A developer taught himself programming all alone. Now he presents his first title, but fans are loudly warning against the fan project for One Piece.
How did the developer manage that? On Reddit, the developer reports on the journey he has experienced. In mid-2024, he started the development of his own game as a “small, fun challenge”. He assumed he would need a few months.
But the estimate turned out to be wrong, as the project took more than 2 years to complete. In the end, the developer turned a small learning project into a fan game of One Piece, designed in the style of Jump-and-Run titles on the Game Boy Advance.
In the process, the developer learned to create combat systems, design a user interface, fix bugs, and accompany the game until launch. However, the players are warning against it.
Here you can see the trailer:
The Big Copyright Problem
What are the fans warning about? Although the developer is a big fan of One Piece, that does not allow him to simply create and publish a game based on the brand. Even as a fan project, he does not have the necessary rights to publish the title.
Yet, that is exactly what the developer did at the end of his programming journey. The fan game of One Piece is currently available in the PlayStore, thus violating trademark law. In the comments on Reddit, there are accordingly many warning voices:
- EtherealScorpions: “You learned a lot about code in two years, bravo! … But something tells me that you will spend the next two years learning about copyright.”
- Fox-On-Games: “The copyright will cause him huge problems.”
- Demoliscio: “And it looks like he didn’t publish it as Ltd, but as an individual/sole proprietor, so any fines will go directly to him/his assets.”
- Palbur: “Wow, he really didn’t think through the publishing part.”
- Wonderwall_1516: “Why put so much effort into something that can be destroyed in seconds?”
- itdoesntmatterrly: “Really nice, but dude, do you know what copyrights are?”
There are dozens of other comments along these lines.
What could happen to the game? We at MeinMMO are not legal experts and cannot provide a precise assessment. However, it is conceivable that the creators of One Piece could have the game removed from the PlayStore by sending the developer a cease-and-desist letter.
In this case, he would be obliged to pay a sum of money and stop the distribution of the game. If he does not comply with this letter, further legal steps with even more serious consequences could be possible.
What exactly will happen to the developer will be seen in time. However, he likely has little chance that the game will remain online and that he will not receive any correspondence from the copyright holders of One Piece. A MMORPG also had problems with copyright in 2026: MMORPG becomes a surprise success, then is removed from Steam, now returns with good news
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