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Zoop
1
The Jaguar version of Zoop was intended to have "snazzier" graphic effects, but these had to be rejected due to Sony wanting the PlayStation version to be the best rendition of the game.
Sonic Frontiers
subdirectory_arrow_right Sonic The Hedgehog (Franchise), Sonic Boom (Collection)
1
Despite being synonymous with the "edgy" 2000s era of the Sonic franchise that Sonic Frontiers hearkens back to, Shadow the Hedgehog is completely absent from the game. No official comment has been expressed on why Shadow is omitted, however, a month before Frontiers' launch, the game's writer Ian Flynn would quote retweet a screenshot of an interview with writers for the Sonic Boom cartoon claiming that Sega are restrictive on Shadow's portrayal to the point where it's preferable to omit him in spite of his fan-favorite status than work with Sega's restrictions, with the caption "[quote-retweeted] without comment".
3D Pinball: Space Cadet
subdirectory_arrow_right PC (Microsoft Windows) (Platform)
1
At an unknown point after 3D Pinball: Space Cadet's removal from Windows hardware starting with Vista, there was an attempt within Microsoft Garage (Microsoft's program for experimental, non-profitable employee projects) to revive the game with compatibility for current Windows operating systems. While the port was finished, it could not be publicly released due to the 1994 contract with Cinematronics (now merged into THQ Nordic) stipulating that the game could not be released as an independent entity, only bundled with Windows hardware.
Tetris: N-Blox
1
Tetris: N-Blox was originally a fangame by Paul Neave, well-known for his unofficial ports of other vintage games like Pac-Man and Frogger, but would eventually become licensed as an official Tetris product.
Among Us
1
The Airship update for Among Us partially took so long to come out because of talks with lawyers about circumventing bootleg Among Us merchandise.

Among Us creator Marcus Bromander would claim two years later in an interview with YouTubers LS Mark and Veronicaandjelly that he felt that taking legal action against fake Among Us products was a "losing battle" and that he ultimately just found them funny and thought of them as free promotion.
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month October 25, 2023
subdirectory_arrow_right Splatoon (Franchise)
1
On October 24, 2023, Nintendo released a list of "Community Guidelines" for eSports events surrounding their games in Europe and Japan - these rules received major backlash from competitive Smash and Splatoon players and were theorized as being intended to directly stifle Nintendo's competitive communities. With particular criticism going towards:

• Enforcing a maximum player count of 200 per day for in-person tournaments
• Enforcing a cash prize maximum at £9,000 / €10,000 and prohibiting sponsors from funding events
• pre-Switch games (particularly Super Smash Bros. Melee and Super Smash Bros.) not being available for licensing
• Not allowing titles from Nintendo's games to be used in branding, even including shortened variants such as "Splat" or "Smash".
• Banning modified, emulated, or fan-made games - the prior two being essential parts of modern day competitive Melee.
• Food, drink, and merchandise sale being banned from venues
• Arguably most damningly, requiring official licensing for smaller-scale high school charity events.
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month October 25, 2023
Super Mario Bros. 2
1
As of 2023, only 4 licensed IP adapted games have been released on Nintendo's retro game digital download services: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles for NES on Wii (which was later delisted on January 26, 2012), Transformers: Mystery of Convoy for NES on Wii, Quest for Camelot for Game Boy Color and GoldenEye 007 for N64, the latter two being on Switch.

Additionally, J.J. & Jeff, Punch-Out!! Featuring Mr. Dream, and Super Mario Bros. 2, all reskins of licensed titles, have been available in their license-less formats.
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month October 25, 2023
Fatty Bear's Birthday Surprise
1
The reason Fatty Bear never appeared in another point-and-click adventure game was due to a mixture of series creator Laurie Bauman Arnold owning the rights to the character and the name "Fatty", in spite of being intended in an endearing manner, being considered potentially offensive.
Smite
subdirectory_arrow_right Ren & Stimpy (Franchise), My Life as a Teenage Robot (Franchise), Invader Zim (Franchise), Rocko's Modern Life (Franchise), Danny Phantom (Franchise), Nickelodeon (Collection)
1
When Smite launched its Nickelodeon crossover event, multiple characters were not voiced by their original voice actors.

• Invader Zim was voiced by Andrew Russell instead of Richard Horvitz
• Rocko was voiced by Matt Cowlrick instead of Carlos Alazraqui
• Jenny was voiced by Jenny Yokobori instead of Janice Kawaye
• Danny Phantom was voiced by Sean Chiplock instead of David Kaufman
• Powdered Toast Man was voiced by Michael Berger instead of David Kaye, his current voice actor and replacement for the now-deceased Gary Owens.

