Topic: Was the unreleased 'Hyouryuu Shounen Keith' Link's Awakening's main inspiration?

Hyouryuu Shounen Keith -- an unreleased 1990 Game Boy Zelda Clone!

Or.... who cloned who, exactly?

This game (developed by Epic/Sony) caught my eye when I saw several screenshots of it in Famicom and Game Boy magazines from mid-late 1990. It was clearly an action-RPG modeled after The Legend of Zelda -- and it was even made a full three years before Link's Awakening on the GB!

The title means "Castaway Boy Keith", and you obviously play Keith, a young adventurer set adrift in the South Pacific who winds up marooned on a small island called Harrods Is. To overcome the devil king Drakhe, Keith has to assemble musical notes, for it's music which will ultimately defeat him. (Well, all this sure sounds awfully similar to the plot to Link's Awakening, doesn't it?)

Keith gets advice and purchases items from what looks like Doraemon but is actually a tanuki (Japanese raccoon dog in folklore, folks), and meets old wise men, as per the usual RPG quest. The graphics look quite blocky and tiled compared to more modern ARPGs like Neutopia and Link's Awakening, but they're passable for a 1990 GB title. All the usual things are here as well: heart meters, sub-screens, dungeons, items to collect, and a map to explore. If it had come out in November 1990 as planned, I'm sure we all would have had great fun delving into the mysteries of this Zelda derivative. Now, just why was it cancelled?

Story and screenshots on Chris Covell's great site

Everything is a clone of something isn't it?

Wow, I've never heard of this. It actually looks more appealing to me since the dungeons look more Zelda 1-like.

Sony probably needed to make room for crappy games based on crappy Sony movies.
(okay, so they did publish Smart Ball and Equinox... eventually.)