last rechost (is this a thing we say on here?) is very good and really gets to the heart of something that's agonizing to me. i wear my influences on my sleeve, i don't mind when people point them out, but when people are just like "wow, it's like earthbound! teehee, you can really tell the dev played earthbound! earthbound!" it's like. is that the only thing you gleaned from the game?
likewise, there's a story beat in slarpg that's similar to something in celeste. i love celeste, but slarpg was in development for almost three years by the time celeste came out. i knew the comparisons would be inevitable, but stuck with my plans anyway because i didn't think changing an important part of the story just to avoid comparisons to a more popular game was a good idea. but now i see (well-meaning, lighthearted) posts that are like "haha wow i guess all indie games about trans girls with anxiety are like this" because two games share some basic story beats
and that's the people who are trying to be NICE. i had to unfollow hard drive on twitter ages ago because of all the posts about how those silly indie devs are always making their unoriginal retro pixel platformers and earthbound-likes
