ROLL BOSS RUSH (PSX)

[isufje]

If it was possible, would a self bootable imbnes cd with a custom set of roms of nes games that the purchaser already owned be legal? Imbnes was programmed with spasm. As far as i know, it seems legal. Am i right?

[MottZilla]

IMBNES from what I remember does not require any Sony owned libraries or software. I remember assembling it once. From Sony's point of view they could not do anything about someone pressing discs with IMBNES on them. I'm not sure if you understood my point earlier that what I've been talking about is the official Psy-Q SDK for PS1. When you compile programs using it, the libraries you are linking to are protected under copyright and thus you could be found guilty of copyright infringement if you then sold your compiled program in some form.

However if you used open source libraries or programmed your own you would not have to worry about this. Nothing is stopping anyone from doing that and pressing their own discs for a homebrew/unlicensed PS1 game. It would require a method to run an unlicensed disc unless the security signature was duplicated. I don't think this would be a significant problem as common PIC chips can be programmed into modchips, or one of many swap methods or parallel port devices could be used to boot the disc.

[isufje]

I see... Can Sony do anything about what I'm currently doing?

[MottZilla]

It's unlikely for them to do anything. There is nothing for them to gain spending money to stop someone from using their ancient SDK to make freeware. But technically if they wanted to stop you from distributing the game they could be an annoyance. Very unlikely though. It's entirely possible you could get away with selling a game using the official SDK so long as no one noticed or Sony didn't choose to take any action.

But moving from freeware to a commercial product is a big difference since money starts changing hands.

[isufje]

I don't like to feel like I'm getting away with something. I like to feel like I'm doing something good for the PlayStation community.

[MottZilla]

You are doing something good. As long as you aren't selling the game you don't have to worry about anything.

[Drew Sebastino]

I like to feel like I'm doing something good for the PlayStation community.

I don't think good for the gaming community and good for the gaming company are always the same thing. I'd say SNES emulators are good for the community, but Nintendo would probably disagree, as long as it isn't theirs anyway. (Virtual Console)

[tepples]

A Super NES emulator that isn't copylefted is probably a good thing for some companies, namely third-party publishers of Super NES games wanting to release their classic games on Steam or Android. Consider what Atlus, Jaleco, and Konami did with PocketNES on GBA and DS. Or does Virtual Console have an exclusivity agreement?

[Drew Sebastino]

Or does Virtual Console have an exclusivity agreement?

You mean like you can't release the game on steam if you also want to release it in Virtual Console? You know, if other companies have used emulators people have made (or at least that's what I think you're saying) does anyone know if the Virtual Console emulators are even made by Nintendo or just hijacked? That would be ironic...

What I want to know is if Nintendo is all anti emulators and maybe homebrew or whatever, has anyone actually gone to Nintendo to try to release a homebrew game on virtual console? Then again, if there is some sort of exclusivity agreement thing, I wouldn't want to.

[tepples]

New games go in the WiiWare section or whatever else they call native games on Wii U. Well-known examples include Mega Man 9 and Mega Man 10. There was also supposed to be Retro City Rampage, and Brian Provinciano essentially had to go into stealth mode for years in order to get Nintendo to become willing to offer a devkit. But Nintendo is historically not a big fan of amateurs going professional for the first time on its platforms.

[rainwarrior]

Well-known examples include Mega Man 9 and Mega Man 10.

These aren't Virtual Console games, and the NES version of Retro City Rampage was only a tech demo, never something that was planned for sale on VC.

Also, they let plenty of "amateur" games on the Nintendo Store these days, e.g. Meme Run, or Plenty of Fishies.

[rainwarrior]

I don't like to feel like I'm getting away with something. I like to feel like I'm doing something good for the PlayStation community.

It's a legal liability to work with intellectual property you don't own. That's just a simple fact. I don't think you're doing anything immoral, but it really isn't legal, and this should not be a surprise to you.

Making a fan game probably is good for the community. I don't see why it can't be that at the same time as being a copyright risk.

If you don't want to feel like you're "getting away with something" you could keep everything you made and replace everything that was borrowed from Mega Man, of course.

[rainwarrior]

Brian Provinciano essentially had to go into stealth mode for years in order to get Nintendo to become willing to offer a devkit.

I can't seem to find any posts from him on this topic. I can find one about why the Wii U port isn't viable, but there he even says that Nintendo was actually the first of the platforms he could announce the port for.

Have I asked you about this before? I feel like you've mentioned it a bunch of times, but I can remember seeing anything to suggest that it's true.

[tepples]

BriPro used to have pages about hardware hacking on his site, such as a circuit to upscale Nintendo DS video output to 1024x768 for use with a bigger commercial touch screen.

[isufje]

I don't see why it can't be that at the same time as being a copyright risk.

Does producing an NES cart come with the same legal risks? If so how does a game like Battle Kid Fortress Peril get produced and not have any legal risks?

If i used an open source sdk like PSXSDK, didn't use copyrighted material and was able to make it self bootable, would i have any legal risks then?