Mario 64 was based on Croc prototype!!!

[SoniCroc]

IGN's review of Croc: Legend of the Gobbos begins as follows:

"It has been said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. If this is the case than (sic) Croc should make Mario 64 blush deeper shades of red than have ever been seen before."

Well, it now looks like the reverse of that is closer to the truth. In a recent article, Jez San says the following:


"The end came when we pitched to do a 3D platform game, the likes of which had never been done before. We mocked up a prototype using Yoshi. It was essentially the world's first 3D platform game and was obviously a big risk - Nintendo had never let an outside company use their characters before, and weren't about to, either. This is the moment the deal fell apart. We later made that game into Croc: Legend of the Gobbos for the PlayStation, Saturn and PC, which became our biggest ever game in terms of sales and also in royalties, since we owned the IP.

"Miyamoto-san went on to make Mario 64, which had the look and feel of our Yoshi game - but with the Mario character, of course - and beat Croc to market by around a year. [...] Miyamoto-san came up to me at a show afterwards and apologised for not doing the Yoshi game with us and thanked us for the idea to do a 3D platform game. He also said that we would make enough royalties from our existing deal to make up for it. That felt hollow to me, as I'm of the opinion that Nintendo ended our agreement without fully realising it."


Am I the only one that thinks this is awesome?! I mean, I've always liked Croc, but I've had in my head for years that it really is just a ripoff of Mario 64. Now I have to think of it that way no longer!

But this still leaves me confused about one thing. On Forte Wily's site, under Random Facts, it says this: "Once upon a time, Croc wasn't as we know him now - he was the star of a dinosaur-themed racing game that was intended to be released on the ill-fated SNES CD-ROM drive add-on. In fact, at one time, Croc was not Croc, nor was he in his own game - he 'evolved' from Nintendo's Yoshi!"

So, given the information we now have, I'm not sure what to make of this. Does this just mean that there was going to be a Yoshi racing game that got canned???

[Forte Wily]

It *is* awesome (for what it's worth, there's another thread about it, too ). I always felt that Croc: Legend of the Gobbos is the superior game, incidentally, because it is a proper platformer but in 3D - Super Mario 64 isn't (and I believe that it was to Croc 2's detriment that the focus-groups were listened to and it was made more like the pale imitation that Super Mario 64 is).

As far as what's on my website, I was only quoting what the chaps at Argonaut said when I went there. With hindsight, they were almost certainly referring to the very same game prototype as has been mentioned in this recent article as being the one that Super Mario 64 is a knock-off of, but, I suspect, obscuring the information a bit so as not to dredge up what were obviously some unpleasant events surrounding it.

[SoniCroc]

Nov 2, 2013 9:42:21 GMT -5 Forte Wily said:

It *is* awesome (for what it's worth, there's another thread about it, too ).

D'OH! And I looked around too, to make sure that no one had already posted this. I guess I'm not very good at looking. (The "eurogamer" thread title apparently just didn't grab my attention...)

So... What happens now? Are the threads going to be merged somehow? Or, perhaps I should try to take this thread in a different direction, by talking about something a little off topic:

I've never liked Yoshi all that much for some reason, but after reading this article (I actually read it a few months ago, I just hadn't gotten around to posting about it), I've started playing as Yoshi when I play Mario Party and stuff, since now I know he is so closely related to Croc! (Of course, there is that note on the Random Facts page, once again, but it's pretty obscurely worded, as you pointed out, so it never really hit home the way this new article did.) And I guess Croc is spiritually playable in Super Smash Bros. also. (going back to my extremely ambitious request to have people send the idea of Croc to some guy who was going to translate the request into Japanese and send it to Nintendo... I'm pretty good at deluding myself if something sounds good to me...)

[Forte Wily]

I'm not entirely sure if I can merge threads, so just don't worry about it.

As far as Croc in Super Smash Bros., I'd love that, but I suspect it's about as likely as a new Croc game being made, at this point - not very.

Anyhow, I always quite liked Yoshi. It was pretty cool back when I originally learned that Croc's very existence can be traced back to him, and it's equally cool that the truth is finally emerging as it is.

Of course, the irony about all those folks who proclaim that Croc: Legend of the Gobbos is a "rip-off" (aside from the obvious fact that it's Super Mario 64 that is the rip-off), is that they very likely would have forever sung the game's praises had it been released as that Yoshi game - it's only the branding difference and the fact they're convinced that Croc is the knock-off that makes it otherwise, since Legend of the Gobbos is in fact a competent 3D platformer, and, it would seem now, the true originator of the genre.

[SoniCroc]

Oh don't worry, I have let go of the idea of Croc literally showing up in SSB; I was simply saying that, since Yoshi is in it, Croc is too by extension, in a matter of speaking.

Anyway, what would be extremely awesome, of course, is if someone were to leak the Yoshi prototype that Argonaut showed to Nintendo!!! I mean, it would be some sort of weird combination of the final game and Yoshi's Island.

I've been thinking about ways in which Croc: Legend of the Gobbos was apparently influenced by its history. For instance, I highly suspect that the reason the bosses are animals that were magically transformed is because Kamek was going to transform them, just as he does in Yoshi's Island. (This also seems like a possible reason why the bosses aren't like that in Croc 2.)

[Forte Wily]

Nov 23, 2013 16:52:38 GMT -5 SoniCroc said:

For instance, I highly suspect that the reason the bosses are animals that were magically transformed is because Kamek was going to transform them, just as he does in Yoshi's Island.

You know, I never thought about that. I can only imagine that the prototype was fairly far along (after all, the Eurogamer interview suggests that they immediately set to work on re-branding it, but were still beaten to market by Super Mario 64, which makes it sound like it was far from early work), so it's entirely possible!

(This also seems like a possible reason why the bosses aren't like that in Croc 2.)

I would say that's probably correct, and I can provide a fact to back that up, too: Croc 2 was heavily influenced by focus-testing* - i.e., getting carefully-chosen groups of the target demographic together and asking them what they think, and what they do and don't want the game to shape up like. That's why it comes off feeling like (in my opinion) a pale Super Mario 64 wannabe (oh the irony), instead of being like the game that it's supposed to be a sequel to.

*This is also why Flibby has boxing gloves (apparently someone commented that his swiping attack looked like he was throwing punches, or something of that nature, if memory serves), but it's pretty clear that Croc 1 wasn't anywhere near as focus-group centred as Croc 2.

[OCG]

Interesting. If only release date of Croc 1 was before Mario 64 as well...

[Forte Wily]

Unfortunately, those doing the ripping off had more resources.