Square Enix Threatens Legal Action Against Type-0 Fan Translation

WiiCube_2013 · Jul 19, 2014

The way to see if the translations are the same are by comparing when it's released.

WiiUBricker said:
I bet people will forget everything if Square Enix announces a PS Vita version.

Would make absolutely no difference. Sure some Vita users would be happy but the majority couldn't care less. It's like releasing Call of Duty for the Wii U except the Wii U users themselves wouldn't pick the game up.

FAST6191 · Jul 19, 2014

GHANMI said:
The patch reworked that way (much like the Fatal Frame 4 translation) shouldn't be problematic (no copyrighted material at all inside of it).

Technically speaking the script being translated is very iffy and has seen things shut down before ( http://www.dmwmedia.com/news/2009/03/02/fan-generated-movie-subtitle-sites-targeted-by-studios being an example, in my search just now I saw another case last year), some of the subtitle sites faced this issue a couple of years back.

+1 to what you said though (I assume this is not a FF7 style case of same game, different videos on all the different discs), whether that was a kind of end run or not remains to be debated but if it is that then it is legally quite sound.

Zero Dozer · Jul 19, 2014

If it's gonna be like this, then you guys should ban EVERY FAN TRANSLATION PATCH POSTED HERE.

I won't ask for something I can find by myself, but I don't like those politics as well.

Edit: (Do not consider this as some idiocy on my part, but I think the same crap applies to everything that wasn't made by a publisher, according to ther goddamned jurassic visions. So, if a fan translation is now considered piracy and you guys DON'T WANT TO GET INVOLVED WITH IT, then why not begone with ALL THOSE PATCHES RIGHT HERE ON THIS SITE? Would be a friggin' bad idea, wouldn't it? Just think about it.

Rules have a price, but there are some whose price people won't be willing to pay.)

Pedeadstrian · Jul 19, 2014

Well, now I don't feel bad for having downloaded a pre-patched copy of Type-0 after Skyblade and the rest's extensive work. Then again, I wouldn't have felt bad anyway. Screw you, SE. You don't translate a bunch of awesome games, whether they be Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, etc., but threaten legal action when someone else does. That's like the corporation equivalent of ignoring your girlfriend and then see her hanging out with another dude and threatening to kill her because of it.

mario5555 · Jul 19, 2014

I deleted my first response to this post until I read Lumstar's reply on page 2 and decided to re-write it again.

So here goes. Take 2.

WiiUBricker said:
In any case, I guess this slims the chances of Blood of Bahamut ever getting completed.

I completely forgot about this game until you brought it up again. And seeing how it's 4 years old and no talk about it ever being translated and released, I don't think S-E cares too much about it at all.

Tom Bombadildo said:
I assume they're doing so because they would rather have people buy their own localization instead of people pirating the game and using the fan translation, which is understandable at least.

T-hug said:
I'm not sure how true this is, but I heard they took donations for the project, this could be why this has happened.

Other projects accept donations, S-E would have to prove that that those donations were given solely for the support of the translation and payment for said translation, flimsy ground at the very best.

Nathan Drake said:
Step 1: Don't localize the game.
Step 2: Wait until fans, fed up with waiting for a localization that will never come, translate the game themselves.
Step 3: Conveniently announce that you are actually localizing the game exactly one day later after the translation release, of all the convenient times.
Step 4: Punish those loyal fans who spent hundreds of hours just doing what you refused to do so that you can rip off their translation and call it your own.

Good going, SE. You have totally earned my respect for portraying yourselves as greedy thieves.

I was on the same thing with my thinking until I remembered that S-E SUPPOSEDLY has a 100% completed translation for the game ready to go. But I'd rather see them work with the fans rather than attack fans wanting to do fan tribute projects to games they care so much about.

Hand said:
If patches and fan translations are not illegal, what can Square do against Skyblade?

Hell even Nintendo turned a blind eye to Mother 3, they knew about it, but didn't kill it (same for Captain Rainbow and the Fatal Frame Wii sequel as well, they funded development)

I'm curious to know what they threatened him with more than a cease and desist (according to sources "in the know", see links in OP) as there has never been precedent for anything more severe before this and hope this doesn't lead to a brave new world of underground translation projects because of the ramifications from this project.

Silentsurvivor said:
IMO they already knew this was coming, that's why they rushed to release the patch before the localization was announced. Now that the patch is out in the wild, removing it from their site is meaningless.

