[mildtrepidation]

The idea that somehow we've hit a point where clones should be rejected or purged misses the fact that this has been happening constantly almost since the inception of the app stores.

They state there's only one Flappy Bird clone in the top 20 on iTunes, but look at the rest of what's there. If you're going to be concerned about games that are clones/copies of what's essentially pre-existing game mechanics, you might want to think about how little comes through that's actually original in any respect.

City builders, TCG's, match 3, slot machines... and we've covered the vast majority of popular apps. Go a little further and you have hidden item games, runners, etc.

The only reason it's so obvious with games like Flappy Bird and 2048 is that the mechanic is so simple and requires so little in terms of effort and resources that anyone with even an elementary skill set on a mobile platform can throw together one of these clones and puke it onto the internet to ride the wave (or at least the foam, as most of them never even get into the surf).

[brownbat]

> happening constantly almost since the inception of the app stores.

Or maybe since the inception of gaming:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artillery_game http://www.pong-story.com/mypongs.htm http://www.mobygames.com/game-group/asteroids-variants http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centipede_(video_game)#Clones (etc.)

[yaeger]

Agreed. It was the same with Angry Birds. Original idea/gameplay? Nope. But, they put some serious thought into that project and it payed off. I have seen the predecessors of this game idea and they were not that polished. And they even went and took a whole different set of characters compared to the original Castle Crushers. They didn't just also make a game where you would throw different sized boulders at a castle.

I mean, does anybody remember battle chess? Did people say "yeah, nice little rip off. Chess has been around for so long. How about something original? Just adding the Battle animation is not really innovative, is it?"

I have no problem with ideas of games being used to make their own implementation. As long as it is not a 1:1 copy simply to try and dupe people into buying your thinking they would be buying the original.

[incompatible]

I expect it would predate the app store concept too, with clones in online or downloadable games sites. The only issue for the clone makers is to avoid tripping over trademarks, copyrights and patents.