Zynga's New Game Pulls From Pokemon, Rage of Bahamut

[The Wooster]

Zynga's New Game Pulls From Pokemon, Rage of Bahamut

Zynga is bringing Montopia to Western shores. It looks awfully familiar.

It's safe to say that Zynga doesn't have a reputation for uninhibited creativity. The social media giant has been hit with a number of accusations of plagiarism since it was founded in 2007, not least amongst them being the honking great big lawsuit brought by EA earlier this year. Montopia, one of two Japanese games from Zynga Japan that are just now being released in the western market, isn't doing much to dispel Zynga's copycat rep.

Stop me if this sounds familiar: Montopia is an RPG for mobiles in which players collect cutesy, element-themed creatures (to fill out their "monstapedia") and have them fight against other players' monsters. Now, Pokemon didn't invent the monster-battling genre, it just popularized it, but Montopia's artwork does seem shockingly familiar.

While there's a clear line of influence from Pokemon to Montopia, the gameplay actually has more in common with another popular social game, DeNA's Rage of Bahamut.

Obviously, Montopia is different enough from both games to avoid legal repercussions. The title has been out in Japan for nearly eight months and Game Freak hasn't unleashed its team of lawyermon. Though that could have something to do with the fact Nintendo, and by extension Game Freak, have no interest in the mobile market.

Montopia went live today, and Zynga plans to release its other Japan-only title, Ayakashi: Ghost Guild, in the coming weeks.

Source: Nasdaq [http://www.nasdaq.com/article/zynga-launches-mobile-social-games-montopia-and-ayakashi-ghost-guild-to-worldwide-audiences-20120912-00839]


Permalink

 

[Pandalisk]

It looks like a game centered around the Pokemon we all know and love before they grew up, like Super Best Friends Forever or such.

Also some of those look desperately like some of the Pokemon, just with a colour inversion. The little Green pokemon on the left is dasterdly familiar. I'll bite, when do i get my first Monster-mon from Professor Twig?

 

[Terminate421]

It looks like they just said "Fuck it, lets make our own Pokemon game, but lets not have fun making it like Gamefreak does!"

 

[Evil Smurf]

It looks like they just said "Fuck it, lets make our own Pokemon game, but lets not have fun making it like Gamefreak does!"

<youtube=zrbg8h71Jew>

Some game play to chew on.

It looks boring, this is a shame because I love Pokemon and would play this game if it was good.

 

[CJ1145]

Lessee...

I can see Chikorita, Turtwig, Shroomish, Snivy, and Misdreavus just in that picture at the top.

This is actually kind of sad; it's more like a parody webcomic than a gae actually trying to earn money.

 

[Solo-Wing]

Yeah no. I will be buying White 2 when it comes out. No knock off is getting my money!

 

[iniudan]

Not sure between laughing, crying or just not caring...

 

[Andy Shandy]

Wait a minute, Jonathan Grey Carter, are you trying to tell me that Zynga are uncreative and just go around stealing other people's ideas? I am truly flabbergasted that you would even make such an obviously untruthful statement. It's not like they are being sued by another games company for ripping off ideas and was sarcastically called out by another!

[sub] And I know I shouldn't have to say it, but just in case, that was obviously sarcasm. [/sub]

 

[Shinsei-J]

Seems horrible, and I don't for care it.
Though I do see some Digimon influences there too.

 

[Berithil]

Nihil Novi Sub Sole.... That's all I have to say.

Zynga lacks any sort of creative gene, therefore all they can hope to do is copy others work and change it up barely enough to try to slide by.

Of course, everyone already knows this, so this is kinda pointless. All we can do is hope that Zynga eventually dies, hopefully sooner rather than later.

 

[carlh267]

Please don't tell me they just seriously gave Pikachu whiskers and set him on fire.

CURSE YOU ZYNGA!

 

[kortin]

This is just...no..why...

why would anyone let Zynga get away with this...

 

[D-Soul]

Fail Pokemon clone is Fail....

 

[Awexsome]

Spoiler: Zynga best tread lightly... they think EAs lawyers are bad they don't want to bring any of Japans wrath as well...

 

[AdamRBi]

It's a little sad, I would come to expect more from a major publisher, even if it's Zynga. Who's idea was it to make a game about monster training and have the main gameplay be "click screen to walk forward, then we give you something at random?"

Makes me think of the most recent Extra Credits episode; Zynga seems to be falling into a trap of their own making, focusing too much on the addicting formulaic mechanics they use in all their games and forgetting that the game has to be fun to play first.

 

[Mirroga]

So Zynga is basically the China of game development. Just copy-paste, photoshop, and then call it a day.

 

[lacktheknack]

Oh Lawd. The programmers and art designers for Zynga must be crying themselves to sleep.

 

[Snowblindblitz]

On that note, what are some good alternatives to Pokemon in the whole monster battle game thing?

I've played Dragon Quest's version, it was neat. Any others?