HMMM. They have copyright over alpha stuff?
If it’s on their web site I would say they own it. That probably includes posts made by anyone.
Ask for forgiveness not for permission?
I’m pretty good at that, and I agree it works. :)
@Cow:
HMMM. They have copyright over alpha stuff?
There’s something VERY important to remember about copyright and trademarks - it doesn’t apply to ideas, only to their practical applications.
See, the whole concept and logic behind Alpha +3 is nothing more than a mental process and you can’t make a claim to that. What WOTC has a claim to is to specific elements of the Axis and Allies universe, like terminology (the Axis and Allies name, I.P.Cs, Industrial Complex, etc.) due to owing the trademark, and to any written/graphic materials they produce.
So, what does this means? That if someone makes a completely new document that describes the Alpha 3 changes but without using any Axis and Allies terminology, images or original text (anything published at LH site or released by WOTC) then WOTC can’t do anything about it.
And the proof to what i’m saying? Look at TripleA. What I described above was what they did when WOTC send them a ‘cease and desist’ letter to shut them down due to copyright/trademark violations a couple of years ago.
Also, trademark does not extend to generic/common terms like geography or infantry/fighter/etc.
Well I did print it out for my home game, alpha 1 2 and 3 sits in the box along with the rules. I own both boxes. I own aa50, revised, I don’t own v4 because that is just 1 territory different and a cruiser piece from revised, I own classic. I own the old europe box as well. Most tripa players do own the boxes. Most players on this forum own the boxes. There are some who can’t get a hold of the aa50 box because of the limited supply (so they printed a scanned version out and bought the pieces separately). Point is the majority of people here are fans or newcomers trying to look up rules.
I understand the concern over piracy and impact on sales, game has to sell or there is no more game, but global is just not geared toward a casual audience. Revised and aa50, yes a casual audience can hop in and play a game in a reasonable time frame, get drunk, roll some dice, move in on germany with allies, move in on russia if he is axis, you get a quick result by taking germany before russia falls = you pretty much won, take russia before germany falls = you pretty much won, both drop same round = you play a couple rounds and you pretty much know who won. Global is not for the casual board game player who wants to pick up a game and just play and have a result after 1-8 hours (depending on their attention span). 1) bigger map 2) more rules 3) OOB is somewhat lackluster (mexican standoff in pacific, germany pretty much should be able to take uk over, japan should get calcutta j3-j4, after that it is pretty much what it is… if the axis are newcomers the usa income would be crazy to deal with, if the axis and mid to experienced, the allies have a difficult time after losing 2 countries. As a result people come to the forum to see if they are missing something about the game… they find out alpha +3 rules exist and they want to try it… but they find it to be scattered.
I just feel that if the pdf was made available, the g40 consumers would be happy. However since they are reprinting this with alpha +3 rules… it might hinder their sales (depending on their marketing analysis). So they might publish the pdf rules after the reprint hits.
@Cow:
HMMM. They have copyright over alpha stuff?
There’s something VERY important to remember about copyright and trademarks - it doesn’t apply to ideas, only to their practical applications.
See, the whole concept and logic behind Alpha +3 is nothing more than a mental process and you can’t make a claim to that. What WOTC has a claim to is to specific elements of the Axis and Allies universe, like terminology (the Axis and Allies name, I.P.Cs, Industrial Complex, etc.) due to owing the trademark, and to any written/graphic materials they produce.
So, what does this means? That if someone makes a completely new document that describes the Alpha 3 changes but without using any Axis and Allies terminology, images or original text (anything published at LH site or released by WOTC) then WOTC can’t do anything about it.
And the proof to what i’m saying? Look at TripleA. What I described above was what they did when WOTC send them a ‘cease and desist’ letter to shut them down due to copyright/trademark violations a couple of years ago.
Also, trademark does not extend to generic/common terms like geography or infantry/fighter/etc.
I think this is right…AND I also would think that the “generic/common” use also includes images that are not “owned” by WOTC. For example, the Air Force roundels being used for markers - those are simply reproductions of widely used images by various governments around the world - they don’t “own” those images. Having said that, if they used a new creation for their symbols, maybe that’s verboten?? Their logo…sure. The term “IPC’s”…sure. The terms “Aircraft” or “Tank” or “Armor”…NO WAY!
Honestly, I think they are going to publish the pdf rules after the reprint hits, probably why they don’t want other sources compiling the rules. In case they make minor changes, add faq stuff in, etc etc etc.
@Young:
The Europe PDF was never available.
Not through any official channel, but someone on this forum was kind enough to scan it for us:
http://www.axisandallies.org/forums/index.php?topic=20856.0
It is my understanding that the latest rules can be found by combining the Global rule set from the Europe rulebook with the contents of this post:
http://www.harrisgamedesign.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=6149
I would think there is restrictions on intellectual property such as game mechanics, I know we are only talking about copyright laws, but you guys are making it sound like I could recreate Axis and Aillies as long as I rename it and give it a whole different look and feel.
Of course you can. There’s nothing unique about the game mechanics of A&A. Just look at what’s there:
All of those elements exist in many other board games, though not necessarily combined in the same way. The real achievement, imho, lies not in the game mechanics as such, but in the finetuning that has given us a board game that is exciting, challenging, and decently balanced while still reflecting the very different powers of World War II.
I would call it ‘Axes & Alles’ or ‘Access & Alice’ or something… :wink:
Game spaces would be ‘water areas/land areas’.
Anything else?
@Young:
I would think there is restrictions on intellectual property such as game mechanics, I know we are only talking about copyright laws, but you guys are making it sound like I could recreate Axis and Aillies as long as I rename it and give it a whole different look and feel.
