Canon
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Canon is any information that is considered to be "real", "official", or "true" in a fictional universe. The following is a full summary of the plot of every canon Pikmin game.
Overview of the canon
Captain Olimar decides that he has been overworking himself at his job at Hocotate Freight and that he needs to go on a vacation. With no destination in mind, he lets his ship, the S.S. Dolphin, make its own way through space. He switches his ship to autopilot and gets up to make a cup of tea, when suddenly his ship malfunctions and hits a meteor. Captain Olimar was then thrown against the control panel and blacked out, while his ship crash-lands on a nearby uncharted planet. He wakes up to discover that he lost thirty parts of his ship. He also discovers that he has only thirty days of remaining battery power in his life support systems, and without it he will die due to oxygen being present on the planet, which is an element that is extremely lethal to Hocotatians. After exploring the area, Olimar finds a dormant Onion. When Olimar approaches the Onion, it seems to awaken, and spits out a seed. Olimar plucks the seed, discovers Red Pikmin, and utilizes their abilities to get back the Main Engine, which allows him to pilot the S.S. Dolphin once again. During his expedition on the planet, Olimar comes across Yellow Pikmin and Blue Pikmin, in that order. After defeating the Emperor Bulblax and obtaining his last ship part, the Secret Safe, he manages to fully repair his ship. Captain Olimar grabs a "shiny alien platter" as a souvenir for his kids, before blasting off back to Hocotate.
After returning to Hocotate, Olimar lands at the Hocotate Freight offices. When his ship touched down, he learns from his boss, the president of Hocotate Freight, that the company had to take out a loan from Happy Hocotate Savings & Loan to repay the loss of a cargo of golden pikpik brand carrots. Louie reported that a ravenous space bunny ate the shipment, but it is later revealed that they were actually eaten by Louie himself, as he couldn't suppress his powerful hunger. The president explains their situation to Olimar, who finds out that the S.S. Dolphin was sold to help repay the loan and that the remaining debt is 10,100 Pokos. In shock of the loss of the S.S. Dolphin, Olimar accidentally drops his souvenir on the ground. As the souvenir rolled into Louie, the Hocotate ship was able to suck it up. It analyzed the piece of treasure to be worth 100 Pokos, which lowered the remaining loan to 10,000 Pokos. Olimar explains that there are more treasures on the planet, and as a result the president sends Olimar and Louie back to the planet to collect more treasure in hopes of paying off their debt.
While landing, they fly through a small blizzard in the Valley of Repose, and try to maneuver through some tree branches. Unfortunately, Olimar hits one of the branches, and Louie falls out of his cockpit, into the snow below. The Hocotate ship barely manages to land, and ejects Olimar out of his cockpit. He gets up and rediscovers Red Pikmin. After a while, the duo are able to reunite and salvage a piece of treasure. During their search for treasure the following days, Olimar and crew discover Purple Pikmin and White Pikmin, and rediscover Yellow Pikmin and Blue Pikmin, in that order. Meanwhile back on Hocotate, the president realizes he bought the loan from All-Devouring Black Hole Loan Sharks instead of Happy Hocotate Savings & Loan. After being constantly harassed by debt collectors over the phone, he goes into hiding, living under a bridge with animals for a short time until he is kicked out by a group from the government offices. He then goes on the run, while eating grass to survive. The president is finally caught however, and is seemingly tortured and threatened to be buried in Hocotate Swamp if Olimar and Louie don't repay the loan soon. Luckily, they collect enough treasure to repay the debt and return to Hocotate, but during the trip back to their home planet, Louie gets left behind. After arriving at Hocotate Freight and emptying the Hocotate ship of all its treasure, Olimar informs the president that there is more treasure left on the planet. The president then orders Olimar and Louie to go back to the planet, but then realizes that Louie was actually left behind. The president decides to join Captain Olimar, and the two return to the strange planet. They recover Louie from the Titan Dweevil, and after collecting the rest of the treasure on the planet, they soon go back to Hocotate.
