I don’t mind the App Store removing shameless copies. But games with distinct features (eg offering Swedish) and which don’t use anyone else’s intellectual property should probably not face such an uphill battle.
Further, they only pay such attention to Wordle clones because they were publicly called out on it. Other clones, even ones that violate IP laws, still get a free pass.
And it’s not as if they’ve stopped allowing Wordle clones in, either.
I'm not sure there's an easy solution here. I don't like copycats for more than one reason, but I don't think it's clear what criteria Apple should apply to determine whether an app is sufficiently distinct.
If we considered language differences as sufficiently distinct, would that also mean allowing companies that watch for any new interesting idea and replicate it in language X?
Outside of wordle and other VERY POPULAR apps (a very narrow scope) it's impossible to expect that apple has a way to tell if any given submission is a copycat of anything.
I agree with this. I don't understand why some make it and some don't. I've said in a different comment that I believe if OP rolled the dice with a new app that didn't have copycat reject history, he has a decent chance to get it approved IMO.
