True New Town Xiaomao | Text
Let’s continue to talk about some stories related to Pokémon today. Because "Zhu/Zi" has been criticized too much, the official has issued an apology statement on performance issues. So today we let it go and study something slightly off the door.
As we all know, since the Pokémon series was not officially introduced into the domestic market in the early days, there were a large number of copycat Pokémon games in the mainland. They blatantly steal Pokémon's IP and character design, but operate the Krypton Gold mobile game.
is also extremely difficult to protect cross-border rights. Even with the strongest legal department, Nintendo , some "fake" games can still be operated happily for a long time.
According to convention, we should list a few examples and then criticize them hard. But things are not that simple. Many counterfeit Pokémon games have their own loyal surroundings and will spare no effort to retaliate against the genuine players who came to criticize them. There are even some works that are popular because of their exquisite pictures, and are used in reverse to mock GF's technical strength.
After all, being copied is a fate that big IPs will never avoid. Especially the early games of Pokémon did not have official Chinese, and the mobile games released later were almost impossible to play in the mainland. The beautiful childhood of most of us is a copycat product expo, and we rely on piracy to get in touch with large overseas IPs. It is difficult to roughly draw conclusions whether this has a positive or negative impact.
The "Legend of Thunder King Bikachu" I will introduce next is the best copycat goods and is generally considered to be the best copycat Pokémon game on the FC/NES platform. , and it is hard for you to imagine that "Legend of Thunder King Bikachu" is a domestic copycat game, but it actually has many people around abroad. , for example, was included in the English Wiki Encyclopedia;
was spontaneously made an English version by foreign players;
and Japanese YouTube bloggers gave a very high evaluation after trying to pass the Chinese game. What is
that makes a copycat game not only not despised, but has the magic of spanning time. It is still remembered by players all over the world today?
Now let's go back to 18 years ago when it was born and see what happened back then.
In 2004, the then infamous Shenzhen Nanjing Technology Co., Ltd. developed this amazing FC copycat game. As for why the company is notorious, let's keep it a secret before talking about it.
is different from the shoddy copycat games on the market. "Legend of Thunder King Bikachu" has a very serious packaging and game instructions , which records the gameplay and a large number of Pokémon illustrations in detail, and is as exquisite as the genuine games of the same period.
game title presents the name of Pikachu as "Bikachu", which is likely to be the popular Cantonese translation "Bikachao" at that time. However, in the actual game, Pikachu's name is still Pikachu, and this move may be simply to avoid piracy censorship.
A major selling point of "The Legend of Bikachu". is that it is copycat enough to restore , and even adds a lot of elements in its original form, so it dares to claim to be "the only version on the market where all the elves can fully evolve."
Compared with several early Pokémon games, "Legend of Bikachu" may make domestic players feel more familiar and intimate. This is because more Chinese people are exposed to Pokémon IP through animations rather than games. In 1998, in order to commemorate the first theatrical version, Pokémon launched the game "Pokémon: Pikachu" which is close to the animated character, which is commonly known as "Pokémon: Yellow". The basis of
"Legend of Bikachu" is to transplant "Yellow" to FC and use some art materials from the second and third generations of "Gold and Silver" and "Gemstone", making some of the Pokémon in the game look more exquisite than the original version on Gameboy. According to current industry terms, this is a "Remark Remake Edition" and can be sold again for $60.
In addition to the character, the gameplay system of "Legend of Bikachu" is also particularly perfect. At that time, most of the counterfeit Pokémon games on the market had no evolutionary gameplay, or even no basic attribute restraint and other systems. In essence, they were just a layer of Pokémon skin's turn-based RPG. Only "Legend of Bikachu" completely restores all the system of the original work, including Pokémon evolution, attribute restraint, abnormal state, and secret skills. For the young players who did not have genuine game consoles at that time, this was almost a replacement for the pirated game.
But the charm of the game is more than that. Another big selling point of "Legend of Bikachu" is "evolution" . I refer to the all-round evolution of game content. In addition to copying the original content as much as possible, also actively optimized some systems for the FC platform it logs into.
