Blizzard Censors StarCraft II Maps

[Anti_Bodies]

Ummmm my favorite TD in WC3 was "Nazi Tower Defense"

It was actually pretty challenging and funny (if you keep an open mind). I don't suppose this would fly through Blizzards nazi standards (pun).

 

[killer1390]

Blizzard is a BIG company, obviously. They don't want their games spoiled by people being malicious. Malicious people have the habit of finding loopholes in rules to continue being malicious, and then Blizzard will look like the bad guys for shutting them down.

In the blob of legal shit that blizzard has released, they put a section that will basically let them take anything they deem offensive for any reason, and take it away because they can. This is to cover any malicious pieces of shit that come along.

A very big company indeed. But, those malicious people will still be just as malicious with or without that legal clause. The point is that even though they give themselves permission to take anything down without any spoken reason, it does not mean they should.

The company(no matter what company) always looks bad if they do not give information about why they do something.

 

[TheOverWhelming]

Basically, I can't say "fuck" in a game when a character is under extreme distress and may die shortly afterwards.
Sure, "Shit" works too but that feels more humorous when you're about to get your face eaten by Zerg.
"Crap", on the otherhand, just feels stupid. Would you say "Crap" when you're about to die? No.
This also limits people who want to basically make campaign-type mission [series], to tell a story they devised. You pretty much can't cause a genocide against a people in any story that takes place on Blizzard's servers.
And this isn't about people being "malicious", if people are generally trying to ruin Blizzard's rep by making games that are basically porn (or something else most people can agree on as unneeded and stupid) but still are within the rules, then Blizzard should do something about it. I'm talking about the people who are becoming limited by Blizzard's rules. People who are going to be annoyed and be forced to do a few extra hours in the GE because through sheer chance something that be taken offensively.
Edit: By the way, what do you mean by "Malicious [things]"?

 

[tagg1080]

It.
Is.
There.
So.
They.
Can.
Stop.
Malicious.
Dumbasses.
Not.
To.
Stop.
Regular.
Map.
Making.

/facepalm

 

[HINDYhat]

Ummmm my favorite TD in WC3 was "Nazi Tower Defense"

It was actually pretty challenging and funny (if you keep an open mind). I don't suppose this would fly through Blizzards nazi standards (pun).

I actually made a Nazi TD once, but it was banned from EpicWar. I would lol if you're talking about the map I made. I think the swastika was the wrong way around in mine.

If you people can't come up with unique and creative ideas and concepts, which doesn't violate against their terms of agreement, then...

Tough Luck

QFT.

 

[TwentyThree]

>_>
I don't think he understood that question TOW...
Malicious means offensive, insulting, evil and cruel..
and you can say Fuck, Shit, Whore, etc etc because they are already in the game, if you pay attention to the Campaign the various characters swear quite often!

 

[Anti_Bodies]

I actually made a Nazi TD once, but it was banned from EpicWar. I would lol if you're talking about the map I made. I think the swastika was the wrong way around in mine.

haha well the one im talking about had 9 human players. The map was in the shape of a swastika with 2 players on each wing plus 1 player in the middle. 1 leak and you lose. all the units were air. And I think one of them was called "Shiteater Jew". It was the most hilariously awful map Ive ever played. One of the better towers was called "Jew Oven". I remember having trouble getting into rounds 12+.

God I loved that map. So funny. So bad. So challenging.

 

[Karawasa]

I could see playing Nazi TD (with an open mind) if...you build as the Jews and kill the Nazis. But, it's the opposite and rather profane actually. You love that map? God help you.

 

[MySpaceBarBroke]

*yawn* Their server, their rules. I can't stand them for taking away our LAN and shitifying Battle.net, but this is pretty stupid. They don't want nazis and porn on Battle.net. Is that too much to handle?

When they start reporting Chinese anti-communist activists or something, then it's worth complaining about.

