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[TekunoRobby]

Our very own Kobun Heat (Chris Kohler) wrote a nice article on the infamous and often humorous clones of the past. The article goes as far back as the Space War/Computer Space and as recent as Fighter's History/Street Fighter II. It's a nice quick read and has some of the most notable examples although I kinda have to wonder about that Ninja Gaiden - Castlevania bit.

Here's the site:
http://www.1up.com/do/feature?pager.offset=0&cId=3147544


Here are some of the highlights:

In his book Masters of Doom, David Kushner tells the story of how id founders John Carmack and John Romero got started making PC games. At first, the two Johns had set out to try and score a gig with Nintendo by recreating Super Mario Bros. on the PC. This was only possible after Carmack, the programming genius, hit upon a method of scrolling the playfield, which the other team members didn't think was possible on the 8086 processor.

The team sent their creation, a pitch-perfect version of the first level of Super Mario Bros., to Nintendo. Nintendo politely complimented their work but told them they had no need for such a product. Undaunted, they made their own side-scrolling game, which turned out to be the groundbreaking Commander Keen. What they did not do is release their carbon copy Mario game.

Atari did face quite a bit of competition in the early days, but its biggest rival wasn't a rival at all. In public, Atari and Kee Games were bitter enemies: co-founder Joe Keenan had supposedly split off from Bushnell, stealing equipment, game concepts, and some of the company's best engineers and designers. Behind the scenes, it was all an elaborate scam: Kee was part and parcel of Atari, and the competition between the two was concocted to get around the amusement machine distribution schemes of the time (the distributors wanted exclusive contracts, but there were often two or more distributors in any given area).

Atari would create a new game, then, Kee would introduce its own version. And vice versa, since to keep up appearances, the two companies did maintain separate offices and staffers.

It is one of the cardinal rules of video game journalism, I think it's in the union contract or something, that if you write anything about Fighter's History you have to mention that Karnov was the final boss. I'll do it, I mean, I don't want to get fined or anything. But I'm starting to wonder if anybody's going to care anymore. Half the people reading this probably have no idea that Karnov was originally the overweight shirtless star of his own NES platform game, kind of a fire-breathing version of the Iron Sheik.

Knowing what we know about Fighter's History, though, it begs the question: did Data East put Karnov into the game for nostalgic purposes, or because since he breathed fire they could just give him Dhalsim's special moves? Probably a little from column A, a little from column B. Not only does Karnov have two moves which are probably best described as the Yoga Fire and the Yoga Flame, but when you get hit with them you reel back in the exact same "hey, I'm on fire" animation as in Street Fighter II. Classy.

Know of any other rip-offs not covered in the article or have any more recent examples of obvious cloning?

 

[Matlock]

Great article, but it seems something was lost in formatting it--he references sidebars that don't come until after the article is done...

 

[stewy]

I wonder if the article ran in one of the magazines. They don't seem to check that sort of formatting when they transfer that stuff over to 1up.

 

[Professor K]

I remember watching someone play Donkey Kong Country. Now this is one of the most hyped games in videogame history (mainly due to the ACM graphics) so I was really hyped up to see it.

I was downright SHOCKED to see this game blatantly rip-off damned-near entire levels from some of the best side-scrolling classics.

The underwater levels of Super Mario Bros.
The cannon-travelling level form Sonic 2
Hell, even the mine-cart level from the lesser-known Taz-Mania

I just couldn't believe that no review at the time pointed out all the rip-offs in that game. I mean, the game was good, but some of its best parts were ripped off from other games.

And who can forget Namco playing "me too" with Sega through much of the 90's?

Sega makes a 3D fighter. 6 months later, Namco has one!
Sega makes a 3D gun game, 6 months later, Namco has one!
3D tank game. 3D helicopter gun game. 3D racer. 3D flight shooter.

Game for game Namco just followed Sega and almost always had greater success with their rip-off than Sega had with the template.

 

[GotchaForce]

Sometimes it makes me wonder whether it's subliminal (the unconscious) or just blatant. For instance, Psi-Ops and Second Sight. Who ripped off who? Last year we saw the return of the brawler, first Rockstar announces Warriors, and in the months before release we get Beatdown and Urban Reign. Final Fight is yet to come. I think the San Andreas thug thing is blatant, it took a while before we got 187, Crime Wars and 25 to Life. Sometimes it seems like it's on purpose, sometimes it seems like a big coincidence.

 

[Anyanka]

Somehow I suspect Naughty Dog was "inspired" by Mortal Kombat when they created Way of the Warrior.

 

[Professor K]

Yeah, some are blatant.

True Crime, 25 to Life, Saint's Row. These are obvious attempts to "me too" GTA. It reminds me of the Resident Evil rip-offs of the mid-90s. Seems every publisher had to have one.

