Square-Enix squashes another another fan project.

[Bells]

Originally Posted by Regulus Tera

In what way are these guys "stealing" Square's property? By modifying a ROM of a cartridge they've long since bought?

Dude, Rt, C'mon... they own the Cartridge, not the game inside of it..!

They are not selling the hack at any cost either

From the legal point of view, they are SAYING that they are not/will not sell the hack at any cost. Which, for a company, makes a huge difference.

You guys should at least take a look at the Letter Square sent them

[bluestarultor]

Originally Posted by Regulus Tera

In what way are these guys "stealing" Square's property? By modifying a ROM of a cartridge they've long since bought? They are not selling the hack at any cost either, so there's no potential market being sucked from Square. If anything, these guys are keeping alive a franchise Square has long since been neglecting.

Tera, they're not stealing something tangible. Let me explain this to you, because I really do want you to understand. Intellectual property is the ownership of ideas. Yes, the people bought the game. We'll assume that, even though it's not necessarily true. But they don't own the characters or the franchise. That's what they're stealing.

Loss of sales are also quite hard to measure. There will be a percentage of people, amounting to a large numeric value, who will not buy a game when they can get a similar one for free. In the wake of sales of the original game, there will be those who will pass it up for a free hack. In fact, it need not even be the same franchise that will lose sales. Games are an oligopoly, with a lot of competition. Sales of other games than your own are assumed to hurt your sales. Therefore, a free game based on one of your own taking sales away is especially a slap in the face. Just because a game is being distributed without cost does not make it not take up market share. There's more than money to consider. Games also require time and interest. Time and interest are impacted by any game. Therefore, a ROM hack, especially of that size, can impact player time and interest in your product.



I'm no economics major, but I hope this helps you get an idea of what I'm talking about.

[Kim]

Originally Posted by bluestarultor

There will be a percentage of people, amounting to a large numeric value, who will not buy a game when they can get a similar one for free.

I'm not taking either side, as I can see both have a point, but, to be fair, those people are usually the people who'd just pirate the game anyways.

[h4x.m4g3]

Originally Posted by bluestarultor

Do me a favor. Go make some sort of piece of work. One that you value. I don't care if it's a game, picture, song, or whatever. Sell it for profit. Now have a bunch of people steal it. Have people steal your characters, your lyrics, your art, whatever. Have it spread all across the Internet. Now see if you don't care and admire all those people for stealing your hard work and doing with it what they please. Bonus points if they make something really good out of it that DOES hurt your sales. Square isn't shitting on a damn person. They're protecting their property, just like you wouldn't want people breaking into your home and running off with all your prized possessions. It's their property just as much as your computer is yours.

Or you know, since there not selling it, not claiming it as their own, and leaving all your rights intact, you could just accept the free publicity. I mean if its a really good game it gets people interested in the official product drums up support for your franchise and conjures up interest in your project without you spending a dime or lifting a finger. If its bad it dies, no one remembers it, anyone who ask about it gets told to buy your product because the fan-made one is crap.

The only way this could affect sales negatively is if your product is inferior to the fan-made one and at that point your arguing against the free market.

I mean legally they have the right to pull this project, but it doesn't mean it makes sense to.

Also what's up with Square waiting until the project is almost done to send out the C&D. I haven't been keeping up with this project, but it seems like a dickish move to wait till after time and work have been invested in a project like this to get it shut down, instead of stepping forward early on and saying 'Yo stop that please'. I mean did they really not hear about this project till now.

Edit for Post made while I was posting this post that I just post: At Blue, the majority of the people following this project from its origins and would likely be the majority of the ones downloading/playing are self-devoted fans of a game that came out 10 years ago, and odds are dieing for a new game to come out. At Julford below, thanks for that information, because it makes it worse (in my eyes at least) and a better reason to get the C&D because at that point your pointing people to an illegal version of the existing software/ip in order to play this derivative work.

[bluestarultor]

Originally Posted by NonCon

I'm not taking either side, as I can see both have a point, but, to be fair, those people are usually the people who'd just pirate the game anyways.

If only we lived in a perfect world. :J

Really, a lot of people would have fewer compunctions against getting a new game they figured was "legal, otherwise it wouldn't be here, right?" than stealing one they knew was an illegal copy.


