Where's Neutopia?

[Black Tiger]

It seems to me that Neutopia should've been one of the first games released for the Virtual Console.

Anyone think that either Nintendo doesn't want it on VC or that Hudson is choosing not to release it just to stay on Nintendo's good side?

Other than Nintendo not being cool with the whole Zelda rip off factor, they might also not want Neutopia stealing any of the NES & SNES's Zelda games' thunder.

[Keranu]

I think they just haven't gotten around to adding it yet. They just released Dungeon Explorer, so maybe they're going to wait awhile until releasing another adventure game.

[Joe Redifer]

I hear that Neutopia is a complete and shameless rip-off of Sega's beloved Golden Axe Warrior, which in turn is an evil rip-off of Golvellius, also for the Master System.

[SignOfZeta]

Other than Nintendo not being cool with the whole Zelda rip off factor, they might also not want Neutopia stealing any of the NES & SNES's Zelda games' thunder.

I find that...extraordinarily unlikely.

[Odonadon]

I hear that Neutopia is a complete and shameless rip-off of Sega's beloved Golden Axe Warrior, which in turn is an evil rip-off of Golvellius, also for the Master System.

Where did you hear that?  No, it's a Zelda rip-off through and through.

OD

[Joe Redifer]

Zelda is a rip off of Golvellius, Golden Axe Warrior and Neutopia!

[kungfukid]

I hear that Neutopia is a complete and shameless rip-off of Sega's beloved Golden Axe Warrior, which in turn is an evil rip-off of Golvellius, also for the Master System.

Where did you hear that?  No, it's a Zelda rip-off through and through.

OD

Both points are of course true, but I always find arguments like this kind of pointless, by the same logic you could say that about 50 shooters for the PCE are all rip-offs of each other or every platform game is a rip-off of another... They're all RPG games following an RPG format, the same as Alex Kidd & Mario having similar formats, or SF2 & Fatal Fury & Mortal Kombat, or Mario Kart and Sonic Drift etc. etc. I wouldn't say they were all rip-offs, just different games following the same format - some of the games will undoubtedly be better than others within that, and generally as time goes on some formats can be improved upon! For example, Golden Axe Warrior is a thousand times better than Golvellius! I for one am glad nobody has the copyright on a particular format because we'd never have gotten a number of classic and excellent games otherwise!

[Black Tiger]

Although most games are based on others, even the more blatant rip offs aren't usually as close as Neutopia is to the original Legend of Zelda. Golden Axe Warrior comes close and Golvelius is way different as far as rip offs go.

Other than Nintendo not being cool with the whole Zelda rip off factor, they might also not want Neutopia stealing any of the NES & SNES's Zelda games' thunder.

I find that...extraordinarily unlikely.

Why, because Neutopia doesn't even compare?

I'm not saying that Neutopia is way better than any Zelda(however it is my 2nd favorite Zelda game after the original), but if someone unfamilar with the early Zelda games were to try out NES Zelda for 500 points and Neutopia for 600 points, they'd probably feel like they got ripped off buying Zelda since they're the same game except that Neutopia looks nicer.

[FM-77]

I don't think they'll make Neutopia available. I don't think Hudson wants to dig up that blatant Zelda rip-off now that they're best pals with Nintendo.

[Keranu]

I don't think they'll make Neutopia available. I don't think Hudson wants to dig up that blatant Zelda rip-off now that they're best pals with Nintendo.

Haven't they always sorta been best pals with Nintendo though?

[FM-77]

I don't know, but I get the impression that they weren't, considering they were competing with the SNES/PCE back then (I'm aware that they made some games for Nintendo though).

[Joe Redifer]

All Hudson does is rip people off.  Neutopia is to Zelda what the original Adventure Island is to the original Wonder Boy.  I'm going to be ignorant and assume those are the only two games Hudson ever made to support my argument in the literal sense.

[Keranu]

I don't know, but I get the impression that they weren't, considering they were competing with the SNES/PCE back then (I'm aware that they made some games for Nintendo though).

I assume they have always been pals after reading some stuff that Steven Griener guy of Hudson was saying, like how Hudson was Nintendo's first third-party developer and they have had a close relationship since then. Even when the PCE was out and competiting with the other guys, Hudson was still kind enough to make quite a few games for the SNES and Genesis.

All Hudson does is rip people off.  Neutopia is to Zelda what the original Adventure Island is to the original Wonder Boy.  I'm going to be ignorant and assume those are the only two games Hudson ever made to support my argument in the literal sense.

One word:

Bomberman

[Black Tiger]

I don't know, but I get the impression that they weren't, considering they were competing with the SNES/PCE back then (I'm aware that they made some games for Nintendo though).

I assume they have always been pals after reading some stuff that Steven Griener guy of Hudson was saying, like how Hudson was Nintendo's first third-party developer and they have had a close relationship since then. Even when the PCE was out and competiting with the other guys, Hudson was still kind enough to make quite a few games for the SNES and Genesis.

All Hudson does is rip people off.  Neutopia is to Zelda what the original Adventure Island is to the original Wonder Boy.  I'm going to be ignorant and assume those are the only two games Hudson ever made to support my argument in the literal sense.

One word:

Bomberman

Six words:

Panic Bomber, Bomberman Kart, Bomberman Wars.

[esteban]

All Hudson does is rip people off.  Neutopia is to Zelda what the original Adventure Island is to the original Wonder Boy.  I'm going to be ignorant and assume those are the only two games Hudson ever made to support my argument in the literal sense.

Actually, on a few occasions it was worse than that: Hudson (in Japan) cloned games and then slapped licenses on them. I couldn't find Kaminari's post about this (it might have been a different forum), but he went into detail with a few games (i.e. with the bastardized Wonderboys and Dynastic Hero as a case study, IIRC?)

EDIT: I only found this brief comment from Kaminari, but there's a much better post out there. Somewhere.