That time the US Government stole Mario's music

Hello! So if there's one thing Nintendo treasures, it's its copyrights. For years, they have been extremely proactive when it comes to protecting their intellectual property. In fact, they are famous for issuing takedown requests, which are legal demands to remove Nintendo copyrighted content from a website or publication. But... What would happen if an opponent appeared that Nintendo couldn't defeat? An opponent too big, too powerful. Like a

government

. But wait, there is more. What if it were something even more powerful than a

government

? I hear you ask what is more powerful than a government. Of course, two governments!

Yes, today I would like to share two stories of Nintendo intellectual property

stole

n by two different governments. Friends, we're in for a wild ride today. We'll see! First, the United States government. Now, in case you didn't know, the US government agency in charge of environmental issues is called EPA or Environmental Protection Agency. And the EPA has had an active online presence since the mid-1990s. Look at this fossil from a bygone era! So the way the site worked was that it was divided into several different regions. And on Earth Day 1997, Region 9, which covered Arizona, California, Hawaii, Nevada and a bunch of Pacific islands, this region came up with an idea.

They called it: Recycling City. This is what the home page looked like back then. If we enter Recycle City, we can see that it is a real place where we can look around. We will be able to travel to each of the main areas, and carry out activities there. Now the goal of this Recycle City site was to show children what effect recycling can have on the environment. And the crown jewel that was Recycle City was this game: Dump Town. Here is the description: “Welcome! You're the new city manager of Dumptown! When you start playing, you'll see Dumptown at its worst: it's full of trash, polluted, and nothing is recycled or reused.

There are plenty of trash cans and trash bins, but no recycling bins. That means all the trash goes straight to the landfill on the outskirts of town, where it does no one any good. In his new role, he can initiate programs that encourage Dumptown citizens and businesses to recycle and reduce waste.” As you can see, this game is actually very complex. Especially considering that the game was released in 1997, this is really impressive. Now, when Recycle City came to life back then, it was really cutting edge. However, as the years went by, it wasn't updated much and started to look more and more dated.

And so, at the end of 2011, the site received a big, fancy overhaul. It had stylish graphics, maps, and social media links. What a difference. And pride of place here is everyone's favorite Dumptown, haha! However, the EPA wasn't content to stop there, so in January 2017 they added a whole new set. It was called… The Recycled City Challenge! What was this game? Well, let's take a look. First, we are greeted by this beautifully designed title screen. Alright, let's take the plunge and click the "let's get started" button. And oh, what is that? Do you hear that

music

in the background?

Sound a little familiar? Well, it's actually a cover of a song from Yoshi's Island DS: underground

music

, to be specific. It is not strange? They're not even subtle about it: in the game files, the music is called "yoshidsunderground.mp3"! Here's a comparison between the two songs. Here is the original… And here is the one from Recycle City. Again, here's the original... And Recycle City's version. They are almost identical! It is not strange? Now, this remained undiscovered on the Recycle City site for just over 2 years, when it was discovered by the Forest of Illusion Twitter account. From there, countless news stories were published about this strange phenomenon, with headlines like "EPA Teaches Kids to Recycle by Illegally Using Old Nintendo Music" and "EPA Stole Yoshi's Island DS Music for Flash Game in favor of recycling".

What was the EPA's response? Well, they stated: “The Recycle City Challenge game was created for the EPA by a contractor. “We are investigating whether the contractor received permission to use the music, to the extent permission was necessary in this case.” Now, I think it's pretty unlikely that this contractor received permission from Nintendo to include a song from one of its biggest and most important franchises in a strange US government recycling game. But we'll never really know. However, this song mysteriously disappeared from the game just one day after the news broke, which sounds a bit like an admission of guilt to me.

It's a shame, it would have been extremely entertaining to see Nintendo sue the US government. Now, that's not the only

time

something like this happens. The Chinese government has done something very similar, although much more blatantly. Yes, on January 30, 2019, the Supreme People's Court of China uploaded this video to its official Weibo account, which is basically Chinese Twitter. And I mean, look at it. What is this? Now, the goal of the game was to promote all the successful prosecutions the court had the previous year: all corruption was stopped, all criminals were caught, and all innocent prisoners were freed.

Now, I think the Chinese government and I probably have some different opinions on what counts as justice, but then let's watch this video, okay! So the game appears to be called “super Mario Mr.Judge 2018” and features Mario, well, sort of like Mario. Something went a little wrong here with Mario's appearance. In any case, I think it's safe to assume that this is Mario, one way or another. Now, Mario begins his adventure through the Mushroom Kingdom, but this is not a normal Mushroom kingdom. It starts fairly regularly, although it has some pretty choppy animations. However, instead of collecting coins, Mario collects these colored squares, which have legal words related to them.

However, the smuggling weirdness continues, with Mario exclaiming "Wow, cool" in Bart Simpson's voice. ...I-Interesting... Next, Mario jumps on these umbrellas that say "Protect Equality." Protect equality huh...? Now, continuing with his travels, Mario encounters a tiger. A tiger, you say? Well, in China, tigers represent powerful and corrupt officials. After the tiger come the flies, which yes, that also represents something, in this case, the lower level, the government employees. And it's OK! That's level 1 completed! I'm not going to go over everything because this video is surprisingly long, but there are some strange moments coming: First of all, there's an encounter with these...

I'm not even sure. Samurai, maybe...? After that, there's a pretty gruesome scene of a man in a bandana running over and, I think, killing a group of children. Yes. Fortunately, the police soon arrive, arrest him and take him to court. And with that, level; 2 is complete. From there, the art takes a pretty steep downward turn... I'm not sure what happened there. And all these trees are being creepy. I don't like the way they look at me. Mario jumps off-screen and is stomped on by a giant foot, revealing that the tree-dwellers were actually criminals. How could they!?

Mario continues to get rid of illegal fishing, restoring peace to the fish populations, and also frees these ice-encased toads, which I assume represent unjustly convicted criminals. Oh, this next part is pretty fun. Mario collects all these coins with the words "copyright infringement" on them. I think the irony should be immediately apparent. And finally, Mario reaches the last mast of his pirate voyage to capture Chinese criminals. So how did that feel to viewers? Well, like a ton of bricks... Japanese netizens responded: "Did they really get permission for this?", "What were they thinking?", as well as "Examine yourself first before doing things like this." So yeah, not a great reaction.

Now, China's court did not give a formal response to this reaction - or at least, I can't seem to find one. However, on the same day the outrage arose, this promotional video mysteriously disappeared from the high court's social media page. It is not interesting? Again, it's a bit embarrassing. It would have been even more entertaining to see Nintendo sue the Chinese government. Now, what conclusion can we draw from both incidents? What moral is there in the story? Hmm, I'm not sure there is one, really. Although it is quite entertaining. I guess this goes to show that basically everyone has violated a copyright or two at some point in their lives, powerful governments notwithstanding.

Whether it is a small violation, like the recycling game, or a blatant and blatant infringement like the one in China's High Court, everyone around the world violates copyright. Maybe that's a sign that copyright law is being violated. Uh-oh, I think Mickey here might have something to say about that. I have to run! Hello! Thanks for watching until the end! I hope you found it interesting! If you want to hear another story of Nintendo bordering on copyright, although this

time

they are on the other side of the table, check out my video on Zelda and the copyright incident.

Otherwise, see you next week. Bye bye!