Copyright encompasses a products implementation, character design, names, code, writing, level design, art, audio, UI, marketting, etc. It does not apply to the concept or gameplay. Developers study and incorporate gameplay mechanics and concepts all the time, its how the industry evolves. The original Warcraft: Orcs and Humans was essentially a clone of Dune 2 in many respects, but didn't incorporate any of its assets, setting, or writing. Or for a more recent example, PubG vs Fortnite.

Usually things start to be a problem if people copy the game progression, level design, assets or asset design, or other aspects in combination with little deviation that it starts entering clone territory, but even then it depends. Manamon is certainly very similar, but does not use any assets or audio from pokemon, not to mention an entirely different interface to accommodate accessibility.

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Someone once asked Nintendo about permission to create an accessible version of Pokemon. The rep said something to the effect of "we say no by default, even if you technically could, just to minimize litigation. So "No."" Basically, I think Nintendo would prefer to not hear about line-toers that don't directly impact them, because then they'd have to call their lawyers and at the very least it'd cost them time and money that just ignoring it would not.

I agree with what has been said here, and I've personally found all of the accusations of Manamon as a copy of pokemon to be deeply unfair.
Was Manamon enspired by Pokemon's world, moves and battle style? Of course it was, but hell so was digimon.

Yet Manamon has very much its own story, its own world and characters, and its own set of creatures.

There are several issues with the game, hell what game doesn't have issues.
I personally really wish both that the trading system was far less clunky and reliant on all that port opening nonsense, and that the game had party experience rather than single creature experience so that the grind factor was evened out a little more, since I confess that has always been my issue with manamon and why I've never got too far through the game. That being said though, its still a great achievement and easily one of the best audio rpgs we've ever had.

I don't think there is a legal issue here, but I felt like Manamon was a slap in the face to Pokemon. I didn't like it at all for that reason, though no doubt it is a fun game. In my mind though, it is a pokemon rip off.

Personally I like it because it's a rip off of Pokemon and that it's made to be accessible. Seriously, what Pokemon game, (besides Pokemon Chrystal), are we as blind people able to not only play, but play it well? If anyone can tell me about an accessible game, I'll take back what I said about liking Manamon in a heart beat.

Noone is saying you shouldn't like it. But that wasn't the nature of your question.. if you like it because it's a ripof, all power to you. But most of us who call it a ripoff see it as just that. I personally would've liked to see a world and setting and world that was more far removed... which could be easily done. The same concepts as pokemon could be taken and used to create a game that was more distant. And manamon... where does that word even come from? It's so close to pokemon that anyone who hears it and knows anything about comparitive similarities couldn't mistaken it for anything else other than what it is.

I'm just gonna talk about copying consepts here not about manamon. We had a lot of mainstream games that have copied the consepts of other games and gamers in mainstream comunity are playing them all and enjoying them. Take just cause and G T A, some call of duty modes and counter strike, Mortal combat and tuff dark fighter and skull girls and a bunch of others as a lot of examples. I personally have no problem with doing that. Maybe one day someone comes in and develops a game that you have to cross jungles and live in there, Make things yourself, etc etc and that won't be a copy of stw. "Some people like to say clone". If it would, Just cause and mafia both were two copies of G T A, tuff dark fighter, skull girls and a tun of other similler games were all a copy of mortal combat, Every fps game that might have death match mode and similler modes to call of duty or counter strike would be a copy of them. The fact is that the developer of those games, All have coded their games from the scratch, All got inspirations from their today most played games and added the consepts to their own games, Plus a bunch of new features, missions, game plays that might make their game something special amongst the games that they used to get inspirations from. Unfortunately we are more than enough censetive about an audio game which is similler to another famous audio game. Fr example not all fps(s) are redspot copies, Not all multiplayer gamerooms that have card games are quentinc's gameroom and rs games copies. Speaking of qc gameroom and rs games, These are similler to each other, with the exception of both having different features that those features aren't exist in the other one. They even include some games that are the same as each other like ninety nine, 1000 miles, etc. So that shows us that people got too censetive in recently, since ultrapower copies came out. I don't think i've ever seen anything about the word "clone" in a game's topic back that time. Those people that are like that should change themselves about those games that aren't really a copy of another game and probably just got some consepts of that other game included in them.
Sorry for my tuns of gramar errors and my weirdish spelling. Thanks for reading

Well, Square Enix and other console game developers don't seem to be interested in blind accessibility. By default video games are... visual and I have no idea when they'll want to make there work unnecessarily harder.
I feel like the older games would be easier to copy in an accessible format and aren't reducing or affecting their sales. I believe that anything more then 3 system generations old should be okay to duplicate until the time comes when games can be played by all and the blind won't have to wait for an out dated game and the technology to play it.
But really, I doubt that all games could ever be made playable by both the sighted and not.
Anyway, if someone puts in the hard work to make a very similar game they should be compensated and appreciated for making something accessible. And, on that note, I'm waiting for Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior III to be accessible.

Wait, so if I'm making accessible Gothic from scratch, I am breaking the law? Yes, I use Gothic's assets, level design, dubbing and music. The thing is, the original game is not even in 1% accessible, so...

my thoughts are staying the same for this particular discussion. I say if the original game is not accessible, then we should be allowed to make something like it that is.

Unfortunately, while I fully well agree on an ethical standpoint that yes, since the big companies aren't providing accessible games there should be no restriction on creating accessible versions, sadly there have been a number of cases in the past where  has resulted in legal stupidities.

tom Ward contacted Lucas arts about creating a starwars game, and was told that he'd have to pay several tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege of using even starwars characters, names and music in a commercial work, let alone trying to directly create audio versions of any existing starwars games.

Then, people  remember how poor tom was set to release his audio remake of the atari 2600 game, montizuma's revenge, under the name of montizuma's return. He completed about six levels of the game and was even selling commercial copies, when he received a lovely cease and dicist letter from a game studio who were producing a game with the same name. nevermind that their game was not the least accessible.

I suspect in this instance Tom certainly could have made a case and the existing cease and dicist letter was more a scare tactic than a serious threat, probably from someone at the company who googled and wasn't even aware Tom's game was an audiogame, but sadly the net result was Montizuma's return got taken down.

Yet, all this being said, fo course Phil Vlasac hasn't had any hassle over Sarah and the castle of witchcraft and wizardry, though since that only uses the harry potter names, characters and world and doesn't actually reuse sounds or gameplay ideas from any existing harry potter game, its quite possible that it went under the radar.

ditto with packman talks, though since there have been so many packman games over the years what the current status of packman is I don't know.

Freeware remakes of games used to be fair game, indeed their used to be a site called Retroremakes" which was exactly that, though with the increasing power of the mega coorporations that is getting more difficult, Nintendo recently in 2016 suppressed the release of a really good freeware Metroid ii remake, just in case it might be better than their own.

So, at the moment its probably better to steer clear of using actual game characters in audio remakes, though of course if someone wanted to make an audio side scroller about the fabulous fettuccine brothers who must jump their way through the fungus kingdom, stomping on the heads of toad soldiers and boopers in order to defeat the evil toad known as king Scouser and rescue lady lichen, I don't think there would be an issue .

No, not using original assets you should not be able to just come along and make a copy using the same graphics, sounds, menus, etc. Manamon does not do that though, but I do think they take the idea a bit far. It's one thing to take inspiration from something you love, but they really tried to copy the entire concept. Which I guess isn't a problem, at the time when it came out though, I felt like it was a slap in the face to pokemon.