Famed Wired.com blogger and karaoke legend Chris Kohler has penned a new 1UP feature discussing 'Retro Rip-Offs', or plagiarism in the game industry, and it's got some fun sassiness in it.

Kohler smartly points out in his intro: "This could easily be a piece on how popular, innovative games invariably spawn a succession of imitators. But not only is that rather old-hat as far as video game feature-writing is concerned, it would be a piece on genre creation, not plagiarism", going on to explain: "No, this is about serious plagiarism, the sort of copyright-infringement stuff that makes the lawyers come running."

That plagiarism includes such goodness as the classic German platformer Great Giana Sisters, absolutely nothing like Super Mario Bros, for which he notes: "There were eight worlds of four levels each. Level 1 was above ground, and the opening cluster of bricks mimicked SMB's. The first enemy was an owl that looked suspiciously like a Goomba. Level 2 was underground. Level 3 was on a series of platforms that crossed a vast chasm. Level 4 was the boss' lair. Sounding familiar?" Luckily, Great Giana Sisters has been resurrected for the GP32, Dreamcast and Windows in the form of 'Giana's Return' - but it's all very non-commercial, so they may be safe this time.