M.U.G.E.N

M.U.G.E.N is a 2D fighting game engine designed by Elecbyte and originally released in 1999. Elecbyte distributed beta versions that ran under DOS, Linux, and Windows. The engine allows for anyone to create characters, stages and other game objects through interpreted text files and graphics and sound compilations and it also supports various types of audio formats such as MP3, ADX, OGG and MIDI as background music during gameplay. The engine allows for the type of functionality found in most any commercial 2D fighting game, such as the Street Fighter games produced by Capcom or the King of Fighters games produced by SNK. Creators of M.U.G.E.N content are from all over the globe, including American, Portuguese, Japanese, Chinese, and French creators.

History
From 1999 to 2001, there were several incremental releases of the M.U.G.E.N engine for DOS. Development of the DOS version was ceased when Elecbyte switched to the Linux platform in late 2001. For a time, Elecbyte had posted a request for donations on their site to legally obtain a Windows compiler to make a Windows version of M.U.G.E.N. A number of donations to the Elecbyte site soon followed, as many users would much rather have a Windows version instead--there were problems with using the DOS version of M.U.G.E.N on Windows XP. The new Linux releases added features that the DOS version did not have. There were then promises of a Windows port of the engine, but the development group decided to discontinue the project in 2003, presumably due to leaks made public of a private Win M.U.G.E.N beta that was provided to donators. The Win M.U.G.E.N beta contained a two-character roster limit, locked game modes, and nag screens. A "no limit" hack that removes these limitations was made available in 2004. This Windows version is functionally the same as the last Linux release and is the most widely used version of M.U.G.E.N today. Despite some controversies - modifications made on the actual engine are sometimes seen as an analogue to those made on the creations developed for it, and this is a recurrent topic of discussion among M.U.G.E.N fans (see Fork (software development)). Since development of the engine was halted and no source code has been made available by Elecbyte, there are now some projects in the works to make a clone of the engine from scratch, such as OpenMugen. Some of them present online capabilities, a much sought-after feature. None of these projects are currently complete, though many have high hopes for them. Today, many examples of M.U.G.E.N can be found in combo videos on the video hosting site YouTube.

Legality
The previous license agreements for usage of M.U.G.E.N from Elecbyte have expired and it appears that a new license agreement will never be granted. Thus, any current distribution of M.U.G.E.N has not been authorized by Elecbyte and is technically illegal, although Elecbyte has never taken any legal action; the company has simply disappeared without explanation. Many people chose to continue using M.U.G.E.N despite the lack of a new license. Creations such as characters and stages for use with M.U.G.E.N are not a part of Elecbyte's license, but only the software itself is. So, it is up to the individual whether or not to violate Elecbyte's license by using M.U.G.E.N Elecbyte itself has not made a public statement since 2003, when they stated that the project had "hit a snag".

Most characters and stages are of dubious legality as well, as most are made using sprites and sounds ripped from copyrighted games. For this reason, some standing communities enforced a loose "time-release" rule, whereby they do not allow linking to characters made from recent games. While this has no actual impact on the legality of the materials in question, it has presumably served to avoid any legal pressure from the copyright holders. But some copyright holders, such as Capcom, are said to understand that it is just fanart work and don't care about it.

The work material has two categories: the content of the SFF (sprite format, based on PCX images) and SND (audio format based on WAV) files are copyrighted by the respective owners (like Capcom, SNK, etc); the other files, like CMD (command file), AIR (animation file) and CNS (constant and state definitions, the main file of a M.U.G.E.N character) are copyrighted by the author of the character or the stage. Elecbyte stated that the reason why the code files were text-based and directly processed by the engine in this manner was so that users could learn from each other, yet there has been a great deal of controversy regarding permission (or lack thereof) between coders.

'Warehousing'
There has been debate over the act of hosting the works of content creators for the engine without consent from the author, a practice dubbed "warehousing." The matter is similar to hosting roms or mp3's. Warehouses and content 'megapacks' seem ideal for new members: obtain everything quickly. Arguments have risen against this practice though. The authors' respective sites generally host the current version of their work while a "warehouse" would tend to host whatever they have on hand instead. The second is that many author sites get revenue in one form or another, be it by advertising banners on their site or merchandising such as that sold by [Mugen Institute] for their original Dragon Claw character. Since the site hosts the content is downloaded from a site unrelated to the author's, said site is less likely not to be visited and thus, the author loses the aforementioned revenue they could otherwise have gained. Because of this, content creators are more fond of networks that link to their respective sites rather than "warehouses" that provide direct links.

Warehouses are also considered by some to be illegal in that they violate certain copyrights pertaining to the code used to create the content, much like hosting a videogame FAQ is considered in violation of the author's copyright unless permission to host is given. Also, not all creations are simply derivative works or fan art: some are original characters of the author's own design. Such a violation of copyright on those grounds would be where the original author has good standing to legally sue. It is argued that legal action isn't sought for most M.U.G.E.N creations because the origin of sprites and sounds has been ripped from commercial games even though the program code is crafted from scratch.

Several points have come up however from people to try and justify being able to do as they please with content for the M.U.G.E.N engine, though most are shot down by warehouse opponents, who utilize several implied and stated legal factors.
 * The first is that the engine is freeware, and thus covered under freeware laws. However due to the license agreement which in part still applies, M.U.G.E.N itself is actually shareware, and covered under the laws governing such.
 * The second belief is that because usually copyrighted characters or sprites such as those owned by Capcom or SNK are used in the works, the works themselves are a violation of copyright and thus any claims are to be argued as null and void. Capcom, SNK, and other sites have however not shown any ill will towards those creating content for the engine, despite being aware of the practice for several years. In fact only two groups have stepped forward to ever ask content from their work not be made for the engine: the creators of the Queen of Heart games, and the creators of Melty Blood (in that they wished for sounds and voices from the game itself not to be used with the characters, though this limitation was removed in subsequent installments of the game series by the publishers.
 * Many sites that use this argument tend to host original characters generated by the author themselves (such as those by [Reu] or [Rikard]), in which case the characters are still copyright of their authors. The copyright on the code itself is a factor here, though many people misinterpret claims of copyright to cover the sprites or the character concept, which may not be the author's intention at all.

Still, the arguments against warehousing however have generally come under fire, namely despite copyrights used, the fact that many works still use commercial sprites or sounds in their works. Despite the fact many creators claim copyright only on their own created content, this constantly becomes the focus of the arguement. Also is the fact that some Internet users prefer the 'easy and accessible' deal warehouses offer them with readily available characters that might be offline or save the user the time and effort of wading through hundreds of sites to find what they're after, and could ultimately care less about the community ethics (though creators in the community have lashed against this behavior, stating that it isn't these people they're creating for). Lastly, the M.U.G.E.N community is one of the few online game and modification communities to practice such disdain for warehousing, leaving the door open for critics who feel the thoughts and ideals of communities such as MAME or Half-Life modding should be applied to the M.U.G.E.N community at this point. All three of these usually lead to very heated debates on public forums and such, with neither side seemingly willing to back down from what they consider to be right.