RotRank: Italian Brainrot Character ELO Ranking

RotRank is a fun web application that lets users compare and vote on popular Italian Brainrot characters. The system uses an ELO rating system to rank characters based on community votes.

Italian Brainrot refers to a series of viral AI-generated memes that began trending in early 2025 on platforms like TikTok. The memes feature bizarre characters with Italian-sounding names, often combining animals with objects or giving them anthropomorphic features.

These characters include:

• Tralalero Tralalá: A sneaker-wearing shark, often depicted mid-dance or sprinting
• Bombardiro Crocodilo: A crocodile fused with a military bomber plane
• Tung Tung Tung Sahur: An anthropomorphic wooden figure wielding a baseball bat
• Lirilì Larilà: A cactus elephant wandering the desert with flippers
• Brr Brr Patapim: A fantastical creature, half baboon and half bush
• Chimpanzini Bananini: A hybrid of a chimpanzee and a banana
• Bombombini Gusini: A goose hybridized with a fighter jet
• Capuccino Assassino: A cappuccino cup dressed as a samurai assassin

1. The application presents you with a matchup between two random characters
2. Click on the character you think is better/cooler/funnier
3. The ELO ranking system will update based on your vote
4. View the leaderboard to see which characters are ranked highest

See how characters rank based on the votes of all users. This collective ranking shows which characters have the most overall appeal in the community.

Track your own preferences with personal rankings! Your votes contribute to both:

• Your personal ELO leaderboard that reflects your individual preferences
• The global community rankings that everyone shares

Your personal preferences are saved to your browser, so you can come back anytime to continue ranking your favorites.

The ELO rating system (named after chess master Arpad Elo) is used to calculate the relative skill levels of players in competitive games. In RotRank, we use it to determine which Italian Brainrot characters are most popular:

• Each character starts with an ELO rating of 1500
• When a character wins a matchup, their rating increases
• When a character loses a matchup, their rating decreases
• The amount of change depends on the difference in ratings between the characters

The application uses authenticated images from a reliable source to ensure all character images display properly.

• main.tsx: The main application file containing both frontend and backend code
• README.md: This documentation file