With the recent example of Uncharted 4 using Ubisoft's art assets, whether intentionally or not, this got me thinking about the topic of plagiarism in games. There are a few examples I know of. Some are for sure a conscious decision to rip off someone else's work, while others may be attempts at homages that crossed the line of paying respect to the original work and instead straight up stealing the ideas. I'm going to start with some of the most egregious examples that I know of, and if anyone else has more, feel free to share them here.
We've all seen this by now, I'm sure.
For my money, one of the worst offenders has to be SNK (or Eolith, depending on when you are talking about). I'll start out with a couple that a lot of you have probably heard of. The most famous example is the character of k9999 (pronounced "K four 9". The blame for this one is definitely on Eolith) This character seems like it's meant to be a homage to the character of Tetsuo in the film Akira. Here's an example of all the comparisons:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsqK9LWVHNY
If you'll notice, they even went as far as to hire Tetsuo's voice actor for the character. And then they hired the voice actor of Tetsuo's rival Kaneda, as the voice of K9999's rival Kusanagi. This allowed them to play up the Tetsuo spoof even further. In any case, they obviously went too far with this one, and after King of Fighters 2002, the character has been replaced by the less blatant, "Nameless".
Now on to SNK music. This example is also pretty well known. This is a comparison of the tune for the Ikari team in King of Fighters '94 contrasted with the Faith No More song, "Surprise, you're dead!" Maybe you could say this one is a coincidence. I'm not sure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0axSMCi4pMQ
However, this next example I'm pretty sure is a straight up rip off. I'm surprised that I've never heard anyone draw the connection before because I've been noticing it for years. I've googled this and come up with no other examples of people noting the similarity. Am I the only one who noticed it? I believe that the character of k9999 is not the first example of SNK ripping off Akira. I'm pretty sure that they had done it before way back in the soundtrack for King of Fighters 97.
I've made this video to submit my case. Please watch and see if you agree:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDA919naMSA
Pretty blatant, I think.
Anyways, those are just some examples I've come across. Now let's hear some others that have come up over the years from you fine folks!
We've all seen this by now, I'm sure.
For my money, one of the worst offenders has to be SNK (or Eolith, depending on when you are talking about). I'll start out with a couple that a lot of you have probably heard of. The most famous example is the character of k9999 (pronounced "K four 9". The blame for this one is definitely on Eolith) This character seems like it's meant to be a homage to the character of Tetsuo in the film Akira. Here's an example of all the comparisons:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsqK9LWVHNY
If you'll notice, they even went as far as to hire Tetsuo's voice actor for the character. And then they hired the voice actor of Tetsuo's rival Kaneda, as the voice of K9999's rival Kusanagi. This allowed them to play up the Tetsuo spoof even further. In any case, they obviously went too far with this one, and after King of Fighters 2002, the character has been replaced by the less blatant, "Nameless".
Now on to SNK music. This example is also pretty well known. This is a comparison of the tune for the Ikari team in King of Fighters '94 contrasted with the Faith No More song, "Surprise, you're dead!" Maybe you could say this one is a coincidence. I'm not sure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0axSMCi4pMQ
However, this next example I'm pretty sure is a straight up rip off. I'm surprised that I've never heard anyone draw the connection before because I've been noticing it for years. I've googled this and come up with no other examples of people noting the similarity. Am I the only one who noticed it? I believe that the character of k9999 is not the first example of SNK ripping off Akira. I'm pretty sure that they had done it before way back in the soundtrack for King of Fighters 97.
I've made this video to submit my case. Please watch and see if you agree:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDA919naMSA
Pretty blatant, I think.
Anyways, those are just some examples I've come across. Now let's hear some others that have come up over the years from you fine folks!