experience
Recently, a product was rejected by Apple's 4.1 review. The specific rejection text is as follows:
Guideline 4.1 - Design - Copycats
Your metadata appears to contain third party content. Specifically, your app resembles xxx game and its console.
The next submission of this app may require a longer review time, and this app will not be eligible for an expedited review until this issue is resolved.
Next Steps
The copywriting has been written very clearly, which means that your product is too similar to a certain well-known game, you are infringing, and the review time will be longer later (in short, your submission will be thrown into the delayed waiting queue , indicating that the priority has been lowered).
In the end, it is Apple's old tradition, similar to warning copywriting:
Submitting apps designed to mislead or harm customers or evade the review process may result in the termination of your Apple Developer Program account.
Submitting applications designed to mislead or harm customers or to evade the review process may result in termination of your Apple Developer Program account.
Apple's traditional threat: the words are sharp and the consequences are serious.
analyze
Frankly speaking, I didn't expect 4.1 before this, because the functions between products are inevitably similar, and I didn't deliberately imitate certain games during the development process (yes, simply put, I think I am innocent).
So my personal guess is that Apple's review should be manually glanced at it, and it "feels" a bit like it, so I just follow the feeling and directly reject it.
No way, I also adopted the traditional response routine after encountering Apple's rejection: reply to the panel communication first.
deal with
My response in the reply panel is roughly like this (in Chinese):
I have mixed feelings about the "copycat" issue with this game. First of all, according to the characteristics of the game xxx, it can be summarized as follows: (some words are omitted below). However, this game does not use a combination of gameplay such as xxx, so it does not constitute infringement.
I have fully considered this problem when developing this software, so I fully respect the unique gameplay of xxx as a well-known game, so I developed a gameplay that pays homage, but there is no plagiarism.
I hope the auditors will be aware of it.
Three days later, Apple reviewed and replied to me, which generally means: Thank you for your reply, but we insist...
what else to say, as expected, change it.
So I started to analyze how to avoid copycat this time. In fact, I have really differentiated the gameplay (of course, the core will definitely not change a lot, otherwise everyone will not have to play the game). The focus is on the vision, so I hurriedly asked someone to help me re-adjust the game color scheme and some patterns, and submitted it again.
I waited with a slightly apprehensive mood, but after waiting for a few days to enter the review, it actually passed in seconds!
Summarize
Experience conclusion: the copycat of 4.1 is not terrible, it is much better than the 4.3 that judges you to be a vest. First of all, 4.1 is basically a human review, which is easier to be reasonable, but a machine review is very difficult, because now Apple's review is the younger brother of the machine, and all listen to the machine; secondly, you must have a straight back, as long as you have fully considered the issue of infringement , and have done the corresponding treatment, you will have more confidence, and it will be better to challenge the review; the third point, don’t rush to modify, first theory, put forward your own opinions, and learn to look at the review, don’t learn how many netizens make yourself miserable Yes, I said a lot of pitiful words, and the arguments were not focused. The last point is to accept your fate. If you really insist on Apple's review, then don't get entangled, and give up the account as soon as possible to be safe.
Regarding the point of not being miserable with Apple, you can refer to this article for details: The role of "selling miserable" in the communication and appeal of Apple's review tends to be negative .
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