s'ok - I showed Loren before it launched, and he was cool with it :)
for the sake of your own brand, I'd iterate that design so it doesn't look like a carbon copy. Either people will assume you ripped him off, or that it's another of his games, not yours.
I agree. Especially since you've copied another existing game (Quarto). Which is fine, I guess, but at the moment you've copied someone else's game and copied someone else's style... Your unique idea is bringing these two elements together, which is good, but in the future I might suggest copying Loren on a deeper level: Create both your own interesting presentation style and a clever new game mechanic to go along with it.