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Star Fox Adventures
Star Fox Adventures (2002)
subdirectory_arrow_right Dinosaur Planet (Game)
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Attachment There's a fairly common misconception that the character of Krystal was originally meant to be a cat in Dinosaur Planet, prior to being redesigned as a vixen when the project was transformed into Star Fox Adventures.

The reality is that despite having a somewhat feline look, Krystal was always intended to be a fox as early as Dinosaur Planet, her original backstory even claiming that she belonged to the "Vixon Tribe" on planet Animus (Sabre and Randorn on the other hand belonged to the "Wolven Tribe", as they were both wolves). Former Rare artist Kevin Bayliss has stated multiple times that she was meant to represent a stylized arctic fox in particular.
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Backstory/Lore, Character Design, Development, Early Build, Early Idea, Misconception
person Dinoman96 calendar_month July 20, 2024
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Franchise: Mario
subdirectory_arrow_right Banjo & Kazooie (Franchise), Conker (Collection), Donkey Kong (Collection)
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A common belief relating to Rare's work with Nintendo in the 1990s is that the Banjo-Kazooie series and the early family-friendly iteration of the Conker series were originally intended to share a universe with Donkey Kong. By extension, this would also connect them to the Mario series. This belief stemmed from Banjo and Conker's debuts as playable characters in Diddy Kong Racing, other shared characters (e.g. Gnawty, a beaver who appears in both Donkey Kong Country and Banjo-Kazooie), and other planned appearances like the Ice Key from the Banjo-Kazooie series' unused Stop 'n' Swop feature being found in the data for Donkey Kong 64. This interpretation was so popular at one point that the largest English-language Mario fan wiki, Super Mario Wiki, hosted articles about Banjo-Kazooie and Conker characters.

However, Banjo-Kazooie creator Gregg Mayles has stated that Rare's non-Donkey Kong games were never intended to share a universe with Donkey Kong, while Conker's Bad Fur Day director Chris Seavor has gone on to say that Banjo-Kazooie and Conker also do not share a universe.
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Backstory/Lore, Crossover, Misconception, Suggested, Theory
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month June 19, 2024
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Gregg Mayles' statement:
https://twitter.com/Ghoulyboy/status/1087327241346920448

Chris Seavor's statement:
https://twitter.com/GoryDetail/status/1241106477135298566

Mario Wiki staff talk about the removal of Conker and Banjo content:
https://www.marioboards.com/threads/857/
Gabriel Knight 3: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned
Gabriel Knight 3: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned (1999)
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The game is notable for two puzzles considered by fans and critics to respectively be one of the best and worst ever made for an adventure game.

The puzzle "Le Serpent Rouge" ("The Red Snake") involves decoding torn-up poem stanzas by hunting for information during the game and solving geometric mapping puzzles. This puzzle was widely praised for its overarching complexity and intriguing nature regardless of the player's interest in the real-life mysteries of Rennes-le-Château, a Southern French commune crucial to the game's plot that has been covered in various books and conspiracy theories. The poem was originally included in the "Secret Files of Henri Lobineau", a 1967 dossier about the fraternal organization the Priory of Sion, and was modified to make the puzzle solvable. Lead designer Jane Jensen named it her favorite and most challenging puzzle, designing it around the game's fully controllable 3D camera.

Meanwhile, a puzzle designed by producer Steven Hill was disliked internally and was meant to be replaced with a puzzle by Jensen, but they were forced to leave it in the game due to time constraints. It starts with Gabriel Knight finding that his friend Detective Mosely arrived in France the night before in a tour group and is scheduled to rent a motorcycle that day, so he goes to rent one himself. The nearsighted rental stand clerk requires a passport to confirm arrivals, revealing that the only rides he has left are a bike saved for Mosely and a cheap scooter. To get the bike, Knight plans to disguise as Mosely by Spoiler:stealing his coat and passport, and hiding his long blonde hair in a hat, despite putting it in a visible ponytail. He then draws a mustache on Mosely's passport photo to obscure their facial differences, goes to a shed, puts masking tape on a hole in the shed door, sprays a nearby cat with water causing it to run into the tape and stick fur to it, and applies it to his face with some maple syrup from breakfast to make a fake mustache. The disguise inexplicably works, and Knight gets the bike.