Sometime after this, Olimar once again goes on a lone vacation on the S.S. Dolphin, presumably rebought by the president after being sold off in Pikmin 2. The S.S. Dolphin gets hit by a meteor and crashes on the Pikmin planet once again. Like his first trip, Olimar has a limited number of days due to his remaining battery power in his life support systems, and has to collect all 30 parts of his ship that were lost during the crash. He rediscovers the Red, Yellow and Blue Pikmin, as well as discovering Ice Pikmin, Rock Pikmin and Winged Pikmin. Eventually he meets a plant-space dog hybrid whom he names Moss. After fully repairing the S.S. Dolphin, he sets off to escape the planet, however Moss stows away inside the S.S. Dolphin, resulting in her coming down with an extreme sickness due to a strange connection she has with the planet. The ensuing struggle to return Moss to the planet coincides with Olimar's life-support system finally giving out, crashing Olimar back on the planet. In an act that ultimately revives him, Olimar is brought to the Onion by Moss and his own Pikmin, and is transformed into a leafling; after which he is brainwashed with the teachings of Dandori and has his ID scrambled and replaced with a simple Error 404 Page not Found message.
Before his takeoff and ensuing crash, Olimar was able to release a distress signal including his voyage log about the planet across the universe, resulting in the Rescue Corps flying to the planet to make contact. This also, however, results in many other unrelated parties attempting to land on the planet for their own motives. Every single one of them is stuck on the planet; all either crash-landing or being stranded on the planet some other way. One particular member of the Rescue Corps is eventually able to make a successful landing, and sets to work saving the other Rescue Corps members, the many castaways (including those who have been transformed into Leaflings), and Olimar himself.
Eventually, Olimar is found and cured, but the space dog of the Rescue Corps, Oatchi comes down with a similar condition to that of Moss, preventing them from leaving the planet. They are informed that a veterinarian from the planet Koppai has also crash-landed on the planet. Arriving in a new area, they find a Koppaite with Louie, who was sent by the president to find Olimar but ended up being distracted by the prospect of creatures to eat; he and Moss abduct the Koppaite and run away. In spite of his interference, they are able to rescue her. She informs them that they will need DNA from an unaffected space dog, and they recall that Louie's voyage log mentioned that there was one in the deepest part of a cave in the area. The Rescue Corps finds both Louie and the Ancient Sirehound in the cave, and are attacked by them. They are victorious, and while the Sirehound itself escapes it leaves behind its collar, which has enough fur on it for a cure to be made.
With everyone cured and rescued, they all manage to escape the planet, leaving Moss and the Pikmin behind.
Some time after this, the planet of Koppai is in the midst of a planet-wide food crisis. They decide to send unmanned scout vessels, called SPEROs, out into space to search for planets that contain edible matter. The final SPERO returns with data indicating that one planet has "unlimited food resources". Koppai names the mysterious planet "PNF-404", and proceeds to send three explorers to PNF-404 in search of food. Unbeknownst to them however, Olimar and Louie also return to the planet to collect more treasure, as Hocotate Freight's new business venture failed miserably and the company has fallen into debt once again. Olimar and Louie start their search for treasure in a garden. The next day they go to a forest, but at the same time, the Koppaites' ship, the S.S. Drake, mysteriously fails, causing the Koppaites to lose control of their ship, and forcing them to make an emergency escape into different areas. Captain Charlie wakes up in the Distant Tundra, finds Yellow Pikmin, and eventually loses them when he's confronted with the Vehemoth Phosbat. Alph then wakes up to find himself in the Tropical Wilds, encounters Red Pikmin, and reunites with the S.S. Drake. He then learns that they cannot return to their home planet without the cosmic-drive key, which is nowhere to be found on the S.S. Drake. On the same day, during the start of Olimar and Louie's expedition in the forest, the two come across the cosmic-drive key, which Olimar takes as a souvenir for his son.
Olimar and Louie head to a river, and Olimar realizes that a number of his logs and notes have gone missing. Olimar also buries the Scorch Guard here, along with a log, as he states that he doesn't need it anymore. Meanwhile, Alph makes his way to the Garden of Hope, where he gets Rock Pikmin and reunites with Brittany. Before they begin their expedition in a tundra, Olimar finds Charlie's impact site and leaves the Anti-Electrifier with a note, due to the area having "many electrical contraptions". After defeating the Armored Mawdad, Alph expands the S.S. Drake's receiver range using the Data Glutton, and Alph and Brittany discover the Distant Tundra. While landing in the Distant Tundra, Alph mishandles the ship and Brittany is thrown overboard. She falls into a cave where she discovers Yellow Pikmin. Olimar and Louie finally collect enough treasure to repay their new debt, but Olimar picks up a reading of a golden object in the Formidable Oak. He ignores Louie's refusal to go to the area, and they go to the Formidable Oak the next day. While Olimar records his log, he gets captured by the Plasm Wraith, and Louie runs away. Olimar attempts to escape the Formidable Oak several times, but the Plasm Wraith repeatedly knocks him unconscious, since his spacesuit puts him in forced-sleep. After escaping from the Formidable Oak Louie somehow ends up in the Twilight River while the ship itself crash-lands in the Garden of Hope, losing several of its parts in the process.
