Oh gameloft..
polycounter lvl 18
Just saw this nice collection of videos in another forum, and felt like pasting it here:
Halo rip-off:- NOVA
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9crEF_QVNU
Starcraft rip off:- Starfront: Collision
www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0AsGfcJjuc
World of Warcraft rip off:-
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql-iu98XGds
CoD: MW rip off:- Modern Combat
www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CwSedSzckE
GTA Vice City rip off:- Gangstar: Miami Vindication
www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONmIz8yk6V4
Uncharted rip off:- Shadow Guardian
www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CqO4t7y_3I
Soul Calibur rip off:- Blades of Fury
www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtsUjcpp57w
Replies
Oh no, I'm not claiming they are breaking any kind of laws. what they do is legally proper however creatively rotten.
Apple is known for banning games like Unpleasant Horse for stupid reasons, even slightly 'exposed' ladies for a lack of better terms, how come this game got under the radar?
Calling them uncreative is a bit too much IMHO. Unless you expect originality, which i don't believe such thing exists.
Well that analogy went bad fast.
Jokes aside, Gameloft is a big deal and Apple is also 'known' for rampant double-standards. They smack around some tiny developers once in a while to keep family watch-groups off their back but they don't touch the big players who have the money to fight back. This is business 101, man.
Apple will screw them eventually, but not yet because Android is keeping them in check.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtsUjcpp57w#t=0m25s
Reminds me a lot of;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pm5VP3of-dA#t=01m50s
Mobile games don't really get the same love as consoles, and definitely not as much as computer games. Even if they're doing this for insincere reasons, they're still upping the level of games being developed.
NOVA is an Android compatible game.
@Eld
You're setting a pretty low bar for "rip-off". I have no doubt in my mind that all the games you listed as being the source of those clones were derived from games that came before them. All art is built on the art that came before. Modern Warfare, for example, is highly derivative of other games that are centered around modern military combat and CoD:MW didn't invent military shooter simulations. Getting annoyed because Gameloft used obvious concepts and ideas doesn't make sense since ideas are not really exclusive to anyone in particular. They have a severe lack of creativity and imagination, for certain, but they didn't rip anyone off. They are derivative, without a doubt, but the game industry at large is pretty derivative.
Edit:
Oh, I just realized you're quoting someone else. So, I guess my comment goes to the fellow you quoted...
I personally think its cool to have games on iphone that are similar to console titles that I like. Its not like we are going to see actual iOS modern warfare/halo/starcraft games in the forseeable future anyways.
I have a few of their games, and I think they are pretty solid. They do a good job mimicking a console experience on a phone...which is something I look for when buying iphone games.
I am mostly okay with the Gameloft clones (from a business standpoint it makes sense ...), but indeed the music in that trailer is crossing the ripoff line for me.
the pistols from Nova are COMPLETELY 100% identical to the halo pistols. its as if they didnt even try to make it different at all..
but hey, if it aint broke dont fix it right?
Call me an starry eyes massive vagina if you will, but I was hoping that if you're going to copy something from a game, at least put your flava in it, make it something so that people are willing to defend, and be your fans on that.
Conduit is a Halo rip-off also, but they varied things in it enough so that it's has it own looks, and doesn't scream 'stolen'. And it fun in it's own right.
Don't the guys over there wish to do more? Lack of ambition is a dangerous thing...
Gameloft is strictly looking to get money and not trying to impress anyone. I won't be surprised if they do a minecraft rip off for IOS. Taking existing highly profitable game formulas and ripping them off to IOS land seems to be their new business model.
But yeah it looks like from a business standpoint this was a smart thing to do, not necessarily original but very smart. Blizzard hasn't banked on iphones or android phones yet so I figured it was a matter of time before somebody cashed in on it. I agree with Ace-Angel though, if you're going to ripoff the gameplay directly you might as well put ya flava in it lol
I was just thinking the same thing before you posted that!
@Ace-Angel
I agree, recycling ideas into your own work is pretty worthless unless you can add something to it, make it better, or redefine it entirely. I have to grant it, they did nothing to innovate and only imitated better games. Gameloft will go down in history as the most unimaginative studio ever. I know, because I've seen NOVA on my brother's G2x. It sucks.
