• Light/Dark
  • Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.

What's the legality of Dreams and its recreations of existing games?

Kaeden

Kaeden

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,898
US
ArkhamFantasy said:
This is a lawyer talking in depth on the discussion.

Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Thanks for posting this.

One of the really great parts in there was how MM was talking about the positives of LBP with regards to IP infringement and how IP holders were actually asking them to be whitelisted and that they'll never request any of their material to be taken down because it makes their IP look really good. Which brought up the point that indeed 'most' people will probably build something in Dreams that is a GOOD take on whatever it is, instead of trying make it a negative. Therefore most IP holders probably won't have too much of a problem with it. Not all, but probably more than not.

Great video.
 
Dyle

Dyle

One Winged Slayer
The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
29,890
wildbite said:
As long as all the assets are created brand new, wouldn't it be the same as fan art?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Level design is also a form of copyrighted content, so if someone remakes a game in Dreams 1:1 with the original game's level design it could be considered copyright infringement
 
Iwao

Iwao

Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,776
I would love to know what the limit is for publishers taking action. Someone making an audio/visual re-creation of Sonic or Mario or some kind of animated short with these characters seems fine to me. That's like fanart/fanfiction and they'd have to be really petty to take that down. Then, how different is that from making a game using these assets? Really, I'd love to know.
 
Pankratous

Pankratous

Member
Oct 26, 2017
9,237
A lot of people in this thread don't seem to understand copyright... at all.

Probably the same people who upload DBZ videos to YouTube and mirror the image and voila, no copyright breach.
 
KDR_11k

KDR_11k

Banned
Nov 10, 2017
5,235
wildbite said:
As long as all the assets are created brand new, wouldn't it be the same as fan art?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Fan art is copyright infringement too unless explicitly permitted by the copyright holder (e.g. Lucas Arts used to explicitly permit fan works). It's usually ignored unless it becomes too big.

bsigg said:
So feel free to explain why it wouldn't
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

This is the fair use law, does that look like it'd apply to copies of games? What fair purpose would such a copy supposedly serve?
17 U.S.C. § 107
Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 17 U.S.C. § 106 and 17 U.S.C. § 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include:[6]

  1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
  2. the nature of the copyrighted work;
  3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
  4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.[7]
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Also fair use is an affirmative defense, the process is that you get sued for copyright infringement and in a court of law show that your copying serves one of the protected purposes. The court decides whether your use of the work is fair and not excessive for the purpose. "It's free" is not sufficient.
 
Last edited:
OP
OP

Deleted member 18944

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
6,944
KDR_11k said:
Fan art is copyright infringement too unless explicitly permitted by the copyright holder (e.g. Lucas Arts used to explicitly permit fan works). It's usually ignored unless it becomes too big.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

There is missing nuance to this.

If you are creating fan art that is transformative, that would fall under fair use.
 

Deleted member 44129

User requested account closure
Banned
May 29, 2018
7,690
I dont think that any of the recreations of existing IP's are of a scale that represents a "threat" to the real games. They're basically fan art. If someone did a 1:1 accurate Sonic The Hedgehog 2, there would be emails sent, but in the current form factor, I just don't think games publishers feel it's worth looking like spoilsports for the sake of a short inferior Sonic or Maria knock-off.
 
bsigg

bsigg

Member
Oct 25, 2017
22,537
KDR_11k said:
This is the fair use law, does that look like it'd apply to copies of games? What fair purpose would such a copy supposedly serve?
Also fair use is an affirmative defense, the process is that you get sued for copyright infringement and in a court of law show that your copying serves one of the protected purposes. The court decides whether your use of the work is fair and not excessive for the purpose. "It's free" is not sufficient.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Legalese means jack shit to me. What cases has this been applied to and how was it ruled.
 
OP
OP

Deleted member 18944

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
6,944
bsigg said:
I would assume everything falls under fair use since it's being recreated and not using existing assets (i.e. ripping models from another game and placing them in this). They won't be able to charge for anything.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
bsigg said:
So feel free to explain why it wouldn't
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Fair Use often utilizes four factors to determine what is and isn't copyright infringement.

Transformative

Examples of transformative work - Parodies.

Nature of the Copyright

Examples - Educational content

Amount of copyright taken in said work

Effect that the work has on a potential market

---

Just because you recreated the work and did not use existing assets to to create it does not fall under fair use, because what factor would it be falling under? Recreating the work isn't transformative, because you're replicating, copying, the work.

Additionally, you selling the work or not is also not a defense of said work and if it should be allowed. You are no longer using said work for personal use. Putting it out there, even with no money exchanging hands, is still beneficial to you and potentially infringes on a potential market for said work.

