Question about pirating

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Question about pirating

Postby LaChaise » Wed Aug 05, 2015 7:01 am

Hey I need a mod, what our policy on download links for stuff that is not licensed in the US? And what about fan translation patches or mods for games? All of these are in some sort of a gray area when it comes to legality so I was wondering what the rule was on here.

I'm asking because we are talking about a game on Octo's video game diary thread. It's a Japanese game that has never been licensed outside of Japan (and probably won't ever be), and there's a fan translation for it but I couldn't find a version that wasn't prepackaged with a copy of the game itself.
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Re: Question about pirating

Postby Learned Nand » Wed Aug 05, 2015 7:57 am

In what way are mods or translations a gray area? There's no law against them.
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Re: Question about pirating

Postby LaChaise » Wed Aug 05, 2015 8:05 am

Sure but some sites do frown upon linking to unofficial content like this.
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Re: Question about pirating

Postby Marcuse » Wed Aug 05, 2015 9:45 am

If it's free additional content created by a fan I see no reason to consider that a problem. We have a problem with pirating, which is obtaining copies of a game without paying the company that made them. We have a mod thread for Skyrim already, and I see this as no different.

It's adding to the game, to make it more accessible to non-Japanese speakers, rather than taking anything out, cracking it, or circumventing the requirement to pay, so I can't see a problem with it.
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Re: Question about pirating

Postby Dr. Ambiguous » Wed Aug 05, 2015 9:57 am

Well, the issue there Marc, is that the link with the fan translation (the mod in question, so to speak), also includes a copy of the game itself, not exactly legally. The trouble is, the only way to get a copy of said translation, is with the illegal copy of the game. The game however, was never sold stateside, soooo I'm not entirely sure where that exactly stands legally, but as such, I'm a bit iffy on it.

For the record, unofficial content like mods and such, I have no problem with linking to. Since they require that you already own the game, and they don't come with the game. This is a little different, and given that it was never licensed or sold in the US, or for that matter any country other than Japan, I don't care if people do that, buuuuuuut I'm a bit iffy about linking to them anyway. To be clear, I'm not sure if this is technically covered by our rule against piracy or not, so this is not to be taken as a statement on policy.
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Re: Question about pirating

Postby Marcuse » Wed Aug 05, 2015 10:08 am

Hmm, yeah if the mod requires an illegal copy of the game, then that might be problematic. I think we'll confer and see what comes of that.
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