I think there's some kind of intellectual property "issue" that's come up with the SCX/DWX team. The models are out there (in SCX) and can be added to DW, though. Of course, I have no idea how to do it, and neither do most of the people around here. And, doing so without the authors' blessings may be shady dealing...

I tried one time to swap the akula II mod with the gepard from the SCX.
I sucssecfully did it! But there were some problems!
The main 2 probs were the propeller animation and bridge position that I have never discovered where to change! So when I would go out to the bridge I got an inside model view! lol very strange...

Masts and antenas were easly adjusted at the database.

I guess non playable platforms are much easier as there is no need to adjust masts and bridge position.

If the models have not been officially "registered" somehow/somewhere in the States, assuming you can do it because not all can be registered, there's no legal issue here. Intellectual property is protected according to specific rules...you don't get any protection without an "officialization" from State's authority. It everywhere like that...patents included...

Yes, but if we start taking the models without permission, it would not be ethical and in the long run could hurt the community much more.

Not illegal...only morally reproachable...

Plus theres is also the fact that you would become responsible for denying the community of any further updates to these models, or any newer ones too :yep:

Certainly not illegal, but when you consider that the models are being done by people who share a passion for naval games and that they do it for FREE, even if its not ILLEGAL (in strict legal terms) to use their models we still shouldn't do it.
We should respect their "will", and if they deny the use of such model than amen and let somebody else try to model it to be used in DW.
Fan based communities are based on trust, disrupt that trust and the whole community will sufer.

Its the work of an afternoon to download SCX II and DWEdit and then changing the database yourself to get some much better models into DW.

Uncontroversial and relatively easy.

If you want to do this for youself - then theres no problem.
If you want to release it then thats a big No NO :nope:


Yes, i suppose you could make "some" of the changes in an afternoon. But if you want them done right then its a lot more than just changing the model names to reflect the replacement one.
For a starter all the weapon launch points and Towed arrays are in different places.