So I got into old TSR books years ago and discovered that TSR recycled a concept in their short-lived scifi RPGs. In Amazing Engine Bughunters they had an ancient war between two alien civilizations, the Shapers and Artificers. In Alternity Star*Drive a few years later the same basic concept was recycled for the war between the Stoneburners and Glassmakers.

Just this year I stumbled across an old 80s scifi novel,  Schismatrix by Bruce Sterling. Its main conceit is an ideological conflict between the Shapers and the Mechanists. TSR basically copied the idea with a few tweaks in Bughunters, namely making them two different alien species rather than human ideologies.

In d20 Modern, genetically engineered organisms called "moreaus" and "franks" feature. They're copied directly from the Moreau novels by S. Andrew Swann. There wasn't even a word of credit given to Swann!

Have you ever encountered situations like this in your RPG books? Where it feels like the author is making a reference/homage or, in egregious cases, engaging in lazy rip-off?

There's an apocryphal Battletech story in the graphic novel (well, really more of an illustrated anthology) Shrapnel, put out by FASA in the late 1980s.  A group of Mechwarriors and infantry are in an abandoned bakery in a bombed-out city and find themselves cornered by a large number of unidentified Mechs, and lure them into various traps, culminating in causing the floor to collapse underneath one and it falls into a giant oven that was (apparently) abandoned just before it was about to bake a huge number of bread loaves.  The mech goes up in flames (well, it overheats and ammo cooks off) when it falls in after slipping on a huge puddle of lard they'd spilled near the trap.

One of the group quotes Shakespeare's Henry V "And Falstaff sweats to death, and lards the Earth as he walks."

The other quips back "Watch out.  You might get what you're after.  I'm an ordinary guy, burning down the house."  (A lyric from the Talking Heads hit "Burning Down the House".

Either David Byrne, the Talking Heads as a whole, or Sire/Warner records (or all of them together) didn't think much of that "tribute": when the story was later reprinted in a different Battletech book, and later reprintings of Shrapnel, the final bit of dialog was edited to make it more vague (it just read as the 2nd soldier saying "Watch out, you might get what you're after.") and even later revisions completely removed both the remainder of the lyric, and the Shakespeare quote, although why the Bard's quote was taken out is beyond me.  I doubt he has much in the way of a literary estate to complain.

The game is dotted with other pop culture references: there's a minor cult of Grateful Dead fans on Solaris VII, who run a hamburger joint, Apple Computer still exists and they have their own planet (named Macintosh, "after an ancient and very successful computer the company once made", per the source book) where they manufacture communication and fire control systems for Mechs.  If you look at the fluff for some Mechs you'll note that manufacturer's name.

There's a one-man recon vehicle called the Pack Rat, and under "notable vehicles and crews", one famous scout has named his "Micky Rat" which according to the technical readout (3025, I think?) is "named after some long-forgotten cartoon character".

Oddly enough, the game that you would think would be literally swimming in pop culture references, Cyberpunk 2020, has nearly zero.  No Sony, no Mitsubishi or Honda or Toyota, Nissan or Datsun, no Microsoft nor Apple, or Oracle, Silicon Graphics...none of it.  Just Pondsmith's made up companies.  Not even gun manufacturers, who notoriously DGAF about people saying "Colt" or "Smith & Wesson" in books and other media.  Or at least at that time they didn't.  So it makes Cyberpunk seem a bit...hollow.  Still, it's not like you can't just make those references real world yourself: Arasaka becomes Sony, etc.  I think there's one faint mention of the Cyberpunk genre of fiction in the entire game, ever, and its two netrunners talking and one of them says something like "Reminds you of Gibson's work, doesn't it?" to which the other says that it's "bad luck" to invoke the name of the "godfather" or something along those lines.  William Gibson has been notably frosty toward RPG representations of his work.  He dislikes Cyberpunk the RPG, he hates Shadowrun, and really does not like Cyberpunk 2077 which he says is just Hotline Miami or Grand Theft Auto with a thin veneer of things stolen from him.

Believe it or not in 1e AD&D there's one faint pop culture reference, but it's up to the DM whether or not the characters will "see" it: a magic shield found in ... I wanna say it's C1 Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan, the illustration of the shield clearly depicts it as Captain America's shield.