First of all, in order to facilitate gamers on red and white machines . The Pokémon, which needs to be exchanged with other players in the original game, can evolve naturally as long as it is upgraded to a sufficient level in this game. Some secret techniques do not require the partner Pokémon to learn them specifically. After getting the corresponding gym badge, Xiaozhi can use 年后 , flying technique and other moves that can change the terrain, which simplifies the difficulty of map exploration to a certain extent.
In addition, "Legend of Bikachu" has also added many legendary Pokémon that cannot be captured in the original game. The popular Three Divine Birds, Thunder God Yan Emperor Water Lord, and even Super Dreams and Dreams. At that time, almost all the legendary Pokémon in the Pokémon project could be captured in this work. What makes more players talk about is that "Legend of Bikachu" restores many hidden plots after passing the level. When Xiaozhi defeated , the four kings of and became the league champion, he would be told by his mother that something strange happened to Hualan Cave when he returned home. Entering the deepest part of the cave to grab or defeat Super Dream, you will get a dream boat ticket to the real final area of Neverland.
On Neverland, we can encounter many secluded legends Pokémon. The final boss of the island is actually a successful Rockets trio in the if world line. He has a lot of powerful Pokémon under his command and has already achieved strength beyond the Four Heavenly Kings of the Gym. The hidden ending of the
game is also buried with a large number of easter eggs. defeats the Rockets trio, they will tell you that your new boss is Kameyou, is hidden in the Nanjing Technology Development Department of Rainbow City , and it is yes. If the player collects all the elf picture books to find Kameyu, he will give you the most mysterious dream in the entire Pokémon series as the final reward for "thank you for playing my game".
Therefore, at that time, many players believed that the playability of "The Legend of Bikachu" was even better than the Pokémon masterpiece it copied, and praised it as the best pirated game ever.
comments from Japanese netizens, Google machine
This is why, this copycat game that should have been criticized has received extremely high praise both at home and abroad. Until today, there are still people in Baidu "Legend of Thunder King Bikachu" bar, saying goodbye to the game in sincere language. Because during the long period when genuine games cannot enter the level, it has really weaved a beautiful dream for many children who have the dream of becoming a Pokémon master.
OK. Go back to the above question, why did Nanjing Technology, the developer of "Legend of Thunder King Bikachu", become notorious at the time? In fact, you can understand the reason in just one sentence. Nanjing Technology is a company specializing in copycat FC games, and has been active since 2002. Before "The Legend of Thunder King Bikachu", Nanjing Technology had launched several copycat Pokémon games, but there was not much to talk about, all of which belong to the skin-changing feces I mentioned above.
, and some readers may not notice a point of complaint, , that is, there is actually without Pokémon game on the FC platform. The red and white machine was born in the 1980s, and the first Pokémon IP work, "Pokémon Red and Green", was released on the Game Boy handheld machine in 1996.During the same period, the game consoles in Japan have been updated to N64 and PlayStation, and a large number of 3A game IPs we are familiar with today have begun to rise.
However, you know, in 2000, a ban on game consoles cut off game contacts between mainland China and other parts of the world, but FC was packaged as a learning machine by Xiaobawang and became popular in China. Therefore, all the Pokémon games we played on FC are all masterpieces of domestic copycat manufacturers after the red and white machines became popular in China in the late 1990s.
Following the idea of "FC+3A game" , I found many domestic FC copycats that were so outrageous that I shocked my mother. I believe that the developers of these games are definitely a group of super hardcore players who keep up with the trend. has built FC into a super platform that can play all games. What are the PC-side " Diablo ", the arcade " King of Fighters ", PlayStation's "Tomb Raider" and even the domestic "Sword of Sword" and "Legend of Jin Yong" have to be honestly used on the red and white machines for us FC players to enjoy.
