Re: [GD-General] Copyright on games

[Simon S. <red...@ho...>]

>From: Gareth Lewin <GL...@cl...>
>To: gam...@li...
>Subject: RE: [GD-General] Copyright on games
>Date: Mon, 3 Mar 2003 14:44:23 -0000
>Reply-To: gam...@li...
>
>I will come out and say that Bust-A-Move clone was a random example based 
>on
>a game that you can play here with Sky (British sat TV company).
>
>I'm asking in general.
>
>IANAL = I Am Not A Lawyer ?
>
>My wife is, maybe I should ask her ? :) Although I doubt she would know,
>it's not her field (thus my question here).
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Steve Maier [mailto:st...@ys...]
> > Sent: 03 March 2003 14:37
> > To: gam...@li...
> > Subject: Re: [GD-General] Copyright on games
> >
> >
> > Well The Tetris Company has taken action against others that
> > have made Teris clones before.  Their website if I remember
> > correctly even had a link to talk to them about officially
> > licensed games, but they guy answering the emails was not
> > very helpful.
> >
> > I had heard of a publisher (Extreme3D) getting sued for
> > having clones, but then there is egames, which does alot of clones.
> >
> > IANAL, so I can't talk about the legality of a bust-a-move
> > clone, but there are alot of them out there - and some big
> > names making that type of clone for different consoles too.
> > So I think that you might fall under a copyright owners
> > radar, and that they would probably not sue, but there is
> > always a chance.  Take a look at Snood.  They have been a
> > very popular shareware version of bust-a-move and I don't
> > think that have been sued yet.
> >
> > Steve
> >
>

My understanding is that it's patents you have to worry about.  Patents 
being for the "idea" and copyright being for the "implementaion".

So you could copy the basics of the game idea, but you would have to make it 
look different. (Unless they have a patent)

The easiest way to find out what matters is to contact the creators of the 
original game, and a lawyer :)

--redwyre

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