Hi y’all.
So let’s cut to the chase.
What is the legal background for being commissioned for work if it’s an asset of any kind being made for romhacking purposes? I understand romhacks and the nature of how their made are fine, but I’m curious how being commissioned for making an asset for someone doesn’t fall into the “technically sorta illegal” catagory.
TLDR: Whats the legality of being comissioned for romhack assets?
-MegaCowsamMan
I mean
Romhacking itself is kinda illegal in general, we’re allowed only to continue because Nintendo seems to not mind. But if they wanted they could totally just cease and desist every single hack.
So do not worry about the illegality of being commissioned.
Alegal, maybe? Are you talking about taxing the commisions or something? I don’t think you’d get into trouble for contributing to a romhack in any way except by spreading the roms themselves.
Actually 
Romhacking is technically legal. Modifing a game you own is totally fine, and even upload it to your computer as a ROM is cool. The problem is, of course, when you don’t own the game and download the ROM from another source.
Noone at IS going to pursuit you for this, tho.
The only romhack that got a Cease and Desist (that I can find) is Pokemon Prism. But from what I’ve heard it was more because they used actual copyrighted content for their trailer and some of the assets that aren’t in the original game (This might be false, as it’s not sourced and I haven’t played the game). The Pokemon company is way more defensive of their IP than IS, so you’re fine.
it’s only technically sorta illegal if you directly use assets that are protected against other use by copyright law
Also Japanese companies tend to enforce IP rights selectively, they don’t blanket C/D stuff because Comiket is good marketing
This is a good part of why splices tend to go up F2E and are pretty much always F2U, it would feel scummy otherwise
I consider it less risky if there is no money exchanged.
This is because I believe that if the fan is doing the activity completely free of charge, there is less chance of anger.
For example, let’s say there are two types of activities: those that fans do for free as a hobby and those that make money.
“Which would you strike down first?” If I had to guess, I would say the one that is making money.
Because it would give them a rather good reason that they are making money by using their data without permission.