| Jack Nilssen |
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The cynic in me whispers that this was only done because it was so prominent, and embarrassing them on the charts.
One has to ask how such blatant scam-based apps get into the storefront in the first place; shouldn't *that* be the first line of defense? Of course not, because for Apple it only matters that whatever's in place on their shelves is moving units and contributing to their bottom line. |
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| Bart Stewart |
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I ran into another one just tonight -- and it's our old pal Zynga again.
Namely, Zynga's iOS game "Scramble With Friends" appears to be a direct lift of the venerable "Quordy". Not only does Scramble offer zero original or innovative features beyond the basics of Quordy (Facebook integration and defining "a game" as three matches are hardly novel gameplay concepts), it actually lacks Quordy's single-player capabilities. If Apple was serious about preventing obvious cash-in clones, it would yank Scramble With Friends most instantly. But who thinks they'd actually pull a Zynga game? |
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| Christian Keichel |
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The whole video games industry is founded on copycat games. Popular game mechanics were always copied, there were dozens of Pong clones (despite the fact, that even of this game concept both Ralph Baer and Nolan Bushnell are claiming to come up with the idea).
Space Invaders spawned hundreds of similar coin ops, in the end, a whole game genre was developed by this clones, while Space Invaders itself failed to stay relevant, games like Galaga took the concept of the game to new heights over several years. Call of Duty, todays most successful western games series, started as a Medal of Honor copycat and stayed one for several years, until they transformed the series into the Modern Warfare games. On the NES the dozens of RPGs were completely indistinguishable from each other, each one looked exactly like Final Fantasy. The difference is, that under normal market conditions (outside the strange Appstore universe), a developer or company doesn't have the right to forbid this copycats. In other parts of the entertainment industry, it's similar, just imagine a world, where DC Comics forced Timely to stop their Captain America series, because it is a copycat of Superman, a world, where the heirs of J.R.R. Tolkien tried to forbid the hundreds of Books, that follow the concept of The Lord of the Rings so closely, that you can only talk of LoR Clones, and so on. |
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| Aiden Eades |
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another difference is although they could be claimed to copycat a lot of those were vastly different.
Yes all RPGs looked like final fantasy, that's all they were capable of looking like, but an RPG isn't based on how it looks (well, didn't used to be) but the storyline. And that is what set apart RPGs back in the day, pong clones and space invader clones sure, that's all that they were capable of. But CoD being a clone of MoH also gets me. Yes they're based on the same concept and gameplay stylings, but the storylines and how the game plays out are completely different There's a difference between a game based on the concepts of others, and a game which is a blatent clone of another. If CoD had the same levels, the same characters (just named differently) and was called "Medallion of Honor" then i'd agree it's a clone, but it isn't. That's the arguement here. Videogames have evolved by taking existing ideas, and polishing them to make something new. These appscams don't do that, they take the existing idea, and do nothing with it. Half of them even take away bits. |
| Kim Pallister |
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Kind of poor reporting here, gama.
1) "In an attempt to prevent developers from stealing ideas on the iTunes App Store, Apple has silently" If they didn't state what their intent was in removing them, then don't infer their intent. (could have just as well substituted "In an attempt cover their....", or "In response to complaints from crony friends...." - its all speculation). 2) Of the 'mechanisms', there's no mention of DMCA takedown notices, and I'd like to know how that played in, if at all. 3) Despite the prominence of the TripleTown/YetiTown debacle, Yeti still appears to be up. 4) Should mention some of the past cases here, like the Mumbo Jumbo example from a couple years back. |
| Alexander Pick |
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If doing games with similar mechanics would already be theft, there would be just one 3D shooter, one real time strategy game etc. but this has nothing to do with reusing similarmechanics, it's plain plageatism and that is seen to much recently, even by big companies (you know who I refer to).
I think there is a big difference between using a known mechanic and doing knock of copies of games and market them with similar names. |
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| Kenneth Blaney |
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I'm very glad this got resolved without needing a campaign like with the Lugaru HD problem a few years back.
If you don't remember, "Lugaru HD" was made open source due to the Humble Indie Bundle's success. A developer took the source code, compiled it as is, and then uploaded it to Apple's service as "Lugaru" and priced it at a fifth the amount as the original on the same service. It took lots of complaining to get Apple to remove the blatant copycat. |
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| Gil Salvado |
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I wouldn't criticize Apple for intention, despite all second-toughts we still have to thankful. At least it's a sign of good will to protect their customers and clients. Or would you even dream about Facebook removing any obvious copycats at all?
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| Lauren Poling |
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Search "Clockwork Shark Studios" and "David Tillotson" on the App Store. Same person.
- NinjaJump - Line Man Run - Angry Zombie Birds - Graviti and also Graviti! (which comes up in search results for "VVVVVV") I've reported them all, numerous times. They're still available for purchase. I guess the lesson to be learned here is: IP theft is okay up until the point that Apple can no longer turn a blind eye. |
| Alexander Cooney |
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It really does remind you how the systemic nature of games makes them so vulnerable to identical reproduction by random people. Mobile games especially, where artistic immersion is impossible and the mechanics are really all that people care about.
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| Gregory Booth |
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Apple did the right thing. Period.
They need to do more of it. No one will suffer but the pirates. This will not result in a multi-year submission process or 6 digit submission fee! LMAO! This is nothing but propaganda from people who defend pirates. The real question is how do we make it less desirable for pirates and copycats to engage in blatant copying of other developers work? How do we make them think twice before doing it? How do we make it not worth their time? There is a huge difference between incremental/significant improvement or fair use of an idea or mechanic and outright plagarism. It is amazing the lengths people will go to defend plagiarism, pirating, botting and hacking. |
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| Ashkan Saeedi Mazdeh |
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Even with these acts there are smaller games which do copy cats and exactly clone but Apple would not notice them because they are not that famous.
I myself know a game which is an exact copy of activision's river ride. Even more stange is that it's devs are happy that they made success with it. it's not your success it's your idea piracy guys. open your eyes. |
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