Question: the legal status of the engine

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Marscaleb
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Question: the legal status of the engine

Post by Marscaleb »

I was thinking about this the other day.

Is there anything in the source code that isn't part of the same GNU Public License that the Doom source code was released under? (Or possibly is public domain, i guess.)

I know there were some additions made to the ZDoom code that made its use limited to things like "personal use only" or otherwise "non-commercial use only." I think they added some proprietary code for audio formats or something, and apparently added code from the build engine and a few other things.

But what about 3DGE? Does 3DGE have any additional code that wasn't part of the same GPL agreement as the original Doom source code? Or is everything added to the code only original code that is thus part of the original license? Is 3DGE an engine that is constrained to the same strictly non-commercial uses like ZDoom, or is open to every use that Doom is open to?

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Corbachu
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Re: Question: the legal status of the engine

Post by Corbachu »

Sorry for the delay here.

EDGE is and has always been 100% GPL-compliant. That means you can take the source code and do whatever you want to it -- as long as it is, in turn, released back into the public under the same license GPLv2 (or greater). This also holds true for stand-alone games. The two my team are making -- SLaVE and Hypertension: Harmony of Darkness, will have their respective code-branches released to the public as soon as the game goes on sale, since that is the only lawful requirement.

However, I suggest if you do release anything stand-alone for the engine, you either rebuild EDGE2.pak completely from scratch, or at least replace the offending contents (stuff in Doom/Heretic font, etc). The stuff in the PAK file can't be used for commercial purposes, but they are easy enough to swap out. Plus, once those few graphics are replaced, you would just need a compliant IWAD that, too, is legal (building off of FreeDoom is very popular).

Other than that, every single part of EDGE's source code is GPL abiding. Whatever code we have adapted from other engines or ports also come from equally-recognized GPLv2+ ports.

Open source all the way ;)
\(סּںסּَ` )/ۜ

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Marscaleb
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Re: Question: the legal status of the engine

Post by Marscaleb »

That's good to know.
Naturally there wouldn't be any need for me to hold on to some title bars in a Heretic style. Though honestly, I'm pretty sure those are not violating any copyright laws. They are not actual artwork directly ripped from game, they are new content designed in the same style. You can't copyright a style. They easily fall under the Fair Use clause; at best they are the same as a parody.
And to be really, brutally honest, everything anyone says about copyright laws is just a squishy guideline, and what really matters is if someone decides to sue you or not. And I'm pretty sure Id and Raven have no interest in paying a bunch of lawyers just because I had hidden data in my game that can't be accessed without special tools when it is nothing more than a couple words that exist only so the code they decided to release is still compatible with half the reason they released the code to begin with. Yeah, not gonna happen. ;)

Personally, I think whatever changes I make to the code for my project, I want them to be ones that are part of 3DGE's code. At most, I would have my code check for my iWAD first, and maybe support achievements if I get that far.
At the very least, I hope keeping that goal as a mantra will help me from going overboard on this project. :P

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