Meanwhile, Alph and Brittany reunite once more in the Distant Tundra, take down the Vehemoth Phosbat, and rescue Charlie. They then track down a signal coming from the Tropical Wilds, and after defeating the Sandbelching Meerslug, Alph expands the S.S. Drake's scanning range again via the Folded Data Glutton. They locate Twilight River using their ship's expanded range, then head off to this newly discovered area to pursue a signal they received. They find Winged Pikmin, and pick up a message from Louie asking for help. They manage to rescue Louie, who was captured by the Scornet Maestro, only to have him land the S.S. Drake in the Garden of Hope and steal all their juice and Charlie's rubber ducky the very next day. The trio chases the thief, and along the way, find Blue Pikmin through a path that Louie managed to open with unknown explosives. Meanwhile, Louie attempts to make his escape via the totaled Hocotate ship but he is eaten by the Quaggled Mireclops instead. The trio eventually discover and defeat the Quaggled Mireclops, and take Louie back with them, now tying him up. Louie reveals the location of Olimar, and the explorers set out to rescue him at the Formidable Oak. The final fight happens against the Plasm Wraith, and afterwards, Olimar returns the cosmic-drive key, and the whole cast leaves the planet.
After arriving back on Hocotate, Olimar and Louie are ordered by the president to immediately return to PNF-404 to recover the Hocotate ship. They land on PNF-404 via a pod, making a rough landing in the Tropical Wilds. The two spend the day producing Pikmin for the rest of their time on the planet. The next day, Olimar is homing in on a signal and assumes it is one of the ship parts. Unfortunately, Olimar miscalculated and landed some distance from the Onion. After sweeping through the area in an attempt to locate the origin of the signal, Olimar and Louie can't find the ship part they came for. During the third day they explore the Garden of Hope, clearing the area of any dangerous creatures as they search for their wrecked ship. After clearing the area of hostiles, Olimar and Louie discover part of the Hocotate Freight ship. Olimar realizes that many of the ship's parts were scattered around the planet, and they set off to search for them. On the fourth day they find and recover the Main Engine in the Distant Tundra.
The next day, Olimar and Louie attempt to track down a signal from another ship part and recover treasure from inside a cave. The two somehow get separated, but reunite before the end of the day. On the sixth day they collect treasure in Twilight River, but at the end of the day Louie eats half the fruit they found. Olimar then asked and harshly ridiculed Louie on his excessive appetite, resulting in Louie running away. The next day, Olimar searches for Louie and, after reuniting, Louie apologizes for what he did. On the eighth day, Olimar and Louie go on another expedition to collect treasure. Olimar picks up a faint signal presumably coming from one of the Hocotate ship's parts. However, after exploring, it turned out to be a signal from a fruit, which was produced by the Fruit Finder. On the ninth day, they follow signals into a cave below ground, and discover and collect the Chronos Reactor in the Formidable Oak. On the final day, the radar picks up signals from the remaining ship parts. Olimar finds a point where all the signals from parts converge, and learns that the cluster of ship parts were eaten by indigenous life-forms. Olimar and Louie retrieve the last few parts, the Nova Blaster, Repair-type Bolt, and Analog Computer, and finally repair the Hocotate ship. They finally leave PNF-404 via the Hocotate ship and head home to Hocotate.
Some undetermined amount of time after this, Captain Olimar is flying through space on his new ship, the S.S. Dolphin II, and comes across a field of asteroids. He tries to dodge them, but fails and crash-lands on an unknown planet where he discovers that the Pikmin and other creatures from PNF-404 live on this planet too. To get his ship back in working condition, he has to recover some treasures found throughout the land, so that the S.S. Dolphin II can extract their Sparklium to fuel the rocket. While exploring the planet, he rediscovers Red Pikmin, Yellow Pikmin, Blue Pikmin, Rock Pikmin, and Winged Pikmin. At some point, Olimar realizes that the ship lost an important ship part, the Sparklium Converter. Through some effort, him and the ship figure out that the piece lies in The Final Stretch. There, he comes face to face with the Berserk Leech Hydroe, and using the help of some Red Pikmin, manages to defeat the creature, expose the parasitic Leech Hydroe, and recover the missing part. With the S.S. Dolphin II refueled and the Sparklium Converter recovered, Olimar gives the Pikmin one final goodbye, and heads home safely.