Again where's the proof of this allegation? I've read lots of conspiracy theory posts about this issue when it seems like Sky and his group were doing something shady on nothing more then fear mongering and unsupported supposition.

This is something which is not needed right now. Make an educated opinion when all of the facts are out there.

Dimensional said:
I almost get the feeling Sony is going to do something like take the fan translation, and use it for their localization, and basically steal from the hard work of the fans. The fans should copyright the patch. They could do that at least. Right?

I know you meant S-E. It all depends on derivative works let's see....

Here's what the US govt. says on the issue.

source: http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ14.pdf

"To be copyrightable, a derivative work must incorporate some or all of a
preexisting “work” and add new original copyrightable authorship to that work.
The derivative work right is often referred to as the adaptation right. The following
are examples of the many different types of derivative works:
• A translation of an novel written in English into another language"

Legal zoom's comments are a little more gloomy.
source: https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/what-are-derivative-works-under-copyright-law

Who Can Produce Derivative Works?
Only copyright owners have the exclusive right to produce derivative works based on their original, copyrighted works.

I'm not going to go into that any further, chillingeffects.org has a good article as well ( https://www.chillingeffects.org/derivative/) that goes into why it might not be as cut as dry as S-E would like for it to be about their case, other than to bully a translator not fully versed in the law and hope they can get them to settle due to being scared and not having large coffers of money to defend themselves against said lawsuit or legal challenge brought against them by the copyright holder.

Lumstar said:
In any case we're long overdue for these things to actually reach the courtroom. Settling or C&D's don't establish quite a firm legal precedent.

Are you planning on supporting Sky and giving unlimited ($$$) funds for his representation in court? I thought not, there is no way he could do anything but settle or get punished. He's 23 years old, and unless his parents are loaded, I don't see this going into court to battle it out against a multi-million dollar corporation.

I've been reading some ignorant posts on this issue (at the links provided in the OP) but seriously....think before posting a bit more. Because what you've been coming up with makes little to no sense, and could be construed as false allegations where there is none....speaking of which...

Lumstar said:
Besides people are too quick to demonize the side of the story we haven't even heard yet.
It very well could be the patch contains SE copyrighted material, which they wouldn't have known until they were able to obtain it.
That'd be a plausible explanation for the timing of this.

And you have this solid proof from what source? That could be construed as a libelous statement accusing the team of using that material in their patch with no proof that it was done so.

Or is an outright speculation (which I believe it is) that you read on sky's blog page that someone (or you) made a comment of out of thin air with no proof to back up that statement.

S-E has a track record of killing fan projects, and this is another in a long line of bullying tactics from them. They are willing to punish fans for their dedication and loyalty rather than reach a hand of friendship out and work with them (see Xseed, Capcom, hell even Nintendo, etc.) on projects to enhance brand perception.

Edit: For the record, I've not read Sky's notes on the translation, nor have looked at the patch myself, I'm just commenting on the allegations being made and no proof other than hearsay, and I say thing only after reading Ghanmi's post, I'd have to look into it further and see how much merit is in those claims.

Hargrun · Jul 19, 2014

Zero Dozer said:
If it's gonna be like this, then you guys should ban EVERY FAN TRANSLATION PATCH POSTED HERE.

I won't ask for something I can find by myself, but I don't like those politics as well.

Edit: (Do not consider this as some idiocy on my part, but I think the same crap applies to everything that wasn't made by a publisher, according to ther goddamned jurassic visions. So, if a fan translation is now considered piracy and you guys DON'T WANT TO GET INVOLVED WITH IT, then why not begone with ALL THOSE PATCHES RIGHT HERE ON THIS SITE? Would be a friggin' bad idea, wouldn't it? Just think about it.

Rules have a price, but there are some whose price people won't be willing to pay.)

It's a bad idea.

First you forgot the fact that there is much copyrighted material with the patch (that isn't a simple PPF or Xdelta file).

Second, donations. I agree with what was said above, all the money that was donated hardly will pay the team effort but... Again... This is the world in which we live.

Zero Dozer · Jul 19, 2014

So is that it? Conform with the rules and be a helpless little lamb to anyone who wants to rape you?

Sorry, I don't play by this.

As I said, I won't break the rules here, but that doesn't mean that I agree with it.

Also, Mario5555 scored a big one here; even Nintendo with their hollywoodian tactics allowed the Mother 3 translation to exist.

