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[Chris Whitman]

I think it's totally a social thing. It's about whether the person is in a social position to be 'deserving' of the source material.

For example, I'm generally willing to give a small, independent developer who is not out for money the benefit of the doubt, because much of their work, if derivative, is more of a tribute to their original source (I may not like it if it's too derivative, but I'm not going to fault them for it, personally), but if a large corporation lifts the idea entirely to 'exploit the brand,' I am usually none too pleased. I like the idea that art is communal, and something to be shared and built upon, not horded, but I hate the idea of a big marketing machine letting independent developers take all the risk so they can reap all the reward with their large market share.

However, I am also annoyed when someone declares something a ripoff due to superficial similarity. I've raised a lot of ideas early in design to people and received the response, "Oh, so it's like this game because they both cast a human being with hair as the protagonist and sometimes you walk around."

I would like it if more independent developers would make a note of their source material (such as in Bonesaw), but I would also like players to give a game the benefit of the doubt if it obviously only shares a superficial similarity to some other game (such as in Fez). I would also, also like it if cash-obsessed giants who can't wait to get their greedy paws on someone's work and claim it as their own would kindly fuck off and die.

[carbon]

I, too, get annoyed by people who claim similarities for extremely broad topics. I showed my friend (who is an avid gamer but not a game programmer) a very early alpha screenshot of my game and he said, "So you're making a <game we play> clone?" The only similarity being that my main character was a ball (because I lack the art skills for anything better) and that it was a top-down shooter.

I tried to tell him that he was over simplifying things. I gave him a few of the gameplay ideas that were original (at least in their totality, not individually), but he couldn't get past the fact that it was a top-down shooter, therefore it's automatically a clone.

[moshboy]

  ...with games more than anything else, people are very sensitive to anything which intrudes upon their favourite game in any way, and will almost automatically react with hostility towards it. (Very generally speaking, of course. )

See, here's where I kindof disagree. As an example Cave Story, like many people, is one of my favourite indie games. Does The Underside intrude? Yes (and obviously quite intentionally I might add) but there seem to be two distinct groups of people.. those who embrace it (like myself) and those who are dead set against it, regardless of how polished and fun it actually looks. I see it as the closest thing to a Cave Story sequel people are going to get but that's just me. Others tbink that it's a huge deal that it steps on Cave Story's toes.

I wouldn't react this way for every similar situation.. it really does vary from game to game. But you did say very generally speaking though so maybe this is what you meant also.

[.TakaM]

it just comes down to a combination of popularity and ignorance.
They almost come hand in hand, such as people swearing little big planet is the first 2D platformer with 3D graphics ever made.

lostwinds for wiiware is already falling victim to horrible LBP related accusations

[Chris Whitman]

Wait, it's a video game?

That shit is totally ripped off of Pong.

[cmspice]

Wait, it's a video game?

That shit is totally ripped off of Pong.

seriously.

[Corpus]

lostwinds for wiiware is already falling victim to horrible LBP related accusations

Words cannot describe how stupid that is, so I'm guessing it's true. Gotta love humanity.

[Melly]

Man, LostWinds looks fantastic.

It seems crying rip-off is becoming quite popular nowadays.

Maybe something that helps this is the fact that the main ways a game can be known to the public before it's released is through videos and images, both of which are extremely incomplete and insubstantial ways to show off your game because of the lack of interactivity. So before a game's anywhere near done people make comparisons based on superficial aspects like similar aesthetics.

I wonder if it would be best to promote your game with a beta version of it so people can try it out and have a glimpse of what you're really doing before releasing any images or videos of it. Probably would be difficult to convince publishers that it could be a good idea. I feel the over-reliance in images and videos for publicising games also leads to prejudicial and stupid claims like "teh grafix sux so it must suk", since pretty graphics will ALWAYS look more appealing in static images. It is a primarily interactive medium, afterall, so maybe publishers should start capitalizing more on that aspect when getting the word out.

[Montoli]

lostwinds for wiiware is already falling victim to horrible LBP related accusations

I'm embarrassed to have to ask, but what is LBP in this context?

Side note - that looks awesome.

[Al King]

Little Big Planet, a game developed by some ex-Lionhead guys for the PS3. Which, incidentally, is nothing like Lost Winds.

[Eclipse]

well, so if it's like that they both ripped off "Bug!" for Sega Saturn and Windows95



A 2d platform using 3d isn't something really original (and it sucks) but that's something like a sub-genre of platform games

oh, The Underside is really a cave story ripp-off (graphically, don't know about the gameplay itself) because the author actually copied a lot of sprites at 90%

[shinygerbil]

wait what

[ravuya]

People are stupid. Some morons on kotaku were saying XNA is a rip off of LBP because you can share games. I wouldn't get too worked up over it.

[ptoing]

So what do we conclude?
Other than: Lots of morons out there.

[deadeye]

So what do we conclude?
Other than: Lots of morons out there.

Seems to me that "Lots of morons out there" is the reason for just about all the world's ills.  The biggest reason, anyway.

Other than that I think we concluded that if you rip something off for the sake of ripping it off and give no credit to your influences then you're an asshole, but it's okay to rip something off if you put a new spin on it.  Just hope it's spinny enough to satisfy the Lomot.

Hey, that's a pretty good acronym.  Like the collective idiots of the world all mashed together in one big, blubbery heap of shit.  "The Lomot."

Be careful kids, or the Lomot will get you

[PHeMoX]

Yeah, in the article that is pretty much what one of the developers said. He basically said that they had this style in the works before they had even heard of TF2. They were apprehensive about the style at first, however, due to TF2's success he said that they were pretty much convinced that it could be just as popular if they didn't go with the "photo realism" type of look.

Well yeah, but who wouldn't claim being 'secretly' the first with something like that? I've got tons of 'design documents' here right laying at my desk, basically one big heap of potentially great ideas, and one of my older game ideas was actually very much like the game TrickStyle, the hoverboard race and stunt game. I'm pretty sure the reason why I thought of the same things as they did was because of the fact that we've likely been inspired by the same sources. I never made 'my' game idea into an actual game and even if I would have, they would have made the "same" game simultaneously without knowing of my game in progress anyways.

I think we just have to live with the fact that not much is really original these days. On the other hand I applaud people for "ripping off" Crush or Paper Mario when they do it like Fez. I mean seriously, if it's done properly and has a unique own twist to it, why complain? It's not like it's exactly the same game, right?

Obviously I do not like the dozens of Bejeweled-clones out there, but somehow that's different and even then I don't quite blame them for making them. Those Bejeweled-clones are a bit extreme most of the time, but take for example a gameplay feature (or gimmick) like Max Payne's Bullet Time. We could argue all day long about whether or not it's "right" to copy such a thing into other, new games... but truth is, it doesn't matter as long as it's done right. Max Payne's bullet time rocks, Total Overdose's SlowMo and Bullet dodging rocks too, heck even Stranglehold's Tequila (slow-motion) Time rocks bigtime.

I'm not sure if Portal will cause a similar hype amongst developers to add Portal's main feature, but I wouldn't be too surprised if in some form or another that would happen.

[GP Lackey]

Whatever, Portal's just a cheap Prey knock-off anyway.

[Mitchard]

I sure hope those dudes that made Chess sue those dudes that made Checkers, 'cause dayum.

[PHeMoX]

Whatever, Portal's just a cheap Prey knock-off anyway.

...yeah, but even Prey wasn't the first game with Portals in it. 

[fish]

wait until you see fez's "secret cave" tileset.
there will also be a story!