Moreso than Le Serpent Rouge was praised, the disguise puzzle was roundly criticized for its lack of hints, the impossibility of Knight convincingly impersonating Mosely, and the cartoonish roundabout way of Spoiler:making the mustache clashing with the game's serious tone. Critics felt that while it was not the most difficult puzzle, the solution was too absurd for the average player to think it would work. The most scathing review came from future Valve writer Eric Wolpaw, who blamed Jensen for the poor design (it was not known at the time that she did not design it), and called the process of Spoiler:making the mustache "deranged", controversially declaring it was proof that adventure games "committed suicide". While Jensen disliked the puzzle, she thought it being the death of adventure games was "kinda overblown", and the "length of the sequence and the lack of hints" was what made it bad.
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Backstory/Lore, Complaint, Corporate Affairs, Development, Early Idea, General, Level Design, Misconception, Mistake, Politics, Real Life, Reference, Religion, Reviews
person MehDeletingLater calendar_month June 5, 2024
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Gabriel Knight 3: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned - Le Serpent Rouge poem and walkthrough:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7b47CJrnyc
https://sierrachest.com/index.php?a=games&;id=39&title=gabriel-knight-3&fld=walkthrough&pid=101

Hunting Shadows: The Making of Gabriel Knight - Chapter 5:
https://web.archive.org/web/20200513021453/https://episodiccontentmag.com/2015/11/20/hunting-shadows-the-making-of-gabriel-knight-chapter-5-of-5/

Anastasia Salter - "Jane Jensen: Gabriel Knight, Adventure Games, Hidden Objects" (2017) - Influential Video Game Designers. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 978-1501327452. (Pages 58-60):
https://books.google.com/books?id=cPEkDgAAQBAJ

Jane Jensen Adventure Gamers interview:
https://web.archive.org/web/20190715214638/https://adventuregamers.com/articles/view/18170

Le Serpent Rouge real poem article:
https://www.renneslechateau.nl/2012/01/13/the-red-serpent/

Le Serpent Rouge puzzle miscellaneous Adventure Gamers acclaim:
https://web.archive.org/web/20210715000329/https://adventuregamers.com/articles/view/18643/page/page4/page7/page10/N100/page15
https://web.archive.org/web/20170428013712/http://www.adventuregamers.com/articles/view/17459
https://web.archive.org/web/20170311222718/http://www.adventuregamers.com/articles/view/18586

Computer Gaming World - Issue #179, June 1999 (Page 63 in magazine):
https://archive.org/details/Computer_Gaming_World_Issue_179/page/n66/mode/1up?q=serpent

The Games Machine - No. 6, March 2008 (Page 68 in magazine):
https://archive.org/details/the-games-machine-italia-speciali-06/page/n67/mode/1up?q=serpent

Detective Mosely tour group context just before the puzzle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hjzZ0z4b5E

Disguise puzzle footage:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hpcmJLrseI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xx3D9xb_sFg

Kotaku interview snippet:
https://web.archive.org/web/20200619041238/https://kotaku.com/how-we-survived-adventure-gamings-most-hair-tearingly-r-5903932

Computer Gaming World - Issue #189, April 2000 (Pages 74-75):
https://archive.org/details/Computer_Gaming_World_Issue_189

Old Man Murray (Eric Wolpaw) - Death of Adventure Games:
https://web.archive.org/web/20200405052244/http://www.oldmanmurray.com/features/79.html

Gamasutra interview mentioning impact of Old Man Murray blog post:
https://web.archive.org/web/20200618200402/https://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/134850/spyparty_and_the_indie_ethos_.php?page=3

GamesRadar+ article:
https://web.archive.org/web/20200603224407/https://www.gamesradar.com/the-top-7-stupidest-puzzles/4/

InVisible Culture article (counterargument about the "death of adventure games"):
https://web.archive.org/web/20200622204402/http://ivc.lib.rochester.edu/the-kinesthetic-index-video-games-and-the-body-of-motion-capture/
Shining Nikki
Shining Nikki (2019)
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In 2020, to celebrate the launch of Shining Nikki in South Korea, Paper Games released a series of in-game wardrobe items based on the hanbok, a traditional Korean dress. This led to complaints from Chinese players, who objected to the hanbok being treated as a traditional Korean item and claimed that it was actually rooted in Chinese culture. On November 4, Paper Games released a statement supporting the argument that the hanbok was not Korean, and that "as a Chinese company, we want to reiterate that our stance is always consistent with our country China." They also announced that any accounts spreading misinformation about China or trying to insult the country would be blocked, implying that arguing that the hanbok was Korean counted as an offense. The hanbok items were ultimately removed from the game a day later.

