$12256 / $11500
Hi, I am a freelance artist who is interested in using FLARE to create a mod. In this mod, all characters, monsters, animations, environments, and effects will be created by me from the ground up. It will feature an original story, as well as original spells and progression system. I have chosen to work with the FLARE engine due to it's ease of use for a non programmer and due to the core mechanics of the engine aligning with my design goals, which is a hack-and-slash RPG.
My question is whether I would be able to sell this mod as a pay-to-download. I wish to approach the project in a professional manner, and have given myself a timeframe of July to December 2015 to work full time on the mod.
I am also open to other options if selling the mod is not possible, as long as I am able to stay afloat during the months that I intend to spend working full time on the mod. Thanks!
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This is FLARE's license: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/clintbellanger/flare-engine/master/COP...
Yes, you can sell and make commercial use of it. However, you will have to give everyone the same freedoms as FLARE does – that is, the source code of your mod under the GPL.
Consider alternative business models like crowdfunding and “pay what you want”, instead of selling copies of it, since people can share it legally for free.
Standard disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. You should always talk to a real lawyer.
Note that data files aren't required to be covered by the GPL. Since the engine is separate from the data (game) that's actually fine. If you make changes to the engine you must publish the code changes under the GPL.
Your art and config files will be covered by copyright, which means you can legally protect your game from being redistributed. (Though as with most legal things, this is generally more expensive than it's worth.)
To summarize, the engine must be free, but the content can be proprietary. I'd say go for it!
AFAIK you can also still trademark your game even if it's open source, so if someone forks it they have to call themselves something else.
Yes, you can. This is quite common in fonts.
If your mod contains 100% original content, you are free to license it however you want!
The engine is designed to be completely separate from all content. So while the Flare engine is GPL, mods can be whatever license the creator chooses.
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Note the "fantasycore" mod packaged with the engine is CC-BY-SA. Any custom mod heavily depending on fantasycore should probably be licensed CC-BY-SA.
Hi Clint,
I just wish to clarify what is meant by heavily dependent. I will be reverse engineering some things from fantasycore.
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My portfolio site
Flare Project thread
Oh, reverse engineering is completely fine. We expect everyone to take heavy inspiration (and copy/pasting) from the basic data files we create. I made the data files .txt so that anyone could be tempted to open them up and see how they work.
Above I meant, if someone makes a game that uses mostly fantasycore art, that mod will probably have to be CC-BY-SA itself.
Why don't you worry that someone will steal your mod
Free use of the kind,,,
Flare is GPL3, which allows selling, as long as you release back under GPL3 all changes to the code, which you link at compile-time (i.e. using patch utility).
You don't have to release under GPL3 your graphics, which is linked at runtime, unless you link graphics files in into Flare's main executable at compile time.