Ripoffs that became more famous then the original

[Ieyke]

Does Bioshock count if Ken Levine was involved in the development of the original (System Shock 2)?

I mean seriously, it's the same game but streamlined for consoles and set in a different location. The plot is very similar and I think if System Shock 2 were more commercially successful Bioshock might not have happened.

BioShock is a spiritual successor.

Kimba the white lion to The Lion King. The classic anime was much better then that overrated Disney movie, and they didn't even try to hid the fact it was a rip off.

Wait, I thought Kimba came way before Lion King, and people were accusing LK of ripping off Kimba.

Which is exactly what the person meant

Oreos I guess.

Yep, Hydrox wants a word...

I came to this thread specifically for Oreos being a rip-off of Hydrox.
This is the price of giving your cookies the name of a bathroom cleaner.

 

[bartholen_v1legacy]

Apparently Naruto started off as a Harry Potter manga riff.

Which is...interesting, considering the insane similarities between Orochimaru and Voldemort.
- White skin.
- Snake thing.
- Immortality.
- Lust for knowledge.
- Crippling injury.
- Schemes for Resurrection.

While Naruto was undoubtedly popular, it's nowhere near the levels Harry Potter reached, see what the thread is actually about. Harry Potter, in turn, is a ripoff of Neil Gaiman's Books of Magic. Haven't heard of it? I certainly hadn't.

Though once you start going down this slope, isn't essentially all fiction in the end just regurgitated ideas and themes from ancient myths? And the lines between inspiration, homage and ripoff can fluctuate endlessly.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

LEGO. Lego was a rip off of kiddicraft's self locking building bricks. The founder of lego copied the kiddicraft blocks and sold them, then later bought kiddiecraft when they were trying to sue Tyco for copying "their" bricks. Lego now compared to the kiddicraft bricks though have greatly improved them and probably have gone farther than the original company ever would have, so I would say it was an improvement.

Minecraft. Markus Persson gives credit to Infiniminer as his inspiration for Minecraft, and when comparing the two it is an obvious ripoff. With what he did with it though, the ripoff exceeded the expectations of either game creators.

 

[Major_Tom]

Terminator! I was lifted from two Outer Limits episodes written by Harlan Ellison.

I also want to say this before some 'superior German engineering' asshole brings it up: AK is actually NOT an StG 44 rip-off.

 

[Legomaniac91_v1legacy]

Deadpool was a ripoff of DC mercenary Deathstroke the Terminator, yet its the Merc with the Mouth that we all love.

Warcraft was originally going to be a Warhammer game, but was changed for some reason. Now WoW has been going on for over a decade and raked in several billion dollars for Blizzard while Warhammer/40K still struggles to break into the video game market.