Pablo Picasso once (apparently) said that:

“Good artists copy, great artists steal.”

To pay homage, be influenced by, respectfully reference… or just blatant stealing and plagiarism. Call it what you will. I’m here to look at some very obvious instances of games that outright ripped-off other games. Now, I’m not talking about games that are very similar and in the same genre per se. I mean I read an article recently that claimed Streets of Rage was a Final Fight rip-off. Errrr, no. They are just both scrolling beat ’em ups. If you are going to go that route, then Double Dragon came before Final Fight and Renegade (Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun) was before Double Dragon. Even then, Renegade wasn’t the first game of its kind either. But I digress.

I’m not going to nitpick a game because it has similar game mechanics or is part of the…