How can Nintendo cartoon Captain N use video game characters owned by different companies without those companies appearing in the show&#39;s copyright? Captain N was a late 80s cartoon which uses characters and settings from several games that are playable on the Nintendo Entertainment System console. Some of these are Nintendo owned, but there is a significant amount not owned by Nintendo like Mega Man, Castlevania, Tetris, Dragon Warrior and Final Fantasy that appear but the companies who own these games don't show up in the credits or even in the copyright section of the DVD i own. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8jxeetnZ9U As you can see from the link, the show claims that all of the elements in the show are owned by Nintendo/Nintendo of America despite that not being true.
Attribution is not a legal requirement If company A owns IP (copyright and trademarks in this case), they can licence it to company N on whatever terms are mutually acceptable. They may require company N to attribute their IP or they may not.
This is known as "film novelization"(For example, the novelizations of the Star Wars movies are film novelizations, created under license), and is copyright infringement unless made under a license from the copyright holder. Specifically, you would be making a derivative work of the original, by changing the medium. One of the rights provided by copyright is the right to control the transference from one medium into another. This, in my (non-lawyer) opinion, is unlikely to be found as fair use. There are four test factors for determining fair use(source), decided on a case by case basis: Transformative Character of the Derivative Work: Unlikely to be found in your favor, as nothing is transformed ("I don't change anything, the name are the same, everything is the same, it's just a conversion to textual form"). Nature of the Original Work: A narrative entertainment film, thus unlikely to be found in your favor. Amount and Substantiality of the Portion Taken: You've taken all of it; not in your favor. Effect on the Potential Market: You are essentially providing a free version of what copyright holders can often charge for; negative effect on their potential market. Not in your favor.
License to use does not mean license to create derivative works These are different rights under copyright. If you want to make a derivative work, which your animations are, you must have a license to do so.
Most games have a TOS to playing that include provisions such as sales of in game items through out of game currencies (i.e. real world money changes hands for digital product or account). I believe Pokemon does have this as part of the TOS which could get you and potential customers banned from competition and possibly the modern online trade features, but am unable to look at the current TOS to verify. It should not be hard to find such a document and read for yourself.
A CC0 license granted by party A only waives their rights, and not those of unrelated party B (i.e. Marvel). And while Marvel might have granted the cosplayer a limited right to depict their persona's, that almost certainly does not constitute a sublicensable right. This is especially the case if the rights are implicitly granted (by Marvel not acting).
IP in Game Rules Game rules and other game &quot;mechanics&quot; are not protected by copyright. They are considered to be &quot;ideas, methods or procedures&quot;. 17 USC 102(b) provides that: (b) In no case does copyright protection for an original work of authorship extend to any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery, regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work. If the wording of the rules is not the same, and no art or visual design was copied or imitated, the fact that the gameplay is the same does not afford any copyright claim. Claims of Similarity A comment from the OP says: I seek clarification on whether claiming the game is similar to the original would infringe on the original game's intellectual property. If the maker or distributor of the new game states that it is similar to the old game, something like &quot;This is a Flower version of Monopoly.&quot; would that be any sort of IP infringement? Such a statement would in no way infringe any copyright. Would it infringe the trademark rights on the mark &quot;Monopoly&quot;. That is harder to say. The key question in a trademark case is whether the use of a mark, or of words or images that refer to or suggest a mark, would cause reasonable people to falsely think that the new product or service is endorsed, sponsored, or approved by the makers of the old, or to falsely believe that the new product or service comes from the same source as the old one, that is, is made by the same firm or the same people. Whether a particular statement of similarity would do that is a question of fact, and would depend on the details of the statement and the overall presentation of the new game. But a disclaimer can and often does avoid a potential trademark infringement issue. A statement something like: FlowerPoly is not endorsed, approved, or sponsored by Hasbro, the makers of Monopoly, and holders of the trademark on that name. FlowerPoly was created by a completely different group of people. One should not rely on the reputation of Monopoly when deciding to purchase or play FlowerPoly. It would be wise to have the exact details of any statement of similarity, of any disclaimer, and of the name itself, reviewed by a lawyer with experience specifically in trademark law. In general, merely suggesting a similarity is not trademark infringement. Specifically, comparative advertising is not infringement. For example, a new drink could advertise that &quot;NewCola is better than Cokle.&quot; That would not be an infringement of the trademark &quot;Coke&quot;, because it makes clear that the products are different, and come from different sources.
Unless the game is out of copyright, e.g. chess, snakes and ladders, Go, or checkers, your software would probably be considered a derivative work of the copyrighted game and an actionable infringement. The fact that you do not monetize it is not a defense. You would need written permission in the form of a license agreement from the copyright owner to do this legally. The penalties for violating copyright laws in this way could be punishingly serious.
No. Copyright does not have exemptions for obsolete works, use with credit, or non-commercial use. Depending on the purpose for the distribution, this could be fair use, but it is unlikely that a court will consider this fair use when the only reason is for other people to be able to play games. Perhaps you could try contacting Adobe; it's possible that they will give you a license to distribute the Flash Player. This isn't directly relevant to the legal aspect of copying Adobe's Flash Play, but to answer the underlying issue of legally playing Flash games, perhaps you/others could try Gnash, a libre reimplementation of Flash. I have not used it, but apparently Gnash can run some Flash software without using Adobe's player.