Friday Slide: Fruit Ninja Vs. Veggie Samurai

With 70,000 game apps and counting, there's bound to be some overlap. But when two apps are this similar, we start to take notice. Following the success of new Top Ten regular Fruit NInja, developer Quantum Squid has announced their own Iron Chef, called Veggie Samurai.

Dane Emerson from Quantum Squid told us that they made no bones about following in the footsteps of Fruit Ninja.

"We are fans of Fruit Ninja and consider it the leader in yet another 'mini-genre' of game types that the App Store fosters with its overwhelming adoption by developers," Emerson said. "There's no question that they are currently the reigning king, but with the sheer volume of iDevice games being released by the day, developers and creative types are going to naturally start thinking about ways to expand on the original concept."

"We have never intended to make Veggie Samurai out to be anything other than what it is," he said, referring to the text in the Youtube trailer which serves as a nod to Fruit Ninja.

Emerson also pointed out that Veggie Samurai will improve on the formula created by Fruit Ninja, adding "dicing" moves which allow you to cut up the flying food into smaller bits, more combos, and an iPad-native version.

Fruit Ninja's creators seem to have taken the game's imitation as a sincere form of flattery. Phil Larsen of Halfbrick told us he feels Fruit Ninja "is the original and I believe it will remain the best."

"I can certainly see that Quantum Squid has tried to replicate our formula and fill areas they think we may have missed," Larsen said, referring to Veggie Samurai's touted new features. "However, our fan base and community involvement has ensured we have incredible amounts of data, feedback and dedicated testers. We make every update and choose every feature with great consideration, and know that that’s the reason Fruit Ninja has continued to improve in the way that is has."

"Everyone takes inspiration from somewhere, including us. Quantum Squid just seems to have been a bit less subtle about showing where they got their idea! They are naturally free to do what they do, but we’re not going to be changing our focus or our development plans at all."

Improving on an established genre is something we look for in our reviews, but so is originality. We're not sure yet which game will prove superior, but this is all part and parcel of the limitless cage match that is the App Store games market. Flight Control vs Harbor Master, Undead: The Last Refuge vs Call of Duty: World at War: Zombies, and Doodle Jump vs. Doodle Jumper-- they all seem to have just been the opening skirmishes of a deadly knife fight that will leave a lot of juice on the walls.