The Sincerest Form of Theft

Feature from Matt - Saturday, 20 August 2011 @ 1:08am

Mobile games are huge money, but they actually don't cost that much to make. The Return On Investment can be very good if the game is successful. Angry Birds is estimated to have made $70 million, a solid return on some cartoon pigs and cartoon birds. Of course, what better way to tell that a game could be successful than to just copy another game that's already successful?

A few weeks ago we got a PR email from a company called Pepper, announcing their new game for the Blackberry platform. It was called Ninja Fruit Bash. The principle is that fruit is thrown up in the air and your job is to slash at it to destroy it. But don't hit the bombs!

This may sound faintly familiar to many. Halfbrick's Fruit Ninja (probably copied from Pepper's original idea) has been hovering around the top of the iPhone/iPad app store, and will soon be one of the best things on the Kinect as well. So there's no doubting the bankability of the idea.

And Ninja Fruit Bash isn't alone. On the IOS alone there is the blatant Veggie Ninja, Fireworks Ninja, Pizza Fighter and more, all copying Fruit Ninja's gameplay and themes. 

Fruit Ninja and Veggie Samurai. Any similarity is purely coincidental.

Halfbrick aren't alone in this, though. I've always been a fan of the game Zuma from PopCap, and recently downloaded "Zuma Seasons" from the App Store (later renamed to "iZuma" and then "^o^ Fireball ^o^", and I swear I'm not making that up) only to find that it's not a PopCap game at all, but a blatant rip-off of the idea AND the name.

I spoke to Phil from HalfBrick about what this means to HB, and how they respond to it.

For what it's worth I contacted Pepper to see if I could ask them some questions too, and they replied almost immediately with enthusiastic approval. Since I sent through the questions they have not responded.

It's not just bottom feeders like Pepper (still not sure why they didn't respond to my questions) who are distinctly lacking in originality on the lucrative mobile platforms.

Of particular note is Gameloft. Gameloft is a company whose business model appears to be largely based on taking popular and successful franchises and squishing them onto iOS. And business is booming.

This first came to my attention with the release of Dungeon Hunter. A rather generic dungeon crawler that's pretty solid technically, Dungeon Hunter clearly apes Diablo. Though in fairness it's probably hard to make a dungeon based RPG that doesn't ape Diablo. But later games were a bit more blatant. Shadow Guardian was clearly Uncharted on the iPhone. Actually a pretty stunning achievement, to be honest, and very competent. But still just Uncharted on the iPhone.

Shadow Guardian: In no way like Uncharted

The next was probably the worst - Order and Chaos. Still a highly promoted game, Order and Chaos is an MMO that is so much like World of Warcraft there seems to be no point in its existence. It's not just elements here and there, it seems to be lifted almost entirely. The starter races are "human or elf" for the good guys, and "undead and orc" for the bad guys.

Not content with this there's further Blizzard "love" in StarFront: Collision. I'm waiting to see Darkthorne or Three Norsemen. They will rock.

The larceny continues with games like Nova being an unabashed clone of Halo, and Eternal Legacy a clone of nothing specific except the entire JRPG genre (and mostly Final Fantasy XIII).

Blades of Fury is Soul Calibur and Modern Combat: Sandstorm should be obvious. The recent BackStab is so much like Assassin's Creed it should probably just have been called Pirate's Creed. 

The funny thing about Gameloft especially is that their games are actually exceptionally good. They're brilliantly made, and it's impossible not to think they could have something to offer if they just made up their own damn ideas.

Gameloft CEO Michel Guillemot has responded to continued criticism of their business practices with a degree of derision.

And there may be something in that. StarFront is an obvious and unashamed rip-off of StarCraft, yes, down to the capitals. But Blizzard have made no effort themselves to port what would be both a popular and ideal title to the platform. 

Jason Holtman of Valve has been quoted as saying "Pirates are underserved customers", making the point that sometimes unethical behaviour is simply due to the corporate wishes not aligning to the market's needs. In a sense maybe that applies here too?

Gameloft's success is representative of a clear demand among the public for these titles on the platforms. While companies like Blizzard and EA are leaving the wads of ready cash just lying around people like Gameloft WILL pick them up.

The same argument could be made in the case of companies like Pepper. There is no Fruit Ninja for the Blackberry platform, so maybe titles like Ninja Fruit Bash are a logical consequence of HalfBrick's failure to support the platform?

I actually don't really believe this one, by the way. Companies like Halfbrick have to make logical and intelligent business decisions like what platforms to support. That doesn't make their IP open season on any platform they decide isn't commercially viable.

There is another question here that's hard to answer. How much is too much? Without some degree of "copying" we'd have never gone from Space Invaders to Galaga. We'd have never had games like Uncharted itself (clearly drawn from Tomb Raider) or Saint's Row (clearly drawn from GTA3/4). The entire FPS genre started with single defining games such as Doom or Quake. Other genres were largely defined by titles such as Mario or Tetris. Without Halo we never would have had Haze. Ok, bad example.

That these big titles influence followers is undeniable, and not necessarily even negative. Good ideas should have an impact. But how much? When is it too close?

It seems the key lies in presentation. When you make a game that plays like something else you're on solid ground. Assassin's Creed in the Wild West sounds just fine, as long as you bring plenty new to the table. And looking similar is actually fine too. Drawing inspiration in the art and menus for Mass Effect for your space puzzle game is entirely reasonable. But when you're copying both the look and gameplay of a game... now you're just copying.

It's hard to tell where this trend in mobile gaming is going to go. A look at the App Store shows clearly that it's rife, and a look at the comments on titles by companies like Gameloft show that purchasers either don't know or don't care about what's happening.

And of course, that's the problem. These games will keep getting made while people keep buying them, and right now there's no incentives to stop people buying them. Small companies like Halfbrick are fighting small companies like Pepper to protect the value of their IPs, but no one from a mega-company like Blizzard seems willing to step up and criticise Gameloft for their blatant theft. Nor willing to fill the void themselves.

And until they do the situation will stay as it is, or get worse.