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Starfield Pre-Release Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

Risewild

Arbiter
Joined
Mar 23, 2018
Messages
495
Location
Australia
It's a different case. They wanted to just grab the audio files from Fallout 3 and pack them with their mod. Bethesda said they can't allow that because the audio files are under different legal mumbo-jumbo and the actors association (or whatever it's called) would be able to sue Bethesda for allowing the redistribution of files that Bethesda owned the copyright for just Fallout 3 and no other game.

Our TTW installer does extract the FO3 files (from a legal English installation) into new temporary files, patches them, encodes them for the correct format (if they are audio files), repacks these new files, copies them into the TTW install directory and then deletes the temporary files (it does other stuff too like adding TTW files that don't exist in FO3 or FNV, or extracting and patching some FNV files too, etc.).

People suggested to the FO4 Capital Wasteland team that they should make an installer like TTW does, but they didn't like that idea for whatever reasons they had.
Interesting! I suspected it was the usual actors union bullshit at fault, but could you explain some more about the legal differences between the two approaches? So Bethesda has to shut down a mod that directly distributes copyrighted VO assets, but they're not obligated to interfere with the distribution of a tool that facilitates the same result on the user's end, is that it? Or is one simply easier to turn a blind eye to than the other?

And can you speculate on why TCW might not have wanted to do what TTW does? I know the project nearly shut down when they were told they couldn't reuse FO3's VO, before they decided to bite the bullet and record everything again, and then F4NV adopted the same approach.
Rusty is right in the above post. We can do whatever we want with the game files privately, as long as we don't distribute them, Bethesda is pretty chill about it because there's no law that prevents the user from grabbing assets from games they legally own and using them in different games as long as the user has the know-how to do so.

But as soon as someone starts distributing those assets without permission, then it becomes a copyright infringement, for the company that owns those files. Voice and music files are used by gaming companies under licenses (unless they are royalty free), so if Bethesda (in this case) goes ahead and gives permission for modders to use these files, then they themselves are breaking the legally bound license, which means they will get into legal trouble and can be put into court or have to pay a hefty amount out of court and then forced to revoke the permission they gave.

Fun fact, Bethesda asked the Nexus not to host TTW when TTW was first born, because Bethesda was worried we would distribute assets from the games. This was one of the reasons why we made our installer the way it is, it is also the reason why TTW is not on the Nexus to this day.

About FO4 CW team and their decision to not have an installer like TTW... I can only speculate, but I can come up with a few reasons why that might be:
First, getting someone that knows how to create and maintain the installer is a pain. TTW has had some versions delayed in the past because of this same reason.
Second, if the mod requires an installer then it can't be automatically installed by mod managers. So no one-click download and install, no including it in Nexus collections, users that are too used to this easy stuff will get problems installing it, it increases the customer support that a team needs to offer to users.
Third, maybe Bethesda telling them that they couldn't legally allow it scared the team and they decided to not bother with an installer, because what if Bethesda shuts them down later for other reasons and all of that?
 

Gargaune

Magister
Joined
Mar 12, 2020
Messages
3,179
Rusty is right in the above post. We can do whatever we want with the game files privately, as long as we don't distribute them, Bethesda is pretty chill about it because there's no law that prevents the user from grabbing assets from games they legally own and using them in different games as long as the user has the know-how to do so.

But as soon as someone starts distributing those assets without permission, then it becomes a copyright infringement, for the company that owns those files. Voice and music files are used by gaming companies under licenses (unless they are royalty free), so if Bethesda (in this case) goes ahead and gives permission for modders to use these files, then they themselves are breaking the legally bound license, which means they will get into legal trouble and can be put into court or have to pay a hefty amount out of court and then forced to revoke the permission they gave.

Fun fact, Bethesda asked the Nexus not to host TTW when TTW was first born, because Bethesda was worried we would distribute assets from the games. This was one of the reasons why we made our installer the way it is, it is also the reason why TTW is not on the Nexus to this day.

About FO4 CW team and their decision to not have an installer like TTW... I can only speculate, but I can come up with a few reasons why that might be:
First, getting someone that knows how to create and maintain the installer is a pain. TTW has had some versions delayed in the past because of this same reason.
Second, if the mod requires an installer then it can't be automatically installed by mod managers. So no one-click download and install, no including it in Nexus collections, users that are too used to this easy stuff will get problems installing it, it increases the customer support that a team needs to offer to users.
Third, maybe Bethesda telling them that they couldn't legally allow it scared the team and they decided to not bother with an installer, because what if Bethesda shuts them down later for other reasons and all of that?
Thanks for elaborating. I was under the impression that a tool purpose-built for reusing copyrighted materials outside of their licensed scope could similarly fall foul of copyright regulations - e.g. torrents have other uses (at least theoretically), while a program that ports VO from Fo3 to Fo4 only has the one - but I might be labouring under a false premise, I haven't looked at any of this stuff in a long time. Obviously, Bethesda could C&D any mod that rubbed them the wrong way, but they're probably not keen to stifle the community and start setting precedent unless they absolutely have to.

For TCW, the third option appeared the most likely to me. It's just that the effort of maintaining an installer seems much smaller than having to re-record everything, and I believe both TCW and F4NV will be using dedicated installers anyway, even if only to check that their original counterparts are installed on the target machine.
 

