To avoid unwittingly ending up in hot water, I'm not using specific names here. Also, since it relates to sprite creation and using assets in games, that's why I posted the thread in the Developer’s Discussion. Not that long ago, a good online friend of mine tried to submit an extended version of Blaze the Cat sprites onto a sprite web site. Her submission was rejected not due to the quality, but rather the simple fact that she lacked the permission from the original rippers of the sprites. If the sprites she used were custom, that would be a horse of a different color. If you poured your energy into creating the most appealing sprites possible, wouldn't you be miffed if someone uses your work willy-nilly and not even give you credit? Now, the case here is that the sprites are actually ripped straight out of the game. Sure, it requires a good deal of effort just to compile them all, but all the ripper is doing is piggybacking off the hard work of the actual artists from the games. While I'm not saying that the practice of ripping needs to be abolished, like I'm probably unintentionally implying here, my concern is how some ripped assets require permission from the actual ripper. If anything, it makes more sense to ask the original developers permission to use the assets (let alone rip them) in the first place. Sure, you can ask for credit for the rips, but if somebody forgets that fact, it's not worth hounding the other person. Now, I know of at least one other person who agrees with me on this fact, which is how you shouldn't require permission for using ripped assets. It's comparable to trying to sell a stolen car, although not as illegal. It's one thing if this kind of sheet goes through anyway, but it really is another if this kind of tomfoolery is actually enforced by a site staff. The worst that should happen for failing to ask for permission from the original ripper is a tantrum from the ripper in question; however, now it has reached the point where you can't submit edits of ripped sprites that require permission from the original sheets. Say what you will about edits, but they are not only a reasonable start for a career in pixel art, but some edits actually turn out very well. On top of that, this also doesn't bode well if this kind of enforcement extends into creating so much as a sprite comic with ripped assets requiring permission. It defeats the purpose of submitting ripped sprites to a site at all and matters get even more complicated if the original ripper is incommunicado. So, what are your thoughts on this?

I believe that ripped graphics shouldn't be credited to the ripper, but to the original game's creators. I mean, you didn't make those graphics you ripped from Super Mario World or Sonic the Hedgehog or Mega Man, and I didn't make the stuff I got from Wario Land 4. Their creators did, and that's who should be credited. Based on that, you should be perfectly fine to expand on them or submit them elsewhere. You can't claim ownership over something you didn't create/get the rights to. And you certainly shouldn't be going around putting stupid warnings in the 'credit' tag or whining that resources you technically stole are being 'stolen' by someone else. As for edits... I'm gonna be honest and say that if the law doesn't say they're your own property, then nor will I. Only original sprites are something that's owned by their creator, and which you should really 'credit' to the submitter. So yeah, that's my thoughts on this matter.

But then again, what if someone ripped something from a game whose publisher went out business, (like Accolade, the company who made Bubsy)?

As someone who's ripped many a sprite in my day, I would never expect credit for merely transferring someone else's work from game to sprite sheet. Its a little tedious, but super easy for most consoles. I feel like a lot of rippers understand this and usually don't expect credit. Being accredited on the site itself is usually enough. That being said, resubmitting someone else's rips to a sprite archive is a huge taboo in the spriting community. I think that might be where their problem is.

This is why I don't demand credit for such a thing. Instead, I say it's appreciated. Some things are much tougher to get in picture form than others, but I would nonetheless not demand it.

Credit is implied when you explain what the rip is actually [i]from[/i]. It is redundant to expressly credit Nintendo for Wario Land 4 rips.

I've never felt ok with a sort of... "tangential piggyback" credit of official sprites. I got the Pokemon portraits and many backgrounds from Pokemon Dungeon for GBA, but never wanted my name attached to their work... if I did, would that seem wrong?

