15 replies to this topic

[AdmiralJaden]

Has anyone ever seen nintendo come here and do a C&D or similar takedown measures? Just curious.

[Magi_Hero]

Alleged ones in the past have come to Armageddon Games but Nintendo apparently does know about ZC and hasn't bothered us.

[AdmiralJaden]

Alleged ones in the past have come to Armageddon Games but Nintendo apparently does know about ZC and hasn't bothered us.

I always wondered about it, personally. ZC is pretty popular, hitting a lot of major networks and channels, and given Nintendo's passion for throwing down the gauntlet (no pun intended in zelda's case), it's kind of surprising that some of the big games haven't been shut down.

[Russ]

Part of the problem is the ease with which we could recover from a C&D. Zelda Classic's source code is entirely custom, just built to work similarly to Zelda 1's. If we were to be C&D'd, we'd just have to remove anything Nintendo owns from the program. So we'd change the name, change the default tileset to something like Koten that's entirely custom, remove the Z1 midis, 1st.qst, and 2nd.qst and bam. It'd be ZC, stripped of anything they could put a copyright claim on. So if Nintendo issued a C&D, it might take down certain quests from the database, but ZC as a whole would only suffer a temporary setback. Meanwhile, Nintendo would get a lot of criticism for attacking fan games. So nothing to gain and reputation to lose. It wouldn't be a smart move for them.

[Anthus]

Russ has a good point, but the reality is it could happen any time, but it is pretty unlikely.

[Naru]

What is a C&D. I don't think Nintendo really cares. About our opinion. And thanks to the new profile pics I keep confusing Russ with Aevin.

[Sephiroth]

@Naru a C&D is a letter or other document that a company which owns an intellectual property, (in this case Nintendo owning the Legend of Zelda franchise, along with copyrights on said franchise not limited to the games, characters, artwork, etc) sends a letter or notice to a 3rd party (whether it be another company or a group of individuals, or even a lone individual either asking them to stop what they are doing and never pick it back up, or in some cases, wishing to discuss licensing terms so the company that owns the copyright(s) can keep their copyrights active. ... Because once someone owns a copyright, they may be legally obligated to pursue others infringing on their copyright, less they lose it.
 

I am not trained in the legal arts. This post need not be taken in as final. See a trained lawyer on this matter if you want a more accurate description.

Edited by Sephiroth, 20 September 2016 - 05:56 PM.

[thepsynergist]

If Kotaku finds out, my Pokemon game might be the first.

[Kivitoe]

Wouldn't Nintendo want a fan made game? Wouldn't it just build a bigger fan base for Nintendo? Plus, it's their fault for just giving us Mario Maker and not Zelda Maker also. If Nintendo made a Zelda Maker though, It probably wouldn't have scripting, tile making, etc. So basically, I think that if ZC doesn't mess with Nintendo, they don't mess with ZC and all of our quests.

Edited by Kivitoe, 21 September 2016 - 05:09 PM.

[thepsynergist]

Wouldn't Nintendo want a fan made game? Wouldn't it just build a bigger fan base for Nintendo? Plus, it's their fault for just giving us Mario Maker and not Zelda Maker also. If Nintendo made a Zelda Maker though, It probably wouldn't have scripting, tile making, etc. So basically, I think that if ZC doesn't mess with Nintendo, they don't mess with ZC and all of our quests.

 

That's a lot of people's stances, but since Iwata died, the new president of Nintendo has been going after fan material like crazy.  I wish they'd honor doujinshi works outside of Japan...

[Naru]

Who is Iwata. What are Doujinshi works? Did I miss anything important?

We had a similar topic not long ago. And even more similar topics before that.

I might have played pokemon uranium before. I honestly understand why they want to stop such a game. And isn't it better for them to just reach out randomly to discourage fangame-makers instead of letting them be? Not that I like it.

[Russ]

Who is Iwata. What are Doujinshi works? Did I miss anything important?

Iwata was the president of Nintendo. He was a really cool guy who basically all the fans loved, but he died last year of cancer, and so the company has a new President now. Doujinshi, as used in this context at least, refers to unauthorized fan works (it has a more specific meaning but that's unimportant here). In Japan, manga fans will quite often make derivative works (basically fan-made unofficial manga) and sell them at conventions. Despite being in violation of copyright, they're very, very rarely charged with any crime. Contrast that with Nintendo recently. They've been shutting down fangames like made, included AM2R, a hugely popular (free) remake of Metroid II, or more strangely, over 500 Mario flash games.

[AdmiralJaden]

@Naru a C&D is a letter or other document that a company which owns an intellectual property, (in this case Nintendo owning the Legend of Zelda franchise, along with copyrights on said franchise not limited to the games, characters, artwork, etc) sends a letter or notice to a 3rd party (whether it be another company or a group of individuals, or even a lone individual either asking them to stop what they are doing and never pick it back up, or in some cases, wishing to discuss licensing terms so the company that owns the copyright(s) can keep their copyrights active. ... Because once someone owns a copyright, they may be legally obligated to pursue others infringing on their copyright, less they lose it.
 

I am not trained in the legal arts. This post need not be taken in as final. See a trained lawyer on this matter if you want a more accurate description.

