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A mobile copycat of hit indie game Unpacking has been removed from mobile stores after awareness was raised by developer Witch Beam Games.
Spreading the news via Twitter (opens in new tab) this morning, Witch Beam said “if you’ve happened to catch an ad for a suspiciously similar-looking game to Unpacking on mobile recently, please know that this is not our game. They sure seem to want to give the impression that it is, though!”
The tweet also featured screenshots of Unpacking next to the imitation, which clearly leaned very heavily on the original. Each room featured in the screenshots is laid out exactly the same as the rooms in Unpacking, with just a few colors and shapes switched out.
If you’ve happened to catch an ad for a suspiciously similar-looking game to Unpacking📦 on mobile recently, please know that this is not our game.They sure seem to want to give the impression that it is, though! 🧵 pic.twitter.com/d3ULxxbmSAJanuary 25, 2022
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The team at Witch Beam Games was apparently made aware of the clone due to the official Unpacking TikTok account “drowning in alerts from concerned fans” who have seen multiple ads for the replica game on the video platform. Those adverts, which also appeared in some volume on Instagram, helped boost the imitation to the top of free games charts on iOS.
The developers behind Unpacking made a thread explaining what this clone means for the indie studio, explaining: “It’s demoralising for a small team like ours to see content we spent literally years planning, refining and handcrafting be hastily reproduced in an opportunistic ad-riddled app a mere 3 months after our launch,” with more screenshots of both games that show that not only were the rooms copied, but also a lot of items in the boxes too.
The thread continues: “We’re a tiny indie team and even with the success we have achieved, we still don’t have the resources to pursue companies trying to use our game’s distinct look and feel to make a quick buck. We have to rely on storefronts like the App Store to better curate their content.”
Witch Beam has since put out two updates confirming that the knock-off has now been removed from both the iOS and Google Play stores.
If you now want to play the real organization sim, Unpacking is available now on PC, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch only.
Looking for a new zen game to play? Take a look at our new indie games list for inspiration.