It's funny...looking over at every RPG I own on my shelf, aside from the previous mentions, I think they're all void of any references like that.  Heavy Gear takes place...pshh...4000? years in the future, making a wink-and-a-nod reference to Marvel Comics or Star Wars or Richard Nixon or Seven Samurai etc., would make about as much sense as putting a Stele in the middle of a modern RPG as an "in joke".  There's just no way Disney or Coca Cola or anything like that is going to survive multiple millennia. 

Now one thing I will say is that Chaosium's Call of Cthulhu has a page full of cultural touchstones from the 20s, 30s and 40s to mention to the characters to get them kind of "invested" in the world, like, yes, you can buy condensed milk - it was invented just a few years ago!  Kodak film exists! etc.  But that's more coloring rather than a subtle reference.

RPG writers are always a little hesitant when it comes to inserting real-world or cross-genre stuff into their games, because you never know who's going to pitch a fit.

Shadowrun, amusingly, notes several older companies still exist though they're overshadowed by the Big Ten. Microsoft is still around (rebranded as Microdeck). They actually have hung in there despite the heir to the empire, Alexander Gates, being a colossal weirdo.

Quote from: thedungeondelver on May 30, 2021, 03:52:56 PMWilliam Gibson has been notably frosty toward RPG representations of his work.  He dislikes Cyberpunk the RPG, he hates Shadowrun, and really does not like Cyberpunk 2077 which he says is just Hotline Miami or Grand Theft Auto with a thin veneer of things stolen from him.

Gibson is right. After all, look at D&D and its relationship with Tolkien's work. We go from deeply layered literary work steeped in European culture, Christian themes & morality to ... MurderHobos in combat BDSM wheelchairs.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on May 30, 2021, 03:06:10 PM
In d20 Modern, genetically engineered organisms called "moreaus" and "franks" feature. They're copied directly from the Moreau novels by S. Andrew Swann. There wasn't even a word of credit given to Swann!

I've never heard of S. A. Swann. I assume the reference is to The Island of Doctor Moreau by H.G. Wells. While Wells' work doesn't involve genetic engineering, it isn't an exceptional or unique to make that leap.

Edit: I looked up Swann's work and now I understand the objection. Seems fairly likely that the combination of these two concepts is drawn from his work rather than independently created as a reference to older classic works.

Quote from: Zelen on May 30, 2021, 05:24:26 PM

Quote from: thedungeondelver on May 30, 2021, 03:52:56 PMWilliam Gibson has been notably frosty toward RPG representations of his work.  He dislikes Cyberpunk the RPG, he hates Shadowrun, and really does not like Cyberpunk 2077 which he says is just Hotline Miami or Grand Theft Auto with a thin veneer of things stolen from him.

Gibson is right. After all, look at D&D and its relationship with Tolkien's work. We go from deeply layered literary work steeped in European culture, Christian themes & morality to ... MurderHobos in combat BDSM wheelchairs.

You're not wrong.

I say that as someone who loves 1e AD&D (where there are no BDSM combat wheelchairs).

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on May 30, 2021, 03:06:10 PM
So I got into old TSR books years ago and discovered that TSR recycled a concept in their short-lived scifi RPGs. In Amazing Engine Bughunters they had an ancient war between two alien civilizations, the Shapers and Artificers. In Alternity Star*Drive a few years later the same basic concept was recycled for the war between the Stoneburners and Glassmakers.

Just this year I stumbled across an old 80s scifi novel,  Schismatrix by Bruce Sterling. Its main conceit is an ideological conflict between the Shapers and the Mechanists. TSR basically copied the idea with a few tweaks in Bughunters, namely making them two different alien species rather than human ideologies.

In d20 Modern, genetically engineered organisms called "moreaus" and "franks" feature. They're copied directly from the Moreau novels by S. Andrew Swann. There wasn't even a word of credit given to Swann!

Have you ever encountered situations like this in your RPG books? Where it feels like the author is making a reference/homage or, in egregious cases, engaging in lazy rip-off?

Lets see here.

A: The idea of Tech vs Organic is not new. It goes back to Luddites and probably further. Writers have been using this for probably centuries because its a real thing and is easy to draw anologies from for just about any setting. Civilization vs Barbarians is the earliest. But by the 1900s you have the beginnings of new tech and new ideas of how they can oppose eachother.

B: TSR didnt copy that far as know beacuse as noted above its not a new concept. So by your accusation Sterling obviously stole from some earlier writer because that is sure as hell not an original concept.

