Digital Sun, the indie developers of Moonlighter, has announced it is delaying a public playtest of its latest game, the Castlevania-inspired tower-defence title ReVamp, in response to cloning fears.

In a statement released to social media, the Spanish development studio thanked people for signing up for the game's first playtest but said, due to reports of "games being reverse-engineered, cloned and published before the original is even out" (and with the launch still "months away"), releasing a large public build right now feels like "too big a risk".

Instead, the studio said it will now hold something more "contained" on the group's Discord, with a public playtest scheduled for a later date, closer to ReVamp's planned March 2027 Steam release.

It should be noted that Digital Sun's statement didn't cite AI tools specifically as the cause of this recent explosion in clone games, but it's not hard to make the connection, with other studios such as the Korean developer YNOT recently pulling the demo of its game after it caught word that someone had used AI to clone it.

Cloning, of course, isn't entirely new for independent developers trying to make and publish their own games. The mobile space, for instance, has famously been home to countless clones of upcoming indie games, with Donut County developer Ben Esposito having fallen victim to this practice back in 2018.

Now, though, with GenAI models like Anthropic's Claude Opus 5.5, it's easier than ever for bad-faith actors to copy and steal from other developers, which is understandably making creatives sheepish about sharing their work before it is ready. This is a particularly worrying trend, when you consider public demos have typically been an important tool for developers to get valuable feedback for their games ahead of release, and a great way to promote their work.

Here's Digital Sun's statement in full:

"About the ReVamp Playtest

So many of you signed up for ReVamp's first playtest on Steam (thank you!), but we've decided to start with something more contained on our Discord, with the public playtest coming a bit later.

Why? We've been concerned by recent news of games being reverse-engineered, cloned and published before the original is even out. With launch still months away, a large public build of ReVamp felt like too big a risk.

To everyone who requested access on Steam: we're sorry for the change of plans. We hope to open the public playtest around January. If you'd still like a chance to play this year, our Discord playtest starts October 29.

Showing games early is how indies get seen and find the fans who keep us going, so we hope platforms keep strengthening protections for original work.

Thank you for your support - Digital Sun"

Fortunately, it seems like most of the studio's followers understood its decision, calling Digital Sun's move "an understandable change" and "a good call," given what has been happening in the scene.

As stated, if you want to try to play ReVamp this year, then you'll need to join Digital Sun's Discord for a chance to be part of this "contained" event, which begins on October 29th.