[quote="CM30"]I believe that ripped graphics shouldn't be credited to the ripper, but to the original game's creators. I mean, you didn't make those graphics you ripped from Super Mario World or Sonic the Hedgehog or Mega Man, and I didn't make the stuff I got from Wario Land 4. Their creators did, and that's who should be credited. Based on that, you should be perfectly fine to expand on them or submit them elsewhere. You can't claim ownership over something you didn't create/get the rights to. And you certainly shouldn't be going around putting stupid warnings in the 'credit' tag or whining that resources you technically stole are being 'stolen' by someone else. As for edits... I'm gonna be honest and say that if the law doesn't say they're your own property, then nor will I. Only original sprites are something that's owned by their creator, and which you should really 'credit' to the submitter. So yeah, that's my thoughts on this matter.[/quote] Well said! I'm glad my Skype buddies and I aren't the only ones who think all this. As for the concept of owning edits, I'm a bit mixed on that. I mean, it's natural to assume that it falls under the same category as ripped sprites; however, there is still an amount of effort to modify the sprites that go beyond just extracting them from a game. On top of that, if the edit is amazing, then I would say that some degree of credit is reasonable. Quite frankly, that whole situation is in a grey area and it's almost like fan works using the actual IPs despite creating original assets (i.e. video game music covers). [quote="SMBXfan"]But then again, what if someone ripped something from a game whose publisher went out business, (like Accolade, the company who made Bubsy)?[/quote] I don't have a good answer for this, but what I assume involves the concept of public domain. Typically, IPs from defunct companies enter this area, which means you are generally free to use them however you wish. The bad news is that this isn't always the case. Even if the original studio goes out of business, there is the matter of certain companies, like the publisher of the game, holding onto the IPs. Some of these situations get pretty complicated, which is why we don't see remakes or sequels to games that are created by past studios. Regardless, it's still scummy to ask permission from a ripper who nicked the resources from a public domain game anyway. [quote="Syaxamaphone"]That being said, resubmitting someone else's rips to a sprite archive is a huge taboo in the spriting community. I think that might be where their problem is.[/quote] On one hand, I see where you're coming from. If you upload full sheets from one sprite archive to another (even if you don't intend to get any credit), then it's similar to providing unofficial mirrors to links and costing the original site some traffic. I guess I would understand where this certain sprite website comes from if my friend got her sprites from Mystical Forest Zone instead of something off the sprite website. On the other hand, this falls into the grey area of edits that I mentioned before. She credited the original rippers of the sprites and this somewhat counts as a transformative work. I feel that any ripped assets shouldn't have the same kind of power as custom assets, so this kind of submission rejection is still absurd to an extent. At the end of the day, it's not really the ripper's place to decide how the sprites are used outside of how they are distributed. If a taboo like this truly is serious, then I'm wondering how a channel like SilvaGunner is still in business. While I do realize that sprites and music are basically apples and oranges and it's likely that the content creators ask for permission (not to mention that YouTube has different moderation practices), I imagine that some of the "high-quality rips" follow a similar case to my friend's extended sheet.

[quote="E-Man"]On the other hand, this falls into the grey area of edits that I mentioned before. She credited the original rippers of the sprites and this somewhat counts as a transformative work. I feel that any ripped assets shouldn't have the same kind of power as custom assets, so this kind of submission rejection is still absurd to an extent. At the end of the day, it's not really the ripper's place to decide how the sprites are used outside of how they are distributed. If a taboo like this truly is serious, then I'm wondering how a channel like SilvaGunner is still in business. While I do realize that sprites and music are basically apples and oranges and it's likely that the content creators ask for permission (not to mention that YouTube has different moderation practices), I imagine that some of the "high-quality rips" follow a similar case to my friend's extended sheet.[/quote] I feel like there is a difference between stealing from a ripper and ripping from a game. If you rip something from a game like SMB1, which has been dissected so many times and ripped from, it's OK, so as long as Nintendo doesn't catch you. If you re-upload a work by a sprite ripper, that's like posting the Happy Birthday song on the Internet (which oddly enough, has been copyrighted), you are just making a copy of a copy, and it's not ethical because a) the ripper will mind and b) the creator of the game holds it anyways. In other words, [img]http://i1.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/358/584/98a.jpg[/img]

With all due respect, I can take you more seriously if you don't use memes in your replies. [quote="SMBXfan"] If you rip something from a game like SMB1, which has been dissected so many times and ripped from, it's OK, so as long as Nintendo doesn't catch you.[/quote] The way you phrased that sounds rather shady if you ask me. It's like you can get away with murder as long as nobody knows. It's highly likely that Nintendo knows about games ripping by now. While I can't tell you exactly why they haven't shut down those places yet (possibly due to respecting the fans), sprite rippers should consider themselves fortunate to continue an action that is arguably on the darker side of the grey area. Still, it seems that profiting off the ripped assets still lands you in hot water if Bullock's assumptions on why Alvin Earthworm got into trouble are correct. [quote="SMBXfan"] If you re-upload a work by a sprite ripper, that's like posting the Happy Birthday song on the Internet (which oddly enough, has been copyrighted), you are just making a copy of a copy, and it's not ethical because a) the ripper will mind and b) the creator of the game holds it anyways. [/quote] The rest of this post doesn't make that much sense in my opinion. Your simile would work better if it was uploading a copy of "Happy Birthday" (which I think is now in the Public Domain since not that long ago) you found on the web and posting it elsewhere. With that said, your comparison makes sound like the issue is more about a loss in quality trying to distribute a xerox of a xerox and less about what the original rippers think. Sure, your original example makes me think of a music recording studio, which is illegal to post their music online. The actual reality, however, is that the person you're stealing from already crossed an ethical line by technically stealing assets from a game. While I get that the ripper minds, what would they realistically do? I mean, you could take a case of a stolen fan game or custom sprite sheet to court and the probability of getting a favorable outcome is far more likely than suing a web site that used the ripped assets from a ripper online. If anything, the original company should punish both the thief and the ripper instead of letting the ripper have their way. I'll give the ripper the kind of leeway that protects their [b]unmodified[/b] sheets from unauthorized distribution, but that's about it.