Way of the Warrior was a pathetic Mortal Kombat rip-off. But didn't Pti Fighter come out before Mortal Kombat?

 

[Anyanka]

Yes but Pit-Fighter has little in common with Mortal Kombat besides the graphics.

 

[Professor K]

Yes but Pit-Fighter has little in common with Mortal Kombat besides the graphics.

I know, but those digitized-graphics games were all the rage and I believe Pit Fighter was amongst the first.

There were tons of fighters to rip-off MK, I'm trying to think of this one that got banned but I remember playing it in the arcade. One character had a mohawk and a chainsaw for a hand. You could dismember your opponent and they could keep fighting. Can't remember the name though.

 

[Anyanka]

Time Killers. It wasn't banned though. It came out before MK too.

 

[Kobun Heat]

Time Killers.

But as I said in the intro, the lifting of concepts and gameplay mechanics isn't really what this piece is about -- it's about instances in which far more was lifted, to the point that somebody got sued or by rights should have.

 

[Anyanka]

Way of the Warrior/MK is as bad as Fighters History/SF II. It even copies the palatte swap hidden characters and the gameplay that feels like it was developed in a week by two guys in their apartment.

 

[Professor K]

Time Killers.

But as I said in the intro, the lifting of concepts and gameplay mechanics isn't really what this piece is about -- it's about instances in which far more was lifted, to the point that somebody got sued or by rights should have.

Yeah, I dig it. I read most of the article (I still have my Odyssey 2 and K.C. Munchkins somewhere in my mama's basement). I can't think of anything in the modern era (besides DKC) where it looks like a developer just ripped off levels from another game.

 

[Matlock]

developed in a week by two guys in their apartment.

AFAIK, Anyaka, that's not too far from the truth. :lol

edit: straight from naughty dog's site (that's since been taken down)

Alright, we'll admit it: this game was a total hack. Nobody makes games this cheap. The most expensive costume in the game was $150. Our friends got paid $25 to be the characters. It was made on two old Macintoshes.

Becuase we had no blue screen, we bought a gigantic tan canvas. We called it the tan screen. We nailed the thing straight into the walls of the apartment we rented in Boston. Our landlord was pissed. We lost our security deposit.

To get the right focal distance to film the characters, we had to put the camera in the hallway outside of our apartment. Our neighbors were always walking by looking in our door at guys in Ninja costumes dancing around. We never explained it to them. They were pissed.

Way of the Warrior was the 3DO's first fighting game. It beat Street Super Street fighter and Samurai Showdown to market. Way was among top 10 best-selling 3DO games at the time, and it ended up outselling Samurai Showdown in the States. They were pissed.

Way had a lot of fans; it was sort of a cult classic on the 3DO. Then again, any 3DO game that did well was a cult classic.

People ask if we might do another fighting game. Sure we will.

http://web.archive.org/web/20000522185901/www.naughtydog.com/naughtydog/wotw.htm

 

[Anyanka]

Yeah. Jason Rubin even plays one of the characters. At least Boon and Tobias hired martial artists to do the moves.

The funniest thing about WOTW is how the generic ninja character is called "Ninja".

 

[ToxicAdam]

Latest ripoff that comes to mind:

I hated this fucking game.


...as far as retro games. You have to hand it to GORF for ripping off not one .. but TWO games.

Space Invaders

Galaxians

 

[Bojangles]

Wonderboy

vs

Hudson's Adventure Island

 

[Professor K]

Wonderboy

vs

Hudson's Adventure Island

DING DING DING DING DING!!

That is probably one of the most classic examples. They just took the whole game and changed some colors!

 

[Greenpanda]

EA's Lord of the Rings: The Third Age RPG has its interface, at least, pretty flagrantly lifted from FF X-1:

 

[Dice]

EA's Lord of the Rings: The Third Age RPG has its interface, at least, pretty flagrantly lifted from FF X-1:

And FFX ripped off Breath of Fire IV

 

[Greenpanda]

And FFX ripped off Breath of Fire IV

...doesn't look much like FF X's interface to me .

I mean, yeah, they both present somewhat similar information, but, really, *any* RPG battle screen does that; if you want to lower your standards to that, you could say that Digital Devil Saga is a complete rip-off of Lufia II or whatever.

The Third Age looks practically identical to FF X, though. Everything is positioned and arranged just as in FF X -- it's *obviously* copied from FF X.

 

[Dice]

Oh I was talking about the battle system not the look of the interface for it.

 

[Kobun Heat]

Wonderboy vs Hudson's Adventure Island

Except for the fact that Adventure Island was a legit version of the game. Hudson had the NES rights; they just swapped in their mascot/PR dude/legendary button masher.

 

[WindyMan]

Latest ripoff that comes to mind:

I hated this fucking game.

