"The two images do look very similar, but we promise you, it is just a coincidence." A response from the neopets team today on The Official Neopets Team Message Board. Honestly, how do you feel about this?
Wow you guys.
Here is what they fully said:
“Hello! So we’ve heard quite a few rumblings about a similarity between a newly released item and a user’s fan art, and we wanted to clear some things up! First of all, we appreciate and really encourage Neopets fan art, and would never use it as our own, especially without permission from the artist. Now, the item in question was independently created completely by our in-house team. It was created based on references of the basic green Korbat image and other existing springy toys, particularly the Blumaroo toy, which is also in a similar pose. The two images do look very similar, but we promise you, it is just a coincidence.“
The only difference is the wings and tail were made shorter to fit in a square dimension. I’m just…in shock. Now it bothers me because they’re saying the image was made completely in house. It obviously isn’t, the expression, ears, feet, hands…??? I did not expect them to go down this path at all.
And it’s not like this was an image I ever submitted to Neopets. It was on my own personal website, deviantart, etc.
Not fair game, Neopets. Respect your fans, respect artists in general.
Gif created by wildmareep:
