Bubble, a failed DVD game console that exclusively had licensed games based on preschool TV properties, had 6 cancelled games: •Angelina Ballerina •Bob the Builder •Dora the Explorer •The Koala Brothers •Pingu •Postman Pat
Tweenies: Doodles' Bones unusually credits the costume actors for the Tweenies TV series in the credits, despite no live-action footage or screenshots of them being present in the game.
BFDIA 5b marks the second time in the Battle for Dream Island series where a copyrighted character is used in a way beyond simply being a recommended character (fan characters that are submitted to the production team by fans of the series to potentially appear in official content). Specifically, the 31st level in the game "Encounter" features Lego Brick, who first appeared as a recommended character in the Battle for Dream Island episode "Vomitaco" and is a reference to the LEGO toy brand. The first instance was in the episode "Reveal Novum", where Dora (a stick figure based on the titular character from the animated series "Dora the Explorer" who also first appeared in the episode "Vomitaco") was one of the recommended characters who had a chance to join the competition, but failed due to only having nine votes: she would, however, compete in the show's second season "Battle for Dream Island Again". Additionally, a copyrighted character appearing in a major role would not happen again until years after BFDIA 5b's release, with the release of the spinoff series "BFDI Mini Replicas". In that series, one of the contestants is Ender Rocky, a variant of the main series contestant Rocky who first appeared as a recommended character in the season one finale "Return of the Hang Glider" and is based on the Endermen from Minecraft.
The uDraw was conceived after THQ employees noticed how difficult drawing was with the Wii Remote in the Wii version of Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter, and was originally called the Drawn to Life Pal. Multiple pitches for other licensed Drawn to Life titles in the same vein as Drawn to Life: SpongeBob SquarePants Edition were made, with Marvel Comics, Pixar, Star Wars, and Conan the Barbarian being pitched as examples. However, no Drawn to Life game with uDraw compatibility would ever release, though one uDraw launch title, Dood's Big Adventure, bears a fair resemblance to the series. No reason has been given for the series' absence or why a new IP was made with Dood's Big Adventure instead of using the brand recognition of Drawn to Life, but it may be connected to the controversial ending of the DS version of The Next Chapter and its finality for the core Drawn to Life Raposa universe.
Tasha Sounart, Pixar's creative director for the Disney Parks and the consultant for Toy Story elements in Kingdom Hearts III, has claimed that she believes the models for the toys in the game were the best they have ever looked in a licensed product that wasn't made in-house at Pixar:
"Really over all, this is probably the best that our characters have looked outside of our movies, because their attention to detail is really, really great."
Prior to release, Arc System Works announced that the game would feature twenty characters as paid DLC for the game's first season, meaning that the game would launch with only half of its planned roster. This prompted backlash from fans, who pointed out that the game reused assets from past fighting games and that half of Team RWBY would be sold separately while the other half was in the base game. In response, Toshimichi Mori announced that the remaining Team RWBY members (Blake Belladonna and Yang Xiao Long) would be free of charge, and that the costs for the characters would not exceed that of the game's base retail cost.
On July 26, 2023, developer PerBlue released a poll requesting input on various franchises that were in consideration for inclusion in Disney Heroes: Battle Mode. As of March 2024, the only franchises from the poll to still not be part of the game are "Encanto", "Gravity Falls", "Miraculous Ladybug", "Inspector Gadget", "Amphibia", and "Fantasia". Notably, "Miraculous Ladybug" and "Inspector Gadget" are not actually owned by Disney, but appear to have been considered due to the company having ties to each of them. With "Miraculous Ladybug", Disney finances the show through its French division, giving them broadcasting rights in places such as the United States and select European regions. As for "Inspector Gadget", Disney was involved in the production of the 1999 live-action film based on the series due to owning DIC Entertainment at the time from merging with Capital Cities/ABC.
During an interview with Forbes in 2016, producer Toshimichi Mori revealed that he had an interest in the Rooster Teeth webseries RWBY, and even expressed interest in making a game based on it, saying:
"If I were to make a game based on something that wasn't a complete original, which is what I have done in the past, it would be based on the intellectual property of RWBY. So each girl has their own kind of color, theme that they are associated with and the original creator has sadly passed away. If we were to ever make a fighting game of this, I would want to really spearhead that if possible."
Prior to EVO 2017, Rooster Teeth teased the possibility of a RWBY fighting game being announced there on their Twitter account. This game would end up being BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle, which was announced after the BlazBlue: Central Fiction championships, where series protagonist Ruby Rose was one of the first four characters announced for the game.
In an interview with TMNT co-creator Kevin Eastman published in Game Informer on March 5th, 2024, he revealed that the comic miniseries "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin", originally envisioned in 1987 as the final storyline during the original comic book's run and set 30 years in the future, was initially planned by Paramount to go "multimedia". However, they scrapped these plans, because concerns emerged about it conflicting with the sales and marketing for the recently-released 2023 animated film "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem". Paramount then suggested that Eastman and company adapt it into a video game so that they could "give it all the edge and all the attitude and intensity that [he] did in the comic series and even go a bit deeper."
In an interview with Yuke's senior vice president and producer Hiromi Furuta published in VGC (Video Games Chronicle) on November 24th, 2020, she expressed that despite the split from their long-time licensing partner WWE, there was no rivalry between the two companies and that she still loved and respected them. She stated that Yuke's aims to create high-quality pro-wrestling games that resonate with the community, and that their new partnership with AEW was simply "creating a new product" with them. In making All Elite Wrestling: Fight Forever, she also revealed that a key source of inspiration came from WWF No Mercy's game system, which is beloved by fans of pro-wrestling games.
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.
