I found some StarTropics cameos

[parrothead]

All the StarTropics series cameos I could think of are these:

• In the first StarTropics, Navigational Computer (NAV-COM) resembles the Robotic Operating Buddy (R.O.B.).
  
• In Zoda's Revenge: StarTropics II, the turtle that the pizza delivery man rides on closely resembles a Koopa Troopa from the Super Mario series.
  
• In Zoda's Revenge: StarTropics II, the Tetrads and Chief Coralcola's initial (or middle name), "Tetris", are based on the Tetris series.
  
• In Zoda's Revenge: StarTropics II, some people in the Venice, Italy setting of Zoda's Revenge: StarTropics II have a dress code similar to Mario's and Luigi's.
  

[Fryguy64]

Indeed. I agree with the cameos in Star Tropics, but not the cameos of Star Tropics in other games that other people keep bringing up. I need to play through Zoda's Revenge again for screenies though.

[Nester the Lark]

admin said:

Those are some fancy straws you're picking at there. Careful, Dan Brown might hear you and write a book about it

That's about as tenuous a link as you can get. It's Bible Code kind of thinking. And - as with the Bible Code - a sure sign that there's no evidence whatsoever worth using.

Heh, heh! I didn't think you'd buy into it. ;D

It was just an odd idea that occurred to me that the weight of the Death Anchor might be referencing a year in American history, like the Sub-C. I looked it up, thinking it would be some arbitrary number, and I was quite surprised that it was the year of the Mayflower. I mean, it literally could've been any of a thousand other numbers with no significant historical relevance.

So, on the one hand, it has nothing to do with anything, and on the other, it's quite fascinating.

[Flip]

About the Kid Icarus stuff, what's really funky is that they don't mention Of Myths and Monsters on Pit's trophy. Only in the American Chronicle and in the stickers. Wtf Nintendo?

Back to Star Tropics, the team that made the game also made Punch-Out, correct? And ROB, and the ROB games? Correct? And the Super Scope, Metal Falcon, etc. etc.? Correct? Why was Star Tropics so novel that it was only an American release, then. I'm not saying anything more than that, as far as cameos and what not. Just, why did Japan get everything else but not Star Tropics? And even then, if they are familiar with Punch-Out, Gyromite, etc., why can't they be familiar with Star Tropics? If they ever put on the Japanese VC, I can imagine we would start seeing Star Tropics SOMETHING make a come back. Likewise, Sakurai put he kaibash on Nazo no Murasame because it wasn't coming back and I think more importantly because it was really obscure outside of Japan. But if said game got released on the American VC, wouldn't you think it OK to start putting that sort of content more readily into future crossover games? I think Star Tropics is in that same boat. It just needs Japanese recognition and then it can become a more legitimate franchise in NCL's eyes. Until then, like Nazo, Joy Mecha Fight, etc. it can be pretty much forgotten.

[parrothead]

ON TOPIC:

I believe the StarTropics series wasn't released in Japan, most likely because most American culture-related stuff are not welcome in Japan. And now for most Japan-only games not being released in either North America, the PAL regions or neither, it depends on what they contain, how many copies of them sold, how revolutionary, how much Japanese text to translate, when did they release and so on. Nintendo divisions outside of Japan (e.g. Nintendo of America and Europe) often ignore games that aren't part of the Mario, Zelda, Metroid, Pokemon, Kirby, Star Fox, Donkey Kong, Yoshi, F-ZERO or any other large franchise.

Shin Onigashima and Yuyuki had Asian culture. Tomato Adventure didn't sell well enough in Japan and was a little too odd and childish. The Densetsu no Stafy series was too childish, had a lot of Japanese text and the games are all often easy to beat. Time Twist sold poorly, was released 8 months after the release of the Super Famicom and contained various events and historical personages that are probably not safe for children (most notably Adolf Hitler, the Nazis, slavery during the Civil War and Jesus of Nazareth). The Famicom Tantei Club series had dead people with a few drops of blood and had some people smoking. Nakayama Miho no Tokimeki High School was starring a Japanese idol name Nakayama Miho, which very few people outside of Japan know her. Chosoju Mecha MG had giant mechs that have the same style as the ones seen in most Japanese television shows like the Transformers, Voltron, the Japanese tokusatsu Spider-Man show, the Super Sentai/Power Rangers series, the Gundam series, the Macross/Robotech series and several others. These are some examples I could think of.