This caused backlash from Korean players, who retaliated by deleting the game and applying for refunds for in-app purchases. On November 6, the game was delisted from Korean stores, resulting in demands that Paper Games be investigated for stealing Korea's cultural heritage and closing the service without offering compensation. This got to the point where Lee Sang-heon, a Democratic Party lawmaker from South Korea's National Assembly, called out Paper Games for siding with false claims from Chinese netizens and directing criticism towards Korean users. He also warned that their actions had violated South Korea's fair trade rules as they did not offer refunds and compensations prior to pulling the game from the country.
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Apology, Censorship, Complaint, Customization, Delisted, General, Legal Affairs, Misconception, Politics, Press Release, Real Life, Social Media, Update Difference
person chocolatejr9 calendar_month June 3, 2024
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Kamikuishiki-mura Monogatari
Kamikuishiki-mura Monogatari (1995)
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Upon its discovery by English-speaking audiences, Kamikuishiki-mura Monogatari was widely speculated to be a propaganda game by Aleph (formerly and more infamously known as Aum Shinrikyo), a Japanese apocalypse cult and terrorist organization most notorious for perpetrating the Tokyo subway sarin gas attack in 1995. The game sees the player control Aleph founder Shoko Asahara, who expands the cult's influence throughout the game before eventually carrying out the sarin attack. Successfully carrying out the attack results in the player winning the game, while repeated mismanagement of the cult triggers the apocalypse that Asahara prophesied. Various photographs, propaganda footage, and news coverage tied to Aleph is also featured throughout the game, most prominently on the title screen.

Despite these elements, the idea that the game was created to advertise Aleph was eventually disproven in a 2019 investigation by Vice. According to the article, the game was published shortly after the sarin attacks with the intent of mocking the cult instead of endorsing them. Developer HappySoft's advertising campaign emphasized their hatred of Aleph and highlighted the fact that players could sell Asahara's bodily fluids to "stupid believers." Additionally, the live-action footage featured in the game was picked specifically to demean the cult, as featured news coverage is negative in tone and shows Aleph spokespeople frantically trying to avoid reporters, while the propaganda footage consists of clips that were widely mocked in Japanese media following the sarin attacks. Vice attributed the misconceptions to a combination of language barriers and limited international knowledge about Aleph beyond the sarin attacks.
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Advertisement/Commercial, General, Inspiration, Misconception, Politics, Real Life, Rumor
person VinchVolt calendar_month May 27, 2024
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Assassin's Creed Shadows
Assassin's Creed Shadows (2024)
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One of the game's dual protagonists Yasuke, an African samurai, is the first main character in the series to be based on a real historical figure, but his real-life identity and status serving under Japanese daimyo Oda Nobunaga has been the subject of a contentious debate among historians. There are few scholarly/historical resources available describing him and his life, and no known resources from when he was alive that refer to him as a samurai, with the most common belief being his title was a retainer.

His reveal as a lead in the game on May 15, 2024 caused polarizing reactions worldwide on social media. Fans critical of the decision claimed Ubisoft were going against the series' penchant for accurate historical backgrounds and misrepresented Japan, which the series had never covered in-depth, by inflating Yasuke's role in history and not having both protagonists be Japanese (the other protagonist, Naoe, is Japanese), claiming he was not actually a samurai. Fans in support of his role claiming he was actually a samurai called these objections racist and based on narrow-minded arguments and inferences, with some claiming that Asian samurai protagonists in media were oversaturated and that complaints would be the same if the game was set in Africa and starred an African protagonist. This intense fighting led to an edit war on Yasuke's English Wikipedia article, with administrators publicly calling its Talk page "a complete dumpster fire". As of July 3, the consensus that the Talk page reached appears to be that the available historical resources are inconclusive as to if he was or was not a samurai, but that scholars consistently describe Yasuke as a samurai without any sources found where scholars do not describe him as one.

This lack of clarity allows popular media to take creative liberties in adapting him, often depicting him as a high-ranking samurai, and Ubisoft seemed to take a similar direction from the outset. A press release at the game's announcement stated:

"Yasuke: A Real-Life Samurai:
Ubisoft Quebec wanted to include a Samurai, and Yasuke's story was open-ended enough to allow for creativity; there are still plenty of questions and speculation surrounding him. The fascinating facts, though, were undisputable: of African origin, he arrived in Japan enslaved by the Portuguese; he impressed with size, strength, and wits; he served under the Japanese daimyo Oda Nobunaga. There must have been something exceptional about Yasuke to succeed in the service of a personality like Nobunaga's, [...] and the goal has been to expound on this in [the game] through his curiosity, openness, respect for values and tradition, valor, warmth, and charisma."

