Tetzlaff
Forum Regular
Posts: 899
Registered: 06-00 |
myk said:
Your reasoning is not valid, because a design directly based on another design is derivative, and thus (at least in the US, where id is from) only legal if the original creator gives the okay.
I donīt know much (if anything) about US copyright laws, but I learned it directly from a member of the Classic Doom3 mod, that the reason they stopped continue to develop the mod beyond Episode1 had nothing to do with copyright reasons.
There are dozens of from scratch remakes of all the Quake1 deathmatch maps for Quake 3 Arena (I collected them all), so I had the impression they were okay from a legal standpoint. There is even this very popular Campgrounds (Q3 map) remake for UT2003 / UT2004. But maybe itīs just like you say, id Software just tolerates this cases? But from what I experienced from all the past years with mods, id Software always made a difference between straight rips (using a conversion tool to convert levels, ripping original sounds and textures to include in the mod etc.) and remakes (creating something from scratch inspired by something from id).
The case with Genertaions for Quake2 was just that:
Conversion of popular maps from Wolf, Doom, and Quake
...
Orignal sounds from the games
Source: http://generations.planetquake.game...m/features.html
While on the other Generations Arena for Quake3 didnīt get any legal trouble, because they create everything from scratch. But all the stuff is directly based on original Wold3D/Doom/Q1/Q1 designs. Take a look for yourself:
http://www.wireheadstudios.org/generations/
Some background info about the previous Generations mod from their side:
Q2Gen released two major versions, the latter of which contained all four classes. However, shortly after release, the team contacted id Software about the mod. The news was not comforting. Q2Generations was, as it stood, illegal. The team had converted models, sounds, levels, and graphics from Wolf3D, Doom, and Quake over to the Q2 engine. These conversions were not allowed, since they were technically theft of id's intellectual property.
Then when they made Q3 Generations Arena, they tried to keep it all legal:
One year after Q2:Generations closed its doors, WireHead Studios announced its successor to the Generations legacy, Generations Arena. After a year of legal research and inquiry, WireHead was certain it had developed a mod design that would fufill all of the fun of Q2:Generations, while remaining completely legal.
So is this derivative work and therefore illegal, as you say, or not?
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03-22-08 21:33 