Common misconception about copyright law, doesn't work that way. A company doesn't have to actively defend their copyright in order to keep it. Copyright lasts for the holder's whole life-span and +70 years (in the U.S.) after their death. That's a system that doesn't really need to be defended. Trademarks, however, seem to be a different story. I remember reading about a judge telling someone that a trademark, because of what it covers, could be lost if the company using it does not actively pursue legal action against infringement. I guess it's assumed that it's no longer in use or something (I don't know what the logic there was). But Trademarks encompass things like Logos (in some cases, where the logo is text as well), business names (probably), slogans, etc.
So, Nintendo doesn't have to defend their works, but they do have to defend titles such as "The Legend Of Zelda" or similar. And of course their artwork and any likeness thereof (even fan-made sprites) fall under their copyright domain.

 

Iwata was the president of Nintendo. He was a really cool guy who basically all the fans loved, but he died last year of cancer, and so the company has a new President now. Doujinshi, as used in this context at least, refers to unauthorized fan works (it has a more specific meaning but that's unimportant here). In Japan, manga fans will quite often make derivative works (basically fan-made unofficial manga) and sell them at conventions. Despite being in violation of copyright, they're very, very rarely charged with any crime. Contrast that with Nintendo recently. They've been shutting down fangames like made, included AM2R, a hugely popular (free) remake of Metroid II, or more strangely, over 500 Mario flash games.

AM2R was awesome lol
But yeah, Nintendo has been doing a lot of that, and it wouldn't really surprise me if a quest here with great quality would tick them off lol (they suffer from quality envy, but when the fans want something specific and they ignore that and go with something else, it's hard for fans to not just make what they want to play themselves, and give it the quality we all come to expect from Nintendo, even though nintendo hasn't been doing great quality lately).

[Anthus]

I want to play devil's advocate here, and say that I think sometimes, Nintendo fans can be huge dicks in some ways. We steal their games (some of us), we always whine about anything, and we feel entitled that they give us something because we've been fans for so long. We feel like we deserve things. The reality is, Nintendo's "hardcore" fanbase is small, and dwindling, so they have to make "casual shovelware" to actually make money. That's all I'm going to say about it, though.

As far as them pursuing fan works, it is something that seems to be happening more, just from what I've seen, and I'm not really sure how they feel about ZC. I'm really starting to believe they forgot about it, or something. Seriously, you'd think we'd be right up the hammer's ally. I'm not saying I want that to happen by any means, I'm just saying, I really don't know, and it puzzles me is all.

[AdmiralJaden]

I want to play devil's advocate here, and say that I think sometimes, Nintendo fans can be huge dicks in some ways. We steal their games (some of us), we always whine about anything, and we feel entitled that they give us something because we've been fans for so long. We feel like we deserve things. The reality is, Nintendo's "hardcore" fanbase is small, and dwindling, so they have to make "casual shovelware" to actually make money. That's all I'm going to say about it, though.

 

As far as them pursuing fan works, it is something that seems to be happening more, just from what I've seen, and I'm not really sure how they feel about ZC. I really starting to believe they forgot about it, or something. Seriously, you'd think we'd be right up the hammer's ally. I'm not saying I want that to happen by any means, I'm just saying, I really don't know, and it puzzles me is all.

That's pretty much my take as well (on Nintendo vs ZC), it is rather odd, given how popular ZC is.
I don't personally think that long time fans feel entitled, we just know what we want in a video game, and won't settle for basic stuff lol. I don't think expecting high quality games amounts to 'entitlement', it just means we expect such a company to continue with the quality of games that they've had for years. Many developers in the AAA market have focused more on 'rapid-fire' games to make money, but that right there is part of what lead to the gaming crash of the early 80's with atari. It wasn't just the quality of the games, it was how often the company shelled out games as well. While there's less risk of that today, because of high quality graphics, it is possible that gamers will eventually tire of the rapid fire nature of the latest games, considering most of those games can be played all the way through within about 6 hours on average.
Personally, that's where I'm at with the industry as a whole: I don't like to buy a game for $60 only to have it last all of 6 hours, or even only a week. I mean, I grew up during a time (from NES onward) where quality games lasted months, and it wasn't only because of a lack of internet at the time, it was because they were fun to play and had really good mechanics that didn't seem repetitive (like modern FPS games seem to be now). In the case of nintendo's rapid-fire approach (if you could call it that, in their case) being smaller games to attract an audience, they need to realize that they didn't get where they are by selling smaller games over a few months or so, they got where they are, by creating games that took a long time to beat, such as metroid, or zelda, or even super mario bros. (all NES), so gamers knew they were getting something that would hold them over until the next big game.
To me, rapid-fire development takes the wrong approach, it's a "twice as bright, half as long" type of thing, and while I'm not a business man myself, it seems to me that it would be better in the long run to prove that the company can make games that the fans enjoy on the whole, rather than trying to constantly win over new customers and spending more money (which is a business model that I'm familiar with: It's more expensive to gain customers than it is to keep existing ones).
Anyway, that's my two cents on that note lol. Got a little off-topic-ish but it's fine.