The original Rubiks brand cubes would rely on the springiness in the plastic. These tended to be rather hard to turn with even the slightest misalignment. Copy

The original Rubiks brand cubes would rely on the springiness in the plastic. These tended to be rather hard to turn with even the slightest misalignment. Copy cats invented the improved mechanism. These will turn with a misalignment up to something silly like 40 degrees. Rubiks copied this mechanism for their own cubes eventually. Long story short, a random chinese Rubiks cube knockoff is quite likely to be higher quality than an actual Rubiks brand cube these days.