Poll: Is modding a game illegal?
- Thread starter Orinon
- Start date
You've probably just gotten spooked by the "any unautherized moddification... is illegal" or something like that. I've noticed that on things before. There's even an episode of Futurama about it.
My rule, and I'm not sure if a court will back you up, but:
If you own it, it's yours. Fuck everyone else.Those licensing statements just let you know who your friends are.
Most of that stuff is just companies like Apple bitching about things like Hack-intoshes, which I'm pretty sure is legal to make.
My rule, and I'm not sure if a court will back you up, but:
If you own it, it's yours. Fuck everyone else.Those licensing statements just let you know who your friends are.
Most of that stuff is just companies like Apple bitching about things like Hack-intoshes, which I'm pretty sure is legal to make.
In my opinion, Modding is fantastic and in no way illegal. If anything, modding would seem to increase sales for a game.
I played an MMORPG called Final Fantasy XI and I modded it all the time. Changed out models, changed out music, even messed with alternately textured environments. Never anything too sophisticated, but definitely altering the game's default models and textures. I also ran a 3rd party windower which Square frowned upon for the longest time. But, once they realized players were going to find ways to run the game windowed one way or another, they went ahead and gave the game a legitimate window option (but it didn't run as well as the 3rd party one so I never used it, lol).
But as far as I know, once a game is yours it belongs to you. If you do any modding, there is absolutely nothing they can do to you unless it affects things on their servers, gives you an unfair advantage in online play, or if you distribute it to others and it could lead to them having a pirated version of the game.
But as far as I know, once a game is yours it belongs to you. If you do any modding, there is absolutely nothing they can do to you unless it affects things on their servers, gives you an unfair advantage in online play, or if you distribute it to others and it could lead to them having a pirated version of the game.
Actually I'm fairly sure it is perfectly legal provided you own the rights to play the game you are downloading.Orinon said:
Why would it be illegal for you to sell content? As long as it's clearly branded differently from bethesda how is that different from them selling DLC? It isn't illegal to sell modifications to operating systems (there are plenty of tools to modify how windows looks and works that are sold at a profit), I can't imagine why a dedicated program would be any differnt. The release of TESCS also seems to pretty strongly imply that bethesda don't care if you mod their games.
On a side note, you should hold it against bethesda that their games are buggy. Sure, it's going to be near impossible to make a game as big as skyrim without any bugs, but skyrim seems to be a hell of a lot more buggy than oblivion or morrowind were, and it's exactly because of this "oh that's fair enough" consumer attitude that it is. There are some bugs that are just flat out inexcusable (especially the sound glitch that broke the main quest for many users) and some that are more reasonable (minor animations glitching and the like). Morrowind, for example, had some bugs, but the game was playable, no doubt because they properly finished it before release as they knew they wouldn't be able to publish patches to the xbox[footnote]It was primarily a PC game, but the majority of bugs would have been prevalent on both platforms, so it's probable that the PC version benefeted from the xbox release.[/footnote] as easily as they can to the xbox 360/PS3/PC as today.
Well, since you're not talking about modding as such, but more about creating your own patch...
This used to be a legally protected right. You could patch your own software. (though you would have to do so without the aid of the original source code, which isn't a trivial task.)
However, more recent laws, such as the DMCA have cracked down on this.
Although even the DMCA contains provisions for reverse-engineering computer software for certain reasons...
Such as inter-operability.
Consider the case for instance where you have a business database, which contains large amounts of data that is critical to the running of your business.
However, the company that made it went bust, and you need to interface with this system somehow, (because replacing it altogether and porting across the data would be too complex maybe).
You are well within your rights in a situation like that to reverse engineer the program so you can get it to work with your newer systems.
Another example might be microsoft word. They've changed their policy in recent years, but for a long time the *.doc file format was completely undocumented.
This meant if you needed to read it, but didn't have access to microsoft software, your only option would be to reverse engineer the file format.
Which, again, is perfectly legal. (Except that certain file formats contain software patents. Eg. While it's legal to reverse engineer the MP3 format, the compression scheme is patented, so even if you succeeded, you'd need to licence the appropriate patent.)
So... Is patching a game you didn't make, illegal? That's circumstantial depending on what you're doing to it, and what your reasons for doing so are.
Also, in general, laws about such things have been getting more restrictive with time, so it's worth some degree of caution here.
This used to be a legally protected right. You could patch your own software. (though you would have to do so without the aid of the original source code, which isn't a trivial task.)
However, more recent laws, such as the DMCA have cracked down on this.
Although even the DMCA contains provisions for reverse-engineering computer software for certain reasons...
Such as inter-operability.
Consider the case for instance where you have a business database, which contains large amounts of data that is critical to the running of your business.
