Maps & Copyright

[Zylfrax791]

So yeah. A little background. I originally come from the Delta Force mapping community and I've never played a single second of PR although I previously played BF2 and still have the boxed disc somewhere in a tote in the garage. That said, I've been playing Squad since May 2016 and I had a few questions related to the PR maps.

So first off, who if anybody owns the rights to the entire selection of PR maps? Secondly, if somebody does in fact own the rights how do you go about getting permission to re-create the maps and the tertiary question is who if anybody has possession of the actual heightmaps?

All the politics aside of the PR/Squad schism I just enjoy creating maps and there are a few PR maps I find interesting and that I think I could accurately re-create in UE4 with my extensive asset library for perhaps Squad or even Insurgency: Sandstorm I'm just really concerned that I don't want to infringe on anyone's creative property just from a personal standpoint.

Any help or opinions would be welcomed.

[[R-DEV]​Rhino]

internet copyright laws give the original authors or artists the right to exclude others from copying their work or claiming it as their own. While online copyright protection does not protect facts, ideas, systems, or methods of operation, it may protect the way these things are expressed.

http://www.lawfirms.com/resources/te...t-internet.htm

To put that into context with PR Maps, all the PR maps are protected under copyright law and belong to both PR and the mapper who made them, but mainly the mapper who made them. If you wanted to use say the heightmaps from a map then you would need to get the original mapper's permission to do so, otherwise, you would be breaking the law.

That said, there is nothing technically that protects the concept of a map, for example, I do not own the exclusive rights to create maps of "Muttrah", so technically anyone can create a "Muttrah" map for any game without my permission, providing they didn't use any of the actual content from the original map, like the heightmaps just for one example. If someone was proven to have used the original heightmap than the original mapper could if they so choosed, proceed with legal action, even if that original heightmap was heavily modified.

That being said however it is very frowned upon for anyone to just copy a map concept without permission (especially of a fictional area the mapper came up with, or their fictional representation of a real place) as it is considered a general courtesy to ask and most of the time you will get it, with possibly some support from the original mapper if you're lucky.

I hope that clears some things up for you.

[Rabbit]

Originally Posted by Rhino

but mainly the mapper who made them.

LOL, okay.

[Zylfrax791]

I see. So its really pointless to waste a bunch of time recreating an upgraded variant of a previous map others might enjoy in a new game because everyone is extremely protective of their maps. No problem. I'll move on and make something original. You can close the thread.

[Bluedrake42]

Developers of Project Reality are not qualified to give legal advice, and I would suggest you seek professional legal counsel for any questions related to copyright or intellectual property law.

[[R-DEV]Mineral]

Originally Posted by Zylfrax791

I see. So its really pointless to waste a bunch of time recreating an upgraded variant of a previous map others might enjoy in a new game because everyone is extremely protective of their maps. No problem. I'll move on and make something original. You can close the thread.

Not necessarily. When it's about working on a existing map to update it for PR:BF2 (for an event, an overhaul, to fix some stuff,...) we AFAIK always have allowed it. We don't need the original mappers permission for that.

When it's about adopting PR:BF2 maps for other games we believe it's not our right for us as a team to decide that. Hence we direct them to the original main creator behind the map. Because usually that mapper is no longer within the team and therefore we cannot directly decide it for him/her. So in that case we will always point the person in the right direction to contact the original mapper. We can never assume what the original creator wanted with his map in terms of adaption.


But as Rhino says, many of our maps are direct implementations or heavily influenced by real world locations, so it's not like we can claim any right to that.

So I really don't see any real arguments here to say that we are super protective as the PR team for our map designs. We don't want to decide in name of the original creator, and we obviously don't claim any rights to real locations.

[[R-DEV]​Rhino]

Originally Posted by Zylfrax791

I see. So its really pointless to waste a bunch of time recreating an upgraded variant of a previous map others might enjoy in a new game because everyone is extremely protective of their maps. No problem. I'll move on and make something original. You can close the thread.

While that isn't totally the case, I agree you are better off making something original for many reasons.

For starters you don't have to live up to the hype of the previous map (which may also been blown out of proportions by nostalgia), any differences you have between the old and new versions will be seen by many as bad and so on. Also in terms of maps like Muttrah for one key example, people will dismiss it as "it has been overplayed and we don't want to play it any more, not even in a new game!!!" As such you're far better off IMO, to create something totally original and you personally will get much more from it, even if it isn't that much of a popular map as you will learn a lot more from it than copying someone else's work.

Originally Posted by Bluedrake42

Developers of Project Reality are not qualified to give legal advice, and I would suggest you seek professional legal counsel for any questions related to copyright or intellectual property law.

Indeed we are not but not everyone has the time and/or money to have these legal questions answered by a professional lawyer and the basic concept for Copyright Law on the Internet is rather simple. While I'm sure a Lawyer can tell you far more and could probably find some loopholes for you to exploit if you wanted to, I don't believe anything I've said above is incorrect from hearing and reading it from many sources over the years and if there is a lawyer around here can they are more than welcome to correct me.