HA1 Task 7 - Contractual, Legal, Ethical and Professional Issues

Employment

The purpose of this contract is to set forth the terms of your employment - what the company expects you to do for the company, and what the company will do for you in return. Employment contracts at game companies are pretty much like employment contracts at any other sort of company. The game industry employment contract is likely to include clauses about benefits, confidentiality, about inventions, and about not competing with the company during or shortly after the term of employment.

 Development Agreements

 Game publishers often hire game developers to create games for them. A development agreement is a contract that spells out the terms of the development deal.

 Terms - This part of the agreement spells out how much the publisher will pay the developer, what timeframe the developer has to develop the game, and if there will be royalties, what the royalty rate is.

 Ownership - It's important to clarify whether the publisher owns the IP or the developer owns it.

 Warranties - The developing company has to swear that it won't use anybody else's source code and the publishing company has to swear that it has the right to ask developer to create this particular game.

License Agreements

 When a publisher wants to make a game about a movie or something, the publisher and the movie IP owner execute a contract spelling out the terms of the license.

 What's Being Licensed - The contract spells out exactly what the publisher is getting the rights to use.

 What The License Can Be Used For - The contract probably specifies that the publisher only has the right to make a game that works on the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3.

 Territory - The contract specifies what parts of the world the publisher's game will be published in. Publishers always want worldwide rights, of course - but licensors often charge more for that.

 Term - The contract probably doesn't run forever. Most license agreements run no more than 5 years.

 NDA and Confidentiality Agreements

 Non-Disclosure Agreements, Disclosure Agreements, and Confidentiality Agreements are pretty much the same thing. One party, in order to do business with the other party, has to divulge (disclose) a secret of some kind (a plan to make a particular game, or a new technology or process for making games, or a business deal that hasn't yet been publicly announced), and has to tell this secret to the other party. The other party agrees not to disclose the information - to keep it confidential - else damage will be the result to the first party. In such an event, dire things will happen in a court of law to the second party.

 Collaboration Agreements

 The above types of contracts cover the most frequent types of contract in the mainstream game industry. But a lot of people are building indie games or hobby games, and for those folks a very important need is an agreement that cover the all-important issues of ownership and compensation in the creation of games that exist outside of the mainstream industry. Games that might or might not ever generate any money. The majority of hobby and indie projects fail, and a huge factor in those failures is who owns what, who's supposed to do what, and who's going to get what. A collaboration agreement sets forth in clear terms how the indie or hobby project is managed and controlled, who owns the IP, how the game is intended to be used, how any possible income is to be handled, and how termination of the project is to be governed.

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IP

From a technical standpoint, "IP" means "Internet Protocol," and for gamers, it refers to an IP address. This is the virtual location of any given computer online, which makes communicating with other computers, servers and other gamers possible.

One of the main issues gamers encounter when trying to play online are errors in IP address designation, often because of routered connections being too complicated. Without proper IP addressing, getting online becomes impossible.

Copyright

 trademark
patent
registered design

 

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Professional bodies

UKIE - UKIE is the only trade body for the UK’s wider interactive entertainment industry. We exist to champion the interests, needs and positive image of the videogames and interactive entertainment industry who's companies make up our membership.

We’re here to help ensure that our members from the videogames and wider interactive entertainment industry have the right economic, political and social environment needed for this expanding industry to thrive.

We provide a range of services to meet the shared needs of our members and to further the interests of the interactive entertainment industry as a whole:

We build strong working relationships with parliamentarians and policymakers to ensure industry needs are met through appropriate Government support.

Our dedicated intellectual Property Crime Unit seeks to minimise the damage caused by intellectual property theft and catch those responsible for this criminal activity.

We act as a public information resource, to help consumers and the media better understand gaming.

We provide advice to budding IP creators and sellers on how best to pursue careers in the industry.

We work with our European partners, ISFE to ensure our members are aware of key EU developments and to promote the priorities and interests of the industry in Europe.

