We are going to do something different today and talk about games that aren’t part of their series. While some developers love these like Scott Cawthan others like Nintendo hate these. Oddly, I’ve only heard of Nintendo attacking straight ports or when people attempt to make money off these. For example, Pokemon Unbound and Mario Kaizo are likely known by Nintendo, but neither make money and are completely free. Whereas games on specific websites making money off advertising or people charging for their properties that gets banned quickly. There is a lot to love and hate about Fan Games for one a lot of the time talented people in these communities tend to be first time programmers and developers experimenting and some even go on to make their own games. Let’s not forget Earthbound Halloween Hack was technically Toby Fox’s first game available to the public and multiple developers of Sonic Fan Games now work for SEGA directly. Also, some of these add more as well as can be exactly what the fans are looking for something familiar yet sometimes completely it’s own. Now the things I hate Fan Games that add nothing but increased difficulty while this isn’t a large problem for Fan Games I think it is a problem depending on the game. While telling the same story is fine, but increased difficulty can break the balance and if I already played through that same story before I will get bored. Fortunately, just as many Roms exist telling their own stories and having their own mechanics. Further Fan games also can be a way of keeping a franchise alive if games get dull or boring and some can even surpass what the original games. It is a double edged sword you don’t know what you’re getting with these sometimes it’s amazing and feels like an actual project other times it just isn’t balanced, a bad game, or just boring grind fest. If you do have legitimate copies of these games I recommend giving a few fan games a chance and who knows you may be playing something that helps them create their own game in the future. I mean no one predicted a Rom Hack of Earthbound would one day help someone create Undertale or that a few fan games for Sonic would lead to the creation of Sonic Mania. So it is clear talented fans can create great things off of their passion and talent alone and I want to encourage more fan game devs to try and make their own products and see what they can really do without fear of being taken down by large companies.