hi hi !!!!! you're so KIND <33 idk if same face syndrome just talks about the entire design or just the face so i'll keep it to face........ eue)b

i think it essentially boils down to shape language... i was also the type to copy/paste a drawing and add different fur styling and ears, but the face specifically was usually the same T—T if i had older drawings, i would share but i trashed them all. my rules are:

• sharp = mean/feisty/adventurous
• round = friendly/ditzy
• however, art rules are simply made to be broken. do you have a sweet but sharp-featured character? or a malicious rounded friend?? tell them i love them !!!!!!!

my go-to for designing unique features are: eyes and eyebrows (then mouth and proportions lol), since you can be so diverse with this. i get inspo from anime/manga which is why so little of my characters are, yknow, BALD :^) you cannot pry my wig kitties out of my hands

while i think this^ is better applied to cartoon/anime/whatever-my-style-is artstyles rather than realistic, even real life beings have different traits despite being the same animal!

i was gonna say more about designs in general but since this is just about same face syndrome, i'll save it for another time !! just know that if someone is able to differentiate two similar (as in same features like age, gender and species/race) characters just by a colourless sketch, you can consider that as a victory! :Dc