If one were to jump on a Squirtle's head, the water pokemon will retract into its shell, which can then be kicked as a projectile. Although occasionally finding military uses as early ammunition for cannons, this fact has gone ignored for most of their history. Today, however, it provides fodder for one of the most popular video games of the pokemon world.
The first game series featuring Squirtle was a platformer which made it the protagonist. It used water attacks to put out fires (as real Squirtle are, for their ability to convert food into water inside their bodies, used to this day for firefighting and irrigation) and withdrew into its shell to protect itself from enemy attacks. With the forward-R combination, one could even use a rolling attack more similar to a Voltorb's than anything a real Squirtle is capable of.
The gaming company which made this game eventually went under, but not without developing rivalries with other companies such as Nintendo which survive to this day. As an act of playful rivalry, Squirtle were added into Nintendo's Super Mario series, replacing the ill-fated Koopa Troopas of the original game. Today, they are more beloved among Nintendo players as enemies than by the dwindling fandom of the original platformers, but when a remake of the originals set in the Mario universe was recently announced, both sides of Squirtle video game fandom reacted with excitement and anticipation.
