Did I really remake Minecraft?

It looks to have the same appearance, right. But this is weird providers refused your game to my opinion. Many games were looking like Doom. Many games were looking like Unreal (and were actually using its engine). Many games are now using the Disney lighting model.

For me a look is not a game. Also there was a trend some times ago telling that most games will go Minecraft way (I'm not talking about if this is fallacious or not).

So they might do it only to protect themselves.

6 hours ago, _Silence_ said:

But this is weird providers refused your game to my opinion.

One word: Germany.

People here apparently have no idea about technology. I recently created an account on a government website and had to print and sign the confirmation page and fax it to them. I then got a physical letter stating that my account is now active.

I also have been asked multiple times whether my game contains violence. Why is that a problem? That's what the age ratings (USK etc.) are for!?

Also, there is no way to get funding for game development outside of private investors. And there are almost no investors who invest in games in Germany, I guess no one told them that you can make billions with a single game. There are multiple programs that supply you with money when you start a company, and they have some example use cases like a hair dresser or a car repair shop. People here are stuck in the 1980s apparently. Some in the 1930s, especially in Saxony.

Anyway, so you think it's not a problem that my game looks a little bit like Minecraft? But can and should I do more to distinguish it further?

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I guess no one told them that you can make billions with a single game.

Those are the exceptions, not the general rule. As an investment, game development is pretty high risk.

And for the casual observer, your screenshots look exactly like minecraft. As investors have to shift to a lot of proposals, they need to be impressed quickly. Not be reminded of something that exists already. And there is the risk that you used copyrighted materials, which is the most likely reason for the rejection.

For the non-casual observer, I see things that look like a copy-cat of minecraft, and some enhancements on the concept. But nothing that screams to me.

20 minutes ago, Daid said:

And there is the risk that you used copyrighted materials, which is the most likely reason for the rejection.

That is a stupid reason. There is no evidence or indication that I have used copyrighted material without the necessary permissions.

If that is their reason, they would need to reject every online shop because product images and descriptions could be copyrighted material that are used without the necessary permissions.

And why should a payment processing provider even care about that?

Investing in games has a high risk, yes. But it is much easier to find an investor for that in the US or Asia than in Germany. It is still not easy, but in Germany it is more likely to win the lottery than to find an investor for a game.

Apart from agreeing about the situation in germany, there is a public thing starting just about now to which you might apply - „De-minimis-Beihilfe zur Computerspiele-Entwicklung des Bundes“. 3rd of June or something like they start accepting applications.

Haven't looked too deeply yet, but it's sure worth checking out.

Also - put some more screenshots on your page, It sounds nice.

Apart from the payment processor, what other problems are you referring to? I mean yeah, it looks kind of like Minecraft but there are many games that look similar too each other. IMO it's only a problem if potential players think "why should I play this clone when I can play Minecraft?".

Personalty I'm not a huge fan of blocky voxel games, however clearly Minecraft is hugely successful and you can't argue with success. I might try to distinguish my game in some obvious way. Perhaps the artwork would be the place to start.

Another idea just came to me. My own world uses prism voxels however I'm using smooth a marching algorithm so it's still smooth terrain. It strikes me however, one could use the same prism voxels on a spherical world but make them blocky like Minecraft. At least nobody would mistake it for Minecraft at a glance.

4 hours ago, ninnghazad said:

Apart from agreeing about the situation in germany, there is a public thing starting just about now to which you might apply - „De-minimis-Beihilfe zur Computerspiele-Entwicklung des Bundes“. 3rd of June or something like they start accepting applications.

They give you 50% of the cost, up to €200,000. However, you need to have the rest of the money beforehand. So in order to get 200k, you need to have 200k. Not really helpful in my case. If I somehow get 200k until the end of August, I will look into it, thank you.

I need to find a payment processing provider before that, though...

It does look like Minecraft (textures). Also things like "An exotic planet with mushroom biomes" do not help (why do you insist on mushroom biomes when mushroom biome is one of the unique Minecraft biomes? Why not, I don't know, tentacle biome or crystal biome?)

BTW, I would also reconsider if you need a payment processor in the first place.

1 hour ago, Acharis said:

BTW, I would also reconsider if you need a payment processor in the first place.

How would I be able to receive money if not through a payment processing provider?

1 hour ago, Acharis said:

It does look like Minecraft (textures). Also things like "An exotic planet with mushroom biomes" do not help (why do you insist on mushroom biomes when mushroom biome is one of the unique Minecraft biomes? Why not, I don't know, tentacle biome or crystal biome?)

There are hundreds of Minecraft texturepacks. The textures I use do not look like the default Minecraft textures. Comparing it to community-created content does not make much sense.

There are no crystal or tentacle biomes because I cannot create them currently due to a lack of time and a lack of skill to make the textures. And mushroom biomes are very rare in Minecraft (thus not typically associated with Minecraft) and look completely different.

17 minutes ago, Magogan said:

How would I be able to receive money if not through a payment processing provider?

There are hundreds of Minecraft texturepacks. The textures I use do not look like the default Minecraft textures. Comparing it to community-created content does not make much sense.

There are no crystal or tentacle biomes because I cannot create them currently due to a lack of time and a lack of skill to make the textures. And mushroom biomes are very rare in Minecraft (thus not typically associated with Minecraft) and look completely different.

Keep in mind that whether you personally think it looks like Minecraft or not, or the exact textures you are using, isn't really that relevant. If players and others think it's a Minecraft clone, then for all practical purposes it is. I mean you really can't dictate a customer's or service provider's opinion on a matter like this. It will look to them, how it looks to them. If you want it to look different to them, you will have to listen to their input and try to see what you can change.

The thing is, I can't change much. I worked on this for 5 years and already managed to include a lot of features that you will never have in Minecraft. I just can't do more than this as a single person with almost no money (relatively speaking).

And it clearly says that it is still in development, that means that more is coming.

What else can I do? I honestly don't know. I need to make money soon, so there is not much time left.

7 minutes ago, Magogan said:

What else can I do? I honestly don't know. I need to make money soon, so there is not much time left.

I guess if I was in your position, I would just make the textures vastly different. I'm not really sure how.....maybe use pastel colors or something like that. Do something crazy. Make it so when your average Joe has a glance at it, they don't immediately think of Minecraft.

Edit: Actually your thread was useful for me though ?. It now strikes me that I can make a second game out of my engine. A Minecraft style prism voxel planet as I alluded to earlier.

4 minutes ago, Gnollrunner said:

I guess if I was in your position, I would just make the textures vastly different. I'm not really sure how.....maybe use pastel colors or something like that.

So, I should make a CubeWorld clone?

2 minutes ago, Magogan said:

So, I should make a CubeWorld clone?

It's not me you have to convince. I'm not dissing your game. I think it looks fine. I'm just tying to help with a solution. Never take the attitude it's the customer's issue. That's a sure way to fail. If you have a problem, you have to change something.

You could make the colors brighter, maybe put stripes on things. Make it look like an amusement park.

Alternatively give it a SciFi feel instead of a fantasy feel. Sorry if this isn't helpful. If you have better ideas, go with them.

1 hour ago, Magogan said:

And mushroom biomes are very rare in Minecraft (thus not typically associated with Minecraft)

This is wrong. What else would you associate with mushroom biomes if not Minecraft? The huge popularity of Minecraft makes it that people associate even the word "biome" alone with it, not to mention other terms that are less-used elsewhere but gained popularity through Minecraft.

The truth is, Minecraft is so hugely popular that any block-based game is going to get the "another Minecraft clone" reaction first. If some bureaucrat out there who doesn't know any better is refusing to take your game seriously because of it, that is unfortunate, but you have to deal with that.

What you could do is focus on the differences between the two games. For example, your website only has three screenshots, and all those screenshots look like they are made in Minecraft. If the guy from the payment processor looked at those screenshots, it's understandable that they thought it's just another Minecraft clone. Even though you know it isn't, that's not enough, it needs to be obvious to everyone else too.

Yeah, I know... I'm waiting for a freelancer to create some textures for my characters, then I can make new screenshots and videos.

Not sure what I can show though. The screenshots will always look like they are from a block game, thus people will think of Minecraft. I can show some villages, fireballs and raptors, especially in the videos. And of course the space ship.

But apart from that I don't have any ideas.

57 minutes ago, 1024 said:

This is wrong. What else would you associate with mushroom biomes if not Minecraft?

https://wowwiki.fandom.com/wiki/Zangarmarsh

It's not like Minecraft was the first game to have mushrooms. And World of Warcraft is quite popular, too. I'll change the text though, maybe "glowing mushrooms" or something like that.

On 5/23/2019 at 1:43 AM, Magogan said:

They give you 50% of the cost, up to €200,000. However, you need to have the rest of the money beforehand. So in order to get 200k, you need to have 200k.

I don't read German and google translate only gets me so far (and Germany is famous for bureaucracy...), but often these kinds of subsidies are based against project budget, not "money in your bank". Some grants here allow you to value the project itself -- e.g. if a typical salary is €50k and you've worked on it for 2 years, then you can value the project as an asset worth €100k... others allow you to count a value against time that you will be spending during the grant period -- e.g. if the grant covers operating expenses for a year, and you'll be working for free during that year, you can add €50k of expenses against yourself, even though you don't actually have or are actually spending that money.

Lastly, you can always pay yourself money that you don't have -- you can start a company and actually hire yourself on a €100k salary, doing all the necessary paperwork to make it so, even though you don't have the money! Seeing that the company doesn't actually have this money, on the same day that the companies pays you your monthly salary, you can do all the necessary paperwork to personally loan that same amount back to the company. The net result of this is that the company ends up owing a huge amount of money to you and to the tax office... but you're now also actually spending €100k/pa into the project and are eligible to apply for grants and rebates such as this.

There's also often government assistance programmes that can assign you business mentors to assist with this kind of stuff, and also private companies/accountants who are experts in doing this kind of paperwork (some of whom will work for free and get paid out of your grant money once it comes through).

10 minutes ago, Hodgman said:

I don't read German and google translate only gets me so far (and Germany is famous for bureaucracy...), but often these kinds of subsidies are based against project budget, not "money in your bank".

The funding needs to be secured. That basically means I have to have the money. Getting a loan may be permitted, but in practice I won't get a loan.

10 minutes ago, Hodgman said:

Lastly, you can always pay yourself money that you don't have -- you can start a company and actually hire yourself on a €100k salary, doing all the necessary paperwork to make it so, even though you don't have the money! Seeing that the company doesn't actually have this money, on the same day that the companies pays you your monthly salary, you can do all the necessary paperwork to personally loan that same amount back to the company.

Then I would have to pay €800/mo for health insurance because of my salary. I don't have that kind of money. And I have to pay taxes, too. In fact, the company has to pay my taxes, which results in it being insolvent. Not filing for bankruptcy in this case would be a crime.

10 minutes ago, Hodgman said:

There's also often government assistance programmes that can assign you business mentors to assist with this kind of stuff, and also private companies/accountants who are experts in doing this kind of paperwork (some of whom will work for free and get paid out of your grant money once it comes through).

What is a business mentor good for if I don't have money to do anything? I already had one and the only advice I got about funding was to do freelancing. I have yet to find any freelance job that is not doing someone's homework or is in a programming language I don't know much about, which means I'm not being hired. And internationally, I can't compete with people from India.

From a practical standpoint my first reaction to your game's website was "yep, those are minecraft tree textures". On closer inspection I can see the bottom is slightly different, but the initial first impression is there. The way the leaf translucency works is also dead-nuts minecraftian.

You need to do a much better job of selecting media which highlights the unique features of your game. From the text it sounds like there's some space flying or something? There was some moon looking stuff, but it didn't appear to be emphasized. LEAD with the unique stuff to nail the first impression. The tree images came up repeatedly and were the only ones bright enough to see *anything*, so that is the impression a casual observer is stuck with.