Are HL2 Assets in ASW Legal?

[Epifire]

Pretty simple question but it arose when wanting to take advantage of the ASW engine's capabilities for a HL 2 themed mod with much assets the were used in HL 2. Not entirely sure where Valve stands in there view of what can go from one version of the engine to another so with seeing mods like the HL 2: Enhancement and stuff I am confused.

Legal or Illegal to distribute a HL 2 mod in the ASW?

[DonPunch]

well considering ASW is free, I'd say its ok

[Epifire]

well considering ASW is free, I'd say its ok

Well that's the thing Don I keep wondering if it is a breach in terms if people are getting Valve made HL 2 assets in a mod for free? I for one am pretty sure they just don't want you making money off of their assets as the big thing, but I wanted to get some second opinions on it to be sure.

[Habboi]

You could always email a member of Valve and ask? I've never heard a real answer except from the public but some say it's ok as long as it's free and others say no, you're using content from one game and letting people who don't own the game play mods using said content for free.

[Epifire]

You could always email a member of Valve and ask?

Wouldn't know who to E-mail about that to be honest. Never looked into E-mailing anybody at Valve since generally I hear no one ever really gets a reply back from them.

EDIT: Yeah the only thing I have ever read regarding stuff Valve doesn't like is when it means you making money off of their stuff. Pretty relative to what this SFM FAQ page states towards the bottom of the page...

http://www.sourcefilmmaker.com/faq/

I dunno I get the feeling if they were really concerned they would have stated it more clearly but I'm not to comfortable with riding on that alone.

[Major Banter]

I think it's gotten to the point where Valve honestly don't give a damn. They gave you the modding tools and they're shifting everything to a unified file format system based on the 2010 Source engine over the old GCF system.

Think of the amount of crossovers done and so on, and the fact you can grab Source 2007 and 2009 for free as a base for all mods. Legally, it's a grey area - in practice, I should think there's no problem with it at all. Valve support the mod community very well. You'd never get it Greenlit or be able to sell it (even with a license) because of the ramifications of ported content, but as a bog standard ModDB distributed mod - go right ahead I say.

[Armageddon]

I think it's gotten to the point where Valve honestly don't give a damn.

I don't think Valve has ever shut down a mod, they probably never will, tons of mods use crossover content, this has been asked before, it's a dumb question.

[ErikKiller]

And it's not like Valve will launch a horde of lawyers at you if they DO have a problem with it.
*couch*EA*cough*

[Epifire]

I don't think Valve has ever shut down a mod, they probably never will, tons of mods use crossover content, this has been asked before, it's a dumb question.

Well hey, just because a lotta people do it doesn't make it legal so that's why I was asking.

[ErikKiller]

Well hey, just because a lotta people do it doesn't make it legal so that's why I was asking.

It does enter it into the gray zone.

[joe_rogers_11155]

I don't think Valve has ever shut down a mod, they probably never will, tons of mods use crossover content, this has been asked before, it's a dumb question.

Well hey, just because a lotta people do it doesn't make it legal so that's why I was asking.

sure its a grey area, but the fact that you even asked...that paints a big target on your back that says, "NOOB"

[Gary]

People have ported entire HL2 maps over to L4D and Valve featured it. I don't think they care, and if for some reason they did(which is extremely unlikely), you would probably just get an email asking politely to stop.

[Epifire]

sure its a grey area, but the fact that you even asked...that paints a big target on your back that says, "NOOB"

There were some concerns going around in the team so as the guy who has to post and ask everything on our behalf I did. Otherwise I figured Valve didn't care that much either.

[Gary]

By the way. Using Open Steamworks and this, you can add GCF mounting to ASW.