 

[Rui]

My largest worry is the trademark rule. So far, custom Warcraft III cinematics and campaigns have used music from other games. Forbidding that music from being used is literally saying the cinematics and campaigns we'll get will have no music except for Starcraft II's. Can you imagine your favorite movies without music? Imagine Lord of the Rings without music, for example. Or, to be less radical, WoS or The Cult of the Damned. That's what will be coming our way if this trademark and copyright thing is taken to extremes. While the game music is good, it obviously won't fit every theme and will eventually get repetitive and people will grow tired of it.
There are composers here, sure, but, with all due respect, their work can hardly compare.
Personally, I am not too happy about the game itself, and my last hope is the editor and the custom maps that will come out of it.
There's still some hope that it'll be allowed; the importation of such resources may be supported by Fair Use. There doesn't seem to be a lot of ground for legal argues concerning game music, either. This is still my biggest concern, though. Thoughts?

 

[MGCǂSpectre]

At least there will be the offline maps for that. Single player maps will be able to use them.

 

[Rui]

I don't understand, I thought that every map had to go through their servers?

 

[Karawasa]

Not if you upload it to sites...the file can be dragged and dropped to start it within SC2 (w/o publishing).

 

[Rui]

Are you sure about that? I read somewhere that dragging and dropping will make the map be interpreted as melee.

 

[MySpaceBarBroke]

My largest worry is the trademark rule. So far, custom Warcraft III cinematics and campaigns have used music from other games. Forbidding that music from being used is literally saying the cinematics and campaigns we'll get will have no music except for Starcraft II's. Can you imagine your favorite movies without music? Imagine Lord of the Rings without music, for example. Or, to be less radical, WoS or The Cult of the Damned. That's what will be coming our way if this trademark and copyright thing is taken to extremes. While the game music is good, it obviously won't fit every theme and will eventually get repetitive and people will grow tired of it.
There are composers here, sure, but, with all due respect, their work can hardly compare.
Personally, I am not too happy about the game itself, and my last hope is the editor and the custom maps that will come out of it.
There's still some hope that it'll be allowed; the importation of such resources may be supported by Fair Use. There doesn't seem to be a lot of ground for legal argues concerning game music, either. This is still my biggest concern, though. Thoughts?

I'm sure there are places like Newgrounds that can provide quality free music.

I'm not sure what their stance on that is, though.

 

[Dark.Revenant]

So what if I wanted to stick some Rachmaninoff into a map? Would it be axed?
What if I actually paid the royalties for some piece of music for however many thousand dollars it would cost me and put it in the map. How would I prove I did so?
What if I actually composed the piece of music but it sounded similar to something someone else made and got the map banned?
There's a lot of gray, unknown area here. Blizzard really should elaborate on the criteria a lot more, now that they've said that they will be strictly enforcing them.

I think what Blizzard is doing is treating all of us like Blizzard volunteers making maps for Blizzard and covering Blizzards' own ass from legal trouble in the process. These aren't our maps to begin with, after all. According to legality, it's only out of their good grace that we're able to play these maps at all or possibly get paid for making them in the future.

But the whole trademark thing works well in a corporation vs. corporation theater, but not in a corporation vs. individual consumers battleground. Legally, you have to pay some money ($1-$5) to be allowed to listen to someone's recording/composition. It's not enough to pay for the song to put it in your works, however; you basically have to prepay for the unknown amount of people who will be seeing/listening to your work. Royalties. It's basically assumed that people on the internet putting out stuff for free will never ever have the money or willingness to pay expensive royalties for every song they use in their little something they make. It's exorbitant enough as it is just to buy the personal license to be allowed to hear the music that you listen to. Seriously, I'd a thousand dollars in debt right now if I actually paid for all the shit in my music library. The whole system is fundamentally flawed when it comes to the little people like us, but there's no way we can change it unless we can pay for our own army of lobbyists to match the record labels', RIAA's, etc. [/rant]

 

[Anti_Bodies]

If you paid the royalties then you would then make a note in your map that you have the proper documentation, and you probably would send Blizzard the documentation just to be safe. They might not even delete stuff unless other companies send them a cease and desist (or whatever other legal maneuver).

