Best Geek Ever!: Barely Legal

Don't fear the rip-off.

Once Capcom sued another company that made a fighting game. The game, they claimed, followed the archetypes of Street Fighter characters a little too closely and attempted to infringe on Capcom's intellectual property. In the end, the ruling was made that basically Capcom doesn't own concepts like "karate man", or "Russian strongman", and that anyone could make fighting games with those archetypes as long as those can't be confused with Street Fighter's characters.

So, how close is too close? See, during the early days of Fighting Female February I showed this pic of Seifuku Desetsu Pretty Fighter's schoolgirl having defeated someone at her stage, a beach.

The Suuuuuuuuuun goes doooooooooown...

And I made a joke, and we all laughed. Maybe. Then I went ahead and reviewed Super Strip Fighter 4: Hymen Fighting, I mean, the Whore Warriors, I mean no subtitle, and showed you this similar screen.

Okay, the skirt is short enough, but where is the long jacket?

And I had some more laughs at the expense of a Sailor Moon fighting game that's actually pretty solid. After all, it was pretty amusing that 2 fighting games had a schoolgirl whose stage was the a rocky shore and whose winpose was similar.

I didn't think much of it. After all, Japan IS an island, and I've heard girls in sailor outfits are a thing over there. But then someone in Youtube said that Mari from Strip Fighter was similar to a fighter from Pretty Fighter. Called Marin.

I couldn't read the kanji Pretty Fighter threw at me, but further investigation shed light that Marin was, in fact the schoolgirl of that series. This was no coincidence. Amazed, I rushed to my, er...Super Famicon, and put on my, uh...import cartridge, to give Marin a spin.

Marin has a spin attack, a projectile called a "Blue Sailor Punch" and an uppercut. Basically she's the Shoto of the series and an obvious sendoff to Sailor Senshi AKA Sailor Moon(the series, not the titular character.)

Meanwhile, Mari, has those exact 3 things.

Of course, it's easy to see where most new SSFIV(. x .) characters come from. Ran is basically Mai Shiranui from the chest up, and Rana is Hakan as a girl. Ai and Bell are apparently Abel concept art.

Are they sued yet?

But that's kind of what you do in fighting games. You pick and choose characters from other, more known fighting games and give them a twist. Meanwhile, the difference in design is so non-existent between this two girls, that it could pass for a redesign.

StudioS doesn't have the hardest to google publisher name for nothing.

And then there's Mari's B Strip Hyper. Called F.I.S.T. Like the terrible 3D sequel to Seifuku D. Where this happens:

Good one, Strip Fighter. That'll show that dead series from more than 10 years ago who's boss...

So here's two characters who are similarly called, have the same attack moves, and have slight strips of clothing to claim as difference, and with not-so-thinly-veiled-references to the other work. It's obvious. Super Strip Fighter IV ripped off Seifuku Desetsu Pretty Fighter, the obscure girls only fighting game that no one likes for it's own sequel to an obscure fighting game no one liked.

I mean, I get why one would rip off Street Fighter. People like that game. and buy it and know it. They've made movies about it. However, ripping off Hakufu Indecentsu Puta Fighter I mean Seifuku Desentsu Pretty Fighter can only be for one of several weird reasons. Which include actually liking that piece of shit.