Capcom/Resident Evil/Umbrella

[Alex Kidd]

I stumbled across something rather interesting tonight...

Whilst playing Forgotten Worlds on my Genesis, I got to the part in the "Heavenly Zone" (or whatever the hell it's called) where power-ups were becoming more common (with such things as a cow and rice cakes) when 'lo and behold the next power up was a red/white pinwheely thing.

And it occured to me, wasn't that an old logo of theirs from back in the 80's (which is when Forgotten Worlds is from anyway)...

And it occured to me that it's also the logo of Umbrella Inc. in Capcom's own Resident Evil line!

Am I like the first person to realize this, or just the first person to realize it AND think it's a big deal?

http://home.ripway.com/2004-2/66972/screen2.png


Alex Kidd

[MarkMan]

Actually that pinwheel symbol has been in many games before. IIRC it was also in the NES game Ghosts 'N Goblins and a couple of shooter games(the name of the titles I don't remember)...

Also it doesn't look the the umbrella logo to me at all. O_O!

[Alex Kidd]

Oh come on, It may not be an exact carbon copy, but you can't deny the similarities!

http://www.bio-hq.com/Biohazard%203/images/5.jpg

http://home.ripway.com/2004-2/66972/screen2.png

If they weren't both Capcom games I'd pass it off, but it just seems to me that Capcom decided to use an old logo of theirs for a game they were working on (not realizing that the RE line would end up with sequel after sequel after...)

Alex Kidd

[maxlords]

It really doesn't look that similar to me either, except for the color scheme and the fact that they're both round. I think it's a stretch.

[Ed Oscuro]

I'm voting along the "This is Cool!" (uh, obscure Sega reference) Party line. Forgotten Worlds has always been one of the best of the "gimmicky control style games" (Worlds, sorry, ahead of Ikari Warriors and I'd say better than Shock Troopers on the Neo Geo when you take historical perspective into account).

Something that I want to throw out, by the way: The translated version of Capcom's Sweet Home has a line referencing "resident evil." Note that the Japanese version is Biohazard. As my brother once said, "Resident Evil" probably means something like "Home for old people" in Japanese. In any case, graphical cues like this speak much more strongly than translations. It would be neat to know if Capcom referenced other games with ingame text sometimes/often, though...

Hooray for company pride!

[TheSmirk]

interesting comparison, that was the power up , or for bonus points, that appeared in alot of their early games, 1942,1943, Trojan and it was called something like a "Yashishi"

[Ed Oscuro]

Maybe more common than originally thought (probably more common in Japan, too...) but it seems to serve as a sort of visual branding mechanism for Capcom's games.