Everyone should stop crying. Blizzard will do what It can so it doesn't get sued the crap out of just so someone can make their unoriginal map. We should wait in see to how Blizzard actually goes about with this over the coming months. Let's see if they pull any themed maps or maps with music and how they deal with that. I know some maps have already been pulled, though im not sure which ones. And Blizzard is new at this. Everything will be more clear as time goes on.

Stop crying.

 

[Ralle]

It's really sad how they decided to control everything with this game. :S

 

[StormWarriors2]

I understand why they have to do that though.. Getting sued takes alot of money.... Which blizzard cannot afford to lose right now

 

[WherewolfTherewolf]

Well the danger of being sued also comes from their own decisions too - if they didn't force you to go through their server/log in online just to play the game then a lot of this wouldn't be a problem.

 

[Mikecari]

I understand why they have to do that though.. Getting sued takes alot of money.... Which blizzard cannot afford to lose right now

Oh man I laughed far too much on that comment, Blizzard is among one of the richest game companies existing today. From World of Warcraft they literally take in well over a billion dollars annually. Honestly, I hope they do get sued so they lose their cockiness and start listening to the players instead of their stupid managers.

 

[StormWarriors2]

Oh man I laughed far too much on that comment, Blizzard is among one of the richest game companies existing today. From World of Warcraft they literally take in well over a billion dollars annually. Honestly, I hope they do get sued so they lose their cockiness and start listening to the players instead of their stupid managers.

Well one thing i noticed is that i was actually joking. I know Blizzard is one of the richest companies in the world. Though i really think they are big #!@$!@# @#$!@#$ !@ $@#! $!@ #$ !@#$ !@# $@! #$!@ #$ !@#$ @ $@! #$! %^$#^#%#@! %@# $@! % ^@!@ $@! #$!@ #$!@ #^!@# $. But anyway they have be sued. By Gamesworkshop. And GW won the sueing but anyway the funniest thing that i thought when i played starcraft 2 was that i noticed alot of 40k quotes. -.-
Another thing that i noticed was the problem with playing online there is whole lot of rushers and spammers. Which is kinda unfair.

But anyway the most wierdiest thing is that blizzard says they are being orginial but they aren't. I laugh how they are trying not to get sued agian. but they already did.

 

[Vengeancekael]

Honestly, I hope they do get sued so they lose their cockiness and start listening to the players instead of their stupid managers.

Uhm first of all, why should they get sued?
Also, it's their game and I don't think the changes they made are that bad.
Obviously they don't want people to post maps that break a few rules, which is fine I guess, since they wrote the rules.
You're just "pissed off" because of no lan support bla bla.
When will you guys get over that?

 

[StormWarriors2]

I did. I like the new blizzard stuff. Except they got rid of chat channels which pissed me off a little.

 

[MGCǂSpectre]

Another thing that i noticed was the problem with playing online there is whole lot of rushers and spammers. Which is kinda unfair.

Problem? Just stay in Copper/Bronze and be silent. If you want them to create a Stone league, Im fine with that.

 

[StormWarriors2]

well. Thats only, sometimes, but if your fast you can kick their ass.

 

[Rui]

I'm sure there are places like Newgrounds that can provide quality free music.

I'm not sure what their stance on that is, though.

I went to check Newgrounds. I'm not too impressed, so far... but the quality of their works is better. I'll go there again and listen to a few more.

So what if I wanted to stick some Rachmaninoff into a map? Would it be axed?
[...]

From what I read, Rachmaninoff is an old artist. Every work older than 50 years is put under GNU Free License, if I'm not wrong. So the answer is no.

[...]
I think what Blizzard is doing is treating all of us like Blizzard volunteers making maps for Blizzard and covering Blizzards' own ass from legal trouble in the process. These aren't our maps to begin with, after all. According to legality, it's only out of their good grace that we're able to play these maps at all or possibly get paid for making them in the future.
[...]

Yes, I forgot to mention that in my post; they create their own problem by stating that all maps are their property. Why do they do this, by the way?

As for the last paragraph, I guess that, in the end, we'll have to wait for someone to do this and see what happens.