Bug#861612: pixbros: level designs appear to be non-free

[Markus Koschany]

Am 19.05.2017 um 02:24 schrieb Steve Cotton:
> On Fri, May 12, 2017 at 11:03:24PM +0200, Markus Koschany wrote:
>> What we need to check is: Does the game comply with the DFSG and does it
>> infringe the copyright of another programmer/artist. In my opinion that
>> is not the case here because the license is DFSG-compatible and the game
>> looks and works differently in style and artwork. We are not aware of a
>> verdict which states that the level resemblance infringes the rights of
>> another party.
> 
> Hi Markus,
> 
> To clarify, I think it's a copyright violation.  The copyrights in
> question are the layout of the levels, the level designers' choices of
> where the platforms are.  For a simple level like level 30 it would be
> unremarkable for games in the same genre to have a similar level, but
> not the complex designs of most of the levels from 31 to 49.
> 
>> This whole bug report reminds me of Giana Sisters, ...

You are not even the copyright holder of the original game. Just just
claim that the level layout in this case is a copyright violation which
is not backed up by anything. I am sorry but this is layman talk and as
I previously said the mere level resemblance alone is not what paragraph
2.3 in Debian's Policy is talking about.

>> On the other hand we have many open source games that try to clone an
>> older game but they look and behave often differently and use their own
>> graphics or they just reinvent the engine and then use the original
>> artwork (hence why those games are shipped in contrib)
> 
> But the ones in contrib using original artwork only have the DFSG
> parts in contrib, the copy of the original artwork isn't in contrib.

Exactly. But Pixbros has its own distinct DFSG-free artwork. Can't you
see that?

>> Look at Pathological which is obviously a clone of Logical or Tuxpuck
>> which very much resembles the Shuffle Puck Cafe game. Are they non-free
>> too? I don't think so because I have played the original games and I can
>> tell you that the older games had both better graphics, more levels and
>> were more feature complete. They resemble each other but they are not on
>> a par and the risk that some company sues Debian just for distributing
>> them is highly unlikely because we make no money with them either.
> 
> Just as they used new artwork, Pathological used (AFAIK) new level
> designs. The first level looks like a level of Logical, but that's
> forced by the genre, there's a limited set of level designs for a
> tutorial level that introduces the concept of the game.
> 
> With tuxpuck the level design seems to be a rectangular table, with a
> rectangular area of that table that the player can move the bat to.
> 
> Neither of these games seems to have a direct copy from the game that
> inspired them.

Well and here it shows that you apply double standards. In Pathological
the levels are "forced by the genre", in Tuxpuck it is just the
rectangular table and the bat (and you forgot that the second player
uses the same technique to move the bat as in the original game but
nevermind). All major game aspects are implemented from the original
games and it is easy to see from which one they stem from. Nevertheless
the code and the artwork are completely different, DFSG-free and an
independent piece of art. But Pixbros' levels which are simply bars in
vertical and horizontal directions are somehow a copyright violation.

Sorry but this bug report really makes me sad and I'm off to do
something more useful now.








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