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Old 11-18-2007, 09:58 AM   #33
After a brisk nap
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Originally Posted by Trumgottist View Post
They have released games without an agreement with the copyright holder, yes. IANAL, but I wonder if not the copyright status of those games may be that they are as much the property of Vivendi as those who made the deal. (I get that impression from what Aabn writes.) If that's not the case, the best case scenario for the creators is something that nobody has the right to copy.
I'm not a lawyer either, but yes, that's the point. "Public domain" means, roughly speaking, that no one owns any rights to the work. As long as Vivendi owns the copyright to SQ, no SQ game is in the public domain. That's why they (and other game companies) can, if they choose, send cease-and-desist orders to shut down unauthorized fan games, before or after release. Even if some companies don't do it, that doesn't mean they don't have that right.

I'm not sure exactly how much of a fan game they automatically own. Not, I would imagine, all of it in every case. It probably depends on how derivative it is. If you create a mostly original game and stick in a tiny Roger Wilco cameo, that doesn't mean all your work now belongs to Vivendi (I would think). But a sequel that followed the same main character and continued the story from the earlier games would probably be mostly Vivendi's property, if they took you to court.
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