Apple has been nothing but trouble from start to finish while Android is so much more user friendly it’s mind blowing. This is my first public game and while it’s a hobby project I would still like to co-ordinate the release as much as possible.
What has happened is I’ve finally got both binaries of my game Don’t Shoot the Puppy (link here) on Google Play Dev and Itunes Connect and was ready for release. Android got it approved and ready within two hours. Apple, however, is a different kettle of fish.
After two weeks of waiting, the app was rejected. Their message was this:
The rules they are referencing are here:
My reply:
Today they responded with this:
Now, as hilarious as it is for Apple to continue referencing puppy shooting, they obviously avoided any mention of the version of Don’t Shoot the Puppy that already exists. I can understand my violation of the Android rule and I’m willing to compromise by removing any mention of it if I can keep the core gameplay mechanics.
Does anyone have some suggestions / experience they could offer in order to proceed?
I don’t think there is a chance to get that game approved unless you replace the puppy with a robot or something else as that type animal violence is not usually tolerated no matter how pixelated and with age restrictions. Also your achievements seemed to have things like psycho, kill xxx puppies, etc which is even more red flag
BTW I don’t know if you were planning to use the trailer in the stores but it would probably get you in legal trouble at some point as you probably don’t have rights for most of the footage and theme involves animal violence which is PETA or etc bait.
But there are plenty of shooting games on the store, including an existing version of this game. Don’t you think I can use that in some way?
No I wasn’t planning on using the trailer commercially. It’s not even monetized and is just for fun. Bring it on PETA, any publicity is good publicity.
Assuming you are not, just give up on AppStore. You can’t argue them into allowing it, It’s something that just isn’t going to fly. Conceptually there is nothing that you can change to make it fit in the rules, just move on to a different game.
No, I wasn’t joking. I was just looking to see if there was any way to get around this before giving up. It’s just annoying to see all the other sniper games already there and not being able to post something so tame in comparison.
No way to get around it. It’s their house.
Those other games generally have stories that set the context, hence not gratuitous. They are also (generally) skill based and have game mechanics. They generally also have a certain quality level. Apple rules have a certain level of interpretation built it. A good, quality game that falls under those categories may get a pass if otherwise a good game, and/or the violence is story related and purely gratuitous. Given the quality/nature and it’s “game mechanics”, it is a safe bet that it will get rejected for even the smallest rule. Android store doesn’t care about quality, just so it doesn’t crash, hence the wasteland it is. Apple does its best to curate without being wholly dictatorial.
Yeah, I had a feeling the size of the game would be a factor, but you probably know better than I do. It was just meant to be a port anyway. Oh well, I’ll see what I can do before rapping this up.
Sure there are shooters and gore games in App Store but in those its usually monsters or bad guys. Cute games also have some kind of “animals” that “die” like in Angry Birds. They look at the “whole picture” when reviewing a game. Your game is kinda focused on violence and a puppy which makes it really bad combination. How often you see animal violence in TV or movies? barely ever and even when there is some its usually audio only (gun shot, howl) and nothing is shown visually even if it’s a tiger or guard dog attacking.
I’m not sure if you are safe in the wild west Google Play either as it might only take few animal lowers to tag the game as inappropriate
As funny as might seem, there is already a clone of the original game on Google Play called Don’t Shoot the Puppy: Doggy which got favorable reviews. All without the permission of the original developer of course.
@Ony Hah, I haven’t heard that one in a while, thanks.
You response to Apple was funny. Beating apples regulations by claiming they don’t apply won’t work. Apple has already deemed they apply. You must make fundamental changes to your app. Claiming that the app already passed once is likely to get the original pulled as well.
The reference to Android is a no brainer. Delete it.
In a twisted way our society cares more about animal violence then violence against people. Yes it’s twisted. Yes it makes no sense. Yes it’s the way it is.
That’s totally why you picked puppies to theme this game. There is a certian shock value in puppies as opposed to a robot or a virus. But if you want to pass Apples guidelines then you need to retheme it. And if rethemeing it breaks the game, then it wasn’t strong enough to start with, and Apple was right to reject it.
You’re absolutely correct and while I don’t nessarily agree with the theming relating to the “strength” of the game, I am willing to remove references of Android and resubmit.
Also for clarification, the other is not the original, it was a copy from the flash game without permission from the developer.
I feel you’re taking this in an unnecessarily broad context. And any “outrage” I may experience is not because I made a game that is outrageous, as was the intention, but because I didn’t agree with the reasoning of Apple, which has been said previously.
