Ideas cannot be copyrighted. They can be patented but thats another thing entirely. If your game has the same idea but has a different layout different art and a different name then you shouldnt have anything to worry about. I did some checking on this a while ago and that seemed to be the crux of it.
There are 1000000000000s of -exact- cloned board games out there. The only one recently i heard of legal action was a scrabble clone (and only because it was the EXACT same game under another name). Other (hugely successful) scrabble clones change the layout a bit and tweak the rules so get away with it.
The other thing is if your game joins the ranks of 1000s of others will the company be bothered? If your game is hugely successful and sells millions they may attempt a legal attack. The law is not set in stone on this as many of these kinds of cases are tried and what works for one doesnt for the other.
There are 1000000000000s of -exact- cloned board games out there. The only one recently i heard of legal action was a scrabble clone (and only because it was the EXACT same game under another name). Other (hugely successful) scrabble clones change the layout a bit and tweak the rules so get away with it.
The other thing is if your game joins the ranks of 1000s of others will the company be bothered? If your game is hugely successful and sells millions they may attempt a legal attack. The law is not set in stone on this as many of these kinds of cases are tried and what works for one doesnt for the other.