Hey guys, i plan to actually do more stuff on smilebasic as soon as college starts, but im kinda confused on somethings.
IF we make our own Sprites, Are we able to use them even if they belong to a company? for example, i wanted to Make some Gundam sprites (Not ripped off another game) and use them for a game, Will Bandai come and tear me a new one if i do that? i noticed that theres a game that ripped a "Yoshis's Island" For Snes Sprite (they modified it also) and used it in their game, Is nintendo going to smack me if i do such a thing?
I did read the recent originality post that someone made and i realize thats important, i will make original stuff but im just trying to learn at the moment!
Lastly, i just now saw the "DLC" gold content we are able to "Subscribe" (:/) to get larger file sizes and a few things, i kinda planned on making longer story games, Do people run out of the maximum amount of space easily?
Gold Membership: Rarely. The only thing you have to watch out for is the 10 project upload slots, which become even harder to manage if you upgrade to the 100. Just take down useless stuff or consolidate smaller tools if you have to.
Intellectual Property: The problem is almost always when people steal sprites directly, I've never known of original art of a copyrighted property even coming up. There's Touhou stuff but the creator encourages derivative works in the setting and SmileBoom knows that. Gundam franchise... you might be able to get away with original art based on characters from the series. The safest thing to do is not follow the designs completely and just call them generic powered suits. There aren't any known cases like this that I can say with any certainty.
SmileBASIC simply removes it from the servers when they find something they consider copyright infringement, but I imagine if you don't actually have the name Gundam in it you should be fine, but I have no real experience in that. As for the "gold membership" I would recommend just seeing if you run out of space first. The only thing that takes up any real space is images, so unless you have a lot of sprites and grps you should be fine.
@Lego_meister , @Lumage Thank you both for answering! The gundam naming part is probably smart, i didnt even think of it!
To clarify, Bandai will own all of the names and characters in the Gundam universe. If you blatantly copy any of the designs, that can be considered copyright infringement. Using any specific names from the series, too, is unlawful (although it can be pulled off correctly in a parody or easter egg, but that's in very small quantities, which isn't the larger part of the case here).
Whether anyone will care enough to take action and whether SmileBoom considers it a threat is different, but as long as you're careful and not blatantly stealing you'll... probably be fine.
