Ten Examples of Japanese Video Games Borrowing From American Pop Culture



When The Revenge of the Shinobi was released for the
Sega Genesis in 1989, developer Sega got entangled in a web of legal trouble
from numerous American companies. In the Chinatown level of the game, for
example, ninja named Joe Musashi battles Spider-Man and Batman for no apparent
reason.

The likenesses of the Hulk, the Terminator Godzilla, Rambo and various others
were used in the game without the legal right to do so. When the game was
re-released for the Wii Virtual Console in 2009, Spider-Man was re-colored pink
in order to slip by unnoticed by the Marvel Comics' lawyers. (Pink? What a way to butcher Spider-Man, Sega.)

The guys at Capcom Japan, the developer of the Megaman X
series, sure love Guns n' Roses.  In
Megaman X3, the “Neon Tiger” stage featured a heavy metal track that sounds
almost identical to Guns n' Roses' “My Michelle” (see video above). Continuing this tribute, many of the bosses
in the sequel Megaman X5 were named after band members of the original Guns n'
Roses.
Grizzly Slash = Saul “Slash” Hudson,
Dark Dizzy = Dizzy Reed,
Duff McWhalen = Duff McKagen,
Axel the Red = Axl Rose.

]


Lost Odyssey
(XBOX360, 2007)

Lost Odyssey for the XBOX 360 featured a score beautifully
written by Nobuo Uematsu, a composer best known for his work on the Final
Fantasy series.






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