A piece recently posted up on Teamxbox.com says that Sierra Entertainment's TimeShift has been dated. More than that, the game's final box art has also been revealed. But, have you by any chance also heard of Haze, the FPS from Ubisoft? If you have, you must have noticed a "slight" resemblance between the game's main characters. Why don't you read on and see if you agree.

Some time ago, Ubisoft was criticized for an ad for their Rayman Raving Rabbids. We're going to discuss the pictures below. First, the two on the left. (we'll discuss the ones on the right in a minute).

The first image is a Rayman Raving Rabbids ad. The incredibly fun title was developed by Ubisoft. The second image shows an ad again, this time for Sam & Max, developed by Telltale Games. Need I say more? Check out this piece right here to find out more on that story.

More recently however, as Sierra Entertainment has dated their FPS and released its final box art too, I couldn't avoid noticing that the character artwork looks pretty damn similar. Why don't you check out the remaining two pictures. Img no. 3 is the TimeShift box-art, with the game's main character on it, while the fourth is a piece of concept art from Haze. Sure, you'll say "What are you an idiot? Can't you see that Haze's character has full glass over his face, while TimeShift's has a T shaped glass in front of the eyes, nose and mouth?"

Yes I can, dear reader, but the two helmet designs don't have to be identical to be similar. Tell me that one leaves you with a different impression than the other does. Go on, do it! You can't. And if you could, that would only mean you wanted to.

Anyway, I'm not even going to dig around trying to find out whose character designer was the first to think of a bright yellow glass on the front of the helmet. Nor will I say that Ubisoft/Sierra has a history with copying other developers'/publishers' designs. I just thought the two designs were similar enough to talk about it a little. You may share an impression in the comments column.

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you when Sierra's TimeShift launches. According to an official press release, the date is October 30, 2007 for Xbox 360 and PC.