{ADMITS THAT I DIDN'T REALLY GET THE TOPIC} {DUMBFOUNDED}

[quote="SMBXfan"]{ADMITS THAT I DIDN'T REALLY GET THE TOPIC} {DUMBFOUNDED}[/quote] On some sprite sheets, the person who got them wants credit for getting the sprites. Since they're official game resources, it doesn't seem right (to me anyway) to try to attach your name to them for the effort. Getting the sprites from the game is the goal, anyway.

If I ever rip sprites, I don't think it's even worth it to post my name on them. Still, I really don't have have any business ripping assets anymore (especially since the ones I'm potentially after are outside the Mario universe) and I'm a lot more jaded about ripping in general. While Vinny told me that it isn't a thing on MFGG, I do know that I see several sprite sheets over on this certain sprite website ask for credit. A notable example includes these sheets from the third Mario & Luigi game where the ripper says to give credit to him and Nintendo. In fact, I believe that his sheets are still on MFGG with that tag still on it.

There are a lot of sprite sheets on MFGG that ask people to give credit to the ripper. I'm not a big fan of these, especially when the content took just a few minutes to rip. I've noticed an inverse relationship between quality of the submission and the size of the tag asking users to give credit to the ripper - usually it's the smallest, worst-organized sheets that put "GIVE CREDIT!!!!!" in the biggest, boldest text. As a fangame maker, I often choose to give credit to the people who ripped the sprites for my games, especially if the submission was large or difficult to rip. However, if you're going to give credit, you should give credit to the company and/or individual who actually made the original graphics before you give credit to the sprite ripper. Good sprite rippers add value to the original content by putting the graphics in a format that's easy to import into game-making utilities, but ultimately, they're not the ones who own the original material. Occasionally I've seen sprite submissions that actually ask for permission before use. As an MFGG QC staffer, I always decline those, even if it's a custom sheet (and even if it's something like a generic tileset that doesn't use any material copyrighted by others). There's no guarantee that anyone will be able to find you to ask for permission - not all spriters stay on MFGG forever, and e-mail accounts and social media profiles can disappear with time, too. Plus, if you're putting your work on a site designed to help people make games, you should expect game makers to be able to use what you submit.

[quote]an [b]extended version[/b] of Blaze the Cat sprites onto a sprite web site.[/quote] So, was it the original sprite sheet plus additional sprites? In the big picture, people who rip sprites cannot claim ownership of the sprites themselves or demand how they're used. The act of ripping sprites is not a creative work. [i]However,[/i] I suppose a spritesheet as a whole might be considered as a derivative work. If it's obviously a continuation of the original sheet, then I would say it's [b]fair[/b] to give credit but I wouldn't say it's [b]mandatory.[/b]

I don't know how many of the original sprites are on the sheet in question, but you've basically hit the nail on the head. Anyway, the worst this sprite sheet has done is state to give credit if used, but I doubt that my friend actually cares that much regardless. The problem is that other people other there think that ripped sprites are entitled to credit/permission and it has extended to the point where even web sites are enforcing this flawed mentality. Although it's understandable (in spite how it's not necessarily forgivable) that a younger web site would fall into this trap, the issue is that the site in question is actually one of the most influential web sites in the history of online video game fandom. It already has a bit of a history of unsavory conduct without episodes like this contributing to it.

I've thought for a good while now that asking for credit for rips is dumb. I understand it to an extent, it did take some effort, but the most Good Guy Greg thing to do is to not ask for credit at all. (The Chaotic Good version of this being the rare 2007 sprite saying "DON'T DARE GIVE CREDIT OR ELSE!") At the same time, if you make a game, you should try to have thick enough skin that if someone rips your assets, you can handle it without saying anything. It's probably at least a little offensive, but think of it in the same way you might think of harsh criticism, or of piracy. Yeah it sorta sucks, but are you really gonna be the guy that escalates it over basically nothing? Heck, over people enjoying your game?

Heh! That bit about the Chaotic Good credit tag cracked me up! I love credit tags with a sense of humor, which was why I was amused by looking at the sprite sheets on this other web site. I even attempted it myself on my first sprite submitted sheet, but I had to cut most of it back because it was deemed unnecessary. These days, since I'm actually using my Paper Mario sprites as textures, it's impractical to put a huge credit tag on it. As such, I keep it as small as reasonable possible, while the jokes are axed. Even though I place on my sheets to give credit, I won't really hound anyone who fails to do so. Sure, custom sprites require more effort than ripped ones, but there are other problems I worry about instead. It bothers me that some people are more defensive about their sprites than others.