Despite the header used, the quote is carefully worded to stop short of directly calling Yasuke a samurai, with more advertising describing him as a "samurai of historical legend". Game director Charles Benoit later acknowledged his life "is surrounded by mysteries" and that "[Yasuke] told us to tell" his story seen in the game, which was also described by associate narrative director Brooke Davies as historical fiction.

Creative director Jonathan Dumont stated in interviews with Famitsu on May 15 that they chose Yasuke to fit with the story of a foreigner who fights off oppressing forces like the Portuguese slave trade, while exploring a country unknown to him alongside the player, stating that they were "first looking for "our samurai," someone who could be our non-Japanese eyes". The following day, the interviews were edited to remove this quote, and to change quotes either directly or contextually referring to Yasuke as an "outsider" to being a "foreign-born samurai". After further mounting controversy, Ubisoft posted a statement to Twitter in English and Japanese on July 23 apologizing for elements in their promotional materials that "caused concern within the Japanese community", reiterating that the game's story was intended to be historical fiction and not an accurate recreation of events, and that Yasuke's real-life status was "a matter of debate and discussion". The Japanese statement received Community Notes pointing out that the stance taken was contradictory, citing several quotes from both the Famitsu interviews and an Xbox interview that emphasized confirming historical accuracy, but was removed from the statement hours later.
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Adaptation, Advertisement/Commercial, Apology, Complaint, Corporate Affairs, Development, Early Idea, First, General, Inspiration, Misconception, Press Release, Race, Real Life, Reviews, Social Media, Suggested, Theory, Website
person MehDeletingLater calendar_month May 19, 2024
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Game website with "samurai of historical legend" quote:
https://www.ubisoft.com/en-us/game/assassins-creed/shadows

Ubisoft press release:
https://news.ubisoft.com/en-us/article/2LH4Ael4X1TlNJY3B3aYg5/assassins-creed-shadows-launches-november-15-features-dual-protagonists-in-feudal-japan

Ubisoft Forward - June 10, 2024:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPoJUPrCkkg#t=4602s

IGN Japan interview with Brooke Davies:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqwitaREyd0

Ubisoft article with several videos explaining historical backgrounds behind previous Assassin's Creed games:
https://news.ubisoft.com/en-us/article/6d4zQXyH0VF6z75Ab7jfss/discover-the-real-history-behind-every-assassins-creed

IGN articles:
https://www.ign.com/articles/when-and-where-is-assassins-creed-shadows-set
https://www.ign.com/articles/assassins-creed-shadows-yasuke-asian-protagonist

TheGamer article:
https://www.thegamer.com/african-assassins-creed-shadows-controversy/

Time article:
https://time.com/6978997/assassins-creed-shadow-yasuke-controversy/

Forbes article mentioning Wikipedia edit war and international reactions:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/olliebarder/2024/05/15/japanese-fans-are-puzzled-that-yasuke-is-in-assassins-creed-shadows/

Yasuke English Wikipedia article (Note: while much of this controversy occurred on English language Wikipedia, bear in mind that Wikipedia articles by themselves are not reliable sources for historical research, and the English article is not a uniform representation of the information on Yasuke across the different language versions of Wikipedia that have this article. There are varying primary, secondary, historical and pop culture sources suggested for and used in all of these articles either backing up verified information about him, or making different claims that may not be accurate.):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasuke
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Yasuke

Wikipedia administrator discussion:
https://web.archive.org/web/20240518220622/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Talk:Yasuke_is_a_complete_dumpster_fire

Earliest archive of original Famitsu interview (in Japanese; English machine translations for all archives of this article compared between Google Translate and DeepL prior to publishing this submission. Deleted quote in Japanese is "まず“私たちの侍”、つまり日本人ではない私たちの目になれる人物を探していましたが、これは") (May 15):
https://web.archive.org/web/20240515185159/https://www.famitsu.com/article/202405/5194

Archived edited interview (May 16):
https://web.archive.org/web/20240516194746/https://www.famitsu.com/article/202405/5194

Latest archived edit (May 18):
https://web.archive.org/web/20240518034336/https://www.famitsu.com/article/202405/5194

Ubisoft July statement (in English and Japanese; third link contains archived screenshots of the Japanese Community Notes):
https://x.com/assassinscreed/status/1815674592444187116
https://x.com/UBISOFT_JAPAN/status/1815674629643719061
https://x.com/DLibryum/status/1816342689127772542