Even if the copyright holder wasn't thinking of said potential market, that work is still infringing on it. ( Rogers v. Koons, 960)
 
KDR_11k

KDR_11k

Banned
Nov 10, 2017
5,235
Hobbes said:
There is missing nuance to this.

If you are creating fan art that is transformative, that would fall under fair use.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
No, transformative does not automatically mean fair use, otherwise EA could take Mario and make a Mario game without Nintendo being able to stop them. Transformative makes your work a derivative work rather than a straight copy but you still need a license or a fair use case to be allowed to create that derivative work in the first place.

bsigg said:
Legalese means jack shit to me. What cases has this been applied to and how was it ruled.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
You're the one making the claim that fair use applies, how about you do the digging?
 

Nuclear Muffin

Banned
Oct 29, 2017
4,721
Every bit as copyright infringing as any other fan game.

Expect a lot of ceist and desists and a lot of Sony trying to save face as they pretend to not be responsible for the hundreds of Mario fan games that are gonna be conveniently hosted on their platform.
 
KDR_11k

KDR_11k

Banned
Nov 10, 2017
5,235
Hobbes said:
If your counter point is this sentence, you do not understand what transformative means.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Making a new game with an existing character is about as transformative as most fan art, no? A fan fic still uses the characters of the original work. Or do you mean only stuff like collages which would be a bit difficult with Dreams?
 
OP
OP

Deleted member 18944

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
6,944
KDR_11k said:
Making a new game with an existing character is about as transformative as most fan art, no? A fan fic still uses the characters of the original work. Or do you mean only stuff like collages which would be a bit difficult with Dreams?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Here's an example of transformative taken from Stanford's article of Fair Use.

Roger borrows several quotes from the speech given by the CEO of a logging company. Roger prints these quotes under photos of old-growth redwoods in his environmental newsletter. By juxtaposing the quotes with the photos of endangered trees, Roger has transformed the remarks from their original purpose and used them to create a new insight. The copying would probably be permitted as a fair use.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Your point doesn't work because you are saying that EA takes mario and makes a mario game. There's nothing transformative about that. At all.

Yes, most fan art is infringing, but also if your art is considered transformative, it is under fair use.
 
eraFROMAN

eraFROMAN

One Winged Slayer
Member
Mar 12, 2019
2,874
Fair use, Dreams is just a tool set and these kind of projects won't cut into the IP in any real way. Asset lifting is the only dangerous part, but otherwise, no one's mistaking this for the real thing.

... You would think.
 
Pyro

Pyro

God help us the mods are making weekend threads
Member
Jul 30, 2018
14,505
United States
I think they skirt by because it's free and they can only be played on that closed platform.
 
crpj31

crpj31

Member
Dec 13, 2017
560
I think that the best approach would be if Sega and Capcom, for example, sell as dlc the assets for Sonic, Mega man, Final Fight, Shinobi, Streets of Rage ,etc. Nintendo would never allow that for Mario or Pokemon.
But what will happen is probably Media Molecule make the content unavailable to other users and ask the creator to change that content. Or even Media Molecule or Sony contact directly the owners of the IPs and let them moderate what can or can't be publish into Dreams if it identifies a copyright infrigment.
 
Cyberclops

Cyberclops

Member
Mar 15, 2019
1,439
I'm wondering if you could make the argument that copyrighted content is becoming a major selling point for dreams. Sure , no one's paying for a Sonic fangame, but I'm sure some people bought Dreams specifically to play a bunch fangames that infringe on copyrights.

At a minimum, I can see popular dreams being DMCA'ed but it wouldn't surprise me if MM end up having to preemptively stop their users from uploading stuff that infringes on copyright. Sitting back and doing nothing could just show that they're complacent.
 
chrisPjelly

chrisPjelly

Avenger
Oct 29, 2017
10,491
People overblow the "Sony should SERIOUSLY make this a game engine" angle. You can't literally make a game 1:1 with the original and there are severe limitations that disqualify it from being a proper substitute. Any company who DMCAs an entire IP off Dreams will come across as extremely insecure and/or overprotective
 
Jon Carter

Jon Carter

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
5,746
Even if the creators themselves can't profit from their creations (which is irrelevant anyway), Sony does. Any time there's a thread on here about this or that IP being recreated in Dreams, you've got people saying it makes them want to buy the game.
 
Suicide King

Suicide King

Banned
Oct 27, 2017
1,018
I'm pretty sure every single fan project on Dreams can be seen as fair use. Cease-and-desist are more about intimidation tactics and less about legal rights.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.