C: Um... you are aware that Moreau is a reference to Island of Dr Moreau... right? And Franks is a refference to Frankenstein... right? And that writers have been playing off that since both books came out... right? Apparently not. You fail literature - forever.

D: Yes! ... Every time I pick up an RPG I think. "Golly this one ripped off D&D too. The MONSTERS!"
D+1: Yes! ... Every other time BoxCrayonTales makes a post I think "Golly BoxCrayonTales is parroting yet another false screed he read off the internet. You MONSTER!"

x: Drawing inspiration or making references to older works is as old as civilization. Usually just a base concept like Instrumentality or Aliens Invade and so on. Others draw more or make direct ref to something. Sometimes because they know readers will associate it with an older work even when it was not intended or even drawing from.

And that is the big one. Alot of these are not drawing from older works. Its just being inspired by the same, or very similar concepts or bits of history. This is why Space Mongols and Space Vikings and Space Romans etc keep popping up. Not because later writers are "ripping off" older ones. But because everyones reffing or inspired by the same source.

Organic vs Tech/Rage against the Machine is so common because its something most anyone can see and envision a logical counter to. The more tech grows the more extreem the resistance may get. Anyone living near Amish for example will know this one.

x: And others are very much rip-offs or at least pastiches. August Derleth comes to mind. Couple of his stories are very heavily drawn from Lovecrafts stories. Others are just continuations. And the rest are original works. Which Lovecraft encouraged.

Now are some games drawing a bit too heavily from other sources? Sometimes yes. Vampire is probably the most blatant despite the designers claims otherwise. But even that is at best just using the basic concept as a springboard and only one of the factions draws directly from it far as I know. While other factions draw from other sources. Its what White Wolf does. Theres a couple of others Im pretty sure are.

RPGs like Blue Planet feel like they were inspired by shows like Seaquest, just in space. (Then again Seaquest feels like Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea - in the future) But Water planet/undersea exploration stories are nothing new either so who knows. Again at best its a framework for a base idea. But more likely just everyone drawing from a central concept rather than someone elses works.

Immortal at face value one would think is a Highlander rip off. But it is not even remotely similar. On the board gaming side the ill fated Doom that came to Atlantic City was dismissed as a Monopoly rip-off. But in reality it just shared the board and some names because it was in part a parody of that game. But its gameplay was very different.

Z+1: And lastly some games arent rip-offs. Its really the same writers re-using something from their previous works. Best example is Heroscape, which uses mechanics from HeroQuest. Thats because its the same designer. Mice & Mystics uses mechanics from HeroQuest too. That is because some of the designers worked on Heroscape with the other designer. Or TFT and Gurps. Same designer. Also Cook for TSR. Alot of his RPGs share percentile dice mechanics of some sort.

Remember that time that World of Warcraft ripped off DnD and is now worth 100 times as much?

Good times, good times.

Quote from: Shasarak on May 30, 2021, 11:17:08 PM
Remember that time that World of Warcraft ripped off DnD and is now worth 100 times as much?

Good times, good times.

I don't think that's what the OP meant, sure there are fantasy crossovers but I doubt you're going to see Blizzard release a "Forgotten Realms" expansion or "World of Greyhawk" any time soon (ever).  Blizzard is big...big enough to eat Hasbro whole (75bn market cap for ATVI vs. Hasbro's 14bn) but I don't think they'd be that bold because they'd lose in court.

Quote from: thedungeondelver on May 30, 2021, 11:31:32 PM

Quote from: Shasarak on May 30, 2021, 11:17:08 PM
Remember that time that World of Warcraft ripped off DnD and is now worth 100 times as much?

Good times, good times.

I don't think that's what the OP meant, sure there are fantasy crossovers but I doubt you're going to see Blizzard release a "Forgotten Realms" expansion or "World of Greyhawk" any time soon (ever).  Blizzard is big...big enough to eat Hasbro whole (75bn market cap for ATVI vs. Hasbro's 14bn) but I don't think they'd be that bold because they'd lose in court.

Everything is directly copied in WoW.

Quote from: Omega on May 30, 2021, 10:27:32 PM

B: TSR didnt copy that far as know beacuse as noted above its not a new concept. So by your accusation Sterling obviously stole from some earlier writer because that is sure as hell not an original concept.

