koobas.hobune.stream
License and Copyright consequences
This question is not whether of Unity but is related to programming, then all those who do games will probably have the answer to this question.
OK, I'm making a game like guitar hero but I just found out that guitar hero has been losing so much money because they did the songs claim for copyright, then I have 2 questions I need recommendations, information and solutions.
1.- I plan to put my game on the web for all to play but my question is that if I can run into such problems of having to pay to put songs from groups (I need information and then if I have to pay how could I solve this and recommendations)
2.- In my game I imported models of web sites that you need a license then my question is if I can be affected of anything for this type of game that I plan to put on the web and how it can be solve.
You're best bet is to stay away from using other peoples work, especially as an indie developer. If you get song files and put them up on the Internet and especially charge for it without permission you can be sued.
However, the company that owns the songs can choose to ignore it if it's not worth they're time, or if you are really lucky you can get them to pay you for prompting their songs.
But if I were you I would stay out of it. IF YOU USE THEIR MATERIAL THEY CAN AND WILL SUE YOU AND THEY WILL WIN. so don't unless you can get permission, which is unlikely. Sorry.
sounds like possibility to win, nothing or lose. So I don't know what to do, do you think the consequences are really bad??, because of that better I stop doing my game once for all, I really don't want to get in problems only because I want to do a free web game :P
and what is worst, I am not new doing this game actually, I just was planning to do it awesome and I don't want to just throw it to the garbage for this situation.
How bad they are depends on the legal copyright grounds in place. Assu$$anonymous$$g your game doesn't get popular (only a few hundred people play), you wont get sued because it is probably not worth their time and money.
Don't do it, you are just fooling yourself to think you'll get away from it. The moment that a publisher/artist/legal department get a hint that you are infringing their copyright material you will get a 'cease and desist' letter. Which will say unless you take down the material immediately you will be sued. Even after the letter the companies are still within their right to sue you if they feel the need to do so (e.g. to stop others from thinking they can do the same). Whats more being sued will not be for the license costs, it will likely be punitive, ....
... along the lines of those cases against file shares as they will claim a loss for each person who played the game, not just for a single song.
Further more you state you are going to use unlicensed assets/models, whilst these artists might not have a legal department, they can still sue you easily enough, but worse they can destroy your credibility with a simple internet campaign. People do not like their copyrighted assets being used for free.
Simple answer, if you use copyrighted material, you must pay a license.
As regard to songs, that generally means licensing them directly from the owners/publishers. However that simply gives you the license to include the music in the game or to distribute, in all likelyhood you would also need to pay royalties for 'performance' (e.g. playback) of the song. This is rather complex as a number of companies exist to deal with licensing/royalties.
As for models and other assets, again you'll need to buy a license to use them in your game, unless they are released for free/creative commons.
In either case, just because you are releasing a webgame, or aren't charging for it means nothing, you still have to get the licenses, else you will at best be shut down at worst sued.
There is a possible workaround for the music, that is to simply not include any songs. Instead you would provide the data file for a file (i.e the note chart) and let end users access their song library. Of course there are issues such as many different versions of a single song in a verity of formats, from official releases to cd rips or pirated, which might require multiple note chart data files to support.
but, do you know how bad can be the consequences if I do my game normally, because it sounds a little weird to do the note chart and then the people put the song?? it sounds like no one would play my game for actually need to get every song and then put it the game, another thing, there are some songs that the song is not for the studio version there are for live version so, I think those songs there would be no problem but not sure so that are my questions, I don't know if you know something about this.
As I said there would be problems, but its the only way you could do it and stay legal. As for studio vs live songs, its all the same, its all copyrighted.
No, but then you have a different problem as you are facilitating the downloading of illegal songs, assu$$anonymous$$g they are copyrighted. Basically you are acting like a file sharing database, which for non-copyright material is fine, but not for copyrighted material, case in point would be say ThePirateBay. What you could do is provide links to say iTunes for people to go and buy specific tracks that you have compiled a note chart for.
The best way for this to work is to build up a community and let them take over this issue. Let the community build the note charts for specific songs, they may even provide several alternatives to cover say studio vs live versions. Its then up to the users whether they buy songs or not.
It really depends upon what you aim is for the game. Is it just to learn or expand your program$$anonymous$$g knowledge or if you want to build up a commercial product. Perhaps investigate how others deal with this issue, e.g. Frets On Fire or Step$$anonymous$$ania. Here is a link to get you started http://soosck.wordpress.com/2010/12/09/open-source-music-games-linux/