Xbox interview:
https://news.xbox.com/ja-jp/2024/05/16/assassins-creed-shadows-interview/
Star Fox 2
Star Fox 2 (2017)
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Attachment When assets from Star Fox 2 were leaked in the 2020 Nintendo Gigaleak, one character that caught people's attention was what appeared to be a human woman. Some fans and news outlets assumed the character to be black based on her frilly hair and large lips, but palettes were eventually discovered that revealed her to be fair-skinned. The human woman's sprites have the same filename as Miyu and Fay's in the final game, and her two sprites' facial structures resemble Miyu and Fay's prototype sprites (the latter being a sheep instead of a poodle), suggesting she was simply a placeholder meant to give a human reference for Miyu and Fay's anthropomorphic expressions.
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Character Design, Leak, Misconception, Placeholder, Race, Theory, Unused Character, Unused Content, Unused Graphic
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month May 14, 2024
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City Life DS
City Life DS (2008)
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In 2022, the English rock band Arctic Monkeys released a song titled "Sculptures of Anything Goes", featuring the following lyric in the last verse of the song:

"The simulation cartridge for City Life '09 is pretty tricky to come by."

This lyric became the subject of news articles when fans on the music lyrics website Genius initially determined that it was referencing the obscure Nintendo DS game City Life DS, which only released in France in 2008 and the United Kingdom in 2009, and did not sell as well as previous games in the City Life series. Fans theorized that the difficulty in finding a copy of the game referenced in the lyric stemmed from Nintendo eventually discontinuing the DS family of systems to support future consoles. They also cited the closure of the Nintendo 3DS/Wii U versions of the Nintendo eShop as another possibility, but this was unfounded as City Life DS was only officially released as a physical cartridge and not part of the Wii U Virtual Console's Nintendo DS library.

However, it was confirmed in an interview with the band's frontman Alex Turner by Rolling Stone Germany on the day the song released that the lyric was not about City Life DS. He attributed the lyric to the works of author David Foster Wallace, most likely as a reference to his book "Infinite Jest" where the characters consume entertainment in the form of cartridges, which could also be referring to Turner's growing struggle to appeal and relate to Arctic Monkeys' audience from their earlier years as their sound and image changed later on.
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Coincidence, Misconception, Music, Real Life, Reference, Sales, Suggested, Theory
person MehDeletingLater calendar_month May 6, 2024
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Yakuza: Like a Dragon
Yakuza: Like a Dragon (2020)
subdirectory_arrow_right Yakuza Online (Game)
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In a 2020 interview with the YouTube channel Archipel, series producer Toshihiro Nagoshi claimed that the decision to change Yakuza: Like a Dragon from an action game to a turn-based RPG came from a 2019 April Fools' Day video for Yakuza Online showing turn-based combat which was received positively by fans. However, fans and news outlets seemed to take this statement seriously, and Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio's head Masayoshi Yokoyama later had to clarify that it was a joke. The decision to shift to turn-based combat was made before production on the game even began due to it being too drastic of a change to make late into development.
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April Fools, Development, Early Idea, Inspiration, Misconception, Rumor
person Kirby Inhales Jotaro calendar_month April 12, 2024
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Dark Souls
Dark Souls (2011)
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The character most commonly known as Snuggly the Crow or Sparkly the Crow is not a crow at all. She is actually a hawk named Hawk Girl and the more common names were actually created and propagated by fans.
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Misconception, Mistake
person Kirby Inhales Jotaro calendar_month April 10, 2024
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Company: Sega
subdirectory_arrow_right Nintendo (Company)
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Attachment The first official crossover between a Nintendo property and a Sega property is often assumed to be either Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games or Super Smash Bros. Brawl. While these are indeed the first Nintendo-Sega crossovers within the gaming medium, there have been instances prior of crossovers in supplementary marketing material:

• A 1994 advert made by DIC for animation industry insiders showing their global reach through the Panda Club and Dragon Club TV blocks in China shows Sonic the Hedgehog waving through a TV screen while Mario pats him on the back, joined by Madeline from the Madeline book series and Billy Lee as seen in the cartoon adaptation of Double Dragon.
• The infamous Fight for the FoxBox promotional film made by 4Kids Entertainment in 2003, which utilizes existing anime and cartoon clips to make a new crossover story, shows Dr. Eggman and King Dedede as allies alongside Dial-bolic from Ultimate MUSCLE, Dr. K from Cubix: Robots for Everyone, and Shredder from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles working for Wayne from The Cramp Twins in an attempt to shut down the titular television channel. Although the villains do interact in this half-hour film, the heroes mostly do not, with Kirby and Sonic never sharing screen time in particular.

