[bluestarultor]

Mirai, there's a wee problem with a "tribute" when it comes to games. You can make a tribute to a movie with an AMV, or a tribute to a book by recording a few scenes with some friends acting, but you don't remake the movie or rewrite the book.

The problem here is the media. They were specifically using a media, in fact the SAME media, to create a story. Nobody cares if it was canon. They were using Square's resources. They were creating a product using items that were not theirs to use in the same format as the originals and had a pretty darn high profile. That would be the difference between writing Twilight fanfiction and writing Twilight fanfiction, getting it published, and then distributing copies of it for free in a paperback. The fact of the matter is that so long as it stays on some blog somewhere, nobody cares, because it's not in the same format. It doesn't matter if you give it away for free or not.




If they had chosen to write it as a story, or make a small movie, or do ANYTHING but make it a game, it would have been a non-issue. They didn't, and they knew the risks. I'd personally put that team under the misguided category of my previous statement. They wanted to bridge the gap in the most honest way possible. On the other hand, they realized what might happen and accepted it, which was the most honorable thing they could have done. I really do look up to their honesty and wish them well in future projects. Hopefully, the work they put into that project reflects what they'd be capable of doing an original one, because from what I saw, it was a good product.








Edit: Nik: No, "stigma" is an appropriate word. There's a real disdain for people who decompile code from other programs to use in their own. An engine can be legitimately purchased, and I have NO idea what I said to indicate that programmers didn't recycle code as much as humanly possible. On the other hand, they recycle code they have the legal rights to, or else they'd get sued.

And no, maybe I'm not a "real" game designer, but I'm in the process of designing my own games and can say, personally, that if someone went about mucking around with the resources I've spent the past three years creating, I'd be a wee bit pissed, ESPECIALLY if they used it to create another game. Maybe it's because I'm a small time schmuck, but those resources are mine; I made them. It would be a real kick in the balls if someone just up and stole all my tiles to make another game from. Every last one of them was hand done by me for my own purposes. If I wanted other people to use them, I'd have posted them as a sprite sheet somewhere and been done with it by now.




Edit: And to be specific, no, I have absolutely nothing against fanfiction so long as it's not in the same format. 8-Bit is by no means a video game, so there's no problem with Brian doing it. Conversely, I think Brian would be pretty flattered if someone whipped up a decent Atomic Robo game, as it wouldn't be competing with his market. On the other hand, if someone started up a competing site called 16-Bit Theater and started copying his 8BT comics with 16-bit sprites, I think he'd be rightfully pissed.