Most games are assembly line products that change soup but not change medicine, which compresses development costs to the extreme. The materials, systems and frameworks inside are similar, you just need to change the map to be released as a new game. Speaking of
turn-based King of Fighters
, among the many counterfeit FC game manufacturers, Nanjing Technology has become a rising star. Earlier, we also had "Yanshan Software" , which was founded in the 1980s, and Xiaobawang's brother company "Alien Technology" , etc. The former's well-known works include "Tank 1990" and "93 Super Soul", which is often mistaken for Conra's sequel.
Many of the latter products overlap with the early business scope of Nanjing Technology, which makes people suspect that the early Nanjing Technology was just a copy of alien technology’s game products.
Although everyone is copying it, it's just
So is "The Legend of Thunder King Bikachu" the only conscientious work of Nanjing Technology? There is really more than this one. Although Nanjing Technology's game system has been replaced, many of them are quite restored in the plot and picture of . For example, " Dragon Ball Adventure ", adapted from the work of the same name in GBA, the plot ranges from looking for Dragon Ball to the world's No. 1 Martial Arts Club, and finally to defeating Bick's Demon King , and Wukong has also grown from a child to a young man. After playing the whole game, it was like revisiting the first part of the Dragon Ball comic.
They also have another copycat work that shocked the world: "Final Fantasy 7" (FC version) . Later, they even made the prequel "Core Crisis", which made the company's popularity among overseas players a lot.
Nanjing Technology has spent a lot of effort on this, and the production team alone has absorbed many talents from its peers such as alien technology, jungle interaction, and Xi'an Dongxin. This version of FF7 has a distinct art style, and the game UI design is also very concerned. My first reaction is to use fake to make the real one.
FC copycat version
original
game process was not perfunctory, and faithfully restored all the main plots (including Claude's famous women's clothing scenes), and only deleted the relevant hidden branches of Euphy and Vincent.
, a "very understanding" work, has also gained a lot of fans abroad, and it is natural that enthusiastic fans spontaneously made an English version. The original version only sells cassettes worth a few dozen yuan, and was sold on eBay for $60, and is regarded as a fan masterpiece by 8bit game enthusiasts. The cover of
is the movie "The Advent of the Son"
In fact, speaking of this, the two generations of 8090 may be the most affected by piracy. In the 1990s, many places had just solved the problem of food and clothing, and most people had no money to buy genuine games. In the new millennium, everyone will have no worries about food and clothing, and a ban has cut off the genuine purchasing channels.
- whale falls , all things are born. As long as we keep going, the road will continue to extend. Thanks to the general environment, domestic copycat manufacturers have obtained fertile growth soil, so there is no need to worry about the lawyer's letter from the strongest legal department.'s originator of the copycat Yanshan Technology was defeated by its pirated peers, and Alien Technology failed due to the lawsuit. Ten thousand words are omitted here, making Nanjing Technology a unique success later.
Nanjing Technology stopped software development around 2008. The documentary "Battle Net Magic" that caused a sensation in the country was broadcast on CCTV this year. No one dared to move forward against the current , and he really asked Professor Yang to send him a hundred thousand volts.
After that, Nanjing Technology has turned its business center to copycat game handheld consoles. According to the official website, their transformation was not successful, and their products were ridiculous. They did not even have the most marketable counterfeit Switch, and they should have withdrawn from the game industry. But is it the lifting of the game console ban or the rise of mobile games that swallowed up the sinking market? I can't make a clear judgment.
Objective evaluation, Nanjing Technology is indeed a copycat game company that specializes in plagiarizing creativity and mass-produces inferior products to make money. But from the works "Legend of Bikachu", "Dragon Ball Adventure" and "Final Fantasy 7", we can see that they are also core players who love games and really understand the game. So when this group of people really make a game, what they want is not only money, but also people remember it.
Crow Crow is called
In the existing world line, Polish has a game company that started with pirated copies CDPR. But maybe in another world line without a gaming console ban and without the concept of electronic drugs, we will have similar companies. It may not be as successful as CDPR, but at least they have the opportunity.
But life does not have any if, such a copycat game company will inevitably come to an end in our world. But all this makes me unable to mock it. because and their journey is like the history of domestic game development, full of countless dirty, surprises, bumps and helplessness that can make us feel.
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