During 2004, Next Level Games was working on a game based on the WWE franchise called "WWE Titans: Parts Unknown". Planned to release on the Playstation 2 and Xbox as a 1-vs-1 fighter, the game was planned to have a radically different direction from past WWE titles, featuring a new art style that focused on exaggerated character designs and cinematic locales. Settings for the game included urban environments (i.e. rooftops in a city) and an old castle located in the snowy wilderness. Additionally, one stage concept was labelled "Cena Stage", likely in reference to wrestler John Cena. This suggests that some individual wrestlers would have received arena dedicated to them.
While the game would have featured several established wrestlers, Next Level also considered adding original cast members made specifically for the game. One piece of artwork for the game shows that there were plans for anthropomorphic characters (such as crocodiles and bears) and sorcerers. Not much is known about the gameplay, though art for the game suggests that destructible environments were intended to be a key focus. For unknown reasons, the pitch was rejected by the game's publisher, THQ.
Within the 2023 Insomniac Games ransomware leak, a PC developer build of the game was found to include several unused Symbiote bosses, including Riot, Lasher, Agony, and Phage. These characters were intended to appear as a team alongside the main antagonist, Venom. However, during development, the game’s story likely underwent changes and the focus shifted to other characters, such as Kraven and Venom. As a result, the Symbiotes besides Venom, Scream, and Anti-Venom were abandoned.
"TailsTube" is a webseries that began airing on March 22, 2022. Described as a "fun and informative, Tails-hosted show about all things Sonic", the series is hosted by a VTuber version of Miles "Tails" Prower, as he answers questions from fans about the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, often featuring special guests from throughout the series. The series is notable for explaining various aspects of the series' lore. For example, the first episode debunks a popular fan theory that claims that Sonic's world and Earth are two separate planets, and the fourth episode confirmed the existence of a multiverse in the series, as well as establishing that "Classic Sonic" and "Modern Sonic" are not separate entities from alternate dimensions, instead being the same character's past and future variants. The sixth episode also sees Tails mention Jewel the Beetle and the Restoration, two prominent parts of IDW's Sonic the Hedgehog comic book series, further connecting it to the game series canon.
The cancelled Atari Jaguar game Tiny Toon Adventures: Plucky Duck in Hollywood Hijinks ran into trouble with its art direction. It originally used photorealistic backgrounds, uncharacteristic of the cartoon and described by a developer as "build and[sic] engine and insert your favorite licensed character here." Despite a complete reset being done to the game's art direction following this iteration, the art did not live up to Warner Bros.' standards for how the Tiny Toon characters and world should look, lacking color and brightness. After Warner Bros. provided model sheets with specific instructions for drawing the characters, the development team instead switched to taking photos of the TV show and converting those into sprites, which caused issues as the sprites would come out corrupted. Atari ultimately concluded that no artist at Telegames was able to create proper Tiny Toons art, requiring art duties to be swapped out to Digital Delirium, which also failed to deliver Warner Brothers-quality animation, which caused the game's development to start implementing pencil tests into their animation process, which slowed down the game's development significantly. Eventually, all of the art for the first 2 worlds was finished, however Telegames stated they did not need the art at that point, with the art (and its respective levels) not being implemented over a year later. Telegames laid out an offer where they would only release a milestone document if a fully laid-out stage map could be provided, something the developer who released this story believed was a stalling tactic, as they already had the art and mockup stage layouts. Shortly after this, the artist assigned to complete the level layouts was laid off, requiring Digital Delirium to be brought in-house, and some music was made for the game that was completely unfit for the source material.
Adventures of Tron was released in Europe as Adventures on GX-12 without the Tron license. The only difference between the two versions is that the title screen was removed.
Five Nights at Freddy's: Into the Pit is a video game adaptation of the first story in Fazbear Frights #1. Notably, the game, book, and story all have the title "Into the Pit".
During the dialogue between Little John and Baloo as part of their Friendship Campaign "Bear Country", they both point out how they each look and sound similar to the other. This is a reference to how they were both voiced by Phil Harris in their respective films, as well as the fact that some of Little John's animations in "Robin Hood" were copied from Baloo's animations in "The Jungle Book".
Darkened Skye came about as a result of Simon & Schuster Interactive attempting to acquire the M&M's license for use in gaming, due to the popularity of the Spokescandy mascots. Skittles was simply a back-up option in case the M&M's deal fell through, but both licenses were acquired. While Dale DeSharone, one of the game's executive producers, believed it should have been aimed at a younger child audience, Mars wanted to attract an audience of people in their 20s, because that demographic did not buy Skittles as much as people in their 30s and older, though they were also adamant that the game couldn't be violent. The game's aesthetic was inspired by a series of late-1990s high fantasy Skittles commercials.
Robbie Shapiro from Victorious was first depicted as having an interest in performance magic in Victorious: Taking the Lead for Wii. This would eventually be canonized in the TV series with Robbie mentioning an interest in magic, followed by clips released for TheSlap.com of Robbie performing magic tricks.
The uDraw was conceived after THQ employees noticed how difficult drawing was with the Wii Remote in the Wii version of Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter, and was originally called the Drawn to Life Pal. Multiple pitches for other licensed Drawn to Life titles in the same vein as Drawn to Life: SpongeBob SquarePants Edition were made, with Marvel Comics, Pixar, Star Wars, and Conan the Barbarian being pitched as examples. However, no Drawn to Life game with uDraw compatibility would ever release, though one uDraw launch title, Dood's Big Adventure, bears a fair resemblance to the series. No reason has been given for the series' absence or why a new IP was made with Dood's Big Adventure instead of using the brand recognition of Drawn to Life, but it may be connected to the controversial ending of the DS version of The Next Chapter and its finality for the core Drawn to Life Raposa universe.
