Some time ago I noticed that the title song of Virtua Tennis is quite similar to this Metallica track: http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=W2ALsQFm0_g What do you think about this? Is it licensed? The song is from the album "Garage, Inc" which was released in 1998, about the time of Virtua Tennis's Naomi-Release I believe.
Are you talking about the 'Smash, Smash, Smash' track? The Metallica song in question is 'It's Electric' and it's actually a cover of a Diamondhead song. Before their record deal, Metallica would perform songs by Diamondhead and other bands that weren't very well known in the United States. The riff is similar, but it's not the same song and it's different enough to avoid licensing issues.
Lots of game designers do that when they can't make a song for the game from scratch: they just take some song and modifies enough to be considered as a different song, so they don't have to deal with copyrights and that kinda stuff. BTW, "Garage Inc." is a covers album, if you check it well they make covers from Diamond Head, Black Sabbath, Mercyful Fate and Motörhead between others.
