It's a most precious commodity, one that oh so many game characters, from Mario to Kratos, all go ga-ga for. And regardless of whether its rendered in 8bits or via texture mapped polygons, when you see a coin, you had better grab it.

Animator Chris Burns, along with Bob Fox, who both operates Exit 73 Studios, have created an animated short starring Donovan Murdock. He's a guy none too pleased when his Coin is taken from him.

Good thing for us, it's an excuse to kick some butt, and then some.

The following first made an appearance over at Kotaku and has been slowly but steadily making the rounds. And for good reason; it's pretty awesome:

Aside from the kick-ass animation, what makes Coin so special is that it subtly references a dump truck's worth of video game references. Of course there's "Double Dragon" and "Portal", those two are super obvious (along with "Super Mario Bros"). But you also have "Battletoads", "Mega Man", "Legend of Zelda", even "King of Fighters". I think?