Zim's original voice actor Richard Steven Horvitz claimed that he was not allowed to reprise the role of Zim due to Hi-Rez Studios refusing to work with union actors, and that he felt insulted by the temporary recast. For Jenny, Rocko, and Zim, this game marked the first time they had been portrayed in English by someone other than their original actor.
Neopets Browser
subdirectory_arrow_right Neopets (Franchise), Neopets (Company)
1
Neopets' former CEO Dough Dohring was an avid Scientologist, and used L. Ron Hubbard's "Org Board" method for running the business. Neopets founders Adam and Donna Powell were unaware of Dohring's ties to the cult when signing on to allow him to run the company, and it supposedly did not affect the inner workings of the company, though most of the employees were Scientologists and Dohring would often propose implementing Scientology education into the website. Williams would claim of the ownership in a 2014 Reddit AMA:

"Yes. Although we were not aware of it at first as we were totally naive.

Basically the first group of investors (who were the guys that had spare office space in Glendale as their automotive firm was being downsized) were scientologists.

When we realised it was a bit of a shock. Somewhat awkward moment when you realise you started the biggest entertainment site visited by millions of children and teens, but the upper management you just signed the company over to are part of some weird religion that is banned in some countries...

The company was structured like a scientology org. It didnt really change anything that I noticed apart from some odd test that interviewees had to take consisting of questions like which straight line seemed friendlier and stuff like that. We also had a lot of obscure celebrities coming round the office for tours.

At one time there was some talk about putting scientology education on the site, but we killed that idea pretty sharpish.

Adam and I made sure that it never made its way onto anything site related. Religion and politics were two big no nos for us as far as site content went. Can't say the discussions we had to keep it that way were much fun though!"

Dohring would leave Neopets after it was acquired by Viacom in 2005.
Company: Interplay
subdirectory_arrow_right ClayFighter (Collection)
1
In 2015, internet artists Chris O'Neil, Zach Hadel and Mick Lauer were commissioned to make a trailer for a cancelled reboot of ClayFighter. They made a commercial actively mocking Interplay and the ClayFighter brand, showing quotes from negative reviews, referring to low-quality Interplay games, bait-and-switching an Earthworm Jim reboot, and having Lauer narrate the trailer in a disappointed tone of voice when he discovers that he is announcing a ClayFighter reboot. According to Hadel, the CEO of Interplay was "braindead" and did not pick up on the self-deprecation.
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month September 23, 2023
Battle Chess
subdirectory_arrow_right Interplay (Company)
1
Interplay producers were known to unnecessarily modify games for the simple reason of wanting to prove value. The artist for the Queen in Battle Chess worked around this by drawing a pet duck following the Queen on all of her animations to bait the producers into removing the duck instead of content the team wanted to keep.
McDonald's Treasure Land Adventure
1
Attachment In prototype versions of McDonald's Treasure Land Adventure, the shops were McDonald's restaurants, and all the meters and power-ups in the game were McDonald's products. McDonald's burgers as health items in a game could be seen as endorsing them as a healthy food, so it was likely changed for the final game to avoid this perception, and while at the time Ronald McDonald was still seen holding or eating McDonald's in advertising, in later years he would be mandated against doing either. Additionally, a developer from the game has claimed that McDonald's were opposed to the collectibles because they didn't want hamburgers being left on the ground.
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month September 18, 2023
Gungrave
subdirectory_arrow_right Red Entertainment (Company)
1
Attachment At Sega's Game Jam II showcase in March 2002, Red Entertainment announced two new PlayStation 2 games in collaboration with mangaka Yasuhiro Nightow that would be published by Sega, who announced they acquired a 67% stake in Red Entertainment moments prior. The first game announced was Gungrave, which was released in Japan in July of that year. The second game announced was a game based on Nightow's 1995 manga "Trigun" entitled "Trigun: The Planet Gunsmoke", with a short 20-second teaser trailer being revealed featuring silhouettes of multiple characters from the series before ending on Nicholas punching the screen and revealing the game's logo.