However, the company that made it went bust, and you need to interface with this system somehow, (because replacing it altogether and porting across the data would be too complex maybe).
You are well within your rights in a situation like that to reverse engineer the program so you can get it to work with your newer systems.
Another example might be microsoft word. They've changed their policy in recent years, but for a long time the *.doc file format was completely undocumented.
This meant if you needed to read it, but didn't have access to microsoft software, your only option would be to reverse engineer the file format.
Which, again, is perfectly legal. (Except that certain file formats contain software patents. Eg. While it's legal to reverse engineer the MP3 format, the compression scheme is patented, so even if you succeeded, you'd need to licence the appropriate patent.)
So... Is patching a game you didn't make, illegal? That's circumstantial depending on what you're doing to it, and what your reasons for doing so are.
Also, in general, laws about such things have been getting more restrictive with time, so it's worth some degree of caution here.
Its your property. The only thing that Bethesda can say about a mod is that "If the Mod screws up the game its not our problem". As for someone selling the mods. Again its the persons property and they can do what they want with it. It would be like Ford pressing charges on a garage because the owner wanted to put a body kit on it.
Game companies need to get over this idea that they still own a game after you've bought it. Its the only industry i can think of off the top of my head that can get away with it.
Game companies need to get over this idea that they still own a game after you've bought it. Its the only industry i can think of off the top of my head that can get away with it.
Not necessarily. Some EULAs are pretty tight on the matter that you don't own the product (to simplify the things a bit) but rather are allowed to use it. I recently heard somebody claiming just that - once you pay for a game, you can do with it whatever you want, which is absolutely and totally wrong. Their example was that, if you buy a game, you can then distribute it and that's legal (because you hold all the rights over your copy of the product, which apparently includes making further copies for others to use). Well, that's the whole point of having licenses, to set limits to what users can do with a product.sketch_zeppelin said:
Now, that doesn't mean that every piece of software you have is just a flimsy "You are only allowed to use this and only according to this list of rules!", there are perfectly liberal and user friendly licenses out there, including ones that let you do whatever the hell you want with your copy (reselling included). I just wanted you to recognise the difference of owning a physical product (like a car) and a digital one (like a game).
Why is this a poll?
Polls sample opinions. This is a technical question for an expert or a question to look up. I don't take polls to find out the mechanism of action of propanol, the mass of an electron, or the capital of Kazakhstan.
Second, different games have different EULAs which you agree to when you install, meaning the answer would be, "Depends on what the EULA says, whether it's enforceable where you are, and so on." EULAs are contracts and have been dragged into the courts before.
What if a EULA prohibits modding, but the person who purchased the game is a minor? What if you move to a different region (state or nation state) which wouldn't recognize the EULA? What if the EULA contains clauses which would get it kicked out if the company tried to press claims on it, as boilerplate contracts (contracts of adhesion) can be ruled unreasonable and declared invalid (at least in the US)? Is there a problem when you purchase a product and cannot see the contract you're agreeing to until after money changes hands? Almost no other product is sold that way. And do they fall under the special laws regarding boiler plate contracts or not (where unreasonable clauses may be tossed out by the court even if you agreed to them)? If they do, what does unreasonable mean for video games?
I've no freaking clue. I'm not a legal scholar, nor do I feel like learning contract law. You know what else that means? Most people answering this poll have no business answering the question, as they lack the necessary training.
You don't poll to find the answer to a technical issue. Opinions mean diddly on a question like this and the noise of people responding with their opinion will drown out the signal of a right answer.
Polls sample opinions. This is a technical question for an expert or a question to look up. I don't take polls to find out the mechanism of action of propanol, the mass of an electron, or the capital of Kazakhstan.
Second, different games have different EULAs which you agree to when you install, meaning the answer would be, "Depends on what the EULA says, whether it's enforceable where you are, and so on." EULAs are contracts and have been dragged into the courts before.
What if a EULA prohibits modding, but the person who purchased the game is a minor? What if you move to a different region (state or nation state) which wouldn't recognize the EULA? What if the EULA contains clauses which would get it kicked out if the company tried to press claims on it, as boilerplate contracts (contracts of adhesion) can be ruled unreasonable and declared invalid (at least in the US)? Is there a problem when you purchase a product and cannot see the contract you're agreeing to until after money changes hands? Almost no other product is sold that way. And do they fall under the special laws regarding boiler plate contracts or not (where unreasonable clauses may be tossed out by the court even if you agreed to them)? If they do, what does unreasonable mean for video games?
I've no freaking clue. I'm not a legal scholar, nor do I feel like learning contract law. You know what else that means? Most people answering this poll have no business answering the question, as they lack the necessary training.
You don't poll to find the answer to a technical issue. Opinions mean diddly on a question like this and the noise of people responding with their opinion will drown out the signal of a right answer.