V8 is more of a "jump on the car combat bandwagon" game then a rip-off. I loved the V8 games, myself.

If you really want a rip-off, look no further than this little gem, published by Midas Interactive.

Kohler's little rip-off retrospective made me remember this one. I think they, erm... borrowed some other Disney properties for some other PS1 games they published. I can't seem to track them down, though.

edit: Found some.

http://images.hepsiburada.com/assets/Oyuncak/200/oyuncdmidpsx101.jpg - Legend of Pocahontas
http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/B00004ZCVP.02.MZZZZZZZ.jpg - The Dalmations
http://static.oninogames.co.uk/pix/120/20/202625.jpg - Lord of the Jungle

I remember when I first heard of these games, I wondered when Disney was going to catch wind of it and sue. I never heard of it happening.

 

[Fishie flop oog]

I remember watching someone play Donkey Kong Country. Now this is one of the most hyped games in videogame history (mainly due to the ACM graphics) so I was really hyped up to see it.

I was downright SHOCKED to see this game blatantly rip-off damned-near entire levels from some of the best side-scrolling classics.

The underwater levels of Super Mario Bros.
The cannon-travelling level form Sonic 2
Hell, even the mine-cart level from the lesser-known Taz-Mania

I just couldn't believe that no review at the time pointed out all the rip-offs in that game. I mean, the game was good, but some of its best parts were ripped off from other games.

And who can forget Namco playing "me too" with Sega through much of the 90's?

Sega makes a 3D fighter. 6 months later, Namco has one!
Sega makes a 3D gun game, 6 months later, Namco has one!
3D tank game. 3D helicopter gun game. 3D racer. 3D flight shooter.

Game for game Namco just followed Sega and almost always had greater success with their rip-off than Sega had with the template.

VF1 predated Tekken1 by more then 2 years.
By the time Tekken was there Sega was finishing up VF2.

 

[HyperZone<3]

Except for the fact that Adventure Island was a legit version of the game. Hudson had the NES rights; they just swapped in their mascot/PR dude/legendary button masher.

Wait a sec, Wonder Boy was the basis for Adventure Island? How come the Adventure Island sequels follow the original and the Wonder Boy sequels became completly diffrent. Hudson made an entire franchise of a game they liscenced?

Oh yeah, some others.

And there were about eighteen billion "freestyle sports" games that follwed in the wake of Tony Hawk, I remember when just about every game had a "trick" button, I'm so glad that trend finally died. And boy, street racing games sure got popular after NFS:Underground broke a mil.

 

[Boards of Canada]

Kobun, one "rip-off" that many don't know about is StarFox for SNES. Enemy ship designs and other details look like they were ripped directly from Namco's Starblade. I had a link to a Tokyo forum once... It used to be linked to on here a lot (tokyopoia or something) where Dylan Cuthbert confessed that it was "inspiration." Just do a Google search for StarBlade, you'll see that the enemy ship designs are so similar it makes you wonder how they got away with it! Not only that, but the bosses are direct rip-offs.

 

[Jonnyboy117]

Isn't Vigilante 8 the sequel to Interstate 76? Then how could it be a ripoff of Twisted Metal? Not to mention that it's actually better.

 

[thetrin]

VF1 predated Tekken1 by more then 2 years.
By the time Tekken was there Sega was finishing up VF2.

Shows how much care VF puts into each individual installment, considering Tekken is already at 5 with VF, despite starting two years later.

 

[ToxicAdam]

Isn't Vigilante 8 the sequel to Interstate 76? Then how could it be a ripoff of Twisted Metal? Not to mention that it's actually better.

Vig 8 is a spinoff to Interstate 76 not a direct sequel. Vig 8 is Twisted Metal 2 with better graphics, slower driving, crappier levels and a bit more humor.


IMO of course.

 

[Kobun Heat]

Kobun, one "rip-off" that many don't know about is StarFox for SNES.

As I said, "inspiration" isn't what this piece is about.

 

[BenT]

Back in 1996 I was struck by how many elements Naughty Dog had lifted from DKC and put to use in Crash Bandicoot, right down to the stacked furry girlfriend in the bonus stages and the collected fruit items flying into an auto-hiding counter in the corner of the screen. The similarities were more than uncanny.

 

[Anyanka]

Shows how much care VF puts into each individual installment, considering Tekken is already at 5 with VF, despite starting two years later.

Tekken 1 arcade came out in 1994 so it was a year after VF1. Once Namco released Tekken 2 less than a year after Tekken 1 they have been about even in releasing new games. Tekken 3/4 and VF 3/4 were released around the same time. Probably the only reason Tekken 5 is a year ahead of VF5 is Sega doing VF 4 Evolution.

 

[Lyte Edge]

Shows how much care VF puts into each individual installment, considering Tekken is already at 5 with VF, despite starting two years later.