As ridiculous as this all may be, I'm just glad I played 80% of the games listed above on a PC and not on an iPhone/iPad with sub-par graphics, controls and gameplay.
well they ripped soulcalibur off and called Taki Enimia
it's either quite indicative of their creative process, or just screams they're a bunch of douchebags, but who cares
other than that, their games seem at least decent in production so why the hell not
EA had Dante's inferno and that was an AAA level rip-off in lots of aspects.
with gameloft, going AAA is too expensive, but B+ does its job.
I guess what makes me sad is that there's no intention to actually make these games any deeper or better than the source-material they came from.
It's mostly what I'd call an "unofficial port".
[ame]
[ame]
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What Gameloft is doing is questionable, but at the same time, no reasonable console devs right now are even remotely considering releasing their products for mobile devices, like how they've learned to port from xbox to ps3, pc, etc. and vice versa.
Gameloft is trying to tap into a niche that console devs stuck their noses up at. The only problem is they're still thinking like small iphone developers and end up making a handful of crappy ports instead of a few quality ports, that really define iphone gaming. But then again, minimal effort>maximum profit is the business model of choice nowadays .
After watching those videos: What's also distressing is the bluntness that Gameloft has boiled copying down to a method of cinematic bullshit that rides a line of plagiarism with what comes off as arrogance.
they have enough potential for that
Seriously though I'm just glad Gameloft appears to be doing well and is employing people.
From the previously posted Kotaku link.
Made me laugh
At first I wanted to play a devil's advocate and say that we always had low-budget clones of successful titles and that 8-bit era was filled with them. Then I saw that video and gave up.
What I do find hilarious though, is that they had to create all these sprites from the scratch. In a way, they put more effort in this title than Konami, who have been recycling enemies since Super Castlevania IV :poly142:
Tbh...that clone doesn't look half bad.
Back when I was into mobile games I remember gameloft as that company that really put out high quality looking games, but much like back then they suffer from being short and hollow.
I wish they could put that talent to good use.
Oh well, better safe than financially sorry.
I know, I guess my wording was abit off, but what I was referring was to NOVA in this case. For example, I never considered Mass Effect to be Halo ripoff, yet many people claimed that, Section 8 for me was more of a Tribes successor, yet people still claimed it was a Halo ripoff.
In the case of Conduit, the entire deal of traveling different worlds/times which Aliens are trying to stop you from, while having a oppressive regime, having a one eye balled object as a side kick (which doesn't betray you) but also, later on a cheerleader type character going for the sex appeal. You could say it's Halo, but for me it's not, Conduit is it's own thing...especially with the little quips here and there which is enough to make it stand on it's own.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that NOVA is shameless simply put, if you put a black material on most of the enemies, they'll look like Halo, no questions asked, expect the large robot mech's...those things look like the Sentinels from Crysis, and the texture work on those things look shoddy, as if they added that the last moment to add 'variety'. Again, call me a massive vagina full of cupcakes if you will, but doesn't a person want to add their own style to it? I know I would.
The thing that bothers me more is that between reverse engineering of animations and mesh as well texture archives, someone could very well get the models out of Soul Caliber, take out a whole bunch of loops, downscale the texture, use CAT and copy the animation, and bam, you essentially create a model from a source model so hacked up that no one will care.
I know this, because several people in my lab are planning on creating IPhone games like this, and applying to GameLoft with such...
Again, I don't have anything against GameLoft, but I mean c'mon, don't the guy there want to feel proud about making a game that 'looks' like another game, but it isn't?
How about instead of a God of War ripoff, we got...a...Ninja....in feudal Japan...who fought demons...to rescue his wife...but had two swords and two chainsaws chained together...and fought colossal monsters by hitting their weak points while climbing on them...
And when then, out of nowhere, thousands of evil vegetables and fruits sprout as demons and you have to slice them, see? Two games in one, without looking like direct ripoffs...
+1
there's a difference between copying ideas and making a business out of making carbon copies of other people's ideas.
Matthew Klees would be disgusted