Fan made spinoff or Mod. Is it legal and a good thing to do?

[arch111]

Hi all.

Now with engines like Unreal 4 and Unity being free and very powerful, would it be legal and ok to either do a standalone game set in the Warframe Universe, or a mod for a shooter or rpg?

Completely free of course.

I would love to play a FPS shooter as a grineer, vs Corpus with Infested and Tenno as bosses. FPS Conclave is a dream of mine.

I would love to play as a merchant or smuggler and live the events of the game among the real people, factions, Syndicates and NPC:s.

I would love to play an adventure-game in this universe, point and click. 

- In short. If someone were to make a mod or even a small game, would it be allowed?

And would the players want and like it?

Please share insights and opinions.

- Arch111 -

[LordOfScrugging]

3 minutes ago, arch111 said:

Hi all.

Now with engines like Unreal 4 and Unity being free and very powerful, would it be legal and ok to either do a standalone game set in the Warframe Universe, or a mod for a shooter or rpg?

Completely free of course.

I would love to play a FPS shooter as a grineer, vs Corpus with Infested and Tenno as bosses. FPS Conclave is a dream of mine.

I would love to play as a merchant or smuggler and live the events of the game among the real people, factions, Syndicates and NPC:s.

I would love to play an adventure-game in this universe, point and click. 

- In short. If someone were to make a mod or even a small game, would it be allowed?

And would the players want and like it?

Please share insights and opinions.

- Arch111 -

I think so long as it isn't making any sort of profit and not using direct assets from the game, it'll be considered a fan game. Look at lost sector. it's a 2d side scrolling platformer where you play as a pixilated frost fighting corpus units.

[tnccs215]

A Tell-Talesque game based on the life of a grineer or corpus trooper, or who knows, a refugee, could be very fun.

[dealingtrap]

19 minutes ago, tnccs215 said:

A Tell-Talesque game based on the life of a grineer or corpus trooper, or who knows, a refugee, could be very fun.

"Clem, the origin story" ?

[CrudShuzKong]

 

[tnccs215]

Just now, dealingtrap said:

"Clem, the origin story" ?

eh... Not of my liking. I'm not a fan ofClem.

but yeah, if someone wants to do it, go ahead.

Edited April 29, 2016 by tnccs215

[izzatuw]

If you try to directly profit off a Warframe based game and try to do things like Steam Greenlight without DE's permission than it's illegal. 

 

As long as it's something like a Fallout mod than it's cool.

 

[arch111]

1 hour ago, LordOfScrugging said:

I think so long as it isn't making any sort of profit and not using direct assets from the game, it'll be considered a fan game. Look at lost sector. it's a 2d side scrolling platformer where you play as a pixilated frost fighting corpus units.

So say I made a game with Unity.  Here is where it gets fuzzy; can I or can't I use ported/ripped models?

Or is Steam movies an exeption?

We all hate games/mods allmost finished and then shot down by lawyers.

[(PSN)SektorZR1]

55 minutes ago, tnccs215 said:

eh... Not of my liking. I'm not a fan ofClem.

[tnccs215]

1 minute ago, (PS4)SektorZR1 said:

sorry. It feels rather forced.

[arch111]

Chrysis seems like the perfect game to play a warframe in first person. Likely hard to do.

[Xgomme]

Since you don't sell it and claim at yours, you can do whatever fangame you want

[arch111]

2 hours ago, Xgomme said:

Since you don't sell it and claim at yours, you can do whatever fangame you want

Yes but can I use actual ripped items? Like in steam movies?

[Hemmo67]

3 hours ago, dealingtrap said:

"Clem, the origin story" ?

DO IT ; _ ;

[MichelPostma]

I think you'd be fine making something like that if you have the skills. Then when it's done you can show it to the devs. 

Beat and most likely case is that they will praise your work and allow you to distribute it freely. 

Worst case is thay they will say no to it, but then you will only end up with a game to play for personal use. 

I mean? That's not a bad scenario either

[angias]

3 hours ago, tnccs215 said:

A Tell-Talesque game based on the life of a grineer or corpus trooper, or who knows, a refugee, could be very fun.

Tell tale of the lotus in the event of the great war.

[(XBOX)dude1286]

Best case scenario: DE will love it and hire you and the team that helped you build it, publish it, and have your team either support it or create more amazing spin-off games.

Worst case scenario: you get a cease and desist order.

Most likely scenario (with DE): they will like it, maybe say something about it in one of their streams, and will allow it if the game does not directly give you profit off of it.

[Jaruis]

3 hours ago, tnccs215 said:

A Tell-Talesque game based on the life of a grineer or corpus trooper, or who knows, a refugee, could be very fun.

Here's hoping that the story is vaguely similar to tales from the borderlands

A former corrupted individual who later takes the liking of his enemies and later grows attached to them.

Or we could, like, make that a quest 

[tnccs215]

14 minutes ago, angias said:

Tell tale of the lotus in the event of the great war.

I'd love that

 

5 minutes ago, Jaruis said:

Here's hoping that the story is vaguely similar to tales from the borderlands

A former corrupted individual who later takes the liking of his enemies and later grows attached to them.

Or we could, like, make that a quest 

Not so original, but cool too,

[TennoPain]

Moding just kills games for me thats how i got bored of skyrim 

[Tails-san]

Other thing that might be required based on typical rules for this kind of thing: Do not give it a name that makes it sound official, or otherwise try to make it seem official when it's not.

38 minutes ago, arch111 said:

Yes but can I use actual ripped items? Like in steam movies?

Strictly speaking, no, and even the source filmmaker stuff technically isn't allowed to (Ripping the models is technically a EULA violation). However, you'll notice that DE hasn't been taking these things down, even featuring their work on Prime Time and community spotlights. Deathsnack's site is also technically a massive EULA violation (Datamining and unauthorized connection to the service), but similarly remains up. Of course, EULAs in general are typically more of a "we reserve the right to take down anything that does this at our sole discretion" than something that will be enforced with an iron fist. They also reserve the right to explicitly allow things on a case by case basis, and it is not uncommon for companies to make exceptions for video creation (machinima or otherwise). (I am also not a lawyer, nor do I have any formal training in such, this is simply based on my interpretation of the document, though I am fairly confident in my ability to understand legalese.)

So basically, It's the same thing as everyone else has said, regardless of your use of game assets, just with a bit of a higher chance of being told no or receiving a cease and desist if you use them.

[Xgomme]

1 hour ago, arch111 said:

Yes but can I use actual ripped items? Like in steam movies?

Yeah, those machinima on youtube are not made with selfmade models ^^ If you want to export Frost to Gary's mod for example you can, since it's clear that it's a model made by DE, and in Warframe. So just put the classic copyright sentence like "All content, ideas and models are property of DE, in the game Warframe. Blablabla made for non profit project, etc, etc"

 

EDIT : But like Tails-san said, if in a bad mood day they want you to remove your game, you'll have to remove it. But since they don't do it for machinima, and since you don't try to make money with it, I'm pretty sure they won't bother you and maybe they'll like the fact that you made a game about theirs.

 

The EULA is totaly a safe button if someone is going too far, but they rarely use it for fangames, almost going to say never but I remember some Nintendo's facts... x)

 

+ Clem : Origins can be made kinda easily on RPG maker, will maybe give it a try 

Edited April 29, 2016 by Xgomme