Games take inspiration from each other all the time. I’ve lost count of the number of Hades-likes I’ve seen inSteam Next Festalone. If ever a game takes off, especially on Twitch, it will spawn countless clones. Some of these are good (I really likedRavenwatch’sspin on theHadesformula), some are shameless cash-grabs (see the countless mobile bastardisations of Among Us and Vampire Survivors), and some elevate the genre beyond what their predecessors could ever have imagined.
TemTemwas somewhere between the former and the latter. While I never really saw the point of the always-online MMO part of the game, the monster designs were ace and the 2v2 battles were tactical and exciting in equal measure. However, the absurd and arbitrary difficulty spikes put me off ever progressing too far.
TemTem lived and died byPokemon comparisons. While they were likely instrumental in marketing the game, many players were put off by it. “Why play TemTem when we’ve got Pokemon?” “We’ve got Pokemon at home.” “This is just a Pokemon knock-off, a jarg Game Freak title”. These weren’t necessarily fair reactions, but they were reactions.
TemTem nailed the Pokemon feel without resorting to ripping off any monster designs.
I gave TemTem the benefit of the doubt. It did enough differently that it didn’tfeellike a knock-off Pokemon game. It felt like a creature collecting and battling game, but it left plenty of the Pokemon DNA untouched. Its monsters were entirely unique, its traversal was smooth and fresh, its art style was a far cry from any Pokemon title. As I said at the top of the page, it’s fine to take inspiration from others – how many artists have done the same over the years? – and Pokemon could use the competition.
However, TemTem has expanded on its creature collector with a new game mode, TemTem Swarm. Or is it a new game entirely? It’s hard to tell. It’s another download on Steam, so presumably this is a spin-off a lá Pokemon Snap. That’s pretty cool, right? Well…
TemTem Swarm is a Survivors-like, or rather a Survivors-verylike. It’s Vampire Survivors with a couple of twists and a TemTem reskin. The Next Fest demo is quite fun, even before I’ve dived deep into the skill trees or unlocked all the Tems, but it just seems like a dearth of creativity and a bit of a cash-grab.
I’ll allow a studio to produce one knock-off game. One game directly inspired by a hugely popular title. But two in a row, especially when they comprise two thirds of your studio’s titles, feels a little off.
We’re all sick of sequels and remakes, but games that rip off other successful games come in third for me. I want new experiences, new mechanics, new ideas. I’d much prefer to play a game that tries something new but falls short of executing it perfectly than a game that retreads the same ground that dozens of others have in the past year alone and does so competently.
I’ve been quite harsh on TemTem Swarm here, and I must say it does try some new things. The variety of upgrades, synergies, and builds is exponential with the number of Tem you can play as. The environments and attacks look great. The gameplay loop is engaging and, most importantly, fun. But I think about what could have been, what Crema could have made if it wasn’t chasing quick profits with iterative experiences. The studio has shown that it can make good games, so now I want to see it makeoriginalgames.