OFF TOPIC:

If any of you (excluding Flip) don't understand what "Metal Falcon" is, it's actually called the "ST Falcon", not "Metal Falcon". "ST" is an abbreviation for "Standing Tanks". What game(s) did the ST Falcon appear in? That would be Battle Clash (Space Bazooka in Japan) and Metal Combat: Falcon's Revenge.

[Fryguy64]

Basically, Nintendo IRD was very America-centric. The book Game Over described the leader of the team as someone obsessed with American culture. The Nintendo IRD team created the Punch-Out!! series, Arm Wrestling, Teleroboxer, the Play Action Football series, Nester's Funky Bowling and... yes... Star Tropics.

And it's true - they're all heavily influenced by American culture and sports. The characters are usually big and cartoony rather than manga-style.

The difference with Star Tropics is that it's an action-adventure game. It's almost entirely made for the American market (hell, I don't get half the references in the game! What is this... Base-Ball?)

It's a great pair of games though, and it's a shame they will never be treated in the same way as other Nintendo titles simply for the fact they were never released in Japan. I feel the same way about several America-only Nintendo titles. I mean, Gumshoe is one of my favourite NES games from when I was a kid, but Mr. Stevenson and THAT music will never be heard again! Wob-wob-wob-WOB! Love that tune.

Oh, and Metal Combat: Falcon's Revenge was Intelligent Systems - not Nintendo IRD.

[Hiker of Games]

So about that.

I think Mike Anderson is a cameo of Mike Jones. I think the story goes that shortly after Zoda's Revenge, Zoda's race comes to conquer Earth (the aliens we see in Metal Combat) by first weakening the Earth with GLOBAL DESTRUCTON. Mike Jones's dad is killed in the Battle Game. Because Mike would be the property of the person who defeated his father, he changed his last name to Anderson to live underground until he could get revenge.

And of course, Mike ends up defeating the aliens. But Mike's grandson, Rick Wheeler, ends up fighting Zoda's son, Zoda. Then they end up frozen in time until centuries later when... F-Zero begins! Zoda is eventually defeated, but not before he contacts his Space Pirate allies. And older Rick Wheeler and his wife are slaughtered by the Space Pirates on K-2L, leaving their infant daughter to be raised and renamed by the Chozo.

And there you go. StarTropics, BattleClash, F-Zero, and Metroid are all cameos of eachother.

[Nester the Lark]

admin said:

Basically, Nintendo IRD was very America-centric. The book Game Over described the leader of the team as someone obsessed with American culture. The Nintendo IRD team created the Punch-Out!! series, Arm Wrestling, Teleroboxer, the Play Action Football series, Nester's Funky Bowling and... yes... Star Tropics.

According to Stephen Kent's book, The Ultimate History of Video Games, adding Mike Tyson to the game was actually Minoru Arakawa's idea:

Awakawa thought up the idea of licensing Mike Tyson himself. He attended one of Tyson's early fights during a trade show and was impressed by the young boxer's power and skills. Arakawa decided that adding the super-powerful heavyweight's name to the upcoming boxing game would make it more attractive. Nintendo's legal team approached Tyson with an offer that was rumored to be $50,000* for a three-year period, and the fighter agreed. (It should be noted that Nintendo took a chance licensing Tyson, since the agreement was signed prior to his winning the WBC title from Trevor Berbick on Nevember 22, 1986.) When Arakawa told Takeda the idea, Takeda agreed and began adding Tyson's image to one of the fighters in the game.

* Nintendo refuses to specify the amount.

I believe Arakawa was somewhat America-centric himself. He attended MIT and traveled around the US in the early 70's.

