Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

Discuss how to use the Ren'Py engine to create visual novels and story-based games. New releases are announced in this section.
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Suidan
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Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#1 Post by Suidan »

Hi.
As you may know, there is a very popular game made on Ren'Py called Witch Trainer, by Akabur, taking place in the Harry Poter universe.
The game has been "finished" by Akabur, but others, most importants are Sad Crab and Mo, continued the game on their own, making respectively the Russian Edition and the Silver Edition.
The goal was to add functionnalities, to add characters with new storylines, to add cheats...
I would like to make my own continuation to Witch Trainer Russian Edition, which is now considered finished by his creators, to add 4 new characters.
But the issue is : Ren'Py won't open the game.
I asked about it on 4chan/aco/stg, which is where we talk about the "trainers" kind of visual novels, and I read that the files needed to be decompiled.
Is that really the issue ? If it is, how do i get pass it ? Does anyone know how I could edit the Witch Trainer Russian Edition ?

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Re: Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#2 Post by Imperf3kt »

Your best course of action is to try to contact both the original creator and the person who originally expanded it.
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Re: Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#3 Post by Suidan »

Akabur hates the fact that people are using his work (despite crediting and thanking him for it) and Sad Crab is a russian team, I worked with them earlier and they are not very talkative or eager to help. I sent them a message and there is still a possibility that they answer me, but I don't think i's going to happen.

I forgot to say, I tried Lolbot-Iichan's decompiler, which worked (I suppose) but the resulting files don't fit better in ren'py. I then tried CensoredUsername's unrpyc which didn't work because of python code errors. I also DL'd unrpa and rpatool (also from github) but I don't know how to use them or what they are supposed to do. Any help on that would also be appreciated.

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Re: Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#4 Post by Imperf3kt »

So despite the creator asking you not to, you still want to go ahead and do it? Thats not cool.

Why not focus that energy into making your own work?
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Re: Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#5 Post by Suidan »

No, that's what Sad Crab did, taking Witch Trainer to make Witch Trainer Russian Edition. I want to adapt the Russian Edition, and Sad Crab has (so far, and I'm not hiding them my intentions) never forbidden anyone to use their work. It's quite the opposite in fact, they often complain about Akabur trying to keep all his work for himself.

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Re: Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#6 Post by Rudje »

They're deriving work from someone who doesn't want them to do that, and you in turn are continuing to take his work when he doesn't want you to.

It may be seperated by a layer, but you're still using his work when he's forbidden it.

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Re: Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#7 Post by Suidan »

I didn't think much about it, as the plan was not to seel it, and maybe not even to distribute it.
Maybe you're right, but there are other things to consider.
First, one may consider that Sad Crab stole Akabur's work, but by doing it they greatly enhanced it, making an game considerably better that one of the two would have achieved on its own. Then, is it really worth it to blame them for that ? They didn't even claimed the original game theirs, and they kept the original Akabur's credits at the end of the game, so I don't think it's really a problem.
And also, they (Sad Crab) changed many things in the code of the base of the game, so the graphics and the ideas come from Akabur, but the code structure comes from Ren'Py itself, and the storyline has been higghly modified since the time of Akabur. then , is it really to him that I have to ask permission to edit the Russian Edition ? I'm not so sure about that.

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Re: Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#8 Post by korova »

Many people here are creators, so I have the feeling that asking for ways to "decompile" another creator's work won't receive a warm welcome.

If you want to modifiy / add / to anything to another creator's work, you need his/her permission to do so. Without this permission, you are, unfortunately, stuck. Sorry !

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Re: Editing (and potentially decompiling) a game by someone else

#9 Post by Donmai »

Suidan wrote: Tue Oct 24, 2017 1:03 pmAnd also, they (Sad Crab) changed many things in the code of the base of the game, so the graphics and the ideas come from Akabur, but the code structure comes from Ren'Py itself, and the storyline has been highly modified since the time of Akabur. Then, is it really to him that I have to ask permission to edit the Russian Edition?
Yes and No. I mean yes, you should still ask the author to make use of his art/ideas/original scripts; and no, you shouldn't even bother to ask, as he's already given his clear answer before. And he said no.
Suidan wrote: Mon Oct 23, 2017 8:03 pmI also DL'd unrpa and rpatool (also from github) but I don't know how to use them or what they are supposed to do.
What's intriguing me here is why do you believe you will be able to expand that game if you still don't even know how to run a simple python script. Using those tools you mentioned, it's not very difficult to unlock the code of many Ren'Py games, but that's not all. You will still need to know what to do with those scripts. Besides, if you try to use old scripts in a more recent version of Ren'Py, you will probably have to deal with several error messages. Even using a Ren'Py version similar to the one that was used to develop that game, you will still need to be able to understand how every script works. Frankly, as Imperf3kt already suggested
Why not focus that energy into making your own work?
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