Warcraft Total War?

[Septerra]

I was looking around at all the mods being made.. and all of the middle earth mods and the warhammer mod looked great..

but then I was thinking.. is there a warcraft mod underway? I don't really know if WarCraft would fit in the RTW-engine, but it would be fun having huge battles with orcs and humans :)

[dark_shadow89]

This idea's been brought up before...copyright...

[Tigranes]

So? Change the name to "Waarcraft"' and include some pa-rody elements. Claim it was a parody.

[Septerra]

This idea's been brought up before...copyright...

But if it is a fan product not designed for commercial use, does the copyright laws apply?

[Bwian]

If they have a certain 'look' to their units, and you duplicate it, then you are using their 'intellectual property' without permission.

When you get a cease and desist order backed up by an active legal department threatening to hold you personally liable, you don't want to risk taking them on.

In real terms, though, you can quite easily make certain changes to the specifics whilst still working on amod that is using the basic concept. Just do your own artwork 'in the style of' and don't directly copy their units. They can't copyright 'Orc' ...only their version of it.

And DO NOT call it 'Warcraft Total War' .... or 'Total Warcraft' ....

[Septerra]

If they have a certain 'look' to their units, and you duplicate it, then you are using their 'intellectual property' without permission.

When you get a cease and desist order backed up by an active legal department threatening to hold you personally liable, you don't want to risk taking them on.

In real terms, though, you can quite easily make certain changes to the specifics whilst still working on amod that is using the basic concept. Just do your own artwork 'in the style of' and don't directly copy their units. They can't copyright 'Orc' ...only their version of it.

And DO NOT call it 'Warcraft Total War' .... or 'Total Warcraft' ....

What about the Middle Earth mods then? Middle Earth is copyright by Tolkien Entreprise or what the company is called.. right?