This is, of course, discounting instances of unauthorised parodies and mockery at the height of the console wars.
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Crossover, First, General, Misconception, Multimedia Adaptation
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month April 8, 2024
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Print ad cel:
https://twitter.com/SatamHistorian/status/1452085625558118402

Full advert found on eBay, and attached as a file.

Fight for the FoxBox:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKHYLf8uxnk
Franchise: Sonic The Hedgehog
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Attachment Ben Hurst, one of the writers for the 1993 "Sonic the Hedgehog" animated series, attempted to pitch a continuation of the show to Sega in 2002 as either a third season or a movie. He consulted DiC Entertainment, who produced the show (as well as two other Sonic cartoons, "Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog" and "Sonic Underground"), and was given the name of a Sega executive who wanted to talk with him more about the idea. Hurst then received a call from Ken Penders, at the time the head writer for Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comics, who had been made aware of Hurst's interest in making a movie based on the series. Hurst offered to include Penders in the project, and told him his strategy for the pitch was to develop a satisfying storyline to conclude the show, and simultaneously giving Sega ideas for new games. This resulted in a long-standing controversy where Hurst claimed that Penders sabotaged his plan by telling Sega that he was trying to co-opt the franchise, resulting in Hurst's dismissal from the project. Over 13 years after Hurst's death, Penders would give his side of the story in a 2023 blog post, claiming that Hurst's joint proposal between the two would involve asking Sega to pay them to produce the series, and doubted that Sega would even schedule a meeting to let them pitch it if Sega funding the pitch was the premise, stating that "the owner of any IP is looking for a payday when it comes to using the rights for their properties."

In September 2003, Penders pitched his own concept for a Sonic the Hedgehog movie, titled "Sonic Armageddon". Four pieces of concept art were produced, and even a homemade pitch video was made to show to Sega executives. From what is known about the pitch (which seemed to borrow elements from both the 1993 series and the Archie comics), it would have involved the planet Mobius being destroyed and changed the depiction of the roboticization procedure to something much more gruesome than what had been previously seen. Notably, several major characters (such as the Freedom Fighters sans Sonic, Tails and Sally) are not shown in either the pitch video or the concept art, and the characters that are shown are given major redesigns. A common belief is that DreamWorks Animation was Penders' choice to produce the film, but Penders would later state in 2019 that he had pitched the idea to Sega only, and that DreamWorks had no involvement. The film never materialized; Penders would later claim on separate occasions that the idea was dropped because of "massive corporate upheaval", as well as the development of the animated series "Sonic X" affecting talks regarding the film.
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Backstory/Lore, Cancelled Release, Character Design, Corporate Affairs, Development, Early Idea, General, Misconception, Multimedia Adaptation, Pitch Bible/Proposal, Real Life
person chocolatejr9 calendar_month April 6, 2024
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Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door
Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (2004)
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After Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door's announcement in 2003, some Mario fans incorrectly believed that the character of Madame Flurrie was going to be the ghost of Bowser's wife, based off of her character design and Japanese name. This is due to Flurrie's Japanese name, "Cloudia", sounding a lot like "Clawdia", a popular urban legend name for the Koopalings' mother supposedly created by the Mario fan website "Lemmy's Land", as well as Flurrie sharing a hair style with Ludwig and lip-shape with Wendy, who were at the time considered Bowser's children by Nintendo.
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Fan Works, Hoax, Misconception, Name Change, Regional Difference, Theory, Website
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month April 1, 2024
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Pepper Grinder
Pepper Grinder (2024)
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Upon its reveal, Pepper Grinder was compared by some gaming outlets to Game Freak's Drill Dozer, owing to a shared theme of drilling, some similar gameplay mechanics, and a ponytailed main character design very loosely resembling Drill Dozer's Jill. The game's solo developer Riv Hester did say that Drill Dozer was an influence on the game, but it was not intended as an outright spiritual successor, as he did not play it until after work had begun on Pepper Grinder.
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General, Inspiration, Misconception, Similarities
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month March 31, 2024
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Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts
Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts (2008)
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The vehicle-building gameplay of Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts has been claimed by many Banjo-Kazooie fans, often with an underlying anti-Microsoft or pro-Nintendo console war motive, to have been a corporate mandate from Microsoft to Rare, who supposedly wanted to make another 3D platformer like the previous games in the series. However, this is a complete lie as the only known influence on Nuts & Bolts from Microsoft was that they wanted Rare to make games aimed toward a younger demographic. Otherwise, the creative decisions made with Nuts & Bolts were entirely on Rare's development team, which was burned out by 3D platformers and genuinely believed that vehicle-building was a natural evolution of the genre.
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Complaint, Console Wars, Corporate Affairs, Development, General, Misconception, Regulatory Content Rating
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month March 14, 2024
comment Comment (1) | Source
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Reddit posts collecting all of the below sources and specific quotes from them:
https://www.reddit.com/r/BanjoKazooie/comments/grmk7k/comprehensive_list_as_to_reasons_why_nuts_bolts/
https://www.reddit.com/r/BanjoKazooie/comments/gro2kc/child_post_list_of_comprehensive_quotes_from_rare/

