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Legal and economical Frameworks in Industry

 Legal and economical Frameworks in Industry


Working Styles

What working styles are available in the games industry? How has this changed in recent times and what impact might this have on the Games industry and your own career? 

To me working styles include where you work and who you work for. The working styles that come to mind are freelance, in-house , remote and hybrid. Freelancing can cover a vast variety of jobs like illustration, concept generation, 3d modelling or sculpting, environment design however the key difference between freelance and the rest is that you are not actually part of that company you are an external party brought in for a limited time on a contract. In-house refers to you working within a company hierarchy commonly alongside others of your specific field of work with other sections of the company handling different aspects of the project pipeline. Remote and hybrid are interlinked, remote means you work from home or at least you don't go onsite to actually do work commonly working digitally although I know a few artists that still do traditional submissions. The hybrid portion refers to you being able to work from home or go onsite to do work with potential relocation assistance provided by the company.


screenshot taken from LinkedIn job search query Games artist 

Screenshot taken from LinkedIn Job search query Concept artist

A portion of the creative industry in general that had been shaken up in the past few years was the freelance division. It was impacted by Covid-19 and the worldwide lock downs that we had. During the pandemic companies had to close down for weeks leaving freelance workers scarce for work because large studios couldn't use them, even after the pandemic in a report by Amy Tarr it is said that "based on a survey of 1,272 freelancers and 221 organisations that work with freelancers, found two-thirds (66%) of respondents have seen a reduction in work since the pandemic". This sort of thing doesn't bode well

LinkedIn, 2025. screenshot taken from LinkedIn job search query Games artist [Online] LinkedIn.com Available at: https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/search/?currentJobId=4168748620&geoId=101165590&keywords=games%20artist&origin=JOB_SEARCH_PAGE_KEYWORD_AUTOCOMPLETE&refresh=true [Accessed 10th May]

LinkedIn, 2025. screenshot taken from LinkedIn job search query Concept artist [Online] LinkedIn.com Available at:https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/search/?currentJobId=4227071020&f_E=2%2C4&f_WT=1&geoId=102299470&keywords=concept%20artist&origin=JOB_SEARCH_PAGE_JOB_FILTER&refresh=true&spellCorrectionEnabled=true [Accessed 10th May]


Contracts and Agreements.

Identify contracts and agreements that are used in the Games Art industry, how they are used, by whom and why. Explain how you could use contracts and agreements in your own career in the Games Art industry.  

In this section, summarise the significant points of your findings, drawing upon evidence of current research and examples.

Common contracts used within the games industry are NDA's, licensing Agreements, and work for hire agreements.

Non disclosure agreements or NDA's are commonly put in place when companies are working on something unique and don't want to risk the idea or IP being compromised and so the employees working on it aren't allowed to speak about the project to anyone who isn't under the same NDA. The listed information under an NDA can effectively be anything e.g. proprietary assets, artwork produced during the contract period and trade secrets. Again companies use this contract to keep a competitive edge over other companies in the industry.

Licensing Agreements are used to allow a company use another companies IP for a fee or some other payment form under the drafted agreement. The agreement allows the company to "infringe" on an IP but because they have permission and the IP holder has signed off on it they're legally allowed to do so. Companies would do this to open up a new revenue stream as well as to increase their presence in a certain demographics view depending on the brand or franchise they have partnered with. 

Work for hire is an agreement that means the work you do for a company is technically not yours and you do not own it in any capacity which is in direct opposition to the rule of if you make it you are the legal author/owner, "The person who gave you the work, not you, is regarded as the author" (Standley, D 2023) 

If I got to work within the games industry the most common one I would likely run into is the work for hire agreement, I would create art pieces and then move on to another company I obviously wouldn't be able to take ownership of the artwork specifically but my name should be attached to it in some way even if I don't own it. NDA's could come up from time to time if I were to stay on a new project that had only just started development and the company wanted to remain low profile. Licensing agreements are the least likely to directly affect me although if I were to create a piece for a collaboration between two companies I would have to ensure I'm portraying both parties correctly.

Age Rating Classification

​​​​​​​​Explain the purpose of age ratings and classifications in the UK Games Industry and how this may differ in territories other than the UK. Identify systems and processes undertaken by the UK Ratings Board and provide examples of how these requirements impact the development of games art in this sector. Explain how these requirements could impact your own games art development for the Interactive Fiction brief - refer to the requirements of your client, the law and the platform on which you intend to publish your game.

 

In this section, summarise the significant points of your findings, drawing upon evidence of current research.



https://www.gov.uk/guidance/licensing-intellectual-property

Dena Standley, 2023. What is work for hire and how does it work? [Online] Lawdistrict.com Available at: https://www.lawdistrict.com/articles/what-is-a-work-for-hire-agreement [Accessed 16th May 2025]

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