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Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Wed, 5. Dec 18, 21:03
by DuckSoup
So after I started to chat about this on Discord, it was suggested to me that I reach out to Ego before doing this.

Is it okay if we import assets from X:Rebirth (Ships and stuff) to X4? Obviously there are certain legal concerns, but I was hoping for some kind of input from the Dev's on this one.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Wed, 5. Dec 18, 21:24
by Knightdark
I'm not connected to Egosoft, but I don't see why it wouldn't be allowed. The assets themselves wouldn't be very useful on their own right? So it's not like a gamer pirating x4 will benefit from it much. Or am I wrong?

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Wed, 5. Dec 18, 21:51
by xtra
As i can remember, in X3 we had some ship mods from X2-ships. And we had a cockpitmod in x3 from the x2-ships.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Wed, 5. Dec 18, 22:15
by DuckSoup
The concern is taking original assets from another game and making it available to the public. It doesn't hurt to check. Having some kind of confirmation from Ego would help though.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Wed, 5. Dec 18, 22:16
by Knightdark
DuckSoup wrote:
Wed, 5. Dec 18, 22:15
The concern is taking original assets from another game and making it available to the public. It doesn't hurt to check. Having some kind of confirmation from Ego would help though.
I see you're point. Better safe than sorry right? (of course, there is also the saying, better to ask for forgiveness than permission, so I'm not sure which I like better :p)

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Wed, 5. Dec 18, 23:15
by xtra
Maybe its a good Idea to send a PN to a Egosoft Moderator here!

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Thu, 6. Dec 18, 05:03
by Requiemfang
You do realize that egosoft imported content from XR right? I mean I'm seeing ships that were in that game being put into this new game. Heck there was someone who managed to import some ships from X3 into XR which surprised me to say the least.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Thu, 6. Dec 18, 13:32
by xtra
We have sound mods, importing the music from x3 and the other old x games

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Thu, 6. Dec 18, 16:01
by DuckSoup
I received an official statement from Egosoft.
If you own both XR and X4, then we don't mind you adding a few XR ships to X4 as part of a mod, but we would not allow a 'total conversion' type mod, involving wholesale copying of assets.
This was from DocAce in Discord.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Thu, 6. Dec 18, 16:31
by Riccardoman
Rebirth DLC incoming next years
I can smell it :P

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Thu, 6. Dec 18, 16:45
by xtra
riky rice wrote:
Thu, 6. Dec 18, 16:31
Rebirth DLC incoming next years
I can smell it :P
All Sectors & Ships :mrgreen:

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Thu, 6. Dec 18, 17:30
by Phoynix
Would that actually be a bad thing in a fixed X4 engine?
riky rice wrote:
Thu, 6. Dec 18, 16:31
Rebirth DLC incoming next years
I can smell it :P

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Thu, 6. Dec 18, 17:56
by Riccardoman
It would be awesome actually

More content, more discoveries, more life

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Fri, 7. Dec 18, 11:30
by ADMNtek
Official Egosoft statement on porting XR assets, FYI.
https://i.imgur.com/tTmFK98.png



{Images posted directly to the forums should not be greater than 640x480 or 100kb, oversize image now linked - Terre}

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Fri, 7. Dec 18, 18:13
by Blackscorp_81
After reading that statement, i wonder about it... when i'm not allowed t import/mod ALL X:R ships... than "Modder1" does 3-4 and "Modder2" as well 3-4 and so on... and in the end, we will have them all anyways... just not in one mod but multiple instead... odd decision by egosoft...
Doesn't serve any proper purpose, and makes no sense.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Fri, 7. Dec 18, 22:44
by Knightdark
Hey, you should be glad that they give permission at all. I point your attention towards the disaster simcity! Their policy of allowing no mods (or at least, no kind of modding that MATTERED at least, pretty much ruined the whole game. So I would suggest you don't complain too much before they retract their permission, which they can do whenever they damn will please and there would be nothing anyone of us could do about it.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Fri, 7. Dec 18, 23:34
by Dinoff
I kind of read their statement as "don't completely convert x4 into rebirth" which is common from game devs. But taking the ships and sectors but not the plot would be fine. The point being that they don't want people buying x4 so they can download a rebirth total conversion with better game mechanics.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Sat, 8. Dec 18, 01:30
by aerojet029
It is more of a legal argument.

A developer is usually tight lipped about what you can and can't do with thier intellectual property beyond "its origional intentions"

Because it would be easier to legally abuse any explicit permission. Then egosoft would be left with no legal recourse even there was a legitimate case.

Look at nintendo. In tokyo you could rent mario costumes and drive their gokarts around tokyo. Nintendo never allowed it but didn't do anything until recently where they fined the company and told them to stop. Nintendo never allowed emulation, tries to shut down emulation websites and then sells remakes on each of their platforms and limits pirates from accessing software.

If you look into most game's EULAs, you usually see terms that expresse you can not modify the game beyond its original intentions. People and developers usually ignore it beyond blatant piracy.

TLDR you are in a grey area, i can't give you any advice except try to use some common sense what you share

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Sat, 8. Dec 18, 01:41
by Misunderstood Wookie
Moving assets around within the titles of software on which the same company owns is generally okay provided you not release any of the actual files unpacked (Repack them as a CAT package)
I most certainly not a lawyer but I have tread this fine line for some time now to know that usually, legal action is not the first course of action, the developers or the company or some other department will send you a cease request to no longer develop the project and remove it from the download links.

We have ported between X2-X3 and then again X3-Prelude across different companies with mods (Starwars mods ring a bell?) We have ported assets specifically between X2>>X3 respectively (have not heard of cases of it going from X3>>X2) It is a grey area but one which the developers so far at least have been very forgiving on and have allowed for the past decade.

Re: Egosoft, Is it okay to import assets from X:Rebirth?

Posted: Sat, 8. Dec 18, 02:18
by RWolf
You would think Egosoft would want to do that on their own, since XR had better station and ship assets. They are pretty much going to waste in XR. A lot of X4 assets are straight lazily designed, with symmetrical textures (UV overlap) and models.