GamesRadar 2008 interview revealing Nuts & Bolts has nothing to do with Microsoft's buyout:
https://www.gamesradar.com/banjo-kazooie-nuts-bolts-interview/

IGN 2012 interview revealing demographics mandate:
https://www.ign.com/articles/2012/08/22/ex-rare-member-shares-info-on-cancelled-game

Gregg Mayles 2018 interview revealing Rare wanted a different approach to platformers:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9h9Y55vpHZo

VideoGamer 2008 interview revealing that they thought a platform-centric game would be boring to work on, and was not inspired by user-generated games like LittleBigPlanet:
https://www.videogamer.com/previews/banjo-kazooie-nuts-and-bolts-interview/

Wired 2008 interview revealing Rare thought platforming games stopped being innovative after the Nintendo 64, and the team expanded from 13 to 71 people so they could not make projects like they used to:
https://www.wired.com/2008/05/qa-banjo-kazooi/

Xbox Achievements 2008 interview revealing Rare thought the old movement system was stale, that they wanted players to come up with different solutions to problems, and assumed fans would be mad if they remade a game instead of a making a sequel:
https://www.xboxachievements.com/news/news-1567-x360a-Meets--Rare-and-Talks-Banjo-Kazooie--Nuts---Bolts.html

Gamereactor 2008 interview revealing Rare thought the blockier character designs felt more BK than the smooth versions of N64 models:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rn9Il7IKgEI

The Rare Witch Project 2008 interview revealing Rare believed vehicle-building was the next evolution of platforming games, and that Nuts & Bolts was the third attempt at a third Banjo-Kazooie game:
https://web.archive.org/web/20081223105418/http://www.rarewitchproject.com/?id=1655

Kikizo 2008 interview revealing Rare wanted to test the power of the new Xbox 360 hardware:
http://archive.videogamesdaily.com/features/banjo-kazooie-nuts-and-bolts-rare-interview-p1.asp

Edge Magazine 2010 interview revealing Conker Live & Reloaded's negative fan reception caused Rare to rethink a remake:
https://web.archive.org/web/20101015012359/http://www.next-gen.biz/features/rare-vintage-part-two

Rare 2018 interview revealing Gregg Mayles was bored with the formula and did not know where to take it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2QVnSJDAl4?t=3556

Steve Mayles 2020 interview stating Banjo-Threeie is Nuts & Bolts, putting work into reimagined worlds from Banjo-Kazooie is the same amount of work as new worlds, at one point Rare's management moved all but two people from the Banjo-Kazooie project, Xbox Market was different than the Nintendo market so they weren't sure it'd sell, and Rare was burnt out from making 3D platformers:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dp8n7QKJZHs
Alan Wake II
Alan Wake II (2023)
subdirectory_arrow_right Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League (Game), Sweet Baby Inc. (Company)
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Character Design, Complaint, Corporate Affairs, Credits, Development, General, Inspiration, LGBTQ+, Misconception, Politics, Race, Real Life, Social Media, Suggested, Theory
person chocolatejr9 calendar_month March 8, 2024
comment Comment (0) | Source
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"Sweet Baby Inc detected" Steam Curator list:
https://store.steampowered.com/curator/44858017-Sweet-Baby-Inc-detected/?appid=1934570

Sweet Baby Inc. front page:
https://sweetbabyinc.com/

General info:
https://kotaku.com/sweet-baby-inc-consulting-games-alan-wake-2-dei-1851312428

Article about the group (note the article is in German):
https://www.gamestar.de/artikel/sweet-baby-inc-detected-steam-kurator-hasskampagne,3409770.html

