Copyright insurance and German RPGMaker devs?

[Valryia]

Greetings, everyone.

After unsuccessfully trying to inform myself about my problem, i wanted to try on these forums. Sorry if these questions were asked already, i couldn't find anything.

First, is there a way to test my game - by another party - to prove that my game doesn't infringe any copyright? Or are there ways that i can get protected, if i sell my games through websites like amaranth games? I may be a little paranoid, but with my low budget those potential lawer costs scare me.

Other then that, are there any german RPGMaker developers here? I'm living in germany myself and i would like to ask them how i need to sell my game without getting in conflict with the law and/or how much it will cost, since i have a low budget. Thanks.

P.S: I really hope i posted in the right subforum this time. So confusing.

 

[Andar]

First, the only way to get into copyright infringment is by using resources that you do not own the licence to use.

That is something you need to take care of yourself, no one else can do that - for anyone else it would be accidentally knowing the game you got the resource from, but you know if you have the licence or not when you select and import anything.

Which basically means the best way to protect against copyright infringment is not to use resources from random internet searches but only resources where the terms are given by the original artist, and always keep a screenshot of those terms as well as link to the sites.
How to determine if someone is an artist or just copied pictures together? You can usually see that by the care of their website and if they give resources in a single style (their own) or copied together from different artists).

as for selling the game: you'll need a business licence (which basically costs around 20-30€ depending on town), and you'll have to make your tax declaration contain all expenses and income from that game (which requires more care in bookkeeping)

 

[PandaMaru]

Hello there. Yes, you can find many german fellows in this community.
Why do you have copyright concerns? Have you used some material from google search, or pages without propper terms of use?
You should find a couple of tester before you publish your game. Some of them might know the resources and can help you check them out. I can take a look at your resources, but I can't promise to know every single resource out there.

 

[Valryia]

@PandaMaru @Andar I have this situation in my head:
- I make a graphic (for example).
- someone else steals that graphic, uses it in their game
- when my game comes out, they say that i stole their assets
Is that paranoid? Probably. I want to be sure, though.

@Andar There is nothing else i need to do? I'm sorry if you feel that i doubt you, but I thought that i would have to do some other things - since i get money internationaly - that there was something else i needed to do. Or that i need to get an lawyer (which i have no (good) clue, either, (how much does it cost?)) For example, if i get money through crowdfunding like *******. Also, can i use german words here? I want to use those to make 100% sure that i am using the right terms. Or do i need to do send an private message?

 

[PandaMaru]

Yes, that's a little paranoid.
If they say you stole their assets, they need to prof that and that will be very hard, if they couldn't get their hands on this stuff before.
Just save your artworks with signature and everything before you publish them and give some copys to others. Then you have witnesses. (The beta-tester as example.)
If you want to publish your game, you probably will make some advertising before you even finish your project. This too, will be prof for your work.
Here a link for more information: http://www.urheberrecht.de/

 

[Valryia]

@PandaMaru You really calmed down my paranoia there, thanks.

 

[PandaMaru]

You can test your project yourself: you will have a credit-list (every project should have such a list)
Open your resource folder, check every single file if it's on the list, or do you know which entry it belongs to. Make sure, it's not a only a homepage, but an author and a licence.

 

[Valryia]

@PandaMaru Thanks, i will keep that in mind.

 

[gstv87]

I have this situation in my head:
- I make a graphic (for example).
- someone else steals that graphic, uses it in their game
- when my game comes out, they say that i stole their assets
Is that paranoid? Probably. I want to be sure, though.

if you make any form of art, and upload somewhere public, without any ties to a username or persona, then yes, that's fuel for infringement right there.
if you have a personal website (doesn't have to be your own, it can be an account in a larger site) and upload content under your username, that's all the ensurance you need.
there's an upload date, there's a username, and there's a contact adress.... it's you, not the other guy, who signs that work of art.

you should only worry about random pieces that you made, that you never officialy "signed", which you later think of using in your game.
someone might have picked those up along the way, and used them under their names when they thought they were public domain.

 

[Plueschkatze]

If you are publishing your game to a site like itch.io or steam or whatever, you'll need to have a buisness licence (so you'll become a part-time or fulltime freelancer!), need to do bookkeeping and take care of all the taxes, especially, since you are from Germany, take care of the VAT (Umsatzsteuer), since you'll need to keep track of the people that are buying your game from other european countries, since you'll have to pay VAT taxes TO this countrys instead of paying them in Germany. But there's a finance office in Germany that will forward them to the countries for you, you'll just need to keep track of the money you'll owe.
I know that itch.io offers the opportunity to transfer the VAT for you, too.

 

[Valryia]

@Plueschkatze I didn't know about itch.io. And i just need to talk about this with the finance office, or how does that work?

 

[Plueschkatze]

I'll write you a PM, will make it easier since we can discuss in German

EDIT:
If someone arround here IS from Germany and has experience selling games/art, I'd be more then happy to have a small conversation~ since I have some questions left, too. Pls PM. Thanks in advance <3

 

[JLowther]

First, the only way to get into copyright infringment is by using resources that you do not own the licence to use.

That is something you need to take care of yourself, no one else can do that - for anyone else it would be accidentally knowing the game you got the resource from, but you know if you have the licence or not when you select and import anything.

Which basically means the best way to protect against copyright infringment is not to use resources from random internet searches but only resources where the terms are given by the original artist, and always keep a screenshot of those terms as well as link to the sites.
How to determine if someone is an artist or just copied pictures together? You can usually see that by the care of their website and if they give resources in a single style (their own) or copied together from different artists).

as for selling the game: you'll need a business licence (which basically costs around 20-30€ depending on town), and you'll have to make your tax declaration contain all expenses and income from that game (which requires more care in bookkeeping)

On a somewhat similar subject, are the scripts we create through evening copyrightable? Is that something worth worrying about?

 

[Andar]

yes and no - mostly no

some scripts/plugins/events might pass the threshold for being copyrightable, but that is not an easy limit to reach.
That is because there are limited ways to code something, and you can't copyright basic code. It needs to contain quite a bit of original work to be applicable for copyright. So most events, scripts and plugins don't count for copyright.
Code theft is still possible, but not for simple things.

 

[Zeriab]

Probably the answer is an easy yes.
I expect enforcing it is more difficult because

1. Interoperability concerns may mean the other party can copy your code in their context
2. Same problems tend to have same solutions. I.e. the same code being written independently by different parties is vastly more likely.

According to Wikipedia the following law is related to Germany Zweites Gesetz zur Änderung des Urheberrechtsgesetzes vom 9. Juni 1993, BGBl I p. 910

Copyright means I cannot copy+paste your code. I don't believe it provides any protection against me reading your code, then implementing them with my own code.

As always with legal matters, talking to a lawyer is your best bet.

*hugs*
- Zeriab

 

[Tuomo L]

@PandaMaru @Andar I have this situation in my head:
- I make a graphic (for example).
- someone else steals that graphic, uses it in their game
- when my game comes out, they say that i stole their assets
Is that paranoid? Probably. I want to be sure, though.

How do they get your graphics? Just don't share them beforehand releasing your game? Like, how would they even get hold of this stuff? By hacking your computer?


IN fact, if this would somehow happen and you'd find out and could prove you made these assets you could sue THEM for using your work without your permission.


I don't really have recollection of people being sued over RPG maker assets though.