Edit: h4x: Like I said, loss of sales are hard to measure. There is a middle ground, you know, where a hell of the lot of the bell curve falls, where people get something, say "meh," and leave it at that. That portion of the population, and by "that portion," I mean likely the majority, are not going to get the sudden and irresistible urge to go back and see where it all began. I sure as heck didn't when I started watching subs of Japanese TV. I'll fully admit to not owning a single purchased second of Super Sentai footage, although in the case of some series, it's not because I didn't look for it. That's more of a case of the company sitting on a property, but after initial attempts to find and buy Dairanger, I'll admit to having been content to watch the shows online.

[Julford Hajime]

Originally Posted by bluestarultor

Loss of sales are also quite hard to measure. There will be a percentage of people, amounting to a large numeric value, who will not buy a game when they can get a similar one for free. In the wake of sales of the original game, there will be those who will pass it up for a free hack. In fact, it need not even be the same franchise that will lose sales. Games are an oligopoly, with a lot of competition. Sales of other games than your own are assumed to hurt your sales. Therefore, a free game based on one of your own taking sales away is especially a slap in the face. Just because a game is being distributed without cost does not make it not take up market share. There's more than money to consider. Games also require time and interest. Time and interest are impacted by any game. Therefore, a ROM hack, especially of that size, can impact player time and interest in your product.

I'd like to point out that they were not, in fact, releasing a fully playable game, but merely an .ips file that required another program to use. This other program would take the information in the .ips file and alter an already established illegal ROM of the game that would then need to be run on an emulator.

I could see that argument if they were going "Here's a copy of our game, all you need to do is download it and run the contained .exe!" and you could easily find it on google by typing in Chrono Trigger or something, but this is nothing but altering data already present within the game using a computer program. A court case against Game Genie back in the day was dismissed on the grounds of "the consumer may experiment with the product and create new variations of play, for personal enjoyment, without creating a derivative work."

[Kim]

Originally Posted by bluestarultor

Really, a lot of people would have fewer compunctions against getting a new game they figured was "legal, otherwise it wouldn't be here, right?" than stealing one they knew was an illegal copy.

Um, not really. Most people will just get both.

@Julford: But now you're getting into all sorts of thorny, tangled legal technicalities.

[bluestarultor]

Originally Posted by Julford Hajime

I'd like to point out that they were not, in fact, releasing a fully playable game, but merely an .ips file that required another program to use. This other program would take the information in the .ips file and alter an already established illegal ROM of the game that would then need to be run on an emulator.

I could see that argument if they were going "Here's a copy of our game, all you need to do is download it and run the contained .exe!" and you could easily find it on google by typing in Chrono Trigger or something, but this is nothing but altering data already present within the game using a computer program. A court case against Game Genie back in the day was dismissed on the grounds of "the consumer may experiment with the product and create new variations of play, for personal enjoyment, without creating a derivative work."

The difference is not in the relative legality of either, because as you said, the original is illegal, making a hack the same, but that the work would be distributed, and therefore would be a derivative work based on what I know of law. If it were for personal use, I'd jump right up and say "WHAT THE FUCK, SQUARE!" with everyone else doing so, but it's being distributed, even if they were planning on doing it for free.

Originally Posted by NonCon

Um, not really. Most people will just get both.

The pirates would get both. Other people with stricter views on piracy might not.

[Kim]

Originally Posted by bluestarultor

The pirates would get both. Other people with stricter views on piracy might not.

Yes, except those pirates compose the majority of these theoretical people you said might take free ROM hack over buying the official game, rather than doing both.

[Jagos]

I mean likely the majority, are not going to get the sudden and irresistible urge to go back and see where it all began. I sure as heck didn't when I started watching subs of Japanese TV. I'll fully admit to not owning a single purchased second of Super Sentai footage, although in the case of some series, it's not because I didn't look for it. That's more of a case of the company sitting on a property, but after initial attempts to find and buy Dairanger, I'll admit to having been content to watch the shows online.

I'm merely putting this for example purposes...

I view this as the way someone can read manga online. Recently, I found Battle Royale (okay, two years ago) and decided to get the book as well as the comic series, noting the differences in each.

In regards to the US versus Japanese copyright laws, yes, Square can take this down in the US with very little to no loss on their part. But the odd thing is that Japanese copyright is a little more blurred on the subject. Besides that, the Japanese have a thriving subculture of products that are homages to the original content but are regular spinoffs. Why the US doesn't allow anything in this field is more beyond me.