Stop it!

[chapel]

Well I think that using existing IP's diminishes the overall value of the product made by the mod team. Its not hard to create something new, there is alot of untraveled road when it comes to games and ideas. I would hope most mod teams and people are willing to use their imaginations and creativity to produce their games/mods.

For me, I run Nuclear Dreams, a mod based in a Post Apocalyptic world. Now its a very cliche'ed theme, as well we are using influences from other games, but the key word is influences. Games like the Fallout series, and other rpgs like Morrowind come to mind as influences. I intentionally chose to not use anything directly from any game/movie/tv show/book or anything copywriten. We have alot of original ideas, and things that really havent been focused on, but I can freely say Fallout or Morrowind influenced our design, but we didnt steal their ideas. Blah I hope that makes sense.

Good luck to everyone out there, I cant wait to see whats made.

Oh, about LoTR, I believe Vivendi Universal owns the book rights.

 

[Andy]

I know its been said but, I think Pi Mu Rho would agree, it needs saying again:

http://www.3dactionplanet.com/features/q3dmhellchick/iplaw/

Read.

Learn.

Understand.

(FYI - Caryn "Hellchick" Law is now a community manager at Acitivision - she knows her stuff)

And also:

http://www.3dactionplanet.com/features/editorials/foxedmods/

 

[Sprafa]

Although I still sigh when I see that someone could make a Darth Maul mod

 

[SpuD]

I totally agree with you Sprafa (about the main topic, not the Darth maul mod)

 

[The Black Nine]

Ok, so I have a few questions of my own:

Example situation: Someone wants to make a mod based on, lets say, LOTR, he writes his own story, makes up his own characters, but it's set in the world. This would still not be ok, correct? I mean, the only thing is, if the creator titled the mod with a title that didn't have LOTR in it, it would be kinda hard to prove that this is LOTR, since the setting is pretty broad.

Also, if that isn't ok, then why is fanfiction legal? You see tons of people make their own stories set in already established worlds. I'm not seeing the difference.

 

[Sprafa]

Ok, so I have a few questions of my own:

Example situation: Someone wants to make a mod based on, lets say, LOTR, he writes his own story, makes up his own characters, but it's set in the world. This would still not be ok, correct? I mean, the only thing is, if the creator titled the mod with a title that didn't have LOTR in it, it would be kinda hard to prove that this is LOTR, since the setting is pretty broad.

Also, if that isn't ok, then why is fanfiction legal? You see tons of people make their own stories set in already established worlds. I'm not seeing the difference.

As long as it doesn't generates or threatens to take income from the companies that own the IP, then it's perfectly fine.

If you make a book based off a fanfic i.e. - illegal.

You can say a mod doesn't generates income, but it threatens to remove income since some people might just play only your LOTR mod and not buy the EA/Vivendi games. therefore, also illegal.

 

[Faulk_Wulf]

Okay, I'll probably be grouped into that "Idiots" category for this post, but whatever. You see mods all the time based on things that already exist. Command and Conquer has a popular Spacecraft conversion, along with two popular Starwars creations. There was a popular set of maps based on the Rambo movies as well. Half-Life has seen several Resident Evil mods come and go in its time. Unreal (either "2" or UT03) has a Warhammer 20k mod called Rival Species (and Warhammer 20k was a PS2 game- with the yellow "soldier" the beginning played alot like Medal Of Honor: Frontlines) Do you want me to go on? I mean there is mod after mod after mod based on already existing creations. (This isn't about lack of originality- which there is plenty) This is about fans making something based on a world they love. It's the same as fan-fiction. Fan-fiction is leagal IF YOU DON'T MAKE A CENT. Now I've seen you throwing around that its illeagel to do it if you don't make a cent. But if you're plot isn't THE PLOT from the game/movie and its only based in the world and its not making a cent, then there's no problem. COULD the companies do something about it? Probably. They can probably sue Spirit Lake (neighboring town) for showing "Pirates Of The Caribean" in their gymnasium at their school as a reward for their excellent ITBS (Iowa Test Of Basic Skills) scores. Will they? Probably not. If you don't try and turn a profit, most companies just won't give a s---. It's just that simple. You may now tear apart my post, have a nice day.

 

[JMan]

Warhammer and Warhammer 40k, plus any games set in those universes are open to modding provided you follow a few simple rules (Some naming conventions and including disclaimers on your website are the main ones).

 

[Faulk_Wulf]

Oh. I wasn't aware of that. Okay, strike that one.

 

[André Damli]

It's a bit sad with all these rights.

I'm sure alot of people would love to play a modification set in the Middle-Earth (based on Tolkien's Lord of the Rings), but doesn't actually have anything to do with the Lord of the Rings, or any of it's characters.

Certain things like the elven language (or other languages for that matter) and races would be shared. There's alot of those in forum roleplaying games (there's this one website that does that... Santharion I think).

I'm sure that doesn't matter, though. Infringement is infringement, but it's sad to see that people who can't live with roleplaying on forums and imagine things in their head, is left out like that.