Virtua Fighter -- Tekken
Virtua Fighter 2 -- Tekken 2
Virtua Fighter 3 -- Tekken 3
Virtua Fighter 3tb -- Tekken Tag Tournament
Virtua Fighter 4 -- Tekken 4
Virtua Fighter 4 Evolution -- Tekken 5
Virtua Fighter 4 Final Tuned -- Tekken 5 Dark Resurrection

And of course Virtua Fighter 5 is coming soon, but Tekken 6 should also be hitting the PS3 later on, so both series are equal in the number of games released. Sega has "milked" VF more than Namco has milked Tekken with the VF4 upgrades.

 

[Sagitario]

Wonderboy

vs

Hudson's Adventure Island

 

[Blackace]

Awesome Possum!

 

[Anyanka]

And of course Virtua Fighter 5 is coming soon, but Tekken 6 should also be hitting the PS3 later on, so both series are equal in the number of games released. Sega has "milked" VF more than Namco has milked Tekken with the VF4 upgrades.

There's also side games like VF Remix, VF Kids and Fighters Megamix.

But Namco has updated Tekken 5 twice already with 5.1 and Dark Resurrection.

 

[Matlock]

There's also side games like VF Remix, VF Kids and Fighters Megamix.

But Namco has updated Tekken 5 twice already with 5.1 and Dark Resurrection.

Yeah, but a patch vs. a rerelease with new characters isn't really comparable.

 

[Anyanka]

Final Tuned doesn't have any new characters. I don't play VF so I don't know just how big the gameplay changes were but wouldn't it be comparable to 5.1 and then DR is comparable to Evo?

 

[Lyte Edge]

Final Tuned doesn't have any new characters. I don't play VF so I don't know just how big the gameplay changes were but wouldn't it be comparable to 5.1 and then DR is comparable to Evo?

Most arcade fighting games get patches/new revisions; that doesn't count. VF Final Tuned was released as a new game; not a patch.

 

[Shard]

Speaking of rip-offs and lawsuits, whatever became of the one lawsuit between Sega and EA, et al over The Simpsons: Road Rage?

 

[MightyHedgehog]

Original developer for Super Wonder Boy/Wonderboy, Escape/Westone, did the arcade game for Sega, I guess.

Escape teamed up with Hudson Soft to produce a conversion of the game for the NES, but ran into legal difficulties when it emerged that Sega owned the rights to the Wonder Boy name. With Sega and Nintendo in direct competition at the time, it was unlikely that Sega would be so willing to allow a major rival to use one of their most valuable intellectual property assets.

To get around this hurdle, Hudson Soft simply had the graphics of the main character and the title changed. The result was Adventure Island, which instead of featuring Tom-Tom, featured a character known as Master Higgins, who bore a striking resemblance to Tom-Tom, albeit with a hat. The game was, however, Wonder Boy in all but name. It was later ported to the MSX.

It should be noted that the sequels to Adventure Island and the sequels to Wonder Boy were from then on completely unrelated.

From this Wiki page. Seems reasonable to me.

 

[Anyanka]

Most arcade fighting games get patches/new revisions; that doesn't count. VF Final Tuned was released as a new game; not a patch.

Yeah but what is the line between patch and new game or upgrade? Tekken games have been revised before, Dark Resurrection has already got a version B. 5.1 seems like much more of an update, it has changes to the overall system and tweaks for every single character in the game. Namco even advertised it with posters and additional art on the cabinet. The only thing about 5.1 was that it was free to arcade owners, but so was Ultimate MK3.

So just what was added to Final Tuned anyway?

 

[DDayton]

Great article.

 

[DECK'ARD]

 

[Deleted member 1235]

I actually played and loved this game before I ever heard of super mario

EDIT: the fact that I was beaten by 3 minutes makes me weep openly.

 

[Professor K]

VF1 predated Tekken1 by more then 2 years.
By the time Tekken was there Sega was finishing up VF2.

That just validates my "Namco copied Sega" argument

 

[CR0N0S]

No one's gonna talk about Barry Hatter?

 

[Anyanka]

Well Tekken is a 3D fighter but other than that it has little in common with VF. Same with Virtua Cop/Time Crisis and Ridge Racer/Daytona. Other than being 3D versions none of the games play like copies. Was Namco setting out to rip off Sega or just moving onto 3D gaming?

 

[ZombieSupaStar]

Vig 8 is a spinoff to Interstate 76 not a direct sequel. Vig 8 is Twisted Metal 2 with better graphics, slower driving, crappier levels and a bit more humor.


IMO of course.

wasnt v8 made by the singletrac guys when sony took over (and damn near killed) the TM Franchise (thank god the original devs came back for black).

Or was that rogue trip?


cant remember