Wouldn't be legal....

You can make whatever kind of mod you want. DA themselves putting it in - THAT would be illegal

For being illegal, I've seen plenty of Wing Commander mods for other games not to mention mods based on other titles/movies. Battlefield 1942 for example, has a "Black Hawk Down" mod in the works. I have also seen mods for RPGs, (Morrowind) based on the Ultima Series and more recently J.R. Tolkien's Lord of The Rings.

Now, Chris Roberts can't do that, as WC was property of Origin, which I believe was bought by Electronic Arts.

"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance..."

Also seen plenty of mods beeing shut down due to use of intellectual property like the Dragon Ball Z mod for Quake3 .... Granted it isn't always enforced but that doesnt make stealing intellectual property legal. There are certain loop holes like if it's comedey or parody but thats very vague...

This topic has been debated before in other forums regarding the legality of mods based on other games, movies, and even mods in general. You'll have to understand, I'm not an attorney. I was foolish enough to fall for the IT industry.

I don't play Quake, so I wouldn't know about the incident with the DBZ mod. I do remember a modder for Swat3 was threatened by Fox for a "Die Hard" mod that was made. However, that's been about the only two incidents to my knowledge that's occured. I was simply posting as a suggestion. Unfortunately, I don't have the time required to put out decent mods.

"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance..."

I'd like to see the wing commander universe back in life as much as anyone, but knowing some of the people that worked on the DBZ mod i know how much time and effort was wasted when they had to scrap their dbz content because of the lawsuit.
The mod has been renamed and all dbz references removed it's now just a japanime mod... www.bidforpower.com .

Well, it seems some people don't mind mods being made of their stuff. There are too many Star Wars/Star Trek/Babylon 5 mods for different games to count. I seem to remember hearing that as long as you aren't directly using copyrighted material (i.e. music or official 3D models/textures) then it qualifies as "an artistic representation" which is legal. Please correct me if I'm wrong, and correct the guys at SciFi3D too, since they've been up for years.

There are only 10 kinds of people in the world:
those who understand binary, and those who don't.

Didn't see them sue anyone here when the WC fighters were modded for SL, why should FL be any different?

If they have their heads screwed on right, it could be seen as a boost for WC99 (or whatever number the new sequel is going to be) to know that their ships may be just as revered as the previous ones were. It could even be a selling point if the advertising guys play it right.



--
My idea of an OS is one that operates the system, not a self contained package of every piece of software ever invented.

Wc99?

There are numerous mods for Wing Commander and none have been shut down. For one thing, the Wing Commander product line is basically dead, so any mods created would only show a lasting community support for the game, and could benefit the space sim community by showing EA that Wing Commander is still loved. Second, if the mod is good enough, EA might decide to purchase the mod and sell it (provided Microsoft lets them use the Freelancer engine). Valve has done that on numerous occasions with Half-Life mods.

I'm interested in developing an updated version of Privateer (not #2, I mean the good one) and I posted a similar topic to WC News as well. You can read it here.

about the legal issues of mods/TCs containing copyrighted material:
most IP(intellectual property)-holders will close both eyes if you credit them. means, if you're doing a star wars mod, you HAVE TO write "star wars and all related items © Lucasfilm Ltd.", Wing Commander would be Electronic Arts, or Origin... it's not "George Lucas" or "Chris Roberts" Neither of them really owns their brainchilds anymore (though george lucas owns it indirectly through Lucasfilm/Lucaslicensing).
though in the end it all boils down to the rightsholder. If they don't like what you're doing, or if they are planning a game similar to what you make, then they'll shut you down.

Yeah but since u are using materials owned by lucasarts, thats the same as if you would use my car in an actionmovie and blow it up... If i agree, you may do this with my car (no, not really ), but if i dont u have to take the car back undamaged and find another car to blow up. If you whoever already have blown my car up i'll most likley sue your ass off and get lots of money from it.

Now thats *almost* how it works, its not only to put 'copywrited lucasarts' and they cant do anything. Just check how Blizzard has killed off any starcraft/warcraft mod ever tried to exist.

Yes, but if you create your own models/textures and such from scratch, it qualifies as an artistic representation. I suppose some companies may take issue with this, but I know LucasArts does not, and Star Wars is probably the best mod for Freelancer, or at least some other popular scifi franchise, and as far as I know, none of them really have an issue with mods using their ideas, as long as they are credited, and the mods are free.

There are only 10 kinds of people in the world:
those who understand binary, and those who don't.

still wont work... if they want to take the mod down they WILL do it... they got the money they need, modders most likley dont have that kind of money, and cannot affound a long ongoing trial