The book also mentions that Arakawa kept telling Howard Phillips that Little Mac was supposed to be modeled after him, even tho they looked nothing alike. It's likely that it was one of the other boxers that was meant to look like Phillips, and Arakawa was mistaken.

[Fryguy64]

The artwork in the manual looks a little like Howard Phillips. The sprites in-game don't look quite so much like him.

[parrothead]

Michael Anderson (Nintendo) was named after one of the astronauts that passed away in the burning reentry of the Space Shuttle Columbia.

admin said:

The artwork in the manual looks a little like Howard Phillips. The sprites in-game don't look quite so much like him.

At first glance, the sprites of Little Mac and Doc Louis looked uglier and goofier than the official artworks of themselves. Their sprites look similar to two old cartoon characters: Norville "Shaggy" Rogers and Fat Albert.

[goombaking]

masamune said:

So about that.

I think Mike Anderson is a cameo of Mike Jones. I think the story goes that shortly after Zoda's Revenge, Zoda's race comes to conquer Earth (the aliens we see in Metal Combat) by first weakening the Earth with GLOBAL DESTRUCTON. Mike Jones's dad is killed in the Battle Game. Because Mike would be the property of the person who defeated his father, he changed his last name to Anderson to live underground until he could get revenge.

And of course, Mike ends up defeating the aliens. But Mike's grandson, Rick Wheeler, ends up fighting Zoda's son, Zoda. Then they end up frozen in time until centuries later when... F-Zero begins! Zoda is eventually defeated, but not before he contacts his Space Pirate allies. And older Rick Wheeler and his wife are slaughtered by the Space Pirates on K-2L, leaving their infant daughter to be raised and renamed by the Chozo.

And there you go. StarTropics, BattleClash, F-Zero, and Metroid are all cameos of eachother.

You don't need to be sarcastic. I thought I had a decent case, but I know when to admit I lost.

[Flip]

Regardless, this will fall into the same realm as games like Sennen Koussou or whatever the hell it's called: too Japanese to be American, only too American to be Japanese. At least that cupid game has the good fortune of being around when Japanese get together to make a Japanese crossover game, y'know?

Speaking of which, Punch-Out is heavily Americanized but it was devilishly popular in Japan. I mean, they have boxing animes and stuff over there. So it's not totally devoid of Japanese interest, hence Little Mac appearing as an Assist (and hopefully player in SSB4... sigh). Mike and Star Tropics, on the other hand, have little to appeal to Japanese gamers. They're not really arcade games, they aren't really RPGs, and they sure as hell aren't stupidly goofy in a Japanese way. It was all American fanservice and I think those two games will simply stay that way, lost in time because of a Japancentric company and, at least for consoles like the Wii, industry.

[goombaking]

Not to mention the Mother series taking place in a very American-esque setting and oddly, only being popular in Japan.

[Fryguy64]

The Mother games are set in American-style lands, but the bizarre humour and storytelling are verrrry Japanese. Not to mention the fact it's an RPG.

The only thing Japanese about the Star Tropics games are one or two of the character designs. Mainly Mica and her species.

[Nester the Lark]

goombaking said:

You don't need to be sarcastic. I thought I had a decent case, but I know when to admit I lost.

Don't be hard on yourself, goombaking. On the one hand, you have an evil alien bent on conquering Earth with a very distinct name, which happens to be the same name as another evil world-conquering alien in another Nintendo series, appearing in a game that contains references to other Nintendo series (James McCloud, Mr. EAD, Rainbow Road). On the other hand, the two characters share no consistent physical similarities, the games were made by a Japan-centric company that rarely references American-only releases, and were made by different development teams. So, really, I think it depends more on a personal perspective of what validates a reference.

Fry can do whatever he wants with his own site. He at least mentions it as not a cameo on the F-Zero GX page, and that's good enough for me. At least it somewhat acknowledges the difference in perspectives.

BTW, Fry, the F-Zero GX page doesn't mention that they have more in common than just the names. They're still both evil world-conquering aliens, after all. Might want to fix that error.