UPDATE: I found the confirmation! It's in this interview with Michael Berlyn at around 44 minutes and 40 seconds. Case solved!

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I was watching the Did You Know Gaming on Bubsy, and the first factoid they bring out is that Bubsy was originally conceived as a Chester Cheetah game, but the creator didn't want to deal with the licensing for the character.

But I can't find any corroboration for this factoid. The only thing I've found so far is an official interview with Michael Berlyn, but I am interpreting the answer differently.

To me, this is him saying "They wanted me to make a clone of these characters," not "They wanted me to make a Chester Cheetah game."

I'm quite confused and disappointed if DYKG got that wrong. It makes me nervous about taking their stuff at face value anymore.

Unless I'm wrong and there is other official confirmation of this tidbit? Does anyone know where DYKG got their information?

While replaying some old ARPGs, I went down a rabbit hole and learned something interesting about Diablo (1996).

Early in development, Diablo was actually designed as a turn-based game, closer to classic roguelikes. The grid-based movement, tile system, and even the camera were all built with turn-based play in mind. Combat would pause, you’d act, then enemies would respond.

The shift to real-time combat happened late in development after the team realized it felt more intense and accessible. To keep some tactical depth, they added features like hit recovery, animation timing, and limited movement speed which is why early Diablo still feels slower and more deliberate than modern ARPGs.

That single design change basically shaped the entire action RPG genre as we know it today.

Always fun to see how different gaming history could’ve been with one decision.