Creativity and originality are key factors in creating a good or decent character, and while sure, designing a completely original character is no easy task, there is truly no reason to just deliberately make your character a carbon-copy of an already existing one from other media with few to none changes, other than mere laziness. And hell, this is coming from me, a surprisingly lazy idiot.

Fandoms are generally guilty of this. Just to name a few examples, you have the Sonic fandom and their endless recolored "OCs", the Undertale fandom as well, since let's be honest, a big portion of Undertale OCs are just font skeletons, with rarely any difference in abilities or traits, and for a closer one, the Neptunia fandom here in Wattpad. While it may not be as guilty as the fandoms mentioned above, the problem still remains there.

Some may pass it off as "inspiration", but i say there's a fine line between inspiration, and plagiarism.

Inspiration is to take a concept or idea, be it from personal experience or from some form of media, and work with it, change some factors here and there, give it your own twist, so the final product turns out as something fresh and original, even if it was based on an existing idea.

Plagiarism, on the other hand, is just taking an existing idea and put little to no work on it to change it around and making it your own, and yet, claiming the idea as your own.

For example, let's say i want to come up with a Neptunia character. Say, a CPU.

Let's come up with a nondescript girl for now (i dunno, maybe she could have a bigger hip size than the rest, or maybe she has a fit and athletic body build), now we have to find a weapon of choice... Maybe a scythe, or a flail. What would her abilities be based on? An element, perhaps? Wind? Dust? Steam? Let's go with steam (Hell, you could go further and say she's designed to represent the Steam platform). So a scythe/flail wielding CPU with a fit body build, and who can use steam as the base of her skills and abilities. I haven't even delved into her possible personality and character traits, and yet i already have something fresh to work with.

On the other hand, let's say i just want to take an existing character to work with. Say... Iris Heart. Let's say i want to make a male version of Iris Heart. Now, i could try to change around some factors on the original Iris Heart, and translate those challenges to my male version. In truth, doing this is also no easy task. You have to take a concept and change it around enough to have something new and original, but at the same time, being careful to not alter the base concept too much, else you have a completely different character from the original one, and in that case, you are better off just making your own. But let's say i don't give the slightest ounce of fuck about all that, and i just genderbend Iris Heart and call it a day. Boom. Done. Maybe make him a masochist instead for the hell of it.

Now... Which of these two examples is more creative? The Steam CPU, or male Iris Heart?

AUTHOR'S NOTE:
In no way, shape or form, i am trying to attack or witchhunt specific members of the Neptunia fandom. If any of the two ideas above just happens to be similar or identical to some of yours, take into account that's just a coincidence. I came up with these examples on a whim. My intention is not to shame anyone, but instead, to help others with building their characters.