Tuesday 9 March 2010

Separated at Birth


The Tarrasque

The Gruffalo

6 comments:

  1. I wonder if the Gruffalo approaches the Tarrasque's level of unkillability.

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  2. See also: the Deathclaw from the Fallout computer games series. (Fallout 3 version pictured at link.)

    http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/fallout/images/9/9c/Deathclaw.png

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  3. @eabod - that is a remarkable similarity. Clearly the basic archetype is very influential. I wonder which one came first?

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  4. @Daddy - The Deathclaw is almost certainly an homage. The entire Fallout series - especially the earlier editions - is laden with references, asides, and brazen rip-offs of things that the designers liked or found funny. And since the Tarrasque appeared in the original AD&D (1977), the designers probably knew all about it by the time the original Fallout was published in 1997 (many game designers play tabletop games on their off days, sometimes in the empty conference rooms at the office!).

    Difficult to say which inspired the Gruffalo, though (1999). :)

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  5. @eabod - thanks for the information on that. I'd not heard of Fallout before.

    As for Julia Donaldson, the author of the Gruffalo, perhaps she is a secret gamer and has had a bad encounter with the Tarrasque.

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