7. Ulala

The world of Space Channel 5 couldn’t be more colourful if you remade it with twisting balloons. And with every colour in the world at their disposal, why did Ulala’s creators choose orange – and a particularly orange orange, at that – for the sexy, swingin’ reporter’s outfit? According to director Tetsuya Mizuguchi, “At first, I imagined Ulala’s clothing as a pink and blue cowboy outfit, to appeal to boys and girls. But I saw the final character design, and I knew she must be orange. She has an orange shape, and an orange personality. Now, I think that Ulala is a rainbow, but every colour in this rainbow is orange.”

For the second entry in the Space Channel 5 series, Ulala was given a white outfit, and Mizuguchi quit Sega, rage in his belly. It doesn’t get more orange than that!

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6. Crash Bandicoot

It was 1996, and with ‘top dog’ Nintendo launching a new system with guaranteed best-seller Super Mario 64, newcomer Sony needed a Mario-killer – a character who would show kids everywhere that Nintendo is for kids. They found their champion in Crash Bandicoot, a deformed, wild-eyed, pollution-hatin’ marsupial who dressed like a skateboarder and spoke to a new generation of gamers in their own language. He looked like he could bite Mario’s head off, and in a sense, that’s exactly what he did. How could an overweight plumber compete with a dude so cool, so spiky, and most importantly, so orange?

Ask any colour scientist and he – or she! – will tell you that Mario’s colours, red and blue, are colours for babies. Crash’s loud, electric orange was a taser to Mario’s sweaty Italian balls; he even went shirtless, as if to say, “Orange all over – that’s Crash.” One look at that mutant carrot in shorts, and no kid or teen in 1996 needed to be told: In Mario’s world, he rescues the princess; in Crash’s world, Mario is the princess.

Twelve years later and Nintendo is all but forgotten, while Sony’s never-ending success with the Crash Bandicoot series has made gamers of every man, woman and child on earth. And it’s all thanks to the colour orange.

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5. Samus

Classic game characters and mascots are recognisable by their colours, so not only is Samus coloured orange, but the colour orange is Samus. And if orange is Samus, rest assured that should any other colours pose a threat to it, orange will exterminate them completely. Should it so choose, orange will purge everything green from the earth, and every shade of blue from the sky – thoroughly and completely.

Samus is such a strong character that she adds more to orange than orange adds to her. Through sheer might, and with a little help from our readers’ votes, she has secured her position as the fifth most orange videogame character.

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