Accusation of "woke agenda":
https://www.eurogamer.net/spider-man-alan-wake-ridiculous-fishing-devs-speak-up-in-support-of-consultancy-studio-sweet-baby-inc

Employee statement:
https://dotesports.com/general/news/sweet-baby-inc-detected-drama-explained

Steam follower number:
https://www.themarysue.com/sweet-baby-inc-controversy-explained/

Kyle Rowley statement:
https://www.thegamer.com/going-after-alan-wake-2-for-being-woke-really-gives-the-game-away/

Kyle Rowley tweet:
https://twitter.com/TimePirateNinja/status/1764697135344202183

Stacey Henley quote:
https://www.thegamer.com/diversity-consultants-sweet-baby-inc-gaming-worse-live-service/

Curator statement about list purpose:
https://steamcommunity.com/groups/sweetbabyinc-detected/discussions/0/4302697419069965949/

Employee complaints:
https://thatparkplace.com/sweet-baby-inc-employee-begs-followers-to-report-steam-curator-that-tracks-sweet-baby-inc-s-involvement-in-video-games/

Zoë Quinn and Maya Felix Kramer DDoS tweets that were mentioned in the above article but not actually linked:
https://twitter.com/legobutts/status/439565200576892928
https://twitter.com/UnburntWitch/status/439565409780383744
https://twitter.com/UnburntWitch/status/439565723996655616

Steam Curator About page:
https://store.steampowered.com/about/curators/

Chris Kindred account limit and archived reaction:
https://thatparkplace.com/sweet-baby-inc-employee-who-tried-to-cancel-gamer-over-boycott-list-gets-x-account-limited/

Curator Steam Support tweet:
https://twitter.com/kabrutusrambo/status/1765907696887173127

Curator Steam Support community post:
https://steamcommunity.com/groups/sweetbabyinc-detected/announcements/detail/4128183566040620693

Article about claims of Sweet Baby's extent of their involvement:
https://thatparkplace.com/sweet-baby-inc-misinformation-campaign-about-how-much-influence-the-company-has-quickly-gets-exposed/

Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League end credits with Sweet Baby section:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxWTfD9CHtQ#t=4475

Alan Wake II Game Developer article:
https://www.gamedeveloper.com/design/why-remedy-entertainment-went-all-in-on-saga-anderson-in-i-alan-wake-2-i-
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate (2018)
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Sephiroth's inclusion as a DLC fighter was apparently so top secret that even certain members of Square Enix had not known that the villain was going to be included in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate until the corresponding show-stealing announcement at The Game Awards 2020 was made. Even Square Enix employee and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth director Naoki Hamaguchi was quite shocked and stated:

"[...] it was actually extremely confidential that he was even going to be in it, [...] So, none of the dev team knew, including myself. So it was more like when the whole world knew it, and that's when we knew it like, 'Oh, I had no idea!'"
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Awards/Awards Show, Bonus Content, Corporate Affairs, Crossover, Development, Downloadable Content (DLC), Misconception, Remake, Roster Speculation, Secret
person PirateGoofy calendar_month March 1, 2024
comment Comment (0) | link Source
Epic Mickey
Epic Mickey (2010)
subdirectory_arrow_right Férias Frustradas do Pica-Pau (Game)
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Despite popular belief, Epic Mickey is not the first video game to include the character Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. The actual first game to feature him was Férias Frustradas do Pica-Pau (also known as "Woody Woodpecker's Frustrated Vacations"), where Oswald (based on his "Oswald Rabbit" iteration owned by Universal at the time) was one of Woody's friends that had been kidnapped by Buzz Buzzard.
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Adaptation, General, Misconception, Real Life
person chocolatejr9 calendar_month February 22, 2024
comment Comment (0) | link Source
CrazyBus
CrazyBus (2004)
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CrazyBus' soundtrack is often said to be randomly generated - this is partially false. The game does use a random number generator for its music, but it uses an outdated psuedo-RNG that is not truly random, so every boot of the game will play the exact same tune. However, if you press a button that does not start the game, the RNG will shift and the music will therefore end up becoming randomly generated.
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General, Misconception, Music
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month February 8, 2024
comment Comment (0) | link Source
CrazyBus
CrazyBus (2004)
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Although CrazyBus is often discussed or reviewed as if it were a real video game sold for money, and included in ROM sets and pirated cartridges with authentic games, it was actually intended as a simple tech demo by a beginning developer posted on a Sega Genesis modding forum in 2004.
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Development, General, Misconception, Technology
person Rocko & Heffer calendar_month February 8, 2024
comment Comment (0) | link Source
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