My friend and I are developing an android app based on the game mechanics of board game called Resistance. The only thing we intend to use from them is the idea of game play (2 teams of good and bad in disguise, no extra role/character), no artwork, no nothing else. If needed (and we're thinking about it right now too), we would come up with the entire different theme, adding more features that the original game doesn't have to make sure our adaptation is original (in a way).
I also have been looking up the game Resistance itself, and all I got from wiki is the designer of the game and not much about whether the idea (game mechanics) is protected or not. That further confirms what I learnt from reading somewhere that game mechanics are universal and open to designers/developers, and only artworks are copyright protected. And I have seen people did this before with similar party games like mafias or werewolf.
However, I also noticed that, the company could still hire a lawyer and sue us any time, regardless of whether we're copying them or not. And since we're still college students, we try not to run into this kinda legal problems, but I guess it's unavoidable in this case.
What should we do if we end up publishing this app on google app store (right now we're still doing test and decoration for the app)?
If anything, we could simply take out some features of our original app and create a support app for Resistance (which I have seen others done before and seem to be fine); and simply distribute the original one with full game play to our friends and family.
I also have been looking up the game Resistance itself, and all I got from wiki is the designer of the game and not much about whether the idea (game mechanics) is protected or not. That further confirms what I learnt from reading somewhere that game mechanics are universal and open to designers/developers, and only artworks are copyright protected. And I have seen people did this before with similar party games like mafias or werewolf.
However, I also noticed that, the company could still hire a lawyer and sue us any time, regardless of whether we're copying them or not. And since we're still college students, we try not to run into this kinda legal problems, but I guess it's unavoidable in this case.
What should we do if we end up publishing this app on google app store (right now we're still doing test and decoration for the app)?
If anything, we could simply take out some features of our original app and create a support app for Resistance (which I have seen others done before and seem to be fine); and simply distribute the original one with full game play to our friends and family.
