If you’ll excuse the over simplification, there was a time, not that long ago, when your car buying decision came down to regular cars, sports cars, and SUVs.

And though many SUVs were brought by people who never needed all-wheel drive, let along the ability wade through 3 ft of water, they could still justify buying one on the grounds that the SUV’s tall roof and boxy body made it so much more practical than a regular car.

But then along came crossovers to muddy the water. Except, since many of them don’t even have all-wheel drive, they’d probably prefer to give that muddy water a wide berth just in case they get stuck. And as they often have lower rooflines and sloping rear windows, they’re not as practical as traditional SUVs either.

So if you take an SUV, remove its go-anywhere ability and its practicality, and make it look more like a car, isn’t the result essentially just a car? A fairly ordinary car that a bunch of marketing people are trying to convince us is something else, something better? If the first wave of crossovers weren’t cars, the latest crop certainly are.

Related: 2022 Genesis GV60 Electric Crossover Photographed Undisguised

Let’s take Renault’s Arkana, which has just gone on sale in Europe, as an example. It’s based on the Captur, which is itself a crossover, and comes only with front-wheel drive in Western Europe, but the Arkana is marketed as a coupe-crossover. It has four doors instead of two, and those doors don’t have sexy frameless glass like a true coupe, so its entire coupe claim seems to be based on it having a sloping hatchback.

That’s the kind of sloping hatchback you get on a hatchback, or at least used to. Renault ditched its Mondeo-sized Laguna family car years ago because people weren’t buying it; they all wanted funkier crossovers instead. But in the Arkana it appears Renault has come up with a new Laguna with a modest suspension lift. Volkswagen’s new Taigo, seen below, is another very ordinary hatch bring passed off as a coupe. And cool though it looks, if the Hyundai Ioniq 5 wasn’t an EV, would we really be quite so convinced it was anything other than an sharp-looking XXL Korean Golf?

Related: Does New 2022 Subaru WRX Teaser Prove Its Turned Into A Crossover Sedan?

At this point I should say that I’m not a crossover hater. Despite spending years on staff at British car mags where we’re schooled to get snotty about crossovers because they’re heavier and have a higher center of gravity than regular cars, so are less efficient and don’t handle as well, I totally get the appeal. They look more fun, feel less claustrophobic than normal cars, even if they’re not actually that much roomier, and are easier to get into and see out of.

But while carmakers are busy telling us coupe-crossovers like the Arkana, the BMW X4, and the Mercedes GLC Coupe are segment busting creations that bring something new to your life, I can’t escape a feeling of déjà vu. That claim to being innovative might ring true when it comes from the premium brands that don’t have a back catalogue of regular hatchbacks, but for the mass market brands it sounds like a case of the emperor’s new clothes.