C: Um... you are aware that Moreau is a reference to Island of Dr Moreau... right? And Franks is a refference to Frankenstein... right? And that writers have been playing off that since both books came out... right? Apparently not. You fail literature - forever.

It's worth mentioning that Sterling was one of the founders of cyberpunk. The anthology he edited, Mirrorshades, is less famous in popular culture than Gibson's Neuromancer, but it was generally considered better by the fans who were into cyberpunk, and Schizmatrix is his most famous solo work. I don't know anything about TSR's Bughunters, but given the timing and importance in the zeitgeist, it at least sounds plausible....

... except that claiming moreaus are an original creation of someone named Swann is so silly, that it's hard to take either claim seriously.

Quote from: thedungeondelver on May 30, 2021, 03:52:56 PM
There's an apocryphal Battletech story in the graphic novel (well, really more of an illustrated anthology) Shrapnel, put out by FASA in the late 1980s.  A group of Mechwarriors and infantry are in an abandoned bakery in a bombed-out city and find themselves cornered by a large number of unidentified Mechs, and lure them into various traps, culminating in causing the floor to collapse underneath one and it falls into a giant oven that was (apparently) abandoned just before it was about to bake a huge number of bread loaves.  The mech goes up in flames (well, it overheats and ammo cooks off) when it falls in after slipping on a huge puddle of lard they'd spilled near the trap.

One of the group quotes Shakespeare's Henry V "And Falstaff sweats to death, and lards the Earth as he walks."

The other quips back "Watch out.  You might get what you're after.  I'm an ordinary guy, burning down the house."  (A lyric from the Talking Heads hit "Burning Down the House".

Either David Byrne, the Talking Heads as a whole, or Sire/Warner records (or all of them together) didn't think much of that "tribute": when the story was later reprinted in a different Battletech book, and later reprintings of Shrapnel, the final bit of dialog was edited to make it more vague (it just read as the 2nd soldier saying "Watch out, you might get what you're after.") and even later revisions completely removed both the remainder of the lyric, and the Shakespeare quote, although why the Bard's quote was taken out is beyond me.  I doubt he has much in the way of a literary estate to complain.

The game is dotted with other pop culture references: there's a minor cult of Grateful Dead fans on Solaris VII, who run a hamburger joint, Apple Computer still exists and they have their own planet (named Macintosh, "after an ancient and very successful computer the company once made", per the source book) where they manufacture communication and fire control systems for Mechs.  If you look at the fluff for some Mechs you'll note that manufacturer's name.

There's a one-man recon vehicle called the Pack Rat, and under "notable vehicles and crews", one famous scout has named his "Micky Rat" which according to the technical readout (3025, I think?) is "named after some long-forgotten cartoon character".

Oddly enough, the game that you would think would be literally swimming in pop culture references, Cyberpunk 2020, has nearly zero.  No Sony, no Mitsubishi or Honda or Toyota, Nissan or Datsun, no Microsoft nor Apple, or Oracle, Silicon Graphics...none of it.  Just Pondsmith's made up companies.  Not even gun manufacturers, who notoriously DGAF about people saying "Colt" or "Smith & Wesson" in books and other media.  Or at least at that time they didn't.  So it makes Cyberpunk seem a bit...hollow.  Still, it's not like you can't just make those references real world yourself: Arasaka becomes Sony, etc.  I think there's one faint mention of the Cyberpunk genre of fiction in the entire game, ever, and its two netrunners talking and one of them says something like "Reminds you of Gibson's work, doesn't it?" to which the other says that it's "bad luck" to invoke the name of the "godfather" or something along those lines.  William Gibson has been notably frosty toward RPG representations of his work.  He dislikes Cyberpunk the RPG, he hates Shadowrun, and really does not like Cyberpunk 2077 which he says is just Hotline Miami or Grand Theft Auto with a thin veneer of things stolen from him.

Believe it or not in 1e AD&D there's one faint pop culture reference, but it's up to the DM whether or not the characters will "see" it: a magic shield found in ... I wanna say it's C1 Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan, the illustration of the shield clearly depicts it as Captain America's shield.

