Winged Pikmin

Winged Pikmin
Resistance	Ground hazards
Attack strength	Weak (7.5 Damage)
Mobility	Constantly in flight.
Throw	Normal
Digging speed	Unknown
Carrying capacity	1

Winged Pikmin are a species of Pikmin discovered in Pikmin 3. Their bodies are a vivid pink color with bee-like markings. They have very large heads, small arms and legs, two large blue compound eyes, and very small transparent wings. Upon maturing, they sport the lavender Sutera cordata.

Abilities

As their name implies, Winged Pikmin are capable of flight, and are naturally airborne. They can carry items above the ground and can cut through entire areas to get fruits or spoils back to base quickly. Winged Pikmin are small and fast, allowing them to keep up with the captains at a steady pace. Due to their constant airborne status, they can follow captains even if they're walking in an area inaccessible to most Pikmin types, such as a small pond or other body of water.

File:Pikmin-3-2.jpg

Winged Pikmin carrying pellets over a body of water.

Because these Pikmin can fly, they home in on targets when thrown as to not miss. This is extremely useful when battling a highly-mobile creature. However, there are drawbacks to this. Because they fly and home in on their target, they have trouble flattening an enemy (such as a Dwarf Red Bulborb) by landing on its back. The time they need to home in on the enemy can also be liability, especially if the enemy is attacking or if an obstacle needs to be destroyed quickly.

Winged Pikmin seem to be the weakest Pikmin in terms of attack power, dealing only about half as much damage is a normal Pikmin. However, they will produce twice as much damage when attacking airborne enemies, such as Snitchbugs.

Carrying Properties

Because Winged Pikmin carrying are in constant flight, they have unique carrying properties that differ from the other Pikmin types.

When carrying an object, Winged Pikmin will fly with it through the air, making it difficult to call them back with the ground whistle. Instead, they must be called by holding the button, which will summon a cylindrical beam of light that will call the Winged Pikmin, or by simpling whistling while aiming at the object they are carrying. Winged Pikmin are capable of flying over obstacles and taking arial shortcuts, saving time that would otherwise be lost if other Pikmin carried the object along the ground. However, this is ballanced by their considerably slow flying pace whilst carrying objects. This can cause traffic in groups of Pikmin trying to return spoils to base, as Winged Pikmin slowly carrying an object in the front of the line will cause the rest of the Pikmin to get held up behind them.

If multiple types of Pikmin are carrying something that a Winged Pikmin is also carrying, the Winged Pikmin will carry it closer to the ground and will not fly with it. However, if the "Winged Pikmin-to-normal-Pikmin" ratio is equivilant or above the amount required to normally carry the object, they will lift the object into the air; causing any ground-based Pikmin trying to carry the object to cling on for a few seconds before falling off.

Due to this behavior, and combined with the fact that idle Pikmin are prone to assisting nearby Pikmin who are carrying an item, Idle Winged Pikmin are known to "steal" fruits and spoils from other types of Pikmin by unintentionally snatching them away from the other Pikmin as they try to fly with it.

Obtaining

Winged Pikmin are discovered in the game's fourth area, the Twilight River. Across the landing site, the captains will notice the Pink Onion trapped in the web of an Arachnode on the other side of the river. To get to it, the captains must multitask to construct a bridge out of 4 different piles of fragments scattered across the level. Once the captains finally finish the bridge, they can cross to the other side of the river, kill the Arachnode, and free the Onion.

Using a sequence-break, it is possible to get them early by glitching a captain through the ground at the bottom of the river, and completely bypass the bridge.

File:Pikmin 3 Day Twelve - Pink Onion and Winged Pikmin

Day Twelve - Pink Onion and Winged Pikmin

Trivia

• In the early days following Pikmin 3's formal introduction, speculation was thrown around as to what the pink-colored Pikmin were, or if they were even Pikmin. It took 9 whole months before they were finally revealed to be Winged Pikmin in Nintendo's April edition of Nintendo Direct.
• In the happy ending of the first Pikmin game, there are fourteen multicolored onions flying above the planet's atmosphere. Five of these onions were pink.
• The Winged Pikmin are the second Pikmin type, the first being White Pikmin, to feature compound eyes. 
• Winged Pikmin are the first Pikmin species to have a skin pattern.
• Winged Pikmin have two different death sounds.
• On Nintendo's website for Pikmin 3, Winged Pikmin are called Flying Pikmin.  
• When underwater, Winged Pikmin cannot be seen above the water when using the Koppad's camera function.
• Winged Pikmin drown the fastest out of all Pikmin types.

Gallery

• PIKMIN3LOGO.jpg

  Winged Pikmin seen in the Pikmin 3 E3 2012 trailer.

• 

  An image of the Winged Pikmin, photoshopped to have increased brightness and more organized pixels to slightly increase resolution.

• 

  Artwork of a Winged Pikmin for Official Nintendo Magazine.

• Pink Pikmin Sprouts.png

  Winged Pikmin sprouts seen in the Nintendo Direct 12.5.12.

• Pikmin-3-1.jpg

  Winged Pikmin flying over water.

• Pikmin-3-3.jpg

  Winged Pikmin attacking a Swooping Snitchbug.

• Tumblr mles4tGsiz1qb75euo1 1280.jpg

  A high quality screenshot of a Winged Pikmin.

• 

  Winged Pikmin carrying fruit.

• 

  Leaf, Bud, and Flower Winged Pikmin.

• 

  Winged Pikmin animation.

• Movie02.jpg

  Winged Pikmin being discovered.

• Pikmin3 PinkOnion.jpeg

  The Pink Onion when it is first spotted by the Captains.

• 

  Quoted from the Nintendo facebook page: "Check out our Winged Pikmin! Inspired by the new character in Pikmin 3, this flying machine will launch off of the dock at Red Bull's Flugtag event on July 27 in Ottawa-Gatineau"

• 

  Winged Pikmin as on the back of the Pikmin 3 box art