• Chozo@kbin.social
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    10 months ago

    Another reminder of the age-old lesson: If you’re working on a fan project that involves another company/person’s IP, keep it a secret until you’re ready to release it. So many cool fan projects get shut down because they get impatient and show off their work so early that they get C&D’d before they ever get a chance to come close to finishing their project.

    • Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Don’t forget the other age-old lesson:

      Be prepared to pivot. There’s nothing stopping you from making a homage/inspired by with your own intellectual property.

      • Chozo@kbin.social
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        10 months ago

        Maybe you do. Maybe you don’t. It’s hard to tell, since so few developers ever actually release their fan projects in the first place, so there’s not a lot of noteworthy cases to draw precedent from.

        But at the very least, you’ll end up with a finished product under your belt. You’ll have experienced the entire process of designing, developing, and releasing a video game. That’s legitimate experience that you can put on your resume, even if you are sued for it. But an incomplete project that got shutdown before ever seeing the light of day is worthless to a developer who may want to pursue a future in software.