CathyRina · Jul 19, 2014

...SE, not cool...

Lumstar · Jul 19, 2014

mario5555 said:
I deleted my first response to this post until I read Lumstar's reply on page 2 and decided to re-write it again.

So here goes. Take 2.

I completely forgot about this game until you brought it up again. And seeing how it's 4 years old and no talk about it ever being translated and released, I don't think S-E cares too much about it at all.

Other projects accept donations, S-E would have to prove that that those donations were given solely for the support of the translation and payment for said translation, flimsy ground at the very best.

I was on the same thing with my thinking until I remembered that S-E SUPPOSEDLY has a 100% completed translation for the game ready to go. But I'd rather see them work with the fans rather than attack fans wanting to do fan tribute projects to games they care so much about.

Hell even Nintendo turned a blind eye to Mother 3, they knew about it, but didn't kill it (same for Captain Rainbow and the Fatal Frame Wii sequel as well, they funded development)

I'm curious to know what they threatened him with more than a cease and desist (according to sources "in the know", see links in OP) as there has never been precedent for anything more severe before this and hope this doesn't lead to a brave new world of underground translation projects because of the ramifications from this project.

Again where's the proof of this allegation? I've read lots of conspiracy theory posts about this issue when it seems like Sky and his group were doing something shady on nothing more then fear mongering and unsupported supposition.

This is something which is not needed right now. Make an educated opinion when all of the facts are out there.

I know you meant S-E. It all depends on derivative works let's see....

Here's what the US govt. says on the issue.

source: http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ14.pdf

Legal zoom's comments are a little more gloomy.
source: https://www.legalzoom.com/articles/what-are-derivative-works-under-copyright-law

I'm not going to go into that any further, chillingeffects.org has a good article as well ( https://www.chillingeffects.org/derivative/) that goes into why it might not be as cut as dry as S-E would like for it to be about their case, other than to bully a translator not fully versed in the law and hope they can get them to settle due to being scared and not having large coffers of money to defend themselves against said lawsuit or legal challenge brought against them by the copyright holder.

Are you planning on supporting Sky and giving unlimited ($$$) funds for his representation in court? I thought not, there is no way he could do anything but settle or get punished. He's 23 years old, and unless his parents are loaded, I don't see this going into court to battle it out against a multi-million dollar corporation.

I've been reading some ignorant posts on this issue (at the links provided in the OP) but seriously....think before posting a bit more. Because what you've been coming up with makes little to no sense, and could be construed as false allegations where there is none....speaking of which...

And you have this solid proof from what source? That could be construed as a libelous statement accusing the team of using that material in their patch with no proof that it was done so.

Or is an outright speculation (which I believe it is) that you read on sky's blog page that someone (or you) made a comment of out of thin air with no proof to back up that statement.

S-E has a track record of killing fan projects, and this is another in a long line of bullying tactics from them. They are willing to punish fans for their dedication and loyalty rather than reach a hand of friendship out and work with them (see Xseed, Capcom, hell even Nintendo, etc.) on projects to enhance brand perception.

Edit: For the record, I've not read Sky's notes on the translation, nor have looked at the patch myself, I'm just commenting on the allegations being made and no proof other than hearsay, and I say thing only after reading Ghanmi's post, I'd have to look into it further and see how much merit is in those claims.

No, please drop the ad hominem. I didn't name any particular person or group to take to court.
I was making a general statement about establishing a legal precedent on the matter of game fan translations.

I didn't say I personally believed the patch has copyrighted work. I raised it as a legitimate relevant possibility to this situation, without any mention of past activity from S-E.

WiiUBricker · Jul 20, 2014

WiiCube_2013 said:
Would make absolutely no difference. Sure some Vita users would be happy but the majority couldn't care less. It's like releasing Call of Duty for the Wii U except the Wii U users themselves wouldn't pick the game up.

It seems you missed the outburst of hate towards Square Enix for not releasing it for the Vita.

bobmcjr · Jul 20, 2014

GHANMI said:
The patch in its current form only needs a single disk and not both disks.

I admit I did find it odd that the ROM merging tools also only required a single disc, and either disc was acceptable to produce the full game.
Looking further into how it was done, I found this on the deleted merging blog post:

For the third version of the Merging Files, I decided to include untouched video files, to achieve the maximum quality.

The merging files therefore most certainly contain copyrighted content (additionally I think found some MDL headers in both it and the patch)

Speculation:

Also, given that the patch is almost the same size as yellow.pkg and bigger than each disc, it is highly likely that it too contains most of yellow.pkg.

