modern gameplay with amiga music inspiration

[Chris Abbott]

First, you mentioned many websites, not just kongregate, and their publisher agreements will all have different clauses.

If the game includes someone else's IP, then it's not just your game any more: so you have to get permission for each use case or website, just in case you accidentally try to give away rights to something that isn't yours. Sometimes their T&C might not be compatible: for instance, any contract with them where you declare that you own the game 100%: that isn't true, since there would be parts of the game that aren't yours: yet the company who now "owned" SoTB music (thanks to what they think is a valid contract with you) might then "lend" it to a record company, thinking they have the rights to do so.

This has actually happened much more often than you'd think: the most famous example is Tetris, where it's my understanding that a limited set of rights signed from the Russians by Andromeda software ("for home computers") were sold to Mirrorsoft who inflated the claim of rights to sell the Arcade Rights to Atari.

This is why commercial publishers don't like giving permissions to small projects: there's a real danger that another big company will "accidentally" acquire (or think they've acquired) rights down the line. It's even worse because it's the most enthusiastic people who tend to have a poor grasp of IP law and who will happily sign anything put in front of them, causing massive problems later. It's like handing the keys of your car over to someone you just met for them to "realise their dreams", or "serve the community". There's a real danger of damage, and there's absolutely no chance that person can pay for the consequences of any accidents.

Look at the T&Cs of the websites concerned carefully, and see if there are any small print clauses where you're either promising that you own everything (a "Warranty", usually), or where you're giving them rights to sub-publish or licence/sell content from the game to third parties. Companies like that don't write their T&Cs with a view to giving a good deal to their users, they write it to cover their own asses and make a profit later.

Chris

[egos]

Hello
Thanks for your reply

For congregate.
"Scope of License: By displaying, publishing, or otherwise posting any User Content on or through the Site, you hereby grant to Kongregate a limited, non-exclusive, sub-licensable, worldwide, fully-paid, royalty free license to use, modify, publicly perform, publicly display, reproduce, and distribute such User Content. This license will terminate at the time you remove your User Content from the Site."

I understand your point of view, I just precise that the example of tetris is 15 years old … a millennium in the video game industry copyright.

I am not a lawyer but I know with my personal experience of game industry that the major actor of internet game publishing like KONG or NEWGROUND permit to developer to share their product with no risk….

It’s clear that is very important to preserve the right of owner, but the only guaranty I can give is that I want to preserve my production and the music owner right.

I appreciate your help but I have the felling that is too complicated. As you said “This is why commercial publishers don't like giving permissions to small projects”.
Moreover a independent game developer have to publish his product toa huge number of place. I project to publish it on store (google, apple...)

However I hope its possible to give a second life to this music….