Clones/ripoffs you liked more than the original game

[Veho]

So I was reminded of this by a conversation in the forum chatbox: is there a game that is an obvious clone / ripoff of another, more famous, more successful, arguably better game, that you liked more than the original? Obscure, unknown titles that you played the hell out of.

The conversation was about Bomberman games, and it occurred to me that of all the games of the type, the one I spent most time on and probably enjoyed most was a clone called Bombs and Bugs. I'm not saying it's better, but I did like it more.

There's also the question of what you'd call "clone". There are clones that became more successful than whatever original first came up with the mechanic or the setup, that popularized or codified the genre even if they didn't invent it.

Well, not those.

I'm talking Giana Sisters.

So, any games like that you can remember?

 

[fvig2001]

Probably Super Mario 4, clone of Armadillo but with Mario sprites with a bizarre gameplay. Probably liked it more due to it being Mario and the game being Japanese.

In terms of clones, probably those handheld tetris electronic devices. Some of them had weird games that used tetris blocks

 

[hooky1992]

Knights of Valour by Taiwan software house IGS is a blatant rip off of takes inspiration from Warriors of Fate by CAPCOM, but with improved graphics

 

[aoikurayami]

Payback on GBA.
Back in the days someone asked me to play it with them in multiplayer.

Still got an earworm. Twice.

 

[Dr_Faustus]

No One? Really?

Okay

Simpson's Hit and Run

 

[appleburger]

Crash Team Racing on PS1 for me. I'd consider that a ripoff of diddy kong racing for sure, and always greatly preferred it.

The mechanics felt so well grounded in that game - it really blew me away how well it played compared to other kart racers at the time.

 

[CoolMe]

No One? Really?

Okay

Simpson's Hit and Run

I assume you're talking about it being a GTA 3 clone? And you preferred Hit & Run to GTA 3? i guess it was the first open-world sandbox Simpsons game that everyone wanted back then..

Crash Team Racing on PS1 for me. I'd consider that a ripoff of diddy kong racing for sure, and always greatly preferred it.

More like Mario Kart (MK64 in this case), but sure.. Otherwise i'd agree, CTR is a very competent racer, and the fact it was Naughty Dog's first attempt in the genre, it's astounding to say the least..

 

[appleburger]

I assume you're talking about it being a GTA 3 clone? And you preferred Hit & Run to GTA 3? i guess it was the first open-world sandbox Simpsons game that everyone wanted back then..

More like Mario Kart (MK64 in this case), but sure.. Otherwise i'd agree, CTR is a very competent racer, and the fact it was Naughty Dog's first attempt in the genre, it's astounding to say the least..

I think CTR is directly leaping off the back of Diddy Kong more-so than Mario Kart. Diddy Kong came out in '97 and CTR in '99, I always felt it looked like Diddy was trying to revamp the Mario Kart formula and CTR was borrowing the Diddy formula. The single player in both is very similar. They're pretty different from Mario Kart, in that regard. Mario Kart is certainly the root of the inspiration, though, no question there.

Edit:
Also just saw this on the Wikipedia article for CTR:

During the game's prototypical stage, the team built a replica of the "Crescent Island" course from Diddy Kong Racing to test whether a racetrack of the same scope and scale was possible on the PlayStation.

 

[Dr_Faustus]

I assume you're talking about it being a GTA 3 clone? And you preferred Hit & Run to GTA 3? i guess it was the first open-world sandbox Simpsons game that everyone wanted back then..

Yes and No, for one I can say that I enjoy both on their own merits, but most people you talk to in regards to Hit and Run will always consider it to be a rip-off/knock off of GTA in Simpsons form. Just as Simpsons Road Rage was a Rip-off/Knock off of Crazy Taxi.

I enjoy those games, but I find myself enjoying the Simpsons ones more just because the flavor and effort put into it feels like they took it into their own enough to make it believable as a game scenario you could see the Simpsons be in. Also amazingly enough at least with Hit and Run there are still people so devoted to the game they are still making mods for it and even fan remakes. It really has come into its own over time despite its clear game mechanics came from. I just figured to throw it out now since no one else has lol.

 

[Taleweaver]

Whoa... People are very generous when calling something a rip off or clone. So pretty much whenever someone has an idea, others can't be inspired by it? What's next? Space invaders being a rip off of spacewars?

Anyway... I can think of two, but not the names.
Pac-Man had quite a few distributors, too the point i can't even recall which one was the original. But there was this one that had just better level design(much larger corridors), rotating doors and more stuff.

The other was alleyway in another name. Again: plenty of contestors. But this one mainly had a feature that's similar to ping pong (not a video game) : you could put a spin effect on the ball by moving while bouncing. The ball had a lower top speed as well, so it wasn't so insanely hard. This was somewhat countered by that you had to aim for specific parts among the unbreakable bricks.

 

[DaFixer]

Dolphin Blue its a very good Metal Slug clone!

 

[FAST6191]

I have fonder memories of some of the resident evil clones than I do early resident evils, though I will note I did not do 2 until it was out for a few years on PC and 3 I only played round a friend's. Veronica on the dreamcast might even have been my first and then I really got into it on the gamecube with 4 which is when I went back for all the others in the various ports to that so it is a bit like playing some NES RPG when you have just come off a modern one (can respect it but playing for fun is a different matter).

Dino Crisis and its sequel (we don't talk about 3 in polite conversation) for the obvious one. Ronin Blade/Soul of the Samurai depending upon what region you were in is very much what people think of when they say clone with implied lesser in there somewhere. That said I love it, though I will also note it did the cardinal sin of make the early weapons control worse (after a while early stuff timing you get down and thus are just with lower speed and damage but the later stuff, including hidden options, is far better and more enjoyable to use).

 

[SAORIxMEGUMIN]

Diddy Kong Racing was better than Mario Kart 64.

 

[linuxares]

Does Doom clones count?

 

[Creamu]

I have fonder memories of some of the resident evil clones than I do early resident evils,

Isn't alone in the dark the original here?
Also: The Roman Empire

 

[Taleweaver]

Despite good efforts by Nintendo, the best 2D Mario game is actually newer super mario bros for the wii. Took some efforts to play it legally(you've got to compile the game using the original disc), but it was so worth it.

More official: the c&c / red alert remake contains both the original graphics and digitally improved ones. You can change on the fly. Well... Trying the original was pretty shortlived here.