You can read more about UKIE, our areas of work, and the benefits to becoming a member under out Mission Statement and Our Policies.

IGDA:

The International Game Developers Association is the largest non-profit membership organization serving individuals that create video games. There mission is to To advance the careers and enhance the lives of game developers by connecting members with their peers, promoting professional development, and advocating on issues that affect the developer community

Women in games:

Women in Games International (WIGI), made up of both female and male professionals, works to promote the inclusion and advancement of women in the global games industry.
WIGI promotes diversity in video game development, publishing, media, education and workplaces, based on a fundamental belief that increased equality and camaraderie among genders can make global impacts for superior products, more consumer enjoyment and a stronger gaming industry.
Women In Games International stands as strong advocates for issues crucial to the success of women and men in the games industry, including a better work/life balance, healthy working conditions, increased opportunities for success and resources for career support.

Bafta:

The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) supports, promotes and develops the art forms of the moving image - film, television and video games - by identifying and rewarding excellence, inspiring practitioners and benefiting the public.
As the leading charity in the UK supporting the art forms of the moving image, BAFTA ensures that the very best creative work can be accessed and appreciated by the public.

MEF:

MEF Shapes the ongoing development of the industry through its regulation and policy & initiatives activity. We work globally with key stakeholders at a local level to advance a robust and equitable business environment that protects members’ revenues and facilitates growth.
MEF Connects the industry creating strategic business development and networking opportunities at both industry and dedicated MEF events worldwide. Regional activities such as Summits and Workshops are another way to get involved as is leveraging participation in Boards and Committees.
MEF Monetizes in partnership with its members through analytics and initiative activity that help members navigate the complexities of mobile by exploring new business models, addressing barriers to growth and driving new opportunities for mobile content and commerce.

MEF: http://www.mefmobile.org/about-mef
BAFTA: http://www.bafta.org/about/
Woman in Games: http://www.womeningamesinternational.org/
IGDA: http://www.igda.org/about
UKIE: http://www.ukie.info/about
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The Ethics in games

Violence:

the ethics in video games such as violence is in many games such as call of duty and GTA 4 and may lead people to think or act in a more violent manner because of the things like killing and shooting that you see in such games. Man hunt was banned because of its violence because there was to much and may of been a reason to make a person more violent and try to do something similar like this in real life.

Rating-PEGI:

the rating system in a video game is to give parents a guideline in how to choose a game more carefully for there children. this does not mean that a child or children cant obtain a game over there age rating so it is something more of a guidline rather than a law that has been set in stone.The pan-european game information(PEGI) age rating system was something that had been created in 2003 for to help parents choose a child's game that suite there actual age this spread far across eaurope and took over many age rating systems used before 2003.Company's such as Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo support the PEGI age system and so do other games manufacturing companys.

Eduacation:

Games are both help full and useful when it comes to helping with the eduacation system and it helps people to improve there litracy skills by the use of typing all the time, it can also help with social skills like talking to other people around the world and learning a bit of there culture. this doesnt mean thatit is all possitive it can have negative effects aswell such as like i you learn to play a piano and the difficulty's that it intales that does help your brain skills but something like a playstation or an xbox cannot help your brain develop in that kind of way also xbox or playstation doesnt set you up for later life by getting you a GCSE or A-level they just have the purpose of entertainment and that is the extent of it.

Stereotyping:

In games as you can see a game like call of duty of grand theft auto is very and all men based like all the characters you play as are male soilder or gangsters. women in games are being used as much as the male side to gaming so many women and or men may think that this is stereotyping against women.

Addiction:

Addiction is a key factor in gaming because it aims to give you the perfect world and life by giving you guns to kill others with and making you a master criminal a life that we cannot have so easily making people addicted to playing games as maybe most of the time it is better then there own lives. games like Fifa 13 gives you the life of a star footballer and would become quite addicting or a game like skyrim where you can live the life of a warrior in a fantasy world which is amazing and would also drawn you to becoming addictive to these types of games.