Sam Derboo
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samderboo.com
Sam Derboo
@samderboo.com
Sometimes doing solo game dev sometimes writing about games at samderboo.com
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Many years ago, I compiled a big gallery of game art ripping off other art for Hardcore Gaming 101 @hg101.bsky.social
Now I've started rebuilding it as a database with browsing by tags and fun comparison sliders at samderboo.com/tracing.php
Tracing the Influence: Retraced Edition
A gallery of litigations that could have been.
samderboo.com
Reposted by Sam Derboo
🐴❤️
January 10, 2026 at 6:25 AM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Oh, this look amazing!
store.steampowered.com/app/4285930/...

Not only it's a RPG set in modern-day India, exploring their folklore & myths, it's also made by a team of Indians who have a channel of animated videos on Asian history: www.youtube.com/channel/UCpZ...
Rakshasa on Steam
Rakshasa is a first-person, narrative-driven RPG set in modern India, where a hidden world of Tantrik spellcasters and ancient mythological horrors operate on the margins of society. Rakshasa blends b...
store.steampowered.com
January 9, 2026 at 10:17 AM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
With David Rosen's death, bad information about Sega as a company is starting to re-emerge across the internet.

I will try to give a very condensed version of the Sega corporate shenanigans here as to clear some of the air. 🧵
January 8, 2026 at 8:49 PM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Boy, I tell ya.

#pixelart
January 8, 2026 at 3:52 AM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Bonus for all Patrons - The Guide to Retro Anime, a 90 page preview of a book we've been working on for quite some time www.patreon.com/posts/147339...
January 3, 2026 at 9:11 PM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Oh this page rules. The compositing work is great.

I got one for you. This billboard in Jet Set Radio, which includes this earlier version in the files, which traces its inspo to this promo art for The New Batman Adventures.
tcrf.net/Jet_Grind_Ra...
January 3, 2026 at 5:04 PM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
@samderboo.com Here's one for you, immediately clocked one. Maybe someone can pick out the other two? Source is a Rick Rude WCW promo photo from 1992.
January 2, 2026 at 2:45 PM
Neat discovery by @downchasm.bsky.social: Homage(?) to Crosby, Stills & Nash in Fatal Fury's Duck King Stage #TracingTheInfluence samderboo.com/tracing.php?...
January 2, 2026 at 1:52 PM
Here's a quick one cause I already had these guys lying around: Metal Morph for the SNES. Another one where the center figure is still a mystery. #TracingTheInfluence samderboo.com/tracing.php?...
January 1, 2026 at 1:07 AM
There's this company called Domikey that makes exchangable keycaps and they have a design with a key labeled POOR GUY (no idea what the Chinese characters say)
December 31, 2025 at 7:35 AM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
For years I wondered what the dead boss in Monster Party for NES was meant to be.

The manual says it's a giant spider. Except it's not. It looks like a lizard.

Well, today I stumbled upon this: bogleech.com/halloween/ha...

The 1980s Gegebo Majuu (ゲゲボ魔獣) toy figurines by Bandai.
December 30, 2025 at 12:36 PM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Cowards demand games be given 100% exact translations even if it means all context & nuance is lost on a non-native audience

I simply demand that Taito writes all video games
December 30, 2025 at 10:27 PM
Entry no. 50 in the (new) #TracingTheInfluence database comes from the same publisher as yesterday's Thunder Boy and unsurprisingly goes back to the Frank Frazetta well. This one seems like it's painted a bit more free-handy though, at least with the female character. samderboo.com/tracing.php?...
December 29, 2025 at 1:10 PM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Last night, I showed off the really impressive "G-Zero" for the #Sega Genesis, which featured Mode-7-like #SNES visuals

Today, I want to show you another demo from 2022,
with a similar goal.
But this time for the #NES

"Kart Racer '86"

blackbirddev.itch.io/mariokart86
#retro #homebrew #retrogaming
December 29, 2025 at 12:56 AM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Merry Christmas! If you'd like to spend 45 minutes celebrating video game history with me, we're about to debut The Untold Story of the Nintendo Entertainment System. I worked on his ALL YEAR, and I genuinely think it will reshape how we all think about the system. www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJvp...
The Untold Story of the Nintendo Entertainment System
YouTube video by The Video Game History Foundation
www.youtube.com
December 25, 2025 at 4:18 PM
I also added a randomizer to the #TracingTheInfluence page now! Each time you open this link (or press the "Random pick" button), it takes you to a different entry: samderboo.com/tracing.php?...
Tracing the Influence: Retraced Edition
A gallery of game art that kept a little too close to its inspirations.
samderboo.com
December 28, 2025 at 1:38 AM
Thunder Boy takes from a lot of different Frazetta paintings (and probably other sources) as well, but luckily for me a lot of them are repetitions of things I already cut out. #TracingTheInfluence
samderboo.com/tracing.php?...
December 28, 2025 at 1:32 AM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Getting nearer to unveiling my #pixelart secret santa piece for this year 🤫 In the meantime here's what 2022, 23 and 24 looked like!
December 26, 2025 at 3:44 PM
New images for my Video Game Forklift Museum: Pit-Fighter (taking the spot of the oldest game on the list - wonder if I'll ever find an '80s forklift) and Cyberpunk 2077. samderboo.com/forklifts.php
December 27, 2025 at 2:11 AM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Fuck you people. Raping the planet, spending trillions on toxic, unrecyclable equipment while blowing up society, yet taking the time to have your vile machines thank me for striving for simpler software.

Just fuck you. Fuck you all.

I can't remember the last time I was this angry.
December 25, 2025 at 11:25 PM
This one took a while cause it combines so many Frazetta paintings across multiple screens, but my page for the fantasy strategy game Duel is up now: samderboo.com/tracing.php?... Only the guy in the center is from a Spanish mag called Cimoc - doubt that's the direct influence. #TracingTheInfluence
December 26, 2025 at 1:00 PM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
I think I'm gonna belt out screenshots like this one every time I catch wind of genre-name discourse on my feed, because y'all aren't ready for how *I* categorize my games
July 20, 2025 at 9:54 PM
Reposted by Sam Derboo
Terror at 20,000 Feet
December 22, 2025 at 6:05 AM
Oh my, kinda major breakthrough on this: The guy getting hit, the kneeling woman and the guy getting lifted up on the Ikari III cover (two quotes down) are all from this black-and-white drawing by Frank Frazetta! Gonna make comparisons for #TracingTheInfluence when I have some time.
December 15, 2025 at 3:18 PM
Dunno about the main poses here, but the guy getting his head kicked in to the left is a frequently imitated pose (pictured: Duel, center panel) and the kneeling woman at least also appears on the cover of Thunder Boy. Both are heavily associated with Frazetta, but I haven't found either original.
December 12, 2025 at 1:56 PM