Original Post
How do intellectual property rights apply for ideas across mediums? Specifically, if a company makes a board or pen&paper game, do they have the rights to the rules and ideas associated with that game in any form? Would it be legal for me to make a computer game that use the same rules as that board/pen&paper game? For example, the D&D ruleset is used in a lot of RPGs (including KotOR). What about with board games, using the same board layout, but with original graphics? Here, I am thinking of the board game Diplomacy, where the board itself is just a map of Europe in 1900. If I didn't take Hasbro's artwork (which surely would be copyright infringement) but drew my own map, and created a game with the Diplomacy rules, would that infringe on any rights?
