of which ceremony?

The Game Awards began in December 2014 and honoured Parker for voicing much of the cast himself; the game was also nominated for its narrative and as a role-playing game.

Four years after launch, The Stick of Truth arrived as a download on which console in September 2018?

Nintendo Switch owners got the game seven months after its return on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, where it had first been a pre-order bonus for the sequel.

In which country was the launch of The Stick of Truth delayed after banned imagery turned up in the local version?

Germany outlaws the swastikas and salutes that the game's zombies use, so the release there and in neighbouring Austria was held back for changes.

Which region's release of The Stick of Truth was left uncensored on every platform?

North America got every scene on every platform, while console versions across Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Russia lost seven scenes.

South Park: The Stick of Truth is set in a fictional mountain town in which US state?

Colorado's Rocky Mountains surround the town, and the game lets players wander it freely, from the elementary school to the mall and the cinema.

Which collectible toys from a 1999 South Park episode are hidden around town in The Stick of Truth?

Chinpokomon dolls reward exploring, and the set even includes designs that were drawn for the show but never used on screen.

Fights in The Stick of Truth happen in a separate battle area and use which style of combat?

Turn-based battles give each side a go, but timing still matters: pressing a button as an icon flashes strengthens a hit or softens a blow.

Cartman rules the humans in The Stick of Truth under which title, also the name of the collector's edition?

Grand Wizard Cartman also became a six-inch Kidrobot figure, packed into the collector's edition along with a map of the kids' kingdom.

Besides Fighter and Thief, which standard fantasy class can the New Kid choose in The Stick of Truth?

Mage is one of four classes, yet the choice is loose: armour and weapons are not tied to class, so a Mage can still fight up close.

Government agents in The Stick of Truth have been hunting the New Kid because of which unusual talent?

Making friends very fast is the hero's gift: his family moved to hide him from agents who wanted to use his social-network reach for their own ends.

The original South Park video game, released in 1998 long before The Stick of Truth, belonged to which genre?

First-person shooter was the odd fit chosen in 1998, built on the Turok 2 engine; Parker and Stone had no part in it and later criticised those early games.

Which media company, then South Park's owner, cut its funding for The Stick of Truth during development?

Viacom had grown wary of video games, so a publisher stepped in to fund a project the show's creators had at first bankrolled through their own company.

The South Park TV show is animated in Autodesk Maya, but The Stick of Truth's art was built in which software?

Adobe Flash was used for the game's assets and animations, and the show's studio opened its full archive of art so the town could match the series.

Which Hollywood actor appears near the end of The Stick of Truth to explain a tangled piece of backstory?

Morgan Freeman steps in to explain a final twist, repeating a gag from the show in which he arrives whenever the plot needs untangling.

Which summonable character in The Stick of Truth asks the New Kid to find his three children lost in the sewers?

Mr. Hankey's home shrank during development: an early plan gave his family a large Christmas village instead of a small house underground.