Since then, the game has become vaporware as no other updates from either Red Entertainment, Nightow, or Sega have been released about it since its announcement, with the exception of an official statement from Sega in 2002 that gave no comment on its development. Fans speculated that Gungrave was actually a modified version of Trigun: The Planet Gunsmoke citing its similar storylines and character designs to that of Trigun, but considering both games were first shown off at the same time and Gungrave was released in Japan only four months later, this is not the case.
person MehDeletingLater calendar_month October 5, 2021
Video on Trigun: The Planet Gunsmoke's development:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHPHHzXpb-Q

Trigun: The Planet Gunsmoke teaser trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVGjnYuWa-4

IGN article on Sega's Game Jam II showcase:
https://www.ign.com/articles/2002/04/03/segas-jamming-game-show
Final Fantasy
subdirectory_arrow_right Final Fantasy (Franchise)
1
The Final Fantasy series' title was long rumored to stem from the idea that it would've been Square and series creator Hironobu Sakaguchi's final game if it didn't perform well. According to these claims, Square was in dire financial straits in 1987, with Sakaguchi planning to quit the gaming industry and return to university studies. These claims appeared to be further corroborated when series composer Nobuo Uematsu affirmed them in a 2009 interview with Wired, claiming that Square's financial position was the main inspiration for the Final Fantasy name.

However, Sakaguchi debunked the rumors in a 2015 keynote address. In reality, Square always intended to give the first game in the series a name whose initials were "FF," as the Japanese pronunciation, エフ・エフ ("efu efu"), was considered pleasing to the ears. The developers' initial pick was Fighting Fantasy; however, it turned out that this name was already taken by a tabletop RPG series. Consequently, the title was changed to Final Fantasy. According to Sakaguchi, while Square indeed had their "backs to the wall" during development, "anything that started with an F would have been fine for the title."
person KnowledgeBase calendar_month May 28, 2015
Seaman
1
Attachment Seaman's face is actually that of the game's producer and creator, Yoot Saito. Saito also acts as Seaman's Japanese voice actor. During development, Sega had requested that a celebrity be used if possible to voice Seaman, but Saito was hesitant. He later said in a 2020 interview that the fact that he played the role himself was "the key to success", because it gave him the advantage of being able to rerecord lines as many times as he wanted, so it was no longer a question of money.
person KnowledgeBase calendar_month January 12, 2015
Ares Rising
subdirectory_arrow_right Blue Heat: The Case of the Cover Girl Murders (Game), Cyberdreams (Company)
1
Cyberdreams was originally going to publish Ares Rising and Blue Heat: The Case of the Cover Girl Murders. When the company folded in 1997, the games managed to be completed and published under different companies: Imagine Studios for Ares Rising and Orion Interactive for Blue Heat.
Donkey Kong
subdirectory_arrow_right Popeye (Franchise)
1
Attachment Shigeru Miyamoto originally wanted to do a Popeye game, specifcially based on the 1934 cartoon A Dream Walking, where Popeye and Bluto fight over Olive Oyl as she sleepwalks through a construction site, but couldn't get the license. He would later use the characters as inspirations with Mario taking the role of Popeye, Pauline as Olive Oyl and Donkey Kong as Bluto. Nintendo would eventually release a Popeye game a year after Donkey Kong in 1982.
person Bean101 calendar_month March 24, 2013
Platform: Nintendo Switch
subdirectory_arrow_right Nintendo (Company)
0
In 2020, hackers Gary Bowser and Max "MAXiMiLiEN" Louarn were arrested and extradited to the United States for money laundering and selling products meant to crack the Nintendo Switch's copy protection to run pirated copies of games. The two were members of Team Xecuter, a hacking group which specialized in similar measures for a large number of Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft consoles. In 2021, Bowser pled guilty on conspiracy and trafficking charges and was sentenced to 40 months in prison; Nintendo later filed a separate civil suit against him, which together with the prison sentence left him $14.5 million in debt. The company's legal department claimed during the court case that the unusually severe punishments were intended to send a chilling effect through the piracy world, intimidating would-be hackers by using Bowser's punishment as an example.

Following the case, multiple news outlets noted the irony of Gary Bowser's last name, which is shared with Nintendo of America president Doug Bowser and Mario series antagonist Bowser.
person ProtoSnake calendar_month February 2, 2024
Splatoon 2
subdirectory_arrow_right Super Smash Bros. (Franchise)
0
In 2020, after Nintendo sent a cease & desist to the major Super Smash Bros. tournament The Big House for using emulated Slippi netplay in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, participants in an official Splatoon 2 tournament collectively changed their tags to include the phrase "#FreeMelee". Shortly after, Nintendo would cancel the tournament, with their statement simply pertaining to "unexpected executional challenges".

In response to this, the Splatoon community hosted their own tournament in tribute to The Big House, titled "The Squid House" - this would end up becoming the biggest Splatoon series tournament to date, attracting 7,000 viewers and raising $28,000 USD, with $3,000 going to charity while the rest went to the participants.
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month October 25, 2023
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