Bliblablubb

Arcane
Joined
Mar 1, 2014
Messages
2,925
Location
Copium Den
This game will sell very well, every streamer will play it, people will be super hyped for it.
Yeah, that's the sad truth. These days journalist's opinion is like critics for movies, it has barely any influence on the sales.
Bethesda will hold a promo event in the Kennedy spez center or some other museum, streamers will show off their speshul edishun plastic helmet and their canvas goodie bag, Todd will make a smug joke about "seeing to it personally everyone gets a real canvas bag this time", and people will buy it like mad.
Then, Jimquisition will spend the next 6 months making "Lol Starfield" videos where he just reads off other people's opinions to a 20 second gameplay loop. :hahano:
And the cycle starts anew.

Bethesda's main target audience is probably 14-18, who don't even stick around enough cycles to learn anyway...
 

Bliblablubb

Arcane
Joined
Mar 1, 2014
Messages
2,925
Location
Copium Den
I hope the horde of Todd Howards stans around here have learned their lesson after 76 and won't pre-order like retards. :-D
Heh, the only game I ever preordered was Saint's Row 3. I even got an autotune headset for freez for it. Together with an invoice claiming that this 1 $ thing would have of normally cost smth like 30 bucks. :hahano:
 

Kjaska

Arbeiter
Patron
Joined
Nov 23, 2015
Messages
1,490
Location
Germoney
Insert Title Here
Jimquisition
I stopped watching him years ago. Didn't he troon? I thought I heard he was admitted into a psychiatric ward for a suicide attempt or something.

I don't think their main audience is that young. I think many are old Skyrim fans, who have families now and barely get to play more than 4 hours per week. They just stick to the franchises they know and enjoy them as much as possible and don't engage in any critical thinking, because their life already caps out their mental capacity.
 

Red7

Prospernaut
Dumbfuck
Joined
Jun 20, 2022
Messages
79
Jimquisition
I stopped watching him years ago. Didn't he troon? I thought I heard he was admitted into a psychiatric ward for a suicide attempt or something.

I don't think their main audience is that young. I think many are old Skyrim fans, who have families now and barely get to play more than 4 hours per week. They just stick to the franchises they know and enjoy them as much as possible and don't engage in any critical thinking, because their life already caps out their mental capacity.
u just hate women
 
Joined
Aug 10, 2019
Messages
1,308
Jimquisition
I stopped watching him years ago. Didn't he troon? I thought I heard he was admitted into a psychiatric ward for a suicide attempt or something.

I don't think their main audience is that young. I think many are old Skyrim fans, who have families now and barely get to play more than 4 hours per week. They just stick to the franchises they know and enjoy them as much as possible and don't engage in any critical thinking, because their life already caps out their mental capacity.
u just hate women
How did you manage Dumbfuck! with only 54 post.s That's gotta be a record or something.
 

Red7

Prospernaut
Dumbfuck
Joined
Jun 20, 2022
Messages
79
Jimquisition
I stopped watching him years ago. Didn't he troon? I thought I heard he was admitted into a psychiatric ward for a suicide attempt or something.

I don't think their main audience is that young. I think many are old Skyrim fans, who have families now and barely get to play more than 4 hours per week. They just stick to the franchises they know and enjoy them as much as possible and don't engage in any critical thinking, because their life already caps out their mental capacity.
u just hate women
How did you manage Dumbfuck! with only 54 post.s That's gotta be a record or something.
normie brain cant handle the truth. they reject is like jews did with jesus.
 

Kjaska

Arbeiter
Patron
Joined
Nov 23, 2015
Messages
1,490
Location
Germoney
Insert Title Here
Jimquisition
I stopped watching him years ago. Didn't he troon? I thought I heard he was admitted into a psychiatric ward for a suicide attempt or something.
Yeah, and the Social Blade rankings show it with subscribers slowly leaving.

Still makes 12k Deutschmarks per month though.
I found delight in his ugly mug, when he was a man. It added to his self-deprecating humour.

But as a "woman" he just looks disgusting. That shit ain't funny.

12k/month sounds very undeserved at first, but then you compare it to cumtown and their https://www.patreon.com/cumtown at 130k/month (two way split) for literally just talking shit for 90 minutes at a time. While every episode gets pirated and uploaded to jewtube within days. No video feed. Nick even drops the n-bomb from time to time.

People just have too much spare income.
 

Red7

Prospernaut
Dumbfuck
Joined
Jun 20, 2022
Messages
79
I found delight in his ugly mug, when he was a man. It added to his self-deprecating humour.

But as a "woman" he just looks disgusting. That shit ain't funny.

12k/month sounds very undeserved at first, but then you compare it to cumtown and their https://www.patreon.com/cumtown at 130k/month (two way split) for literally just talking shit for 90 minutes at a time. While every episode gets pirated and uploaded to jewtube within days. No video feed. Nick even drops the n-bomb from time to time.

People just have too much spare income.
u just hate body weight challenged women.

accept your body and learn to love yourself.


also my top dollar jew lawyer team prepares civil suit for your unauthorised usage of "jewtube" word which i coined and i registered as my ip in eurojew patents office 8 years ago.
 
Last edited:

Kjaska

Arbeiter
Patron
Joined
Nov 23, 2015
Messages
1,490
Location
Germoney
Insert Title Here
From all the available info so far, it's looking like this game and the discussion surrounding it is going to be your standard faire of bethesda since fallout 3/oblivion.
 

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