Legal Query

[rawmeatgames]

Hi there folks.

I'm new to this forum, but I am keen to try and make my own visual novel game.

I'm currently brainstorming characters / game elements etc, and wanted to ask a legal question (UK Law or more specifically Scottish Law).

I'm currently thinking the game will involve magic, and one of the features I was going to include in the setting was a sort-of 'magical brothel'. The basic premise being that an illusionist in charge of the establishment can make any of the brothels escorts 'appear' as a person that a customer desires. Sort of like very convincing role-playing with a stranger. The escorts would not be under any judgement impairing influence or have their ability to give/withdraw their consent in any way impaired.

I don't want to create any content that could land me in hot water legally speaking, so I wanted to ask if anyone knows if I would be in legally muddy waters if I created scenes where the customer made some slightly more 'taboo' requests regarding the appearance they requested the illusionist to do for them?
(For example, if a male customer asked the illusionist to make an escort look like their aunt - would I be committing an illegal act by making a scene where the customer and the aunt-looking-escort then had sex?)
Also to be clear, I have no intention of the customers requests dealing with taboo issues such as under-age stuff or bestiality.

As I live in Scotland and don't want the police to come knocking on my door one day, any help with UK law on this topic would be greatly appreciated!

Cheers

 

[Avaron1974]

Content wise you're fine.

The only thing that's really illegal in the UK is anything involving characters that look underage. It doesn't matter if it's a 700 year old vampire in a kids body, if it looks underage it falls under CP and people have been arrested for it.

That being said, the chances of anyone coming after you is very low. Those that got arrested had quite a lot on their PC's and were stupid enough to give the wrong people access to their rigs or in some cases send them off to get repaired with all their stuff still on.

Everything else is pretty much fine and is only subject to whatever rules the platform you are hosting on.

Patreon doesn't like incest or anything non con so rape and mind control are out BUT can be worked around with a patch.

Other platforms like subscribestar don't have those restrictions as they avoid PayPal and major credit cards that forced Patreons hand.

You need only look at games like The Hunter that has beastiality and necrophilia yet people enjoy it. His other games do have underage girls and he's got away with it for years.

As long as you cover your back you should be fine regardless of the content you want.

The only major hurdle most devs face is copyright law from trying to "parody" famous characters or IP's. I use the term parody loosely because it should be protected from copyright law yet some companies, like Nintendo, will fight like fuck to protect their IP's.

 

[rawmeatgames]

thanks. good to know.