Look at the game RISK - you have territories, armies, combat/non-combat/reinforcement phases. Or look at Fortress America where you have units called Bombers, Infantry, etc. Or any other game where you buy your units, make your moves, collect income (or cards or whatever) and place your units.
The sequence and the name of the steps may change but those are details. The basic concept is that you have a game, where the board is divided into territories/zones, and players make their individual moves using units in a sequence. This idea/mechanic doesn’t belong to WOTC or any other corporation - it can’t be patented or registered, it would be impossible to implement and control it.
WOTC or other corporations develop a game they are merely using ideas/concepts that are universal and putting them to practice with their own twist (images, text, artwork, trademarks, etc.) but they don’t own the basic logic, just the practical application (board games, artwork, site elements, etc.)
So yes, you can make and publish and sell your own board game that completely reproduces the A&A game mechanic as long as you don’t use any elements that are unique to Axis and Allies or WOTC. You can make it with aliens, zombies, world war 1 or even world war 2, whatever.
So why doesn’t this happen more often?
Well what happens is most companies (except most of China nowadays) will prefer to make their own practical application (which then has copyright and trademark) rather than just making a generic copy because they want their products to be recognized by costumers as unique (for advertising and marketing). Companies have usually no interest because they prefer to get out their own product, unless it’s a major public hype about the product and there’s lots of money to be made.
What happens in China is that the copyright/trademark law is mainly ignored by everyone, including the government, and so you have companies making copies of products but just copying the process (and violating copyright/patent law) instead of coming up with their own (cheaper - no money spend on royalties or research/development), and giving the copies similar names to trademarked ones (Sanyo instead of Sony, etc.) to help to sell.
There’s already an example of someone cloning A&A for years and selling it as an expansion to the original game - World at War from Xenogames.
This is similar to what happens when companies make clones of products, like a PC/Mac clones - the copyright/trademark is owned by the developer, so if anyone wants to use any part of the product it has to pay them (on this case, either the whole application or part of the code). But if a smart programmer reverse-engineers the code, figures out how it is done and comes up with a new different (and usually better) way of putting it into practice, then it’s legal. That way copyright works both ways - it protects the creator’s work while at the same time allows for further innovation and competition.
I would call it ‘Axes & Alles’ or ‘Access & Alice’ or something… :wink:
Game spaces would be ‘water areas/land areas’.
Anything else?
Just adopt the names/terminogy used by TripleA - IIRC the developers contacted WOTC to figure out how to solve the ‘cease and desist’ letter and they made sure that they were not using anything specific to WOTC. And terms like territory and sea zone are generic - WOTC didn’t create them when they started using them on TripleA.
So there is no intellectual property patent for the Axis and Allies franchise? I find that hard to believe.
@Young:
So there is no intellectual property patent for the Axis and Allies franchise? I find that hard to believe.
There is…it just doesn’t cover stuff they didn’t “invent,” and/or stuff that can be determined to be commonly available, widely used, or stuff that existed prior to them inhabiting the Earth. :)
Terms such as Air Force and Infantry and Sea Zone and dice are completely unprotected because WOTC doesn’t own them. The term IPC or Industrial Production Certificate they DID invent.
That’s my take on it anyway. I’m no attorney but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night! :-D
That’s gold Gerry, gold!
@Young:
So there is no intellectual property patent for the Axis and Allies franchise? I find that hard to believe.
Patents are issued for 20 years under US law, the first edition of Axis & Allies was released on 1981. If it existed (remember that to apply for a patent you need to prove the novelty of your invention), it expired more than a decade ago. Any patent afterwards would have to be issued for a novel game system, something that clearly does not apply since the game system remains the same from Classic to Global, regardless of having NOs, new units, etc. The only games that might apply would be Guadalcanal, Bulge or D-Day, but I don’t think there’s much novelty between their systems and other games outside A&A.
You’re welcome to go through the US Patent Office (http://patft.uspto.gov/) and find any patents given to Hasbro for the Axis & Allies games. I couldn’t find any. The trademark for the Axis & Allies brand can be found though, dated February 11, 1985 (the first trademark must have been for Axis and Allies)
Ahem.
I don’t have time to go and quote the relevant sections of the patent and trademark and copyright laws right now, but I’ll put it to everyone straight.
1. You may not copyright/trademark/patent a “game”, or a “way of playing a game”. This means that the “rules” we all use to play A&A (stuff like movement, what the dice do, casualty selection, everything, etc etc) can not be protected in any way.
2. You may not copyright/trademark/patent generic terms.
3. You may copyright/trademark the artistic elements, and the full name of the game. This means that the art, the look and feel, the design of the logo, and the full name, are all protected.
Simply put, so long as TripleA does not claim to be “A&A”, does not use the full name of “A&A”, and does not directly copy and paste the art of A&A, then there is nothing TripleA is doing that is infringing on Hasbro’s A&A.
Simply put, so long as TripleA does not claim to be “A&A”, does not use the full name of “A&A”, and does not directly copy and paste the art of A&A, then there is nothing TripleA is doing that is infringing on Hasbro’s A&A.
I like the sound of that! :-)
Veqryn, what are your grand dreams/desires (if any) for TripleA? Do you envision maybe eventually selling it to a big video games publisher like Activision or SEGA or something like that? I mean, you could do it couldn’t you? And then maybe they could approach Hasbro/WOTC for the full-on licence/rights to call it Axis & Allies (supposing they do indeed hold patents etc). Would that be cool?
