10 Video Games With Bizarre Origin Stories
7. Conker Wasn’t Always An Adult Game
In 1997, Diddy Kong Racing released for the Nintendo 64 and included a variety of cute anthropomorphic characters, most of which had never been seen before. One of these, Conker the Squirrel, was set to make his debut in the coming months.
At E3 1997, Conker 64 was shown to industry insiders and whilst it seemed perfectly functional it was overshadowed by the charm of Banjo-Kazooie. Many even critiqued the game as being “too cute”, with the potential of reinforcing the negative stereotype that Nintendo was just for kids. Rare, who were developing the game, felt the game was missing something and it wasn’t coming together as hoped.
It was artist Chris Seavour who found the missing element for the project. Bad Fur Day, as he called it, would give the deceivingly cute title a harder edge with violence and raunchy comedy. The first redesigned quest-line featured wasps that stole a beehive, with Seavour adding in a punchline where the bee-hive fights back with automated weapons. The entire team loved it.
From here, development on the project was completely refreshed. Platforming gameplay took a backseat to film parodies, scatological humour and absolute absurdity.
Conker totally transformed, shocking those who had once called it “too cute” and became Nintendo’s second ever Mature rated title.