It's funny...looking over at every RPG I own on my shelf, aside from the previous mentions, I think they're all void of any references like that.  Heavy Gear takes place...pshh...4000? years in the future, making a wink-and-a-nod reference to Marvel Comics or Star Wars or Richard Nixon or Seven Samurai etc., would make about as much sense as putting a Stele in the middle of a modern RPG as an "in joke".  There's just no way Disney or Coca Cola or anything like that is going to survive multiple millennia. 

Now one thing I will say is that Chaosium's Call of Cthulhu has a page full of cultural touchstones from the 20s, 30s and 40s to mention to the characters to get them kind of "invested" in the world, like, yes, you can buy condensed milk - it was invented just a few years ago!  Kodak film exists! etc.  But that's more coloring rather than a subtle reference.

There's a real reason for the lack if real gun company's most gun company's live in a given amount of litigation on a day to day basis combined with the fact most of them have a terms of use if you talk about there products by name.
Such things as "our products must always be shone in a good light and to be of superier quality" makes things like balancing and tweeking as needed to be rather hard.
Now you are probably woundering how video games get away with so much and the answer is thus they never mention a product by its given name. That why fps games so often use military designations in place of a guns real name.

Quote from: thedungeondelver on May 30, 2021, 03:52:56 PM

Believe it or not in 1e AD&D there's one faint pop culture reference, but it's up to the DM whether or not the characters will "see" it: a magic shield found in ... I wanna say it's C1 Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan, the illustration of the shield clearly depicts it as Captain America's shield.

It's the front cover of the inner booklet of D1-D2 Descent into the depths. I think Iron Man's mask is there too - and there is a spidey-symbol on one of the drow (but of course, they love spiders so it might not be deliberate).

Quote from: thedungeondelver on May 30, 2021, 03:52:56 PM
There's just no way Disney or Coca Cola or anything like that is going to survive multiple millennia. 

Oh, I donno.  Considering copyright extension policy, I suspect even in WH40K, thou shalt not mention The Mouse as not to draw its ire.

Fred Saberhagen wrote a short story about Berserkers traveling back through time (and it predated Terminator by a few years).  A few months later, White Dwarf published "Strikeback," a Champions scenario where modern (1980) superheroes were sent back in time to help Holmes defeat Dr. Frankenstein III and Captain Nemo (who had not!Berserker technical assistance).

Don't know if there was inspiration there or not. 

Quote from: Pat on May 30, 2021, 11:44:05 PM

Quote from: Omega on May 30, 2021, 10:27:32 PM

B: TSR didnt copy that far as know beacuse as noted above its not a new concept. So by your accusation Sterling obviously stole from some earlier writer because that is sure as hell not an original concept.

C: Um... you are aware that Moreau is a reference to Island of Dr Moreau... right? And Franks is a refference to Frankenstein... right? And that writers have been playing off that since both books came out... right? Apparently not. You fail literature - forever.

It's worth mentioning that Sterling was one of the founders of cyberpunk. The anthology he edited, Mirrorshades, is less famous in popular culture than Gibson's Neuromancer, but it was generally considered better by the fans who were into cyberpunk, and Schizmatrix is his most famous solo work. I don't know anything about TSR's Bughunters, but given the timing and importance in the zeitgeist, it at least sounds plausible....

... except that claiming moreaus are an original creation of someone named Swann is so silly, that it's hard to take either claim seriously.

It was the combination of franks and moreaus that tipped me off. Moreaus are basically furries, franks look human but have genetic enhancements. Both of these feature in Swann's "Moreau" novels. Both of these later feature in the d20 "Genetech" setting. It seems pretty obvious to me that whoever wrote the setting had read the novels, because it's very suspicious that they would independently come up with the same premise.

Swann used the name as a reference to The Island of Doctor Moreau, yes, but he's the first author to call furries "moreaus" that I could find. And he's the first to use both moreaus and franks (as described above). And the first to feature a technothriller post-war setting where both had been created to fight a war. Check google books if you want to confirm like I did.

The Genetech setting has an identical premise to Swann's novels and uses the same terminology. I think it's implausible that WotC came up with the idea independently, especially so soon after Swann published his books. (They could've adapted the Kromosome setting from Amazing Engine, but didn't.)

My comparison to Schismatrix is not an accusation of plagiarism, but pointing out that Schismatrix was likely a key source of inspiration for TSR given close similarities in concept and terminology. E.g. Shaper/Mechanist vs Shaper/Artificer. The book also clearly draws inspiration from several other sources, like Aliens and Bladerunner.