Comment on Just in case you've been living under a rock: The Crew is playable again!
thingsiplay@beehaw.org 3 days agoMy bad, I should have looked into it before commenting. It’s a community project and not affiliated with publisher Ubisoft, right on the first linked page. So this has nothing to do with “Stop Killing Games” at all.
Little bit offtopic, but still ontopic somehow: I’m not sure why this is a grey area at all. There is a project for Nintendo games/systems providing community servers and services called “Pretendo Network” (fantastic name, BTW). In example Nintendo is aware of Pretendo, even warning in the public, but do not send their lawyers against it: nintendoeverything.com/nintendo-warns-against-usi… (sorry, I have access to Twitter blocked, so I rely on quotes and blog posts):
“We have confirmed the existence of unauthorized services that replace functions such as online play for the Wii U, which ended service on April 9, 2024. Please refrain from using such services as they may pose unexpected security risks.”
So, if even Nintendo doesn’t do anything against it, then it means its legal. xD
illi@piefed.social 3 days ago
Hah, can’t argue with that. I don’t really see into the legal stuff, but I think it is a grey area if you do it independently, without a license from the IP holders. You are technically using their IP and stuff I think. It is especially questionable if you take money for running the service - even if it is donations for just running it and there would be no profit - companies could see it as potentiel profiteering off of their product.
There are examples of such servers running with the publishers blessing - there is a private server for City of Heroes (called Homecoming I think?) which got official license from NCSoft to run it. This is only private server that I know off that is 100% legal.