I believe if this the patcher concatenated resources from both discs itself, and then delta patched everything, it may have been somewhat "less" illegal. The patch format and patcher appear to be custom, hence supporting either disc I guess.

Based on what I've found, this is how the patch operates:

User provides ISO Disc 1 or Disc 2
The embedded .NET DiscUtils open the ISO
PARAM.SFO, ICON0.png, yellow.fsd, and yellow.pkg are likely entirely replaced (the eboot.bin could be patched, but it too is probably just replaced)
ISO is rebuilt with these new files

In this case the only files left untouched would be PIC0.PNG, PIC1.PNG, SND0.AT3, some additional bin files, libccc.prx, and libmd5.prx.

WiiCube_2013 · Jul 20, 2014

XrosBlader821 said:
...SE, not cool...

So close! Would've been funny if you added an extra e to the end making it "...SEe, not cool".

WiiUBricker said:
It seems you missed the outburst of hate towards Square Enix for not releasing it for the Vita.

Well, I'm not much of an SE gamer and never caught on their Final Fantasy hype train. Y'know I'm more of a platforming guy.

vayanui8 · Jul 20, 2014

This is total BS. Square could have asked the translators for the work. There's no reason they had to go after the fans of their game. I will not be supporting Square with their official port if at all possible, and I think it's horrible that they would go after dedicated fans after they failed to deliver a proper translation themselves.

Steena · Jul 20, 2014

Densetsu said:
I agree, can't exactly fault them for protecting their IP. But considering how successful the game was in Japan, I wonder why they waited until Sky's translation came out before they made any official announcement to localize it for the Western market. There was no solid indication of a Western localization until the day after the fan translation was released. I just feel like this legal BS could have been avoided had SE made it clear from the beginning that they were going to localize it, instead of waiting almost 3 years to make the announcement. If the translation patch had not been made available, it probably would've taken SE even longer to announce it.

It's very logical to assume that SE used the interest/hype in the fan translation to gauge interest for a western release, given this timing coincidence. I for one saw a lot of discussion about the translation even outside of gbatemp; when a release date was given, it WAS a pretty big deal.
Which would mean that they purposefully waited until it was near-finished and ready to get released, and then sent a C&D.
Could it also be possible that they are using the patch itself to cut out the bulk of the job, and just put a bunch of english spellcheckers on the job to save some money?

Either way, there's no way this is a coincidence. There has been silence for 3 or so years, and then in a matter of days of the patch release (which was itself unexpected) the game get announced.

Sheimi · Jul 20, 2014

Seems a bit odd that they send a C&D the following day after it was released.

chrisrlink · Jul 20, 2014

ok SE/SS Has a rep of ruining translations/Fan remakes (Namely the 3D Chrono trigger reboot) through legal threats Do they ever go after The RPG Maker community? I'm sure glad gamefreak doesn't do the same with the Pokemon script engine Pokemon essentials fOR RPG Maker XP now if the patch could be only ran with a legal PSN Download/UMD would they stil mind? my guess is yes they would

mkdms14 · Jul 20, 2014

My understanding based on some informations I read a while ago. Don't remember where but SE was originally planing to release type-O in the west in fact according to some people who work closely with SE they had already finished english voice over and finished most of the in game text when for some reason probably because psp sales where down in the west decided to delay the games release until the psvita was released. Since the psvita never really took off I imagine they just cancelled the game all together. Since the next gen consoles are doing really well they saw this as an opportunity to just upres the graphic, finish the localization and make a quick buck.

Imparasite · Jul 20, 2014

All my respect on SE are gone now that's bull$h!t threatening people just like that, SE are just bunch of lazzy bums they all want are money. Well your new FINAL FANTASY franchise are suck nowadays you deserve it big time!! hope this company will suck dust soonnnn.

anhminh · Jul 20, 2014

Why SE need to threatening a fan-translation?
They won't even release on the same console, why they so piss about it?
Or did they think no one will buy their crappy translated game because fan-translator does it better than their translator does?

TheLostSabre · Jul 20, 2014

With the way SE are nowadays, this doesn't surprised me in the least. Anywho, a C&D is useless at this point since the patch is already released online. So this doesn't benefit SE in anyway since those who wants the patch will find it regardless.

Square Enix Threatens Legal Action Against Type-0 Fan Translation

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