what do you think about game reskinning

I was looking for some platformers games like mario or sonic on google play and I found games from different developers, but they have the same levels and the same enemies AI. the difference from one game to another are just the sprites.

there is one comment on one of these games that is like "I liked the character, but the levels are the same from another game that I played, so I will not play".

I just wanna know, what do you think about this kind of reskinning, or reskinning in general?

nemezes

I think that game reskinning can be a good thing IF developers change all the levels and add something new to the game.

Why make a new game that behaves the same way as an old one, but have different appearance? Its better to use the old one as a template for a new or improved version of the game. It saves developers a lot of time and effort.

But, as I said, they need to add new things to the game and change the levels, not just reskin.

Plain reskinning is something I'd call counterfeit (I know some systems that ripped off NES games while changing the graphics, like the N-joypad, 0 original games), under no circumstances it can be considered good (it is a ripoff, and can potentially harm the original devs).

Redesigning an already existing game (assuming the license let's you do it) entirely, like levels and such is an approach that can be considered fair, however improvements are needed, and maybe enough changes to make it more a standalone than simply a mod.

Well... i guess it´s okay if it is targeted to some peer group...

For example a Soldier Jump n´run for Boys and a Candy Jump n Run for the girls .

It's not that much of a problem if they are free as one of the main things that gains a game popularity is originality, I would be very surprised if any of these games get many downloads.

However if they are paid than that is different and they should be removed if it can be proven that they where stolen as it plagiarism.