Licenses/Media
Suitable licenses
The following licenses are suitable for media files (images, models, sound files…):
- CC0 1.0 or newer;
- CC BY 4.0 or newer;
- CC BY-SA 4.0 or newer.
The default contribution license is CC BY-SA 4.0, unless you specify another license, by contributing to Unvanquished you are placing your work under CC BY-SA 4.0 license. You must have right to.
Older licenses like CC BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 2.5, and CC BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 2.5 are fairly acceptable for importing existing media. Many of our older media use such licenses, but please not use those older licenses for brand new content when you have full power to use latest version of those licenses. If you can get permission from original author to get a newer or more permissive license, please get it. For Creative Commons licenses older than 3.0, please ask us before merging.
Media credits
For per-media credits and licenses, see Credits/Media.
Media licenses comparison
| Name | Features | Text | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Full | Abbreviated | Requires attribution? |
Allows modification? |
Licence interoperability? |
Human-readable license deed |
Legal code | |
| Creative Commons Zero (Public Domain Dedication) 1.0 | CC0 1.0 | ❌ | ✅ | ✅ | deed | code | |
| Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported | CC BY 4.0 | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | deed | code | |
| Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported | CC BY 3.0 | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | deed | code | |
| Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Unported | CC BY 2.5 | ✅ | ✅ | ✅ | deed | code | |
| Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 Unported | CC BY-SA 4.0 | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | deed | code | |
| Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported | CC BY-SA 3.0 | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | deed | code | |
| Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.5 Unported | CC BY-SA 2.5 | ✅ | ✅ | ❌ | deed | code | |
They all allow modification, redistribution, and commercial use. They're compatible with storing files public repositories.
Unsuitable licenses
GDC sounds are not free
The #GAMEAUDIOGDC BUNDLE LICENSING AGREEMENT may look free and very close to public domain at first glance (“unlimited number of projects for the entirety of their life time”, “may use and modify the licensed sound effects for personal and commercial projects without attribution to the original creator”, “may publicly perform a reproduction of the sound effects over any form of medium”…) but a clause make it non-free and incompatible with Unvanquished open source development. The problematic clause is:
- This right does not extend to supplying the sound effects themselves whether as files or as the output of a device or service, where the sound effects rather than a project of the Licensee’s are what is being supplied.
This clause forbid us to host the sound files in public Git repositories like we do. For example such link would be illegal if it was a GDC sample: https://github.com/UnvanquishedAssets/res-legacy_src.dpkdir/blob/master/sound/player/level4/taunt.flac
A safe source for compatible sounds is Freesound with CC-By and CC0 filter:
https://freesound.org/search/?f=license%3A("Attribution"+OR+"Creative+Commons+0")
