#apologies to all the beta fans here 💀💀

[liluylero28]

Tried to redesign 3 blue haired antagonists based on an arbitrarily chosen outfit they wear in the anime :)

[tsukikoayanosuke]

A Brief Ramble about the Fangame Drama

Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone.

It seems like we've fallen into another drama pit. Nothing special.

Well, usually I don't want to get involved, but I kinda want to give a bit of my own two cents from someone who made fangames in the past.

Before we start, I think we need to recap a bit. I won't be tagging people just in case.

So, kulfidraws created a sweet little fangame titled Twisted Wonderland: Your Story [BETA 1.0]. The official game blog can be view here, and please read it, it'll be important. Or if you want to see the gameplay, you can watch Ami Yoshiko (that's how I know about the fangame).

However, Proud Hufflepuff and The-Heartslabyul-Hatter posted some false information, creating the drama we have today (I cannot find the original Proud Hufflepuff's post but I vaguely remember seeing that, but I'll link to kulfidraws' post about The-Heartslabyul-Hatter's Twitter post since it was deleted now). This includes kulfidraws receiving anons messages, The-Heartslabyul-Hatter spamming the official Twisted Wonderland twitter, and recently about a Discord conversation.

Now, this might not be the best summary of the drama, because I'm not the best at digging deep. kulfidraws posted the timeline today if you guys want to see it. And a few days ago, The-Heartslabyul-Hatter posted an apology.

From what I see, there's a few major discussion here:

1) Misleading Information

Remember how we are pissed of when someone calls Twisted Wonderland an otome game? Well, the same can be said here. 

First of all, this is a fangame with no association with the real game, Aniplex, or Yana Toboso. kulfidraws even said it themselves on their game blog.

This game is, as kulfidraws pointed out, "merely a fan project for entertainment".

But this is what The-Heartlabul-Hatter said about it:

Someone made a fake Twisted Wonderland game. This is copyright infringement. Game creators do not follow the rules. This is copyright infringement and should be stopped. Please share this message!

... spread the word on fake Twisted Wonderland games that make fans believe it's real! The game creator blocked the warning. Send a message to the creators!

There are a couple of things that I wanted to point out.

The-Heartslabyul-Hatter called this fan game a "fake Twisted Wonderland games that make fans believe it's real". This contradicts what kulfidraws said in the disclaimer that this is a "fan project". Surely when you read that, you wouldn't think that this game is real right?

However, let's just assume that people don't read that and try another angle. The fan game is known because Ami Yoshiko played it. Now, compare her gameplay of the fan game to the actual game prologue. Surely when you see the difference you can tell which is official and which is fan content. Even her title says that "Someone made a Twisted Wonderland Dating Sim and....💔💀😱 | Ami Yoshiko" and she put a link to kulfidraws's game blog. not an official google play. Surely that's an indication that this is a fangame right?

Want another angle? The news spread about the "fake Twisted Wonderland game" is from Twitter. When you search #twistedwonderland, the first thing that came out is the official Japanese Twitter. You can see that Twisted Wonderland is a gacha game, but the one that kulfidraws made is an Otome visual novel. Sure you would believe the actual Japanese Twitter to be the real thing, right?

There are so many angles to look from, I don't see how people can still make mistakes. There are clear differences between the original game and the fan-made one. Google is free. Do your research.

2) The Copyright Problem

On July 5th (or 4th, depending on your timezone), kulfidraws received an ask, related the copyright problem.

Now, copyright is a tricky thing that I'm not versatile at, but what kulfidraws said was correct. If a single fan game can get copyright problems, imagine what will happen to the fanart and fanfictions. We're all screw if Disney and Aniplex are that strict. But also, following GE1KGQEJWHRKGRQOGRQO's logic, if we need permission to make fangames, wouldn't that mean we also need permission to draw fanarts, write fanfics, and edit the sprites for Discord stickers or incorrect quotes?

However, I also wanted to point out that in the disclaimer kulfidraws stated that "This is merely a fan project for entertainment, non-commercial purposes". kulfidraws won't get anything from making this game, only entertainment. Even their interaction with one commenter on the blog pointed this out:

kulfidraws won't get anything from making this game, just like many other fan artists and fan writers in this community, even deny profiting from this. Us fangame creators are just doing what others are doing: making something for fun because we love this media.

But, if I can give one piece of advice for kulfidraws is that maybe add the disclaimer and credit in the game, just in case anybody only skims through the blog post. Even if the game just a demo, always put a disclaimer and/or credit, just in case.

I asked my brother for a second opinion and he did make a good point. Probably the biggest concern is the use of official arts. Because we can see the art in use, it becomes more noticeable than using OST (where there can also be remixes).

So, speaking from a personal experience. I used to be in the Hetalia fandom. There, there are hundreds of fanmade sprites and facesets for many fangames. For someone who can't draw, this is a goldmine, as long as we give credits. I myself had made two fangames with fanmade assets, so the credits are very long. Twisted Wonderland fandom hasn't reached that point yet and I only know two fan game creators, so using the assets from the game is an option, especially those who can't draw.

So, just in case, disclaimers and credits are needed (like a disclaimer at the beginning of the game and/or rolling credit at the end).

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Now, I had a script where I want to address the asks, however, I haven't done much research and I don't think I'm the best person to do that.

I'm only speaking this from a perspective of a fangame creator who also used many assets that's not my own, but I do give credits as much and complete as possible; in the actual game, in the description, in a post connected to the game and a word doc in the game file.

But the biggest issue is the spreading of misinformation. What kulfidraws made was not a remake or "fake" Twisted Wonderland like what The-Heartslabyul-Hatter claimed to be. We always tell people to do their research when they think Twisted Wonderland is an otome game, why can't we do that here as well?

But you might say, The-Heartslabyul-Hatter apologized.

Let's see that apology.

So, from this apology, we can see that:

They are not Proud Hufflepuff, but they share the same Discord server.

They weren't the ones sending the Japanese messages to kulfidraws.

They are sorry for accusing kulfidraws of ignoring and deleting things.

Now, do you see what's missing here?

The biggest issue, the stem of the drama, is Proud Hufflepuff and The-Heartslabyul-Hatter spread misinformation of the fangame, but I don't see any mention of that here. So, if kulfidraws doesn't accept the apology, it's not a surprise. The-Heartslabyul-Hatter and Proud Hufflepuff don't even apologize for that when they're technically the ones who started this.

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The bottom line is don't just go spread misinformation about something when you don't have a clear grasp of the thing.

We're here to have fun and creates various content (fanart, fanfic, fangames) because we love the game. Just, don't do any of this.

Thank you for reading. If I made any mistake, I sincerely apologize.