Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

[Shawn Zipay]

A new game, H.A.V.E. Online, coming from publisher SK iMedia is beginning to raise more than a few eyebrows amongst Korean gaming communities.

<embed src="http://blip.tv/play/AYGOsicA" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="640" height="390" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed>

If you couldn't tell from the trailer (or the headline) a small bit of controversy has already kicked up for how much this game apparently resembles Team Fortress 2. Kotaku even went so far as to toss up a few comparison shots from the trailer for H.A.V.E. in relation to stills taken from Team Fortress 2's trailer.

Given what you've seen in the trailer and the screens, is there really enough justification to cry fowl on H.A.V.E.?

[nemes1s3000]

Re: Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

At first I thought this was a mod for TF2, but hell if it's free then I don't see a reason for it to exist. Sneaky Koreans.

[mifdeath]

Re: Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

Surprisingly derivative of TF2 but I would say they have enough original content to make the claim its their own. The setting alone would be enough to squeeze them by imho. Throw in the clearly differing teams, and totally different character art (except that bat, I mean wtf at least put a nail through it or something) no one will touch them. Also the idea of two teams fighting for objectives is pretty general to a lot of games.

Dont get me wrong here its totally a rip off but...... what isnt these days?

[AlecJ32]

Re: Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

I'd have to actually watch the game-play to say for sure, but even from the given screen shots it's at least strongly inspired by Team Fortress 2.

Edit: Yeah, just watched that video, there's no question. This is grade A rip-off right here.

[SoBe Green]

Re: Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

There have been quite a few TF clones or spin offs. Most of them are pretty terrible. The only one that was even close to being semi popular was Weapons Factory. I'm not a 100% sure on the history or how it came to be but WF has been around for a long time and its basically TF no matter how much you slice it. This one looks interesting if it is free I'd probably play it.

[Linux]

Re: Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

I'd have to actually watch the game-play to say for sure, but even from the given screen shots it's at least strongly inspired by Team Fortress 2.

Edit: Yeah, just watched that video, there's no question. This is grade A rip-off right here

Yea I agree with the Grade-A rip-off. And honestly looks really childish and retarted. I hope this never comes out.

[AlecJ32]

Re: Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

And honestly looks really childish and retarted.

Yeah, the trailer narration sounds like it's aimed at 7 year olds.

[K-16]

Re: Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

Apparently Scorched Earth/Worms, Bust A Move/Groove, Mario Kart, and even Counter-Strike (which was never covered here very ironically enough) isn't enough for the country's industry to copy outright and then change enough to protect themselves from any possible lawsuit. Sigh... Why oh why did Triforce Studios use their talented creative team to copy an existing successful concept, rather than come up with something innovative... I mean, not all Koreans have to rip crap off... MapleStory had its moments, and look how successful that is for Nexon compared to ripping Mario Kart off with Crazyracing Kartrider. God... Is the Korean industry made up of cowards who can't experiment with innovation in entertainment software? It can't be...

Anyways, in short, yeah it's a rip-off, but they can legally stay without worries as there's enough changes to use the "apples and oranges" ******** excuse.

(Sadly, the Bust A Move/Groove rip-off ended up being way more successful financially than the original Japanese games and ended up being imported/localised to North America in hopes of expanding there. My point? It's sadly possible to rip games off and be more successful at it even though the development effort was about half as much as the competitor.)

[-:Nighthawk:-]

Re: Homage or Rip-Off - Korean Game Resembles Team Fortress 2

It's blatantly copying the same concepts, weapon variety, even gib effects... but you can only copyright the way you do something, not the ideas behind it, so nothing illegal is going on here.

Sad that there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of imagination going into this one, but copying successful game concepts is a long-established pattern in this industry.