Capcom copied Splosion Man - Twisted Pixel dev

In 1993, Capcom sued Data East in the U.S. District Court for copyright infringement, saying that the Japanese publisher's Fighter's History arcade game ripped off its own arcade fighting game, the massively popular Street Fighter II. Now Capcom finds itself on the other end of a gaming plagiarism flap, as its latest mobile game has a number of Twisted Pixel Games developers crying foul.

Last week, Capcom Mobile released MaXplosion for Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch, a game with distinct similarities to Twisted Pixel Games' 2009 Xbox 360 game Splosion Man. Both games feature a naked, monochromatic protagonist who spontaneously explodes to jump, can explode up to three times before touching the ground to recharge, and has been trapped in a lab by mad scientists.

Yesterday, Twisted Pixel cofounder and CEO Mike Wilford was critical of Capcom's game in a Twitter post, saying, "Not sure what to say about MaXplosion. Pisses me off. Guess we're just gonna have to make a better iPhone game than them. Shouldn't be hard."

He added that Twisted Pixel had originally pitched Splosion Man to the publisher, only to have Capcom pass on it. Wilford wasn't the only member of Twisted Pixel taking MaXplosion to task on Twitter. The studio's general Twitter account explained the delayed reaction to the game, saying, "We're too busy making original games to notice cheap imitations." Meanwhile, Twisted Pixel programmer Mike Henry posted his own misgivings with MaXplosion, saying "That game is a complete theft."

As of press time, Capcom has not provided a comment addressing the games' similarities.