You start by selecting one of three monsters (they even resemble the starting three from the orignal game). The battle screen and fight dynamic looks almost identical.
Am I missing something?
Meaningful is in the eye of the beholder.
Pokemon is not making a social web game, this is a big difference to the Groupon situation in my opinion as they are different things. I wouldn't say it's a copy just the story/theme is inspired by Pokemon.
His first and only other "company" was a Gaia online type website.
The interface is very confusing. I was only able to navigate it since I was familiar with Pokemon.
It's dumbed down. There is no walking around towns, just battles.
You suggest hate as a primary motivator. Hate is based on repressed anger, and anger is the archetypal emotive of rules that have been broken. What rules do you suggest that he feels have been broken? Perhaps some kind of rule that the things that are valuable are those that are unique and not derivative? What would you suggest is the causative agency of such a feedback based rules paradigm?
I suggest the "causative agency" is the voice that says "I am supposed to be getting all the attention. Why is he? He didn't even do anything